sustain:if:able kiwi

Where do we get enough bread? Graduation sermon 2015

It was the Knox Centre for Ministry and Leadership 2015 Graduation Service last night. I was asked as the new Principal to preach. The lectionary text for the day was Matthew 15:29-39; the feeding of the 4,000. In the sermon I unpacked what the text might mean for being church and for ministry. I was able to weave in some creativity, including an art work by Faith Ringgold and setting up on stage a picnic, with different cultural groups bringing their mat and food, in order to explore the diversity of the Presbyterian Church in Aoteroa New Zealand. It gained positive feedback, so for those interested the sermon in full is as follows

Where do we get enough bread? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights, to feed such a crowd?

I am a Kiwi, who’s spent the last 6 years working in Australia. A land with “golden soil and wealth for toil” to quote from the Australian National Anthem. A land where it should be easy to respond to the question being asked by the disciples in the Bible reading – Where do we get enough bread?

Every country has it’s stories. Here’s an Australian story. It’s called “dog in the tucker box.” It’s an Australian historical monument that sits in rural New South Wales. It’s a celebration of a sheep dog, who loyally guarded is owner’s tuckerbox (Australian for lunch box). So his owner would go out to work and his dog would stay, sitting on top of his lunch box, loyally guarding it from any stranger how passed it.

An Australian friend sent it to me as a challenge. He wanted to ask me how I was using my resources. Was this my attitude to bread? A dog, sitting on a lunch box, guard what I had against all comers. Growling, barking if anyone came too close.

Because this one way to respond to the question asked by the disciples in this story in Matthew. Where do we get enough bread? Where do we get enough bread? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights, to feed such a crowd? Not from me, cos I’m sitting on our tucker box.

In contrast, let me show you a very different image (from Imaging the Word: An Arts and Lectionary Resource). It’s not a white fella Australian historical monument. It comes from Faith Ringgold, an Afro-American artist. It’s called Church Picnic. It is a patchwork quilt that tells the story of a 1909 church picnic in Atltanta. The name of church is in the middle – Freedom Baptist Church. There is picnic rugs. There is food on every rug. It looks like it’s mostly adults who are sitting on the rugs and there are children who are moving between the rugs.

It’s meant to be about a church and how a church relates and shares. I look at the food all spread out. I imagine the children running between the rugs, creating connections, Mum, can my friend have a sandwich; Dad, can my friend have an apple. This is a very different way to respond to the question being asked by the disciples in the Bible reading – Where do we get enough bread? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights, to feed such a crowd?

Answer is that we share. We go outdoors and we lay out our picnic rugs and we place our food on these rugs and our children run from rug to rug. We get enough bread because we share.

Song – 1 verse

This image, Church Picnic, helps me understand our Bible story; and how today, at this Graduation, we might respond to the question – Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights, to feed such a crowd? Let’s imagine that we’re actually in the story in Matthew 15. That we’re part of the crowd. That we’re part of the more than 4,000 that it talks about in verse 38 who are following Jesus.

Imagine that part of the crowd of more than 4,000 is the KCML 2015 Graduation crowd. So some of this crowd are dressed all strange in academic robes and silly pirate hats. Some of the crowd are graduating interns. The class of 2015. We’re hungry. We’ve been following Jesus for days. Three days it says in v. 32. And KCML hasn’t organised any food. The interns have been too busy with block courses and assignments to organise.

So suddenly we’re faced with that question. Where do we get enough bread? We’ve got two choices. We can sit on our tucker boxes. Guard anything we do have. Or we spread out our rugs.

Now imagine with me. I brought my picnic rug. This is the Taylor family picnic rug. Whenever, we travel we take our rug. We spread it out. We spread our food. Place our sandwiches. This is a palangi white bread rug.

Thankfully the PCANZ is full of more cultures than the “palangi white bread” cultures. There’s a Maori proverb isn’t there. Naku te rourou nau te rourou ka ora ai te iwi. With your basket and my basket the people will live

Pacifica people, did you bring a rug. What food would be on your rug? (Bring up Pacifica mat, with Pacifica food.)

Asian people, did you bring a rug. What food would be on your rug? (Bring up Korean mat, with Korean food.)

Do you get the picture. This is the PCANZ – many cultures, many rugs. We’ve been following Jesus. We’re hungry. We’re tired. Where do we get enough bread? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, between Lebanon and the Golan Heights? Where do we get enough bread, in this remote place, to feed such a crowd? By sitting on our tucker box? By each rug, each culture, holding on tight, guard what they’ve got had against all comers. Or by spreading out our rugs? Isn’t this is the kingdom of God? Spreading picnic rugs. Placing our food. Enjoying play. Being led by our children. Letting cultures relate.

Song – 1 verse

So we have two ways to follow Jesus. Like a dog, hunched over a tucker box. Loyal. Dedicated. Protective.

Or like pilgrims on a picnic. Question is why? Why would you choose to spread your rug?

In the text, the reason is because of who Jesus is. If you take your time and you pay close attention, the writer of Matthew is very carefully saying some things about who Jesus is.

First there is the one word in verse 29. Jesus went up the mountain. Where else in the Bible have things happened on mountains? Oh, Sermon on the Mount, Jesus feeds by teaching. Oh, there’s Mount Sinai, Moses feeds the people when he returns with the 10 commandments. Oh, there’s the mountain in the Old Testament reading, Isaiah 25 – the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples, all cultures, a feast. He will destroy what separates cultures, the hand of God will rest on this mountain.
Why share? Because we follow a Jesus feeds.

Second, there is the one word in verse 32. Compassion. Matthew uses compassion more than any other Gospel. 9:36; 14:14; 20:34; 18:23-25. The word in the Greek is splagizomai, it means to be moved in the inward parts. In his guts. Why share? Because we follow a Jesus who has compassion, is moved in his guts for the crowd.

Third, there are four words in verse 36. Jesus took the seven loaves and the fish, and after giving thanks he broke them and gave them. Where else in the Gospels do were hear those words – take, break, thank, give? Where else does Jesus take, break, thank, give? Answer is The Last Supper. Why share? Because we follow a Jesus who will feed us, in Eucharist.

Where do we get enough bread? Why do we choose to spread our rug? Because we follow a Jesus who feeds, who has compassion, who will give his body to be broken, that the hungry world may be fed.

Song – 1 verse

Which leaves a final question. What does this have to do with graduation? What does this have to do with the class of 2015 and our celebration of their achievements tonight? Answer is everything. Absolutely everything.

First, the graduating class of 2015 are becoming ministers of Word and Sacrament. You are being discerned by this church to take and to break and to thank and to give. You are being discerned by this church to have compassion, to feel for people in your guts. You are being discerned by this church to feed, from the Sermon on the Mount and Ten Commandments. In this passage, is a wonderful image of the shape of recognised ministry, as understood by all denominations in the World Council of Churches who ordain ministers of Word and Sacrament

Second, you are ministers of Word and Sacrament in the PCANZ. You are being discerned by this church to help us move among all these beautiful rugs. You are called to help us feast. You are called to help us make sure that the food is shared; that we all get to enjoy not only bread but also kumara and taro and rice and noodles. You are called to a ministry of reconciliation, to help us move from the Palangi rug to the Pacifica rug; from the Te Aka Puaho rug to the Asian rug. You are ministers of Word and Sacrament in the PCANZ.

Third, you are being asked to do this among a people who are hungry. Who have left the safety of home, who have followed Jesus outdoors, who now found themselves tired and hungry. So this is what it means to do things decently and in order. That you find ways to feed; to take, break and thank, to enact the sacraments not only inside the synagogues and church buildings, but also outdoors, on picnic rugs, amongst a people who are tired and hungry. You are called to be ministers of Word and Sacrament in the PCANZ in a church on mission.

Pay attention to land and you realise there’s a missional shape that surrounds the ministry of Jesus in this passage. The days before Jesus has been (according to verse 21), in the area of Tyre and Sidon; what today is Lebanon. He’s been on cross-cultural mission, having his faith challenged by a Gentile, the Syro-phonecian woman.

In the next chapter in 16:13, he will visit Ceasarea Phillipi, in the Golan Heights. In the time of Jesus, this was a major Roman city, complete with temples to the Roman God of Pan. It’s there, in the midst of pluralism, that Jesus will ask his disciples – Who do you say that I am? Not in the safety of a Jewish synagogue, but in the pluralist diversity of Greco-Roman commercialism.

You are called to be ministers of Word and Sacrament in the PCANZ in a church on mission. So that on the way from Syro-phonecia to Ceasarea Phillip, from Lebanon to the Golan Heights, from one cross-cultural mission to another, the people who follow Jesus can be fed, decently and order, as an embodiment of God’s compassion; as sign, foretaste and instrument of a God giving his body to be broken, with thanks, that the hungry world may be fed. This is where we will get enough bread. As graduates, as family and friends, as the PCANZ.

Not by sitting on our tucker boxes. But by spreading out our rugs. Because we follow a Jesus who feeds, who has compassion, who will give his body to be broken, that the hungry world may be fed.

Naku te rourou nau te rourou ka ora ai te iwi – “With your basket and my basket the people will live”