Communion 8/28/2022

You may be seated...A reading from the Gospel of Saint John for our time of communion.

John 6:22–70 CSB

The next day, the crowd that had stayed on the other side of the sea saw there had been only one boat. They also saw that Jesus had not boarded the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone off alone. Some boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. When the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Don’t work for the food that perishes but for the food that lasts for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set his seal of approval on him.” “What can we do to perform the works of God?” they asked. Jesus replied, “This is the work of God—that you believe in the one he has sent.” “What sign, then, are you going to do so that we may see and believe you?” they asked. “What are you going to perform? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, just as it is written: He gave them bread from heaven to eat.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, Moses didn’t give you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” Then they said, “Sir, give us this bread always.” “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again. But as I told you, you’ve seen me, and yet you do not believe. Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. This is the will of him who sent me: that I should lose none of those he has given me but should raise them up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Therefore the Jews started grumbling about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” They were saying, “Isn’t this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Jesus answered them, “Stop grumbling among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day. It is written in the Prophets: And they will all be taught by God. Everyone who has listened to and learned from the Father comes to me—not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God. He has seen the Father. “Truly I tell you, anyone who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that anyone may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, because my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna your ancestors ate—and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.” He said these things while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum. Therefore, when many of his disciples heard this, they said, “This teaching is hard. Who can accept it?” Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, asked them, “Does this offend you? Then what if you were to observe the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? The Spirit is the one who gives life. The flesh doesn’t help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. But there are some among you who don’t believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning those who did not believe and the one who would betray him.) He said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted to him by the Father.” From that moment many of his disciples turned back and no longer accompanied him. So Jesus said to the Twelve, “You don’t want to go away too, do you?” Simon Peter answered, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” Jesus replied to them, “Didn’t I choose you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.”

This is the Word of the Lord. Amen.

Let us pray.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us. Many of us come to your table like many of the disciples mentioned in the story we read, with doubt in our hearts. We trust more fully in other breads, bread that are not of heaven. Bread that is not you.

Or maybe we come to you desiring a miracle more than eternal life with you.

We often betray you, much like Judas, and yet you allow us to come back again and again to this table. Your mercy is unending and teaches us humility…we are not worthy, and yet say we are priceless to you. You will not lose one of us.

You give us a hard teaching, Lord. That if we eat of your flesh and drink of your blood we will receive eternal life. Even more you say that you will remain in us and we in you.

Precious Jesus, I don’t know how you become this meal. That your flesh and blood become subsistence to empower us in this life and to give us eternal life. I can’t explain the reality of this table. But I believe in you, the one sent from heaven…and trust in your Word.

How is it that through your suffering we obtain mercy? How is it that through the cross you bring about justice? How could any of that bring about Joy?! Our minds are too limited to comprehend the depth of your love.

Your body, broken for us. Your blood spilled to cover our sins. Suffering bringing about salvation.

May we learn from you the way of the cross. May we take up our own crosses and follow you. Cruciform lives formed in your image bringing about your kingdom on earth as it is in heaven.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us, sinners. We know you are here in this meal with us, in some mysterious way. And..where else would we go…You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.

Amen.

You may open the elements...

As you hold the bread in your hand, be reminded of your suffering saviour, God incarnated into a body of flesh, by his stripes you are healed. Bread from heaven, bread that gives eternal life…you may take the bread.

As you hold the cup in your hand, be reminded of the blood that was spilled for a new convenant, one in which the law will be written on the hearts of God’s people, and he will forgive every iniquity and remember our sin no more…you may take the cup.

Let us pray in the way our Lord taught us...

Our Father...

Please stand for this morning’s scripture reading, it comes from Saint Paul’s letter to the Philippians

Philippians 2:1-11 “If, then, there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, make my joy complete by thinking the same way, having the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility consider others as more important than yourselves. Everyone should look not to his own interests, but rather to the interests of others. Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, who, existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited. Instead he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity. And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death— even to death on a cross. For this reason God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow— in heaven and on earth and under the earth— and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

This is the Word of the Lord Amen

Benediction

Go now to will and to work for God’s purposes. Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus. Be filled with the same love and look to the interests of others. With reverence for God, work out your salvation. And may God quench your thirst with love and consolation; May Christ Jesus strengthen you and encourage you; And may the Holy Spirit lead you on and make your joy complete.

We go in peace to love and serve the Lord, ........In the name of Christ. Amen.