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Boy Scout Tr #240

Scripture: John 6:25-35

Barbara Brown Taylor left the pastoral ministry to become a seminary professor. And one thing she discovered was that her students were a lot like the people in the church. Ninety-five percent of her students said they believed in God, but this belief offered them no relief from their exhaustion. They believed that God expected the same things from them that everyone else did: high marks, full attention, top performance and complete devotion. They were sold on a culture in which a B+ equaled failure and sleep was a waste of time. Their hunger for connection was what tuned them into the media that blasted their senses all hours of the day. They were afraid of their deep feelings and moved too fast to feel much of anything anyway. Yet if Professor Taylor sent them back to bed instead of attending her class, she knew they would use that time to catch up on something else. So she tried an experiment with them. She required her students to sit or walk for at least 20 minutes, staying fully present in the moment. Their assignment was to resist what she called “the busy monkeys of their minds” that tried to yank them into the past or the future. And when they were tempted to judge their own success at this, their assignment was to resist that, too. She asked them, “Who are you when you are not doing anything?” Their assignment was to tell her what they found out. Great assignment! We need to all do this.

These are some of the responses she received: “This is plain stupid. It’s basically vegging out and I’d rather do it my way, watching television and drinking beer. Who am I when I’m not doing anything? It’s a stupid question, but my answer would have to be, no one. I am no one at all.” That was the hostile response. Here’s another one, a description of the wind blowing across the hairs on her skin: She wrote, “When I stopped to notice this, it gave me chills. Then I began to cry, I cannot explain it, but I did. I believe I was in shock that I did not notice and appreciate the little things in life that are absolutely wonderful. How many times have I picked flowers and never even noticed them—what kind they are, how different they are?” Another student thought the experience was just plain weird.

Barbara Brown Taylor, like our own Barbara Schultz and Vivian Heistand, was trying to give her students a process to experience even just a glint of divine union. Because most of us have this engrained, yet odd notion, that God only values action, that God watches what we do, like an eternal Santa Claus in the sky checking to see if we are naughty or nice. Well, I want you to know that it is in the Bible, even if it feels odd or weird, that God also values our stillness. God values our stillness enough to meet us there, right where we are, when we are doing nothing at all but being attentive to what is happening right now. “Be still, and know that I am God.” The Psalmist said; and remember when Jesus told his disciples to consider the lilies of the field?

After the assignment, Barbara told her students, “If you think 20 minutes is eternity, then, you should try observing the Sabbath sometime.”

God values our stillness enough to meet us right where we are. Now, wouldn’t that be something if all of us could learn to stop running for a few minutes everyday, stop answering all the sirens long enough to hit a depth of living that we have never hit before, enough to feel the wind blowing across the hairs of our skin, long enough to sense a union with what is around us that we have never sensed before. And, to do this, even when there is no one in our life who will honor us for doing it. But to do it with the hope that we will remember how alive we feel, for a minute at least, and to want that as much as we want appreciation and the other customary rewards for all the work we do.

God values our stillness enough to meet us right where we are. I say this right before the busiest time of the year. I say this on the day I have asked you to turn in your pledge cards—these are signs of our productivity. I say this knowing that it is not easy to do nothing for 20 minutes to an hour everyday. It’s even harder to do nothing and at the same time resist thinking about what we should have done or should be doing. It is a challenge to live in the present. But you know what? That is where God is. That is where Jesus is. Jesus said to his disciples, “I am the bread of life.” “I am.” The Psalmist said, “Be still, and know that I am God.” “I am.” Present tense. Now. This moment. “I am.” “I am the bread of life.” “Be still, and know that I am God.”

The question I am asking you to ponder is how do you sense God’s presence in your daily life…and I mean the palpable, tangible, chills up and down your spine presence of something greater than yourself, something holy, something divine. What do you do to make room for that to happen in your daily life? Jesus was dealing with these kinds of questions from the crowd after they had been fed, literally, about 5,000 of them from five barley loaves and a couple of fish. He took the bread, gave thanks, and gave it to the people. He did the same with the fish. And all ate as much as they wanted, they ate their fill. It was one of those Thanksgiving feasts and there were even left-overs. The people realized that God was at work among them in what Jesus had just done. So they said, “This is the ONE.” They wanted to grab him right then and there and make him their king. Instead Jesus slipped away. He went to be by himself. They kept looking for him. They ate and they believed. But a little time passed and they were hungry again. Hungry, not for food, but for another sign. They called to Jesus, “Why don’t you give us a clue about who you are, just a hint of what’s going on? When we SEE we will believe and we will commit. Show us what you can do, Jesus. Moses did. Moses fed the people with bread form heaven. Show us like Moses did. Give us what we want.” That was when Jesus said, “I am the Bread of Life. The person who aligns with me hungers no more and thirst no more, ever.” But they said again, “Prove yourself.” “Give us a sign.”

Sounds a little too familiar, doesn’t it? We want proof from God that God exists and is in control of the universe. We want the same for ourselves. Proof that what we do is worth something. Validation. Everyday, we do what we do and for what? For someone to recognize us, acknowledge our hard work, appreciate us, honor us. It’s a tough world out there. And we want the miracle that will finally say to us, I am worthy, I am special, I am needed. Well what Jesus was saying to the 5,000 and to us, is “I have come from God to validate, to honor, to put you back on your feet alive and whole.” He has done that for us. He does that for us. He will do that for us. Not through any kind of coercion. He simply offers himself. But we want a miracle, and then another miracle, and another. He loved the people, he blessed them, he helped them, he taught them. That’s the way it works. We have choice, total free will. God gives us the room to say no. Jesus gave the people room to reject him. And some did.

They wanted miracle food to eat, not a relationship with an ordinary man. Jesus honored their hunger even as he reminded them that the manna from heaven was not from Moses. It was God who gave it and it is God who gives the true bread from heaven, the bread that gives life. “Give us this bread always,” they said, and that is when Jesus let them know that they were looking at it. “I am the bread of life.” I am. Jesus is God’s bread in the wilderness, the one who reminds us day by day that we live because God provides not what we want, necessarily, but exactly what we need: some bread, some love, some breath, and a relationship with this ordinary looking man, who comes from heaven to bring life to the world.

Day by day, God is made known to us in the simple things that sustain us—those absolutely essential things that are here today and gone tomorrow. We simply must be willing to stop our busy minds long enough to connect with what is in the moment or we are going to miss all the ordinary things that God does, because they are too ordinary. It doesn’t get any better than this. To take the time to realize that everything we have comes from God. To take the time to remember how alive we are. And that is what your regular financial gift to the church represents. Sure it pays the bills and salaries and nitty-gritty things like batteries and paper clips and cleaning supplies. But what it represents and symbolizes is so much more. A gift to the church has always been about gratitude and faith and trust and hope, about knowing that what we receive is far greater than what we give. And being here in this place on Sunday morning is about being in relationship with God and with each other, taking time out to be in the present, in the presence of the divine, and feeling it, because for awhile we are in the stillness, in the moment, attentive with expectant hearts.

If you have come hungry, looking for the miracle to fill your hunger, then I encourage you to look at what you need to satisfy your hunger—is it a high grade from the significant teacher, is it a promotion at work, it is someone telling you what excellent work you have done, is it a special kind of appreciation? It’s not that these things are not helpful and encouraging. We need to do these things for each other, I agree. But I also know that like the 5,000, I get my pat on the back and want more. I get an A+ from my District Superintendent and rationalize—well, she gave every other pastor the same grade. It doesn’t feel like enough. Because what I yearn for can only be truly satisfied by the one who said, “I am the Bread of Life.” Because I yearn for the divine who is here. God is all around us, and in us. To receive the miracle of the Bread of Life I simply need to take a time out, stay fully present and experience what it feels like to be fully alive. You can’t do that for me and I can’t do that for you. We have to do it for ourselves.

God values our stillness enough to meet us right where we are. You have to choose to do it. It’s a choice. And oh, does God want us to choose it. God wants us to want that as much as we want the customary rewards of our busy lives. It is the presence of God that truly sustains us. And God is already here for us. God said it. Jesus said it. Many others have said it. We just need to be still and know that God and God and that Jesus is the Bread of Life and then let the love flow in.

Amen.