Rev Sue preached this sermon on Wednesday 17 April 2024. Here it is for you again:
What does your Christian name mean, why were you named that way? Do you like it? Krystyna asked those of us who were at Foxhill last week during one of the sessions and the answers were fascinating. For many there was a bit of family history involved. Surnames, too, help others to join the dots and connect us to our family members. When we meet someone, names contribute to the impression we are forming of them.
When Moses stopped at the sight of the burning bush and met God in the wilderness, he heard the voice of God calling him to go and bring the Israelites out of Egypt. But it was 40 years since Moses has been to Egypt, and he’s being sent to a people who have very likely lost touch with their own traditions. If he says “God has sent me” they will ask him which god? The Egyptians worshipped many different ones, as did the other tribes around. God replies, “I am who I am” and then identifies himself as the God of the ancestors of the Israelites.
In refusing a name, God has declined to be pigeonholed as being only the god of a particular territory. He is existence itself, the heart of reality. He touched the lives of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but he is not confining himself to one tribe, one area or one epoch. He is the God of everywhere and everyone, then, now and for eternity. He is not just a real being, he is being itself, the ultimate reality. He is the beating heart of the universe.
When Jesus said, “I am the bread of life”, he is identifying with the pre-existent God. If you ever did even a little Latin at school, you will have learnt that amo, amas, amat means I love, you love, he or she loves. There is no need in Latin for a word for I in the sentence. Greek is the same: the word “eimi” means I am. But Jesus adds the word for I “ego”. So, it’s not “I’m the bread of life” but “I am the bread of life”. Jesus is identifying himself with the God who says “I am who I am”. He and the indwelling creator of the universe are one.
Jesus said “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty… anyone who comes to me I will never drive away” He didn’t start by requiring good behaviour, correct beliefs or attendance at church. All good things in themselves, but they are not fundamental. The only condition for eternal life is hunger and thirst. That’s a pretty amazing thought – it’s saying that you will get the thing you most desire simply because you want it. That’s not something that happens very often! We’re talking here about the deep-down longing for God, for that peace, that sense of connection and completion. St Augustine wrote “our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you”. When we talk to others about our faith, we have little to say to those who are satisfied in their lives without God. As Christians we are telling the hungry where to find bread, the heartbroken where to find comfort, the lonely where to find love, the questioning where to find truth. Someone once said, “There is within everyone a God-shaped vacuum, an emptiness that only He can fill” and we will never find rest, peace or meaning until we fulfil the purpose for which we were created – life in God. That experience of oneness, joy and completion can be found in prayer, where it often comes upon us unexpectedly as pure gift, but equally it can be found in the beauty of a sunset or the laugh of a child. Take care you don’t miss it. Cultivate the habit of pausing and enjoying the moment, and you will begin to recognise the presence of God more and more in the ordinary things of life. The more we notice, the closer we come to the truth that is within us, the indwelling God who came to Moses in the burning bush, who lived on earth as Jesus of Nazareth, and who is the fulfilment of the deep longing he has put into our hearts.
Let us pray,
Almighty God,
you have made us for yourself,
and our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you:
pour your love into our hearts and draw us to yourself,
and so bring us at last to your heavenly city
where we shall see you face to face;
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen
St Margaret's Church Prestwich 