"God of Sustenance" | The Rev. Heidi Thorsen | July 21, 2024

Sermon Preached: July 21, 2024 at Trinity on the Green

Year B, Proper 11 (Track 2): Jeremiah 23:1-6 | Psalm 23 | Ephesians 2:11-22 | Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

May I speak in the name of God who made us, loves us, and walks on the journey with us. Amen.

This Sunday is the second part of our six Sunday sermon series Bread from Heaven, in which a number of familiar preachers will take on the task of preaching on the day’s gospel texts, with a recipe alongside their sermon. Last week our summer seminarian William Margraf kicked us off with a thoughtful exegesis about the Biblical story of the beheading of John the Baptist, read alongside one of the most poetic recipes I have ever encountered about how to make tea. William preached about the restorative nature of tea, instructing us in the delicate interplay between water, tea, and air; advising us to warm the cup before we fill it. Above all, William preached about how tea can be a real or symbolic reminder for us to take time, to honor our relationships with God and one another.

By contrast, I have a different sort of recipe to share this morning, a recipe for a snack that I lovingly call “Energy Balls.”

Energy balls: two words that I definitely never imagined preaching from a pulpit. Well, that’s just the kind of creativity that a sermon series gets you…

In the first few days after my daughter was born into the world, I was a bit of a mess. It was one of the hardest weeks of my life, between sleep deprivation, the intense physical recovery of labor, and self-doubt about whether I was doing anything right. Within the first few hours after we brought my daughter home, my mother-in-law showed up on our doorstep, after a quick flight from North Carolina, ready to help. She brought with her a suitcase full of hastily packed clothes and a ziplock bag full of soft-cookie dough-like snacks that she called Energy Bites. Of course, in my postpartum daze, I accidentally started calling them “Energy Balls”— a more descriptive title if you ask me— and that is what I’ve called them ever since. These no-bake energy balls are made of almond flour, peanut butter, and various tasty mix-ins: nuts, chocolate, and dried berries. I have many hazy memories of eating them in the middle of the night with the glow of the fridge to guide my way, taking in whatever calories I could get.

In our Gospel passage for today the disciples are reunited with Jesus after a period of hard work. They have been traveling the countryside, spreading the good news of Jesus’ teaching and healing. Once the disciples have re-gathered, Jesus tells them to “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” The scripture says that many people were coming and going around them, and the disciples “had no leisure even to eat.” Now there are words that I could relate to, in those early postpartum days.

Jesus tells them to come away to a deserted place and rest. It’s good advice. However, it’s important to note that things don’t exactly go as planned. The disciples don’t get their retreat, their “mini-sabbatical.” Instead, the crowd of people seeking healing notice Jesus and the disciples’ departure, and the crowd arrives at that “deserted place” before the disciples ever set foot on shore. Jesus feels compassion for them, “because they were like sheep without a shepherd,” and he continues his ministry of teaching with no more mention of the rest that they had hoped for.

Sometimes we don’t get a sabbatical. Sometimes life comes at us and it doesn’t stop. Sometimes you have a new born baby who is hungry but doesn’t know how to eat; who is sleepy but doesn’t know how to sleep - and all you can do is keep calm and carry on. Sometimes you have a diagnosis that you can’t run away from, and the work of being well is constant. Sometimes the work you have to do is simply too important to pause - when other people are relying on you for care, or competence, or healing.

It’s in those times - when rest is impossible - that we most need each other, and we most need God. When we are unable to rest we need someone else to look out for us - someone to drop off energy balls on your doorstep and remind you of the importance of sleep. Someone to remind you that we are never islands working completely alone in this world.

Jesus’ ministry was a ministry of healing, as people came to him sick in body, mind, or spirit, and were healed. It was a ministry of transformation, as Jesus invited people to think in expansive ways about what the kingdom of God could be like. And it was also a ministry of sustenance, as Jesus multiplied loaves and fishes, and ate dinner with tax collectors, and broke bread with his disciples. Today’s scripture states that the disciples were too busy, even to eat, and the scriptures include this detail because food is important. Both the daily bread that we put in our bellies, and the daily bread that nourishes our soul through rest, contemplation, and prayer. There’s a good reason that the eNewsletter put out by Lilian Revel, our Pastoral Care Associate, is called Food for the Soul. Our souls need food, just as our bodies do. And Jesus reminds the disciples to be attentive to both of these kinds of hunger.

There is a lot of imagery about shepherds throughout our readings today. It’s a common theme in our Christian tradition. This week I’ve been reflecting on how I usually think of that shepherd metaphor in terms of sheep and wolves. I think of the shepherd as the Great Defender of the sheep; the one who keeps them safe. While that is part of who God is to us, there is another part of that shepherd metaphor as well. The shepherd is the one who leads the sheep to greener pastures– which is to say, the one who leads the sheep to their food. Once the sheep have picked over a certain plot of grass, the shepherd leads them to a better place to eat. The shepherd makes sure that the sheep eat food that is nourishing– not weeds that are poisonous and cause their stomachs to be sick. Statistically speaking, shepherds probably spend a great deal more time finding their sheep food, rather than actively defending them from the evils that lurk in the wild. 

This is a reminder to me about how our faith works. Our Christian faith isn’t simply insurance from the bad things that might happen in our lives. Instead, our Christian faith is about finding nourishment. It is about the abundance that we find in our devotion to a God who shepherds us as one flock; one human family. Faith isn’t just a gamble about whether we will go to heaven or hell in the future (and those are terms that could bear a lot more unpacking in another sermon). Instead, faith is about food for our body, mind, and soul.

Where do you go for spiritual sustenance? Perhaps you come to church– after all, that’s where we all are this morning. Perhaps you pray in your own time, in your own way. These are good things to do. And still, there are times when we forget to eat– in a spiritual sense. There are times when the pasture is picked clean, and the well has run dry.

In those times, it’s important to not be too judgmental - to not beat ourselves up for retreat we didn’t take, or the prayers we didn’t say. Instead, in those moments when you notice your own spiritual hunger, take a look around you and see if someone else has some spiritual sustenance to share. Can someone else’s faithfulness nourish your own hunger? When your prayer goes unanswered, is there someone else waiting in the wings whose faithfulness gives you hope? Is there someone else whose story of a prayer answered can give you the strength to keep believing. Sometimes we can’t put a pause on the busy rush of our lives, and we need our spiritual sustenance from one another. We need our spiritual food to-go. Thankfully, the God of our salvation comes to us as a shepherd– one who is often moving, one who knows the art of finding food on the go, one who is looking out for our hunger and the hunger of every other person we meet.

May the God of peace help you find sustenance in the midst of the busy fever of this life. May God, who knows your hunger, satisfy your longing beyond what you could ask or imagine. And may we share our food with one another– the food that nourishes our bodies, minds, and souls. Amen.

Works Referenced

“No-Bake Cranberry Chocolate Almond Energy Bites.” Iowa Girl Eats. Web. iowagirleats.com/no-bake-cranberry-chocolate-almond-energy-bites/. Accessed 20 Jul 2024.