Spiritual Meals: Jesus, IT, and Other Tasty Treats

The Rev. Brad Sullivan

Emmanuel Episcopal Church

August 22, 2021

Proper 16, B

Ephesians 6:10-20

John 6:56-69

Changing Our Diets

I’ve been re-reading IT, a novel by Stephen King about a group of friends from Derry Maine who band together as children and then again as adults to defeat a shapeshifting demon-clown monster thing, called “IT.” IT feeds off of fear and violence, most of which IT perpetrates, though IT also feeds off and seems to help cause greater violence and hatred in the people of the town. IT is most famous for taking the appearance of a clown, and if you haven’t read the book, you may have seen or heard of the miniseries back in the 80s or the recent two part movie series.

Pennywise the dancing clown, IT, is a terrifying villain in this terrifying horror story. IT scared me as an 11 year old, and IT still scares me as a 43 year old. To this day, I quicken my pace walking when past storm drains due to the opening scene in the book.  

Even more disturbing than the monster itself, however, is the response of the people of the town to IT. When things get bad, the people generally do what they should: hold curfews, encourage adults to walk children to school, and increase police presence. At the same time, however, there is a general apathy within the town about the presence of IT. None are really aware of IT, and yet all seem to accept the fact of a high rate of murder and violent crime, and they seem largely to take in stride as well the large number of children who are victims.  

The town prospers, and the people go about their lives accepting IT as simply the way things are. On the one hand, what else are they supposed to do, not really knowing what is going on? On the other hand, how can they just accept IT as the way things are?  See, the people of the town despise IT, and they also feed off of IT in a spiritual kind of way. IT has become so intertwined with the town and the people that IT feeds off of them, and they unknowingly feed off of IT. IT has become their spiritual food. 

Like the people in this novel, we too seem to feed in spiritual ways off of the suffering of others. This is not intentional. It’s not what we strive for. It’s simply the inescapable result of a world full of brokenness and conflict.  

Consider how companies and people profit off of war: weapons manufacturers and others. I’m not saying the military or weapons makers are bad. At its heart, the military’s goal is to protect the weak and the innocent. Weapons manufacturers help make that possible. At the same time, we can’t escape the fact that part of our wealth comes from the destruction and killing of others. That’s just part of the way things are, and that destruction and killing becomes part of our spiritual food.

Think about how many products we wear or use that are made with overseas, underpaid, and oppressed workers? That becomes not only part of our wardrobe, but part of our spiritual food. How much of our economy depends on the same? How much value is derived off of impoverished and crime ridden areas remaining impoverished and crime ridden so that other areas can have premium pricing as a safer alternative? 

How many of us get angry and stay angry at any number of world or community problems that we probably can’t change, but that we can at least get righteously angry about and feel a resulting strength and moral superiority? Anger and contempt, fighting over who is right. Brainless liberal. Heartless conservative. Masks or no masks. The righteous indignation and moral superiority, the anger and contempt are all part of our spiritual food.

In all of these and countless other ways, we are feeding off of the brokenness and conflict in our world. That brokenness and conflict has always been with us and will always be with us. Whether we want it to be or not, the darkness, violence, brokenness, and conflict of our world will always be part of our spiritual food.

In this rather problematic spiritual diet then, Jesus says, “Eat my flesh, and drink my blood.” Eat and drink me as your spiritual food, Jesus says. Feed your spirit off of my spirit. Change your diet.

So, how do we feed less off of brokenness and conflict, anger and contempt, and make our meals of Jesus instead? Well, if we really want the diet to stick and last, then one thing we likely can’t do is make a sudden, drastic, and huge dietary change. If we try to divorce ourselves from everything that is of violence, oppression, and conflict, we are going to find just how interconnected violence, oppression, and conflict is in all we do. We’re not going to make the world perfect, and we’re certainly not going to increase our consumption of Jesus by angrily and contemptuously decrying anything we feel is not of Jesus.

So how do we feed off of Jesus? How do we eat his body and drink his blood? Well, there are countless, infinite ways, including sharing communion here, the spiritual communion, embodied in the meal we share. Other ways to eat Jesus’ body and drink his blood are to take note of each other. Pay attention to each other. Help each other out in fun times together and in rough times together. Stand up for each other. Love each other. Such is the spiritual food of Jesus’ body and blood.

Take time for yourself. Rest. Rely on the Lord and the strength of his power, knowing you can’t get it all done. Have faith and trust in God. Trust in God and in God’s goodness. Trust in your own goodness, being made good and beautiful in the image of God. Trust in God’s love of you and guidance of you. Such is the spiritual food of Jesus’ body and blood.

Strive for justice and peace in how you interact with others, in how you vote. Strive for justice and peace in how you shop, in the things you consume. Seek truth and live in righteousness, meaning live a life seeking good for others and for yourself. Such is the spiritual food of Jesus’ body and blood.

Enjoy the sun, the sky, the grass, the trees, the air. Enjoy the ride. Breath. Breath in the beauty of the moment, even during anxiety, depression, sadness, and fear. Trust in God enough to let go and not have to control everything all the time. Pray. Pray a lot. Make it weird. Such is the spiritual food of the body and blood of Jesus.

We can’t purify ourselves by completely ridding our spiritual diet of any and all darkness, conflict, violence, and oppression. Such things are intertwined within our lives and this world, and there is no ridding ourselves of them. Also, Jesus didn’t say remove from your spiritual diet all things that are objectionable. He knew that wasn’t possible. Instead, Jesus said, “eat my flesh and drink my blood.”

“Be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power.” (Ephesians 6:10) Make your spiritual meals of Jesus. Eat Jesus' spiritual flesh, and drink Jesus' spiritual blood, that you may abide in him and he in you.

Choose Whom You Will Serve (Eat)

Brad Sullivan

Proper 16, Year B

August 26, 2018

Emmanuel, Houston

Joshua 24:1-2a,14-18

Ephesians 6:10-20

John 6:56-69

Choose Whom You Will Serve Eat

“Choose whom you will serve,” Joshua said to the Israelites.  Will you serve God, or will you serve some foreign false god or idol?  Joshua had taken over leadership of Israel from Moses just before they entered the promised land after fleeing from Egypt and spending 40 years in the desert.  In today’s passage, Israel had finished settling the promised land, the territory was all divided up, so, Joshua was leading the people in renewing their covenant with God.  Choose whom you will serve. 

In the context of our Gospel reading today, I think it might be more appropriate to say, “Choose whom you will eat.”  I know; it sounds bad, but Jesus said that those who eat his flesh and drink his blood abide in him, and he abides in them.

Of course, Jesus is not talking about literal eating.  Instead of saying, “go eat Jesus,” think instead about, “having a diet” of Jesus.  If I were to say, “I have a pretty steady diet of Jimmy Fallon in the evenings,” I think you would all understand that I mean I watch the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon most evenings.  I don’t actually do that, but I needed an example that most everyone would get.  We don’t say, “I eat people,” but we do talk about having diets of a particular person’s music or writing, teachings or commentary. 

So, Jesus is telling his disciples to have a pretty steady diet of him.  Spiritual food.  Soul food.  Heart food.  Heck, even brain food. 

I tend to have problems when I choose food other than Jesus.  I tend to get frustrated pretty easily; I’ll make comments under my breath, roll my eyes, the kind of general nastiness that is terribly destructive, even if it is sometimes seen as no big deal.  Such nastiness, such disdain for another is a big deal. It reduces the beautiful, beloved humans around us to contemptuous things to be conquered.  I was reminded of this recently.  Such behavior is not the way of Jesus, and such behavior comes from eating any of a thousand things other than Jesus. 

When we’re calm and at peace with one another, in good times or in bad, it’s a good bet we’ve been feeding ourselves with Jesus.  On the other hand, when the little things leave us angry, resentful, contemptuous, it’s a good bet we’ve been eating something else.

There’s the old Cherokee proverb which says there are two wolves inside of each of us struggling for control.  One of the wolves is darkness and anger, violence and hatred.  The other wolf is light and peace, compassion and love.  Which one wins depends on which one we choose to feed.

So, how do we feed the good wolf?  How do we make a diet of Jesus?  Well, there are thousands of ways to make Jesus our soul food diet…at least 42 ways to make a diet of Jesus.  One way I made a diet of Jesus back in high school was reading scripture every night and praying just before going to sleep.  This practice filled my soul and gave me visions of what life can be. 

Paul’s words from Ephesians from a couple of weeks ago:  “Put away from you all bitterness and wrath and anger and wrangling and slander, together with all malice, and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.”  More than good advice, more than a command to try harder and do better, these words from Paul give a vision of what life is like when we make a steady diet of Jesus.  Reading or remembering Paul’s words; putting away all anger, and wrangling, and slander; being kind, tenderhearted, and forgiving; I picture myself living those words in daily life.  I breathe Paul’s words in and let them feed my soul, feed the good wolf, and for those moments, I am what Paul describes.  My anger melts away and in its place, forgiveness, healing, and love fill my body and soul.

Scripture of one way to make a diet of Jesus.  Prayer is another:  sometimes with words, sometimes in the silence of the moment, simply being present to God in creation all around you.  Eucharist is a way to make a diet of Jesus.  Prayer and bible study with others.  Serving people around you.  Allowing people to serve you when you are in need.  Not responding to someone when angry or upset, but waiting until you are at peace so your response can honor the made in God’s image human being in front of you.  Noticing…simply noticing the lives of those around you, choosing not to be indifferent to the lives and the challenges of those around you. 

All of these and so many more are ways to make a diet of Jesus. 

See, God desires lives of peace and wholeness for each of us, and, in the realm of , “you are what you eat,” God offers himself as our soul food so that we may have lives of peace and wholeness. 

Last week in a radio interview on NPR with a young woman whose life was made whole and set on a new path when she chose to make a steady diet of Jesus.  Lulu Garcia-Navarro* was interviewing Yvonne Orji, a comedian and actress in the HBO show, Insecure, and she described her character in the show as “a beautiful mess.”  She can’t quite get life together, doesn’t have great relationships with guys, though she keeps trying, dislikes her job, and is basically struggling in a life that she doesn’t know how to manage. 

When Mrs. Orji, first got the script, she said that the character in the show was who she would have been like if she hadn’t gotten saved when she was 17.  She’d grown up as a Christian, but not necessarily making a diet of Jesus.  In college, she was planning on going kinda nuts with her newfound freedom and likely make a lot of mistakes which could have had some lifelong consequences. 

Then she went to a Bible study and heard a woman there refer to God as “Daddy.”  That seemed odd to her, calling God “daddy, but she said, “there was something so pure and passionate about [this woman’s] relationship with God that caused that to not be weird for her.”  Yvonne decided she wanted that, whatever she had to do, and she stared making a diet of Jesus.  That changed the course of her life, gave her strength and security to follow where God was directing her, which was different that what her parents wanted for her, and brought her to a place of peace and wholeness, living a life that she never imagined.

That’s what happens when we make a diet of Jesus.  Rather than the unhealthy chaos that comes from filling our souls with all the junk food out there, making a diet of Jesus brings us peace and wholeness, and even new direction, that we may never have imagined, or maybe have only imagined. 

So I leave you with an imagining, with an image of what life on a steady diet of Jesus can look like, in the words of Terri Hendrix in her song called, The Last Song.

May your peace be an anchor in stormy times.

May your hope run like a river that will never run dry.

May your burdens grow light;

May your worries subside.

This is my prayer for you.**

*          https://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=639321123

**        https://terrihendrix.bandcamp.com/album/wilory-farm