"EAT AND LIVE"
John 6:35, 41-51
Posted July 26, 1999
Preached August 11, 1991, evening service
First Baptist Church, Garrett, Indiana
This evening we want to talk about food. That's a relevant subject for most of us.
The 2 biggest sellers in any bookstore, according to Andy Rooney, are the cookbooks & the diet books. The cookbooks tell you how to prepare the food & the diet books tell you how not to eat any of it.
Orson Welles once said, "My doctor has advised me to give up those intimate little dinners for 4, unless, of course, there are 3 other people eating with me."
Champion archer Rick McKinney confesses that he regularly eats chocolate chip cookies for breakfast. He refers to "the basic 4 food groups" as a Big Mac, fries, a shake & a lemon tart.
A California scientist has computed that the average human being eats 16 times his or her own weight in an average year, while a horse eats only 8 times its weight. This all seems to prove that if you want to lose weight, you should eat like a horse.
A young fellow watched as his dad finished a heavy meal & then loosened his belt.
"Look, Mom," he said. "Pop's just moved his decimal point over 2 places."
My favorite piece of diet humor comes from a member of Weight Watchers. At one of their meetings, near Easter, she said proudly that this was the first year her children realized that chocolate Easter bunnies came with ears.
Our subject for the morning is food. That's a subject most of us know too much about. A recent survey found that 41% of men & 55% of women consider themselves overweight.
People who mourn over their excess weight have been known to go to ridiculous lengths to shed pounds. For example, THE GREAT AMERICAN WAISTLINE tells of a mail-order outfit that advertised Slim-Skins, plastic pants with a hose sticking out. Simply connect the hose to a vacuum cleaner, start the vacuum, & (according to claims) it will remove 2 1/2" from your waist, 4" from your stomach, 2" from your hips, & 3" from each thigh in just 25 minutes.
Or try Obesity Ointment, which allegedly removes fat when you apply it to your body. If that doesn't work, there is the Diet Conscience--a recording that lambasts you every time you open the refrigerator with such statements as, "Are you eating again? Shame on you! No wonder you look the way you do! Ha! Ha! Ha! You'll be sorry, fatty!"
In one way or another, many of us are obsessed with food --earthly food. Think what a difference it would make in our lives if we were equally obssessed with heavenly food--the food that Christ gives us.
Jesus said to those who followed him, "I am the bread of life; he who comes to me shall not hunger; & he who believes in me shall never thirst." And again he said, "I am the living bread which comes down from heaven; if anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; & the bread which I shall give for the life of the world is my flesh."
What shall we say to this bold claim that the Savior makes? How is he bread for our lives? Could it have something to do with the ordinance of the Lord's Supper?
A poll was taken of the national membership of one Baptist group. They were asked questions about their devotional practices.
One of the questions asked was this: "When do you feel most a sense of being at worship with God?" More than 80 percent of those surveyed said they most felt a sense of worship during the celebration of the Lord's Supper. Many other Christians would concur. There is something about taking the bread and the cup that lifts many of us to a higher plane. What is it?
PERHAPS IT IS BECAUSE THE BREAD AND THE CUP TOUCH US WHERE WE REALLY LIVE.
George Herbert once described an imaginary dialogue between himself & Christ.
Christ is welcoming him at the door of his own house. Naturally he hangs back, aware of how sinful he is. Christ is quick to notice his reluctance & gently asks him if there is something he wants. Herbert replies that only one thing is lacking & that is a guest who is worthy to be welcomed here.
"But you shall be the guest," Christ says.
"Me, with all my sins of unkindness & ingratitude? I can't even look you in the face," Herbert replies.
At this Christ takes his hand with a smile & asks, "And was it not I who made those eyes & gave you them?"
"Of course, Lord," he says, "but I have misused them. I'm ashamed to be here. Let me go elsewhere."
"But don't you know," Christ says, "who it is who bore the guilt?"
This so convinces him that he yields. "I will come in then, but I insist on serving at tables." Even that is not permitted. This is how the argument ends:
"You must sit down," says Love, "and taste My meat."
So, says George Herbert, I did sit & eat.
There is a part of each of us that knows we are unworthy to take the bread & the cup. Perhaps it is that very knowledge that stirs us. We may not understand what Jesus really meant when He said that we could not share in His kingdom if His body were not broken & His blood shed, but we know that whatever it means we are not worthy of it. And thus when we take the bread & the cup, we sense grace: God's unmerited love for sinners. We are conscious in a way that we may not be any other time, that we are those sinners & God really does love us. That touches us deep down where we really live.
PERHAPS, ALSO, IT IS BECAUSE WHEN WE TAKE THE BREAD AND THE CUP WE DO IT AS HIS FAMILY. HE ALLOWS US TO REACH OUT AND TOUCH ONE ANOTHER.
A few years back there was a powerful film called Places In The Heart. Set in the South during the depression, it told about a father of 3 small children who was accidentally shot in a tragic accident. The young black man who shot the father during a drunken spree was lynched for it.
The widow of the young father is left virtually penniless. She is about to lose her home through foreclosure. Valiantly she struggles to keep her home & the crop of cotton on which everything depended. A drifter, an unemployed black man named Moses, helps her harvest her cotton & salvage her farm.
Eventually, though, Moses is run out of town by the Klan. This was instigated by the gin operator who didn't appreciate the shrewd business advice Moses had given the widow. There are other characters in the movie including a couple who are tragically torn apart by infidelity.
In the closing moments of the film the congregation is gathered for worship. The pastor has just finished reading 1 Corinthians 13. The elements of the Communion are being passed thru the congregation. As the people take the bread & the cup, suddenly you become aware of the fact that this is no ordinary congregation.
The camera zooms in. There is the widow & there is Moses, who has been run out of town. The widow's dead husband is there, as well as the young man who shot him. Even the banker who is about to foreclose on the mortgage & the cotton gin operator are there. Members of the Klan are there. Also, black tenant farmers. The couple whose marriage had been torn are there, reconciled.
It is as if to say, here is the one place where there is healing. Here is the one place where there is room for all. Here is the one place where there is food. Here is the one place where there is life! Here is where we are a family. Here is where we can reach out & touch one another. Maybe that is why the Lord's Supper moves us like it does.
PERHAPS IT IS BECAUSE IN THE ACT OF THE LORD'S SUPPER WE ARE ABLE TO REACH OUT AND TOUCH CHRIST.
There is something about the Lord's Supper that is akin to the touching of his garments.
William Barclay tells us that when Admiral Nelson was buried in St Paul's Cathedral, a party of his sailors carried his body high into the cathedral. His coffin was draped with a magnificent Union Jack. Later they carried his body to the graveside. One who saw the scene writes, "With reverence and with efficiency they lowered the body of the world's greatest admiral into its tomb. Then as though answering to a sharp order from the quarter deck, they all seized the Union Jack with which the coffin had been covered & tore it to fragments, & each took his souvenir of the illustrious dead." All their lives that little bit of coloured cloth would speak to them of the admiral they had loved. "I've got a piece of him," they said, "& I'll never forget him." In a sense, when we leave here this enening, each of us will take with us a part of Christ. We have reached out & touched him.
Of course, theologically we realize that it is not we who are able to reach out to him. Rather, it is he who reaches down to us. As F. Dale Bruner reminds us, the "Eu" in Eucharist, as the Lord's Supper is often called, means "good," and "charis" is the root of our English word "caress." The Lord's Supper is the "good caress." In this ordinance God comes to us spiritually & physically & touches us & says, "I love you."
No wonder the sacred meal moves us like it does. Truly he is the bread of life. He alone touches & satisfies our deepest needs. He alone allows us to reach out & touch one another. And at no other time do we come closer to touching him than when we eat of the bread & drink from the cup.
In a world obsessed with food, he gives us the bread that is eternal. Take and eat and live!
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