Sermon - August 13, 2006

Texts: Deuteronomy 8:1-10, Psalm 34:1-8, Ephesians 4: (25-29) 30 – 5:2, Gospel: John 6:37-51

Theme: Being open to the Father and the Son improves our spiritual eyesight.

Proper 14, John 6:37-51 – Improving our Spiritual Eyesight

Prayer: In the name of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

I’ve always loved books and as a teen I read a lot. Growing up I shared a room with my older sister. We had bunkbeds, and the bottom was usually mine. My mom would often find me in the shadow of the top bunk, curled around a book I was reading. I can hear her now. Maybe your parents said something similar: “You’re going to ruin your eyes reading in the dark!”

And moms are usually right. Right? Sure enough, by high school I needed glasses. My eyesight has gotten worse since. Without my glasses I can read the Big “E” on the eye chart… and that’s about it. Things can be awfully blurry without your glasses, so heaven help you if you forget where you put them or they fall off the nightstand. Have you ever tried looking for your glasses without your glasses? It’s a little tricky.

I relate to the crowd Jesus addresses in today’s gospel, because they too seem to be a little near-sighted. Remember them? The day after Jesus fed the 5,000 they noticed Jesus and the disciples were gone and went looking for them. John’s gospel has a theme of sight running through it. Seeing, seeking, and blindness all play a role in the unfolding and revelation of who Jesus is to the reader. The gospel tells us it’s written so we might believe. For John, to see rightly is to believe, so it’s no surprise that seeing and believing are linked in today’s reading.

If you think about it, John’s Gospel is kind of like a trip to the optometrist. Sounds strange, but stay with me. The optometrist makes you choose between two lenses and say which is sharper. They ask, which is better, 1 or 2? 1 or 2? This continues until you narrow in on your prescription. John does a similar thing. He asks, can you see it? He gives images like the gate, shepherd, vine, and in today’s reading, bread. Bread from heaven, living bread, bread of life. Today John asks us, Do you see Jesus? Do you believe? The entire Gospel wants us to see Jesus is the one sent by the Father, and to seek him out.

If the Gospel wants us to seek Jesus, why is the crowd who sought him a little near-sighted? True, they did follow him so they aren’t completely blind. But they aren’t seeing clearly either. This crowd fails to see beyond the most obvious. They only see the Big “E.” Jesus fed them. Hungry again, they want to be fed and ask for a sign, like the manna from heaven. Asking for a sign shows they see without truly seeing. They didn’t recognize the sign they received for what it was. They see Jesus who turned water into wine, Jesus who heals, Jesus who fed them but they don’t yet see Jesus as the one sent from the Father, as the bread of life. The living bread that will satisfy their hunger and give them eternal life. They’ve seen the Big “E” but have missed the fine print.

Today Jesus addresses the crowd, but isn’t he speaking to us too? Isn’t Jesus saying to us, “I am the bread of life,” and “”This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life.” ? All who see the Son. What might it mean for us to see Jesus? Are we looking? If we’re looking, what are we looking for? Do we see Jesus as miracle worker? Teacher? If we’re looking for just one characteristic, will the divine go past unnoticed?

Back to my story for a moment. By high school I needed glasses, and the doctor said to my mom, do NOT let her drive without her glasses. She may think it’s okay because she’s used to how things have looked. She doesn’t realize how bad her vision is, but she really needs her glasses to drive.

I think today John’s asking us, how’s your vision? Do you see the Son? It’s a good question to ask ourselves at the midpoint of the long season after Pentecost. We may think of this season as uneventful or ordinary compared to Christmas or Holy Week. But I think it is in ordinary time that we should be looking for the work of God in our everyday lives. Lawrence Stookey states: Because we may not recognize God’s action in our midst, we need to ask that our eyes be opened more fully to all of the evidences of God’s grace that are presented to us (Stookey, Calendar p 135). (repeat) Ask... that our eyes be opened... to evidences of God’s grace.

Amazing things happen every day, but because we’re accustomed to them, we fail to really see them or take them for granted. Bread can seem like such an ordinary thing. Are we content to see a loaf of bread as a finished product, lunch... instead of opening our eyes to more? Is our spiritual vision blurred but we don’t notice, like someone who’s used to the way they see without their glasses? How do we go about seeing the miracle, the sign, the bread of life in our midst? In Ordinary time we can pause and take a moment to assess our spiritual vision and ask ourselves how clearly we’ve been seeing Jesus, and how much we might have been missing.

Did you ever try on someone else’s glasses, or an old pair of your own? They don’t work – we need our own prescription, and it’s always changing. I think the same is true of our spiritual eyesight. So we have a part to play. We need to be willing to tell the person in charge, be it the optometrist, or God, just how bad our vision is. Only when we are willing to admit how poorly we see, can our vision be improved. We can ask God to renew our eyes to see our world, and God’s work in it, anew.

I think being intentional about seeing the Son and asking for this renewal is what opens us up to seeing. To truly seeing. Our eyes are opened to more than what’s on the surface. For instance, with our new eyes we may find ourselves looking at a child of God in need of love, rather than what others see on the surface... a troubled teen and a juvenile delinquent. We may see living bread that gives eternal life, rather than sandwich bread we can use for lunch.

As we move through the rest of the season after Pentecost, we can admit our spiritual eyesight is not 20/20 and invite God in to correct our vision. Openness to the Father’s teaching, to truly seeing the Son in our midst and taking the bread of life into ourselves can be like spiritual laser-eye surgery. It can bring things into focus, and improves our vision of God’s kingdom.

Amen.