Taste and see that the Lord is good. (pslam 34:8)

Sunday 2^nd August is Trinity 8 – Proper 13

Isaiah 55: 1-5. A wonderful passage extolling all people to hunger and thirst for the really essential life-nourishing sustenance. Implicit in this piece is the fact that human beings spend so much of their time and energy on ephemeral inconsequential things. So, what does really feed us? For Isaiah, he would refer you to the perfect law of God, which Christians have had spelled out to them in Christ is the law of Love made perceptible through God’s Spirit – made tangible through the sacraments of the church. In the Eucharist we literally feed on God’s very self.

Romans 9: 1-5. Paul articulates his pain and confusion that he is convinced that Jesus is the Messiah and saviour of all, and yet confused as to where that leaves the Jewish people (of which of course Paul is one – as was Jesus). There is much heartfelt internal wrangling for Paul and this central dilemma has muddied Christian/Jewish relations ever since to this day. Some Christian commentators might say that Christianity has simply “replaced” Judaism though personally I prefer to say that the Christian faith has “fulfilled” Judaism

Matthew 14: 13-21. There is rich symbolism in the feeding of the 5000. It recalls the Israelites being fed by Manna from heaven. Here in this “deserted place” Jesus is the new Moses who brings redemption from slavery and want. Secondly it recalls the feeding/multiplication miracles of the great prophets Elijah and Elisha and thirdly it foreshadows the Christian Eucharist “he looked up to heaven and blessed and broke the bread”. This moves the emphasis away from ordinary sustenance to the greater miracle of faith in the sacrifice of Jesus. The sheer abundance of food, 5000 men plus an equal number of women and children all fed with twelve basketfuls of scraps left over, speaks of the super-abundance of love and Grace at the heavenly banquet.

 “Man is what he eats”

This was a statement by a materialist philosopher called Feuerbach.

He didn’t realise it but he was expressing the most religious idea of man.

For in the Bible this is the definition of man presented in Genesis chapter one. After the instruction to be fruitful and multiply, man is presented as a hungry being and everything in the world has been given to us as food.

“Every plant yielding seed, every tree with seed as its fruit, every green plant”.

Mankind must eat in order to live. He must take the world into himself and transform it into himself, into flesh and blood.

We are indeed all that we eat, and the whole world is presented as an all embracing banquet table for man.

And this image of the banquet  remains throughout the whole Bible, the central image of life.

It was the image of life at its creation and also the image of life at its end. The fulfilment of life is that you eat and drink at my table in my kingdom. Jesus says this to his disciples at another meal – the last supper.

In the Bible food is given as communion with God. All that exists is God’s gift to man and it all exists to make God known to man.

In Genesis God blesses everything which means that he makes all creation the sign and means of his presence and wisdom, love and revelation.

In Christianity we have often divided the world into two competing halves. We divide it into Spiritual versus material, sacred versus profane, supernatural versus natural, but in a holistic non-dual Christianity there is no division.

This way of seeing the world as a unity is brought to fruition in the sacraments generally but primarily in the Eucharist, which is Christ’s gift to his church.

The Eucharistic elements are both material and spiritual. Just as life itself is – we are both material and Spiritual.

This is the overarching narrative within which we read those beautiful words of Isaiah where God invites us as hungry and thirsty people to eat and drink bread, wine, rich food, milk and all of it is free.

This is the overarching narrative within which we read about the feeding of the 5000 with five loaves and two fish and twelve basketfuls of scraps left over.

God is bountiful and his love is so fulsome that there is more than enough to go round everyone with more to spare.

This is the overarching narrative within which we approach the throne of Grace this morning.

We offer bread and wine to God and he returns it to us as the bread of heaven.

We are indeed what we eat.

As the psalmist says “Taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him” (34:8)