No Other Good Alternative

Sermon from: August 16, 2009
11th Sunday after Pentecost
Based on Scripture: John 6: 51-59 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%206:51-59;&version=NIV;

Introduction

In Stephen Crane’s novel The Red Badge of Courage, the main character is an 18 year old private who deserts his Union battalion in the heat of battle. The young soldier’s name is Henry Fleming. Henry justifies his actions on the basis that the particular battle being fought was a lost cause and his efforts would not have mattered at all.

In this morning’s Scripture reading from John 6, we read of a desertion, too, but it is not of just one person like Henry Fleming, it is a desertion by many people. The many people who are leaving are disciples of Jesus who like Henry feel that they are in a lost cause.

Not all of Jesus’ disciples, however, walk up and leave Jesus. His original Twelve disciples stick by him at least for this incident. They see correctly that they are better off with Jesus than with anyone or anything else.

Here’s a little more background on John 6.

Background

Jesus had more disciples than just his 12 original disciples. Many of his disciples stayed with him for a while. But an event in Jesus’ third year as full time rabbi caused them to pick up and leave Jesus.

What is so astonishing about this mass exodus of disciples is that Jesus had just done a miracle that no one else on earth had ever done prior or duplicated since. Jesus had just fed at least 5,000 people with just five small barley loaves and two small fish.

You would think that the fresh excitement and wonder of that miracle would have kept the disciples’ commitment to Jesus going for months and years.

But that miracle had just the opposite effect. The feeding of the 5,000 people made the disciples of Jesus want even more. They were asking, “Why just one feeding? If you can feed us once why not every day as Moses fed the people of Israel everyday in the wilderness for 40 years?”

Instead of assuring is disciples, however, that he would give them just what they wanted, Jesus says in essence, “I am feeding you everyday but not with physical bread as Moses feed your ancestors. I am feeding you with spiritual bread everyday and I am that spiritual bread.”

When Jesus speaks these words to his many disciples, there patience has already been worn thin. They feel that they have been with Jesus a long time (two years or so) and He hasn’t delivered on what they thought the Messiah should be doing which is basically fixing all their problems immediately and providing them with all their wants and needs.

And so when Jesus gives them a hard to understand topic such as spiritual bread and that he is spiritual bread, the disciples say to themselves, “We don’t need any more hard teachings. We’ve had enough hard teachings. Give us physical food everyday. Give us freedom from Rome. Give us universal health care coverage by healing everyone and not just a few people here and there in pockets as you see fit. We’ve had one hard teaching too many. We’re out of here.” And they leave.
We can reflect on a number of lessons from this incident and from Jesus’ so called hard teaching.

IF WE GET CAUGHT UP IN THE GIVE ME MORE SYNDROME TOWARD GOD, EVERY TEACHING FROM CHRIST WILL SEEM TOO HARD.


The many disciples of Jesus were caught in a spiraling motion of always wanting more.

Jesus feeds at least 5,000 people one day, and the disciples want him to feed everyone everyday.

Jesus heals some sick people, and the disciples wonder why he doesn’t heal everyone.

Jesus teaches them that he is the truth and the truth will set you free, and Jesus’ disciples want him to free them from Roman bondage immediately.

The disciples of Jesus were no different than the people of Israel 1,400 years earlier who were never satisfied with the manna and quail which God sent to them in the wilderness.

Too often we also get caught up in this wanting more and more vortex. Christ gets us out of a jam and immediately we want him to rescue us out of another fix.

Christ solves one of our problems, and we wonder why he doesn’t take care of all of our predicaments.

Jesus comes to our rescue, and as soon as we are bailed out, we’re on his case to deliver us from another mess.

One of the outcomes of being continually demanding of Christ is that our hearts and minds become plugged up and we cannot understand the big, bill board size messages that Jesus sends us. These cinema screen size messages become too difficult for us to understand because our minds are whirling with 9 font size details of paying the HELCO bill, or finding $40 to fill up our car with gas. When are minds are overloaded with these worries, we cannot process the teachings of Jesus that are multiple times more important than our concerns as important as they may seem.

Instead of wanting more, we ask God to give us the concentration to thank Him more for the essentials He is already giving us. Let’s start with oxygen, let’s think of 85 degree heat instead of 125 degree heat, let’s think of water, and how about everlasting life that trumps any need that we have.

The Holy Spirit can un-clutter our minds of the thousands of details in there so that we can understand the simple, and most important things that matter. Jesus is the Bread of Life, He is the staple of life, He is the essential of life, He is basic food for life. He gives us all the resources we need to be more than sufficient.

THERE ARE THOUSANDS OF ALTERNATIVES TO CHRIST, BUT NONE CAN GIVE WHAT HE GIVES.

Peter makes that beautiful testimony in John 6: 68 and 69. Let’s read those verses together, “Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.’”

The once agnostic scholar C.S. Lewis who became a Christian later in his life once said something to the effect of, “The problem with all religions other than Christianity is that they are 90% right.”

What Lewis meant is that what makes it so confusing for a person who is searching for the true religion is that 90% of most religions are true and so it makes choosing the right religion difficult.

For example, Buddhism has beautiful messages about not being materialistic and greedy and the lessons seem so close to Christianity. Yes, 90% of what Buddhism says is in harmony with Christianity, but it’s the 10% that conflicts or is missing that is the problem. For example, Buddhism teaches reincarnation. The Dalai Lama of Tibet for example, is the 14th reincarnation of a Buddhist teacher who lived as a monk 400 years ago. When the current Dalai Lama dies, his disciples will then choose a child to lead them whom they believe is the 15th reincarnation of the monk.

And so for all religions except Christianity, it’s the 10% that is missing that makes it 100% different from Christianity.

The missing 10% in all non-Christian religions is Jesus Christ who is God the Son, the only Savior of human beings, and who is the only way to heaven.

That portion missing in non-Christian religions makes every religion 100% different from Christianity.

And so Peter is 100% right when he says, “Lord, to whom shall we go. You have the words of eternal life.”

For us, too, what other viable alternative is there? We may wrongly think that God is too slow, too lenient to others, too unresponsive, but what are the alternatives?

What other religions give us the free Bread of Life not obtained by working harder or becoming better persons but based solely on the mercy of God received by trusting in Christ as our Savior?

WE MAY DESERT GOD, BUT HE WILL NOT DESERT US.

Many of Jesus’ disciples walked off and left him, but God promises that he will never leave us stranded.

I always thought Captain Morgan was a fictional pirate. I did not realize that there was a real buccaneer named Captain Henry Morgan who robbed ships especially in the Caribbean and West Indies waters.

In fact in a bizarre occurrence, the British government bestowed on him the status of knighthood because Captain Morgan destroyed Spanish ships in the Atlantic waters between North and South America.

In any event on a trip back to England, Captain Morgan deserted his own crew and took off with the booty which his men had captured.

Some leaders may desert their own followers, but God never will.

In Hebrews 13:5, the writer quotes Deuteronomy 31:6 in which the Lord promises, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”

The same goes for Jesus, God the Son. We may forsake him but he will never forsake us.

When we struggle with illnesses that don’t get healed, bills that don’t get paid, or conflicts that don’t get resolved, Christ is there with us. Bread is the symbol that we are going to have enough to make it through the day. Jesus is the reality that we are going to make through not only today but for eternity.

Conclusion

In the novel referred to earlier, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming realizes the mistake he made by flaking out on his comrades. He gets a number of chances and he fights courageously in a number of battles.

The book ends with Henry, the deserter, experiencing peace for his tormented soul.

Jesus gives to us peace also for our troubled souls but not because we do heroic acts as Henry Fleming did in order to redeem himself. Jesus gives us comfort because He did the heroic act of sacrificing himself on the cross. Because of Jesus, the Lord receives us with open arms even though we have too frequently abandoned him. He welcomes us as if nothing happened because Jesus made it all happen for us to receive God’s forgiveness.

The Lord will never forsake us as we cling to Christ our Savior.

Amen.