Loaves and fishes.
Every once in a while, if you
are paying close enough attention, you will see the stories of Holy Scripture written
directly into your life. I’m sure it happens more often than we ever notice, our
egos and our agendas normally crowding out any chance at recognizing the many
ways the Holy Spirit swoops down to draw us into God’s story. Yet that is precisely
what I found happening to me last week while I was with thirty-six members of
the Epiphany Youth group and chaperones at the 2012 ELCA Youth Gathering in New
Orleans. Our denomination of the Lutheran Church, the ELCA, holds national
youth gatherings every three years, and typically when I attend these huge
events I am so busy and tired and sleepy and hungry that I can’t stop and enjoy
those moments of the Holy Spirit and see my life through the prism of
Scripture. But last week it happened at least once (that I’m aware of), and the
story that I found my life momentarily mirroring is this very account from
John’s gospel where Jesus feeds the multitude, the story of the loaves and
fishes.
The day was Friday, the third
day of the Gathering. Friday was our “easy” day when we didn’t have to be
anywhere at any specific time. Many other youth groups had planned something
exotic and expensive and very touristy to do on their easy day. Some had paid
high-dollar for swamp boat tours, while others had paid premium prices to go to
a museum or the aquarium. Already close to the squeaking point on our budget, we
had not scheduled any of that, and, to their credit, there was no grumbling
from our youth.
What we had left open,
however, was the possibility to visit an Epiphany member out in the St. Bernard
Parish in the Arabi section of greater New Orleans. Joe Wall is a New Orleans
native and is currently restoring an old home there that has been in his family
for four generations. It had sustained some damage in Hurricane Katrina, but
was now in its final stages of refurbishment. Before we actually left for New
Orleans, Joe had figured out the youth Gathering was going to coincide with his
own visit to check on his property, and he invited us out to see a real
historical New Orleans home. He also wanted to take us to lunch at a littlesandwich shop/food mart down the street that supposedly sells some of the best oyster
and shrimp po-boys in the entire city.
So this little expedition is
what we decided to do on our “easy day.” It was nothing too fancy or elaborate,
yet it exposed us to something interesting and authentically “New Orleans” outside
of the downtown bubble we had been in. In terms of the Scripture story, you
might say we had travelled to the other side of the Sea of Galilee.
Joe was a gracious and wonderful
host. When we showed up at his house, the
bottom had fallen out of the sky and we were looking like drowned rats but he
didn’t hesitate to welcome us right in and show us around. We also took in a
few of the sights of the humble but very tidy neighborhood right along the
levee that holds back the Mississippi, including the remains of the oldest
plantation house in the city. Joe was, however, a little taken aback by the
size of our group. I don’t know how many he expected, but he seemed a little
concerned that the little sandwich shop might not be able to handle thirty-seven
people. In fact, he was concerned enough to call the shop ahead of time and ask
them if they—get this—had enough French bread on hand to make that many
po-boys. I had seen the place as we’d driven in. Hand-painted sign,
pay-at-the-cash-register kind of place…to call it a “restaurant” was a bit of a
stretch. In fact, it calls itself a food store. Suffice it to say that because
it was so far off the beaten path, and especially because we were arriving after
the lunch rush, that shop might not have but a few, say 5, loaves on hand. I was
a little worried where we’d get food for our entire group if this option didn’t
pan out. But the owner told Joe on the phone, “We’ll make it work.”
So we trudged down the street
in the rain, literally crowded ourselves into this little food mart, and all of
us—well, just about all of us—ordered po-boys. We took up every seat in the
place. The kitchen help fired up the fryer again full-speed, and the waitress and
the young bus boy, who couldn’t have been more than 11 or 12 years old, both worked
diligently to make sure everyone was comfortable. But just before the food
began to come out, someone requested that I say a prayer. The whole place
stopped talking, and the employees paused in their tasks. Suddenly I realized
that I was praying for the whole establishment, which is something I’ve never
done before. I’ve prayed in restaurants before, for a table or two of people
here or there, but never for an entire eating establishment. So I gave thanks.
Then the food was delivered and, as you guessed, it was absolutely delicious. There
was more than enough for all, and I’m pretty sure I saw some people leaving with
doggie bags.
So, there you have it: life
mirroring Scripture. Loaves and fishes. French bread loaves and shellfishes. Jesus
said, “Make the people sit down—“we’ll
make it work.” So they sat down, about five thousand in all. Then Jesus took the loaves, and when he had
given thanks, he distributed them to
those who were seated; also the fish,
as much as they wanted.”
A miracle—a sign of God’s
presence—happened to us in that little food mart that day. I’m not saying that
the kitchen staff somehow miraculously transformed 5 loaves of French bread into
thirty-eight po-boys, but we did experience a hospitality and and a feeding of
our souls that went far beyond what I think any of us expected. In reflecting
upon our trip as a whole, many of the youth lifted up the day we spent at Joe’s
house and in the Arabi Food Store and Café as one of the highlights of the
trip. It was a humbling reminder to me that wholesome learning experiences do
not always come with a high price of an admission ticket or with elaborate planning.
A component of grace, they just come, and often without warning.
When Jesus Christ is present in
the breaking of bread and the sharing of gifts, any ordinary situation can
become a feast of heaven. And in this occurrence of life mirroring Scripture, Joe,
the other adult leaders, and I all served, if only for a few moments, as the
worried disciples who wondered whether any feast could take place at all,
especially with so many hungry people and in a place with such an apparent
shortage of resources. The youth and the workers at Arabi Food store, however, supplied
the firm if not quiet faith that God was indeed going to provide everything
we’d need: the po-boys, for sure, but also the sustenance of an experience
where relationships were formed and gifts were blessed, from the bread in the
kitchen right down to the labor of the bus boy.
The question is: how many
instances like this will need to happen before we realize that this is how our God
operates, that God does not function on an economy of scarcity? How many times
will our lives need to mirror the stories of Scripture before it finally dawns
on us that God’s grace permeates even the ordinary Arabi Food Store experiences
of life? How many occurrences of God’s surprising grace will it take to convince
us that Jesus is often quietly at the middle of everything, blessing our meager
gifts and our inexpensive easy days and then multiplying God’s goodness so that
there is enough for all.
The sign that those disciples
experienced that day beside the Sea of Galilee was designed to prove just that:
that Jesus is God’s amazing grace and that he is given for the life of the
world. This kind of thing is what he does, not just for our bellies and our
bodies, but for our souls as well. Our lives will be far more with him than
without him. And as we feast on his word in Scripture, as we gather weekly with
other people who are hungry for a word of hope and comfort, as we take our
place at this feast each week, Jesus Christ shows up and promises, against all
odds, that he will be enough, that his own body will be blessed and, on the
cross, broken for the life of the world.
A further challenge involves
not just seeing that this is how Jesus Christ graciously interrupts the normal
flow of human existence to provide
enough for all, but to then model that ourselves as his disciples. God calls us
to be the bus boys and the waitresses, the cooks and bread bakers who see our
lives transformed by Jesus’ power and then go out to see where loaves are
broken and blessed for the life of the world. Strengthened time and again by
the experiences like the youth had in New Orleans, or the volunteers at
Vacation Bible School, or even by our worship here, we become able to see the
scope of our lives written into Scriptures story where people meet Jesus daily and
join in his mission, where see the death of Good Friday give way to the news of
Easter morning.
Our call to pull up a seat
and be fed turns into a call to go gather the leftovers and be prepared to feed
the world. One of the speakers we heard
at the Superdome, Shane Claiborne, said that we often look at all the injustice
and suffering and inequality in the world and often say, “God, why don’t you do
something about all this?” And God says, “I did. I made you.”
And when we doubt whether our
meager lives, our meager gifts and talents, our meager faith are enough to be broken
and blessed for Jesus’ feeding of the multitudes, then perhaps we should arrange
a trip with Joe to Arabi Food Store and Café in St. Bernard Parish for a
refresher course, Or, better yet…no need to go anywhere at all. We can simply
grab a seat and arrange ourselves here at the Lord’s Table, where there is
always plenty for all, the body and blood of our crucified and risen Lord, the bread
of life.
And, by the by, see every
moment of our lives—life, death, and life again—written into the story of God.
Amen.
The Reverend Phillip
W. Martin, Jr.
