It is late
on a Friday afternoon and the hospital is getting
energized. Families arrive to visit their loved ones, children walk through halls
with balloons for their grandparents, and nurses slump their
shoulders at the end of their all-day shifts or scamper around
collecting information about their patients to
begin their overnight push. Things are changing - transitioning in most of the hospital. But not in the emergency room.
At a trauma 1 hospital like this one, things are always a bit on edge in the emergency department.
At a trauma 1 hospital like this one, things are always a bit on edge in the emergency department.
Two trauma
patients come in - a young mother and her 2-year-old daughter. They were in a car wreck on
their way to the family beach vacation. While driving down
the highway, a tree inexplicably fell
across their path. The car swerved into
the median and crashed. The woman and her daughter are flown in by helicopter, and all the nurses and doctors begin to
fret and fuss. Their injuries are not alarming,
but their story is. Word travels
fast - from one EMT to another, to a doctor, to a nurse. The mother and the daughter
were not the only passengers in the car. The father was the one
driving. He swerved to miss the falling tree, and he was killed
in the accident.
The nurses also discover that the mother doesn’t know that her husband was
killed. She was rushed from the scene
too quickly to know. No one in the
emergency room can tell her, though they all know the terrible truth. Only a police officer who was
at the scene can give a
guaranteed-to-be-true, eye witness account. Only someone who was at the
scene can report on the
father’s condition so that no false
rumors are reported. So the
nurses and doctors wait, holding in the news they know. The mother waits for news of
her husband, asking every person that enters, “Is my husband ok?”
All dwelling in a place of quiet desolation.
In the only
miracle story told by all four gospels, Jesus sees the people and he is moved to compassion for them. To him, they are like sheep
who have lost their shepherd. Jesus teaches them and instructs them. He shares with them - at
length, about the kingdom of heaven. Jesus shares
with them so much, that meal times come and go. The dial goes waaaay past the
12:00 end of worship deadline, and Jesus is still
just preaching away. The
disciples become concerned for the well-being of the people. They go to Jesus and say to
him: “This is a desolate place, and the hour is now very
late, send them away so
that they may go into the surrounding country and villages and
buy something for themselves to eat.”
This is a desolate place. This is a deserted place. This is a place of isolation, a place of separation from what is known and
loved. The
disciples don’t get the answer they expect. Jesus says, “You give them
something to eat. You feed them.”
The
disciples, those following Jesus, find themselves in a desolate place. When have you found yourself
in a desolate place? When have you found yourself deserted, isolated, alone? When have you found yourself
like those nurses and doctors, in a desolate
place - a
place of fear and uncertainty, a
place of solitude? We know what a time of
desolation feels like: a loved one lost, a relationship
broken, a dream shattered. These are the desolate places
of life. These are the times when we’d like to throw in the towel.
This is not a new concept for anyone in our faith tradition. After
escaping the clutches of Egypt, the Israelites wandered in the
wilderness for 40 years. They had little food, they had
little water, they traveled
through a deserted land, wishing they had
never fled Egypt to begin with. Yet into
this desolation, God sent manna, a blessing
from heaven. God fed the people in their
hour of need. When their hope
faltered, when they despaired in a place
of desolation, God sent bread from heaven to save them. Into the desolate place, God brought life.
This
experience is written about, in one of the most well-known Psalms: Psalm 23.
Ye thou I walk through the valley of the shadow of death - what place is more desolate there than that? I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me - in that desolate place, God is with us. God walks beside us. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me - like a good shepherd, God’s love is there. God makes us lie down in green pastures, God leads us beside the still waters, God restores our souls, God give us life, and life abundantly.
Ye thou I walk through the valley of the shadow of death - what place is more desolate there than that? I shall fear no evil, for thou art with me - in that desolate place, God is with us. God walks beside us. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me - like a good shepherd, God’s love is there. God makes us lie down in green pastures, God leads us beside the still waters, God restores our souls, God give us life, and life abundantly.
This is the
experience of the disciples in Mark’s gospel. They see this crowd in a
desolate place, and they reach out to Jesus. There in that desolate place, Jesus has the people lie down
in green pastures, beside the still
waters of the sea of Galilee, and Jesus provides for them
food. Jesus provides for them life, and life
abundantly.
We have just
begun the season of Lent - a time for spiritual reflection and self-contemplation. Throughout Lent we are going to be spending time thinking about the face of
Jesus, considering what encounters of
Jesus might have looked like.
Feeding of the 5000 by Morgan Smet |
One of the
ways we are going to be exploring the face of Jesus is through artwork. Each Sunday,
a different artist from our congregation is going to create a piece of
artwork based off the Scripture reading
for that week. I encourage you to look at
this piece of artwork, spend time observing the
colors, notice the
details of the painting, try to see the face of Jesus.
Morgan Smet
is our artist for the Feeding of 5000. In her depiction of this
story, Jesus’ gift in a desolate
place shines bright. Into the darkness of a desolate place, the miracle of the fish and
bread brings the light
of hope. An over-flowing bounty is
given.
Our regional
gathering of Presbyterian churches convened recently in a presbytery meeting. Your pastors and elder representatives considered a number of issues facing our
church. One of the
many important things our presbytery considered yesterday was the addition of a
confession to our constitution. Currently, part of our
constitution is made up of our book of confessions. These are 11
confessions and creeds which Christians have used throughout history which state the
things that we believe. A couple of the more well
known ones are the Apostle’s Creed, and the Brief
Statement of Faith, both
which we regularly use in worship.
\We believe that these confessions are works written by humans, inspired by the presence of
the Holy Spirit, which reflect a
belief held by Christians at pivotal points
in our faith tradition’s history. It is a long
and complex process to add a confession to this list, but our presbytery voted
yesterday to include a new confession, called the Belhar
Confession. This is a
confession which comes out of apartheid-era South Africa. It speaks strongly about the need
for racial justice, equality, and reconciliation. This is a
confession born out of a community of people who found themselves in a desolate
place - a community facing severe
oppression and violence, with no end or hope in sight. In the midst of this
desolate place, God was at work,
and the Holy Spirit moved. The Holy Spirit working in the
people of the Dutch Reformed Mission Church in South Africa. A community of faith was led
by the Holy Spirit to speak out against division, to take a stand
for racial unity, to confess their
belief in a God who brings life into desolation. Within a matter of years, apartheid began to erode.
This is the
promise of the Gospel: that God meets us in our
moments of desolation, that we may find Jesus’ face
in our places of desolation, that the Holy Spirit is with
us in the shadow valley. That is why
we gather around the communion table. In our story
today, Jesus gathered the loaves and fish that the disciples had, he looked up to heaven, he
blessed them, he broke them, and he gave them to his disciples. If this sounds familiar, that’s because it is. This is exactly what Jesus did
immediately before his death in the upper room with his
disciples. He took the loaf,
blessed it, broke it, and gave it to them. In that sacrament,
they met Jesus, and found hope.
The feeding
of the 5000 is the story of Jesus providing bread in a desolate place and it is also the story of a
sacrament. It is the story of communion. God meets us in our moments of desolation at the table. This table is not just for those of us who have it figured out who have all the
answers, it’s also for those who have
the questions. It’s not just for those who have their lives all neatly put together, it’s also for those who
find themselves in a desolate place right now. It’s not just for those who have followed Jesus their whole lives, it’s also for those who trust
that this is a place where they have a chance to
see the face of Jesus for the first time.
Come to this table, just as you are, even in the
midst of your desolation.
Come to this table, and, in this holy
gift of life, meet your God.
Amen.
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