Sermon, March 30, 2003
4th Sunday in Lent, Year B
The Rev. Lowell E. Grisham
St. Paul's Episcopal Church
Fayetteville, Arkansas

Gospel -- John 6:4-15 Jesus feeds the multitudes 

How do we solve problems? There's Philip's way. And there's Andrew's way.

There is a big crowd of people, and they are hungry. Philip surveys the size of the crowd, puts his calculator to it and announces the daunting facts. Too many people; not enough money. This is more than the feeding committee can handle. But Andrew, simple Andrew. The brother in the shadow of Peter's charisma. Andrew brings up a boy. The Greek word is the word used for a little boy. A boy with five barley loves and two fish. Barley is the kind of bread that the poor people eat, very small loaves; and the fish are those little dried, salted things. It's a meal for one peasant. Andrew brings the boy to Jesus.

What kind of inner disposition does it take for Andrew to do that? In any board room or work group he would be ignored at best, more likely ridiculed. But there is in him a remarkable combination of humility and trust. Really it's a form of love. He loves Jesus so much, trusts so much, that he is free to offer an absurdly inadequate resource, not knowing what good it could possibly accomplish. If Andrew had any more pride or any less trust, he would have ignored the child. The committee would have had to figure out some orderly way to disburse the hungry crowd.

Andrew has a combination of inner and outer vision. Like Philip he sees the material picture of the situation -- "...five barley loaves and two fish; ...what are they among so many people?" He can see the real life problem. But he also has an inner disposition that we might call living in faith. He probably thinks the world is basically a good place and that's there is always enough to meet our needs. He's probably one of those people who says "yes" a lot. He probably doesn't worry too much about trying to fix things because he pretty much accepts them as they are. After all, he's able to accept a little boy with a peasant's meal.

Andrew is living "in" something. We've got lots of words for it -- living in the Spirit; living in faith; living in hope; living in love. It's like being inside something wonderful, something powerful that pushes life in a loving direction. When you live in the river you don't have to push it. You can just flow with it. The head can rest in what the heart knows. As author Richard Rohr says, "The great commandment is not 'thou shalt be right.' The great commandment is to 'be in love.' Be inside the great compassion, the great stream, the great river. ...All that is needed is surrender and gratitude. ...All we can do is accept and give thanks." (Everything Belongs, p. 77) So Jesus accepts the crowd, accepts the boy, accepts the bread and the fish, gives thanks for it all, and they all have as much as they wanted. Andrew helped make it happen.

Mostly I live like Philip. But my form of hunger is time. Too many things to do; too little time. And I calculate like Philip. If I can get an uninterrupted hour here, I can get this important thing done and then that one and then that one. And I've quickly planned more than I can do in an uninterrupted life, just as the interruptions come. Maybe you have days like that. Like swimming upstream. Swimming very hard and getting just about nowhere.

But every once in a while, I'll get sane and quit. I'll look around at my life and accept it in all its mess. Usually that'll bring a smile. What a mess! How did I think I was going to control or fix that anyway? Then, I'll let the day come to me. It's a little like floating down the river. I'll make choices -- what's the best thing to do right now. But I'll try not to be too attached to the choices so that when the interruptions come, and they always come, it's God knocking on the door not someone messing with my agenda; it's a chance to do what God wants me to do instead of what I think I ought to do. Now those "Andrew days" are few and far between in my life, but when they come, it's amazing. Good things just happen. And problems tend to take care of themselves. It's beyond my understanding.

Someone has said, "'If you understand it, things are just as they are. If you don't understand it, things are just as they are.' The mystery is to be ready to receive things just as they are and be ready to let them teach us." (Ibid, p. 78)

Hugh Doyle is the accountant and receptionist at the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He and his wife are foster grandparents. They take in little children until they can find a home. His colleagues will often ask him how much sleep he has had, and he'll answer, "Oh, they woke me at two and four -- another chance to learn how to love." (Ibid) What a wonderful way of saying "yes" to life.

There is a level at which we are always saying "yes" to life and to love. At the center of our being, in our true self, where God is one with us, we are always saying "yes." There is a great line from Brother Lawrence. He says, "People would be very surprised if they knew what their souls said to God sometimes." There is a place in the center of our being where we know that everything is a gift and all we need has already been given. What is needed from us is the simple awareness that we are living in this spacious love we call God, so we open our hands to receive the gift, open our mouths to feed on God's abundance.

Get to know the difference between Philip's way and Andrew's way. Get familiar with the "feeling you have inside when you make a resolution to strive to cling to something." Let that Philip-feeling well up inside you right now: "the tight sense of grasping, the 'I have to' attitude that borders on guilt or desperation, the tense and forceful atmosphere of need. Get to know the feeling well, so that whenever you feel it you can stop what you're doing, take a breath, relax, yield a little, and let your real self turn to the real God" in humility and trust like Andrew. Instead of making resolutions, offer gentle prayer; instead of expectations, hope; instead of compulsion, trust. "Seek to encourage yourself instead of manipulating yourself. ...Live, love, and yearn with unbearable passion, but don't try to make it happen and don't try to hold on when it does happen." (Gerald May, The Awakened Heart, p. 138)

What Jesus promises is that you will discover that nothing will be lost. Even the left over fragments are gathered. No matter how poor your barley bread may be or how dried out and preserved your life may feel, the world is good, and abundance is always present. God wants to feed us until we are satisfied. You don't have to push the river because you live in it. It's all about love. The river is love.

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