“So Much Better than Day Old Bread”

Over the past month, a lot of churches have been reading through the 6th chapter of John’s Gospel, and so I’ve been thinking a lot about the events of that chapter and how applicable they are for our world today.

In the 6th chapter of the Gospel of John there is this crowd of people who follow Jesus to Capernaum and when they find him Jesus talks with them about the work that God is calling them to do and their response is:

What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? What work are you performing?  Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ (John 6:30-31)

Here’s the thing you need to know about this group who is asking Jesus for a sign: they actually aren’t that interested in Jesus performing a sign so that they can be reassured and commit their lives to the Mission of God.  No. They are actually just trying to coax Jesus into giving them a free meal.  

Earlier in John chapter 6, Jesus miraculously feeds 5,000 people, and this group that followed him to Capernaum, the ones asking about manna in the wilderness? They were part of that 5,000!  They are following Jesus around because they want more miraculous bread and they aren’t being at all subtle about your hopes and intentions.  

Sometimes in our walk of faith, we start thinking like this group of people.  We start longing for the day-old bread that God once provided. We look to the past and talk about how great it once was and we try and find ways to get back to it.  In not-so-subtle ways, we’ll ask God to return us to the “miraculous” days of yore.

Here’s the problem with this type of thinking – it focuses on the substance of the miracle and not the one who brought the miracle about.  

When that group asks Jesus for some more bread, Jesus responded by saying “I am the bread of life.”  Jesus was trying to remind the group that the meal they had miraculously experienced wasn’t the point, it was His love and His presence in the world that truly matter.

When we think about the “glory days” or the “mountain top” moments of our faith, or “the way things used to be”, we can get caught in a difficult cycle of dissatisfaction. These moments and memories are important, but only because of what they reveal to us about God.  The loving, ever-present God who authored those glory days and mountain top moments should be our focus.  

If our attention is only on the miraculous moments of the past then we are forgetting Jesus. As we head into a new school year where things are guaranteed to be very different, I pray we can all learn to see the presence of Jesus at this moment and this day. I pray that we don’t fall victim to the temptation of looking for day-old bread when The Bread of Life is still with us and guiding us and blessing us in new ways each morning.

A Letter from Pastor Andy

I haven’t slept well lately, and I imagine that’s true for a lot of us. In less than two weeks, we’ve had two mass shootings. Both hit close to home in their own way. Last week’s murders in Atlanta remind us that even as overall rates of violence in our country have trended downward for 30 years, over the past few years mass shootings and violence against Asian-Americans and women have all been on the rise. Like all of us, I know people who have suffered that violence and racism.

Years ago, I lived near the King Soopers that was attacked on Monday. I shopped there and worked in the United Methodist Church that’s less than a mile away, and I still know people in that area. A friend of mine arrived at the store to do his grocery shopping on Monday just after the attack. Like many, as I read the names of the murder victims yesterday morning I felt a tightness in my chest, recognizing that I might know someone on the list. I didn’t, but hundreds of our neighbors did not have that reprieve.

Neither the United Methodist Church nor our congregation have been silent or uninvolved in these issues. Of course, the denomination has unequivocally and repeatedly condemned gun violence, racism, and violence against women. Just this past week, a group of Bishops and other church leaders from Asian-American and Pacific Islander communities issued another statement in solidarity with Asian-Americans and all those who feel threatened by hatred and violence in our current social climate. In addition to public statements, there are United Methodist curricula and other resources for churches to learn more about these issues and help work toward solutions. On the local church level, we recently ratified our reconciling statement, which says in part that we will go beyond statements and commit ourselves to the lifelong process of working to end discrimination and marginalization of any kind. For several years, we’ve been a member congregation of Colorado Faith Communities United, “a diverse group of faith communities working to help end the deaths and injuries in Colorado caused by the improper use of firearms” (per their website). In a sad coincidence, before the Atlanta shootings I scheduled a phone call with the Director of that organization, who has been reaching out to member churches to check in.

In the end, though, there is no simple solution to these problems. No statement or study or organization will solve them, although those things are all necessary and helpful. I am convinced that one root cause of the racism, random violence, and division in our society is that our culture simply does not know how to create authentic community across differences. Local churches can be life-giving parts of the solution, helping to mend the fabric of community in our neighborhoods and cities.

With some exceptions, we tend not to hate individual people. We hate labels. When we know individual people, the hatred becomes much more difficult to maintain. When we know and come to love individual people, we’re more likely to stick up for them and stand with them when hatred is directed against them. We’re more likely to take action to end the violence or exploitation our friends suffer. We’re more likely to think in terms of “all of us” rather than “us and them.” Church is one place where we can build the relationships that bring that shift in awareness.

Christianity was founded on the idea of bringing diverse people together into one body, so any kind of racism, discrimination, or hatred should be completely foreign to us. We have an important gift to offer the world. We are not powerless. What we do matters. Creating healthy, compassionate, hospitable community can have powerful ripple effects. Our commitment to resist hatred and bigotry adds to the chorus of similarly committed voices.

That not feel like much to offer against what sometimes seems to be an overwhelming tide of rage. Still, as Lent and Easter remind us, 2000 years ago the life and death of a Galilean Jewish peasant would have felt insignificant too: one more religious reformer, ground up in the machinery of Empire. But the Easter story tell us that even in grief and loss, even when we feel overpowered, death does not have the last word.

Grace and Peace,

Andy

Faith & Reason

I’ve written before about the importance of faith, about how sometimes we can get caught up in trying to “think our way” to God.   But, I need to mention that there is another side to this, and that is the importance of academics and intellect in our relationships with God.

God has created all of us in His image—in the beginning we were created by God and declared “good”. In this journey of faith we are called to us the gifts of our creation to seek and honor God: with all of our heart, all of our soul, and all of our mind.  

Sometimes we can become too engrossed in the mind part of pursuing God.  Try as we might, we cannot think our way to God.  God is so far beyond our grasp that it would be idolatrous to believe that our intellect would be able to pin down God.  Indeed, our relationship with God is largely dependent upon elements of faith.  

However, so much good can come from the struggles of faith. We are all blessed with the incredible ability to think and reason.  I strongly believe that challenges to our faith are also gifts of God.  If everything was easy then how would we ever grow?  We are constantly being molded to become more mature followers of God and Christ.  Challenges to faith, doubts within faith, all of these are merely further steps toward a more mature, more whole relationship with God.  

Please, do not abandon the questions that you have about God!  Embrace these challenges as signs of God working in your life and remind yourself that God is always guiding you toward maturity.  Our faith is a gift that allows us to be closer to God when the challenges of intellect overwhelm.  But also, our mind and our intellectual struggles are gifts that bring us into a stronger relationship with God.  

A Thrill of Hope

In 2020, we saw a weary world. The lives of far too many loved ones were lost. Dreams were postponed. Trips were canceled. Financial hardship came to the forefront of many lives. Loneliness drenched us. Zoom fatigue was real. The dark nights of winter seemed more dark than usual. We woke up each morning not knowing when this pandemic would end, when our lives could go back to “normal.” Normal became wearing masks, seeing others outside, and keeping distance between those whom we wanted to hold close. Hosting people in our homes became a faint memory we once knew. The simple treasures of sharing a glass of wine or a game of cards by the fire seemed to become activities of the past.

As if a global pandemic wasn’t enough cause for a weary world, racial inequality was revealed to the world in ways that some hadn’t seen before. Precious lives were lost to gun violence. People were killed for crimes they did not commit. A weary world protested and cried out.

Between Australia and the west coast of the US, everything seemed to be burning. Our weary world burned and gasped for air, for some sort of relief. Our climate continued down a lamentable trajectory.

The world into which Jesus was born was weary, too. An unmarried young woman was told she was with child, and her soon-to-be husband was asked to trust that this woman’s pregnancy wasn’t what it looked like. God’s people were living in a culture that was foreign to them. The announcement of Jesus’ birth was unexpected and shocking. I’m not sure what else was happening in that world, but I have a feeling that the people living during that time experienced sickness and violence too.

And yet, for the weary world back then and the weary world today, there is hope.

When I survey the world around me, I see hope in the perseverance shown by a humanity that longs to connect with one another. Zoom calls. Outside gatherings. Game nights on the internet. Video greetings. The willingness to pause and listen and learn from each other. We are created in God’s image, and community is at the very core of our Triune God.

I also see hope in the creative solutions pursued by scientists, doctors, and leaders. In masks. In stay-at-home mandates. In vaccines. We are created in God’s image, and our God is the God of creativity. This is revealed to me by the beauty of the mountains, by the vast diversity in plants and animals and human beings, and in the constant yet changing seasons.

Our greatest hope, I believe, is the hope we find in Jesus Christ. A baby who was born in a stable because there was no room for him at the inn and grew up to show the world how to make room for everyone. Fully God and fully human, Emmanuel, God with us. A child who grew up to save you, me, and the whole world through his death and resurrection. God incarnate who freely gives us grace, not because we deserve or earn it, but because God loves us that much.

A thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices.

And do you know what, friends? Emmanuel, God with us, is still here with us. God is with us in deep pain and in great joy. God is with us in the times of darkness and in the times of bright light. God is with us in our lonely quarantines and in our excitement around vaccines. God is with us in the uncertainty and in the glimpses of hope. God is with us through it all.

As we enter 2021, may you experience the thrill of hope that comes from encountering our loving, all-knowing, grace-giving Emmanuel, God with us.

An Unprecedented Year

Students are beginning to make their way to campus.

For some, it is a return to campus life upended by the sudden onset of COVID-19 last spring. Others will be stepping onto campus for the first time, left only to imagine what things were like before masks and social distancing. All will be well versed in the university’s thorough return-to-campus guide.

So much is new, so much is uncertain.

The Foundation is in a period of transition, bidding farewell to Liza Stoltz Hanson (who accepted a new call as the associate minister at St Luke’s United Methodist Church in Highlands Ranch). A newly reconstituted ecumenical board is forming, with three pastors from constituent churches (University Park UMC, Bethany Lutheran, and Christ Church Denver) serving as interim chaplains for the 2020-2021 academic year.

Campus faith communities at DU are in a period of transition, welcoming Chenthuran Jayachandiran as the new Director of the DU Cultural Center and Spiritual Life (having recently completed his doctoral studies at the University of Iowa, where he focused on emerging adult identity formation).

All of the COVID-related disruptions and changes seem unprecedented, even if DU historians remind us that we’ve been here before––that “from the Black Death in the 14th century to today’s COVID-19 outbreak, pandemics have disrupted everyday existence… [and] one of the most lethal pandemics occurred just over a century ago… the deadly influenza epidemic of 1918.” That perspective of history, while illuminating, may be of only cold comfort.

In the Episcopal Church, there’s a prayer that we pray during Compline (or “Night Prayer”) in the Book of Common Prayer (1979):

Be present, O merciful God, and protect us through the hours of this night, so that we who are wearied by the changes and chances of this life may rest in your eternal changelessness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (BCP, p. 133)

The “changes and chances of this life” can be wearisome indeed. But we believe that, even in these times, we can find rest in the eternal changelessness of God.

That is what we hope to offer you this year at The Foundation: rest in God’s presence.

Know that we are here for you. We are praying for you. And we will do everything we can to help make this an unprecedented year for experiencing the goodness of God, even in these challenging times.

Joseph Wolyniak is an interim chaplain for The Foundation, based at Christ Church Denver. Connect with him on Facebook or at jwolyniak [at] christchurchdenver.org