8th Sunday after Pentecost
August 6, 2000
Pastor David G. Mullen
John 6:24-35
Loving Christ More than Food
Jesus said, "Don’t work for food that spoils. Work for food that gives eternal life. I will give you this food, for I am the Bread of Life." Jesus said that because he knew that the crowds who followed him did so simply because of the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves of bread: they got to eat all the food they wanted–for free!
Ah, now there’s the dream for many of us. Eating all the food we wanted–for free makes it better yet. All the pizza, all the steak, all the Quarter Pounders with Cheese, all the ice cream, that you wanted–with no negative consequences! Take heart! I’ve got the answer for you. Doing extensive research for this sermon, I came across these "Principles for Dieting":
1. If you eat something and no one else sees it, it has no calories.
2. If you drink a diet drink with a candy bar, the calories in the candy bar are canceled out by the diet drink.
3. When you eat with someone else, the calories don't count if you don't eat more than they do.
4. Food used for medicinal purposes NEVER counts, such as hot chocolate, toast, brandy and Sara Lee Cheesecake.
5. If you fatten up everyone else around you, you look thinner.
6. Movie-related foods do not have additional calories because they are part of the entire entertainment package and not part of one's personal fuel, including Milk Duds, buttered popcorn, Hershey Bars, Junior Mints, Red Hots and Tootsie Rolls.
7. Cookie pieces contain no calories. The process of breaking causes calorie drainage.
8. Things licked off knives and spoons have no calories, provided you are in the process of preparing something. Examples are peanut butter on a knife while making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and ice cream on a spoon when making a sundae.
9. Foods that have the same color have the same number of calories. Examples are spinach and pistachio ice cream, cottage cheese and banana cream pie, mushrooms and white chocolate. (Note: Chocolate is a universal color and may be substituted for any other food color.)
10. For every burp, subtract 25 calories.
Great diet ideas. Why is it funny? Because not only is the list not true, many of us can laugh at ourselves for wanting to believe it, even more, for playing exactly such delusion mind-games with ourselves in regard to food. Like the crowds that swarmed to Jesus like flies to molasses, humanity always wants the quick fix, the dole, the easy way to a serenity. To peace. To deep satisfaction. And food seems to work marvelously well for many.
But don’t get me wrong. This is not going to be a diet-Nazi anti-food sermon. Food is a gift from God. Hungry people everywhere know that. And even if we’re not starving we food is wonderful! I love pizza. I love my wife’s gourmet cookies. I love ice cream, cheeseburgers and fries, and about any kind of dessert. And I love going out to good restaurants with family or friends and sharing a pleasant evening of table fellowship.
Go to any bookstore: entire sections lined with rows of diet books. Those books wouldn’t be there if there was no problem with food in America. TV infomercials offer the latest in fad diets, offering Holy Grail of all dieting: eat all you want, anything you want, still lose weight! How, just buy these pills and fat is history! Yet, in spite of repeated dieting, doctors' advice and our own resolve, every year Americans are getting fatter and fatter. The percentage of adults who qualify as "overweight" (20 pounds over the established guidelines) has been steadily climbing for the last several decades --and now weighs in at close to 50 % of the population.
Hey, I fight my personal battles with extra poundage. I’ve tried a variety of diets, but I know in my heart that the real problem, for me at least, is that I gain weight because I eat too darned much and exercise too little. When you take in more calories than you burn up in activity, you are going to gain weight.
Now of course there are some for whom genetics is a problem. And it’s true that, based on primal humanity’s actual survival needs, God made us with a lust for the high calorie flavorings of fat and sugar. And that’s seductive allure of fast food, found everywhere. Couple our love for rich foods with a lack of exercise, and the pounds are going to weigh heavy on us. Beyond that, we sometimes get caught in the trap of trying to solve our emotional discomforts by stuffing our faces, sometimes almost unconsciously, like an alcoholic gulping drinks in a blackout. In fact, many doctors and psychologists who study eating disorders -- both overeating and undereating -- agree that people tend to use food as a way to control other uncontrollable factors in their lives.
But Jesus says, "Don’t work for food that spoils. Work for food that gives eternal life". That’s just what we don’t do. Feeling unloved and rejected? You might not be able to have a good relationship, but you can have a good steak! Had a bad day at work! Why, you’re entitled to a huge bowl of Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia! In fact, go ahead, eat the whole pint! The truth is, we eat to forget, to remember, to feel comforted, to feel stuffed, to be sociable, to be empowered. We work for the food that spoils, instead of turning to the food that gives eternal life.
I think we really do have a problem in America with food. We’re working for and obsessing on the wrong thing, the food that cannot satisfy our deepest hunger. An old (pre-feminist) saying promised, "The way to a man's heart is through his stomach." As one preacher wrote, "Jesus appropriated this wisdom for men and women and took it one step further. The metaphor of Jesus, the Bread of Life, is a metaphor that meets hungering humans where we think we are empty -- in our stomachs -- but then points us to where our real emptiness lies --in our souls. Jesus' image goes through our stomachs to get to our souls." (as found in Homiletics, August 3, 1997) We may love food, but for true well-being we ought to love Christ more.
What, in our compulsions we seek from food, we will find in Christ, and it will be, unlike a bowl of ice cream or gourmet chocolate chip cookies, something that truly satisfies us down to the depths of our existence. Indeed, Christ came down to earth to give life to the world. Real life, not the fake kind we seek from food (or for that matter, work, drink, drugs, entertainment, or any other compulsive addicted sort behavioral target we’ve selected). Real life.
"Don’t work for food that spoils. Work for food that gives eternal life...for I am the Bread of Life." Now guess what the meaning of the word for what we do here is, the word referring to our worship, the word, liturgy. It means, "the work of the people" Here is where we learn how to work for the food that gives eternal life. We work by centering on Jesus Christ, the Bread of life. In our worship, in Holy Communion, in our praying for ourselves, others, and for our church during this month of August, it’s all like the song, "Fill my cup, Lord, I lift it up, Lord. Come and quench this thirsting of my soul. Bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more…"
In other words, we may love food, but we ought to love Christ more. That’s what we’re here to learn–how to work for the food that gives eternal life. Amen