FILLING THE HOLE
Rev. Karen Pidcock-Lester
First Presbyterian Church,
Deut. 26:1-11
John 6:25-35
Introduction to the Scripture
The text we are about to hear
comes just after the fantastic miracle of the feeding of the 5000. Since then, people have been trying to find Jesus,
and have tracked his trail all over the countryside and across the Sea of
Galilee, until they finally have caught up with him in
Let us hear the word of God. John 6:25-35
Pray.
So, here’s what will be happening in our house this week: first, there’s the list to be made of ingredients for the Thanksgiving feast. Then, the grocery shopping expedition where I’ll inspect, hunt, select the goods, pay for them, bag them, load them into the car, unload them from the car, try to find space to store them…
Then we’ll begin the preparation. We’ll scrape carrots, peel potatoes, clean beans, chop onions, cream cucumbers, dice celery, soak bread, crack eggs, stuff the turkey, roll the pie crusts, we’ll pour, stir, mash and slice, bake, boil, simmer, and roast…we will, as Jesus says here in this text, “work for the food that perishes!”
About
And then…around
It does not make sense, but it always happens:
after the feast,
we get hungry again.
We should not be as surprised as we are when it happens.
It has been happening to human beings for centuries.
The same thing has been happening here in this text in John.
The people have just been fed. It has been a fabulous feast. The memory of it will last for centuries.
The people had gotten plenty to eat. The text is very clear about this. The supply of food was not skimpy or sparse. Everyone had “as much as they wanted,” recorded John. Only when “they were satisfied” did the disciples clean up. There were even leftovers to prove the bounty. “Everyone,” says the text, “everyone had eaten their fill.”
And here they are, only hours later, hunting down Jesus
because they are hungry again.
That is the way it is with us human beings…
no matter how much we have – how much fish and loaves, or turkey or pie, or clothes or cars or gadgets or games, or excitement or sex, or even friends and family –
no matter if we are sometimes satisfied, and have gotten our fill…
given a little time, we get hungry again.
We hunger for many things.
We hunger for different things at different times. Superficial things. And deeper things, too.
In our youth, we may hunger for freedom, for independence,
we may crave being treated like an adult, like a person, making our own choices, deserving respect and admiration;
we may hunger for belonging, for acceptance, to have people choose our company…
at any age we may hunger for community, for intimacy, to be known and loved:
as the poet Raymond Carver put it in his little poem “Late Fragment:”
And did you get what
You wanted from this life even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.
We may hunger for meaning, for a purpose, in a world where much seems meaningless;
we may hunger for a dream, for a great adventure, a life that is larger than our own;
we may hunger for rest, when the pace and pressures of the round of days leave us breathless and unbalanced;
we may
hunger for forgiveness, for something that is wrong to be put right, “Ernest
Hemingway once told a story to illustrate the popularity of the Spanish name Paco, but it illustrated more that that. A father, he said, journeyed to
We may hunger for peace, for confidence in the future, while we live in a culture of fear;
for wisdom to choose the right path in a complex world;
we may hunger for justice and goodness to triumph finally over evil.
What do you hunger for?
We hunger for many things.
“Everyone has deep within himself or herself a profound, unquenchable yearning …C.S Lewis observed that human beings try to handle this hunger in three different ways. The ‘fool’ thinks that if she can reach a particular goal, [a particular job or degree, or marriage, or children…] she will be satisfied. After dedicating herself to achieving it, she discovers in the end that it doesn’t satisfy her for long. Consequently, she spends her life jumping from one inadequate goal to another.
“The ‘sensible’ person, in contrast, recognizes that the yearning cannot be stilled, so he tries instead to push it under. Ignore it. This isn’t successful either, for the longing keeps surfacing, and his attempts to repress it must constantly be renewed.
“Lewis proposed a third way, which
truly deals with [this pressing, restless longing] …He says that if we heed
this intense yearning and 1. nothing in the world
satisfies it, and 2. nothing in the world can push it
under, then, 3. we must realize that we are made for another world.” (quoted by Marva Dawn, A Royal
“Waste” of Time: the Splendor of
Worshipping God and
In other words, we human beings will always have a restlessness, a hunger for something more this side of heaven because we have been made for another world.
A bumper sticker I saw this week said “We are spiritual beings having a physical experience.” And that is true! Yes, in our physical experience, we need bread. Flour, yeast, salt, touchable, chewable bread. Jesus knows this, so he gives the people what they need on that hillside – loaves and fish. And Christ calls the church to give loaves and fish to people in need. Ghandi said, “Some people are so poor that the gospel can only come to them in the form of bread.”
But no matter how many meals we serve, or soup kitchens we staff, how many loaves and fish we distribute–
no matter how many loaves and fish we ourselves consume, how many goals we reach or gadgets we invent or even friends we make or years we marry,
there will always be in us a ‘profound, unquenchable yearning – which is at root a yearning for God.” (Dawn, p. 240) That yearning can only be satisfied by another kind of bread.
“I have that bread,” says Jesus.
“I have what you need. In fact,” he says, “I AM what you need.”
Christ comes to satisfy that hunger.
When we are despairing of purpose
and meaning, it is Christ who “holds all things together,” (Colossians
When we hunger for a challenge worthy of the commitment of our lives, it is Christ who calls us to a grand adventure saying , “Go, you work for me now. You are assigned to my kingdom project.” …and who knows where that will take us? Our energies and time and efforts are now caught up in the awesome plans not of some changing C.E.O. or senior partner, but of the eternal Master!
When we ache with the hunger of loneliness, and yearn for intimacy and connections, it is Christ who calls us ‘friend, companion,” and gives us community, bringing us out of isolation and permanently attaching us to his people, so that we are no longer on our own;
when we long for freedom, it is Christ who sets us free and helps us to live authentically in a world that presses us to conform;
when we hunger for rest and calm, it is Christ who quiets us, inviting us to “come, you who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest for your souls;”
when we are starved for security in times of terror, it is Christ who gives hope and confidence, as he says “Be of good cheer, I have overcome the world!”
when we hunger for justice and righteousness and peace, in short, when we long for a whole new world, it is Christ opens the door and guides us to it;
when we hunger for release from the past, yearning for a fresh start, a new beginning, it is Christ who offers a clean slate, saying “all is forgiven…go…begin again.”
when we yearn for assurance in the hour of our death, it is Jesus who snatches us from darkness and says, “I have come to bring you life that never ends.”
I AM what you hunger for.
I AM the bread of life, Jesus tells us.
How do we ‘get’ this bread? The people asked.
People are still asking that question.
It is not difficult. “You do not have to work hard for the bread that endures,” says Jesus. “I will give it to you. You need to do only one thing, really,” he says.
“Set your heart upon me.”
This is how we ‘get’ this bread: come to him. Keep coming to him.
Have a relationship with him.
read his word.
Talk with him.
Spend time with his followers.
Seek his counsel and company.
Rest in his presence – contemplate him.
Follow his instructions and commands, as you would a master. Trust what he tells you, and risk doing it. Love your neighbor, bless those who hurt you, give, forgive, serve.
When you do, he will feed you, and your hunger will be satisfied.
Joy Watkins is the 21 month old munchkin who has been living among us with the Hofmann family. Joy is small for her age. She is not growing. She is not growing because she is not eating. Her body is always hungry, but she cannot eat. It turns out she has a hole in her heart. When the heart has a hole in it, a person cannot eat well, cannot grow because the body’s hunger and needs are not satisfied. With a hole in the heart, you cannot be whole. This week, the hole in her heart was repaired. Now, she has a chance to live fully.
Blaise Pascal once wrote that there is within us, at the core of who we are, a God-shaped hole. A God-shaped vacuum. We are never really ourselves until that hole is filled. (David Rensberger, “Thirsty for God,” Weavings, xv:4, p. 19) As long as we have a hole in our heart, we will not be satisfied. We will always be hungry. We will not thrive and grow and we will not be able to fully live.
Christ came to fill that God-shaped hole.
“I AM the bread of life,” Jesus told us, “whoever comes to me will never be hungry…”
That bread is all we really need for a feast of thanksgiving that satisfies.
Amen.