BProp15

I Kings 2:10-12, 3:3-14; Psalm 111; Ephesians 5:15-20; John 6:51-58

August 16, 2009

Wisdom – Solomon asks for; we have through worshipping community

John doesn’t describe the ‘last supper’ basis for Eucharist.

He wrote not to present or preserve Eucharistic practices, but to interpret those very rituals already established at the time of his writing.

Flesh and blood –

He comes to dwell in us and we in him – abide in me and I in them

Manna –physical sustenance provided in wilderness; God working through his creation to provide for us

Body/Flesh – joining of two to become one- mutual indwelling – pointed to essential unity – like that between Jesus and Father

         And as it is true for Father and Son, Son and us, us and each other.

         Give a gift – or give of yourself. Natives becoming blood brothers. The relationship lives forever.

         Relationship is location of life.

“a life which has to pass the limits of our own person, a life of union with God which leads to unity among all Christians, as well as to the union between all men and women, as far as possible – Daniel Meynen

Life by its very nature is plural.

Two levels –    flesh and blood given through sacrifice – [see Rose article]

                  Take as bridge between need to physically experience spiritual reality

Blood equated with life

“Yes, I will share this cup with others as they share it with me. As Christ shares his very life with me.”

Eat my flesh and drink my blood – language too direct, metaphor too strong to let it slide by

Strong prohibition in the Torah against consuming blood at all, not to mention the unsavory suggestion of consuming human flesh.

The ‘life principle/life force’ or nephesh is in the blood – or, the blood of a living thing is its nephesh.

The Jewish tradition even of the blood of animals NOT used in sacrifice was drained from them, poured onto the ground, and covered with dirt – still practiced in Kosher slaughter houses.

The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread – Mother Teresa

Brueggemann – quote from Finally Comes the Poet

He does not mean rhyme, rhythm, or meter, but language that moves…that jumps at the right moment, that breaks open old worlds.”

Jesus’ language was describing what was happening.

He was taking his tradition’s early insights to a higher level, and by his life lived among us, was embodying them in his flesh – his nephesh.

Wisdom 9:5 – Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Lay aside immaturity, and live, and walk in the way of insight.

We move through the literal, through the allegorical, moral, to the anagogical – the call to the soul.

As we partake of the body and blood of our Lord, he becomes one with our lives, our stories become one with his story – ongoing, never ending so we can hunger again, but always filling and renewing.

John 11:10 – Barnabas – Ezekiel 47:1-12 – a river flows out of the Temple and beautiful trees grow along it, B interprets these as trees of life and says ‘Whoever shall eat of them shall live forever.’

Hebrew idion of ‘flesh and blood’ means the whole man. The whole Christ.

Manna background for bread/flesh theme

Blood of covenant of Sinai (Exodus 24:8) background for blood of new covenant

‘real’ v55 - Jesus is insisting on the genuine value of his flesh and blood as food and drink.

V 57 – literally ‘ the living Father’ – as the living Father, Jesus alive in God, we alive in Jesus

Focus on spiritual life rather than physical death – Alison

Jesus does not take any pains to explain away the Jewish repugnance at the cannibalistic thought of eating his flesh – in 53 he emphasizes the reality of ‘feeding’ (chewing, munching)

John resists overspiritualizing the humanity of Jesus

John resists overspiritualizing the reality of the Eucharistic flesh and blood

Resists attributing magical power to the sacrament with pagan mystery

Insists on belief in Jesus – gift of life comes through a believing reception of the sacrament

Eternal life is to be in close communion with Jesus

Jesus gives us a share in God’s own life

Girard

Truth – aletheia – to stop forgetting, to come out of hypnosis

From Revelutionary Road – You never really forget the truth – you just get better at lying

Truth is exposed when Jesus is lifted up on the cross, the lie of Pilate’s judgment is revealed to begin to help us stop forgetting our murderous ways

51 - I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.

52 – The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?:

53 – So Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

54 – Those who GNAW my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day;

55 – For my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.

56 – Those who GNAW my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.

57- Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever GNAWS me will live because of me.

58 – This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who GNAWS this bread will live forever.”