The Bread of Compassion

Proper 14-B
August 12, 2012

2 Samuel 18:5-9,15,31-33
Ps. 130; John 6:35,41-51

We delude ourselves, don’t we, when we think we live in a world of justice, a world that has “progressed” beyond the blood vengeance of the honor-shame cultures depicted so shockingly in our Old Testament readings this summer.

We read horrible stories about women who have “dishonored” their families – thereby justifying their killing by their own brothers – stories from “far away” places like the Middle East or Afghanistan. We are appalled: how can “honor” be more valuable than a person’s life – than a woman’s life?

But how much more shocking is it that six Americans at prayer in their house of worship in suburban Milwaukee are gunned down – allegedly because someone thought they were Muslims – Muslims, our “enemies,” who have brought “shame” to America. In that horrible scene, remember, there was an example of heroic justice. The Sikhs praised the Wisconsin policeman who risked his own life to prevent more tragic deaths, the policeman who knew right from wrong and acted without thought of himself to aid the people he was sworn to protect and serve.

When we read Bible stories like these from the Book of Samuel, we are tempted to draw a line between them and us: those pre-Enlightenment days were violent and cruel; men with power acted capriciously. Today we are judicious and reasonable; we are governed by law, not ruled by force.

Like the shootings in the Milwaukee, the news reports are full of examples that the capricious use of power and violence are with us still. Even the most “enlightened” of our leaders love to rattle swords. But just as we saw that moment of heroic justice, in the actions of the policeman in the Sikh Temple, even the power of King David at his most self-centered and brutal is tempered by the judgment and justice of God.

The background of today’s story of the death of Absalom begins with David’s dishonest dealings to gain Bathsheba, the woman he loves. The story of how he arranged for the death of Bathsheba’s husband, Uriah, must have been well known in Israel – disapproving gossip was a common then as it is today. David also allowed his oldest son, Amnon, to rape his own sister, David’s daughter, Tamar – and when David took no action to avenge this terrible act, Absalom did so on his own. He plotted and killed his older brothers, and took advantage of growing discontent with David’s bloodthirsty rule to build an army to rebel against his father, and to replace him himself as the King of Israel. That is the cause of the battle that opens our reading today. David, full of military power, defends the throne, but David, full of humanity as well, still does not want his rebellious but beloved son killed. David’s generals, fighting for their king, find it foolish to let the leader of the rebellion to live, and Absalom is killed.

David rules Israel as King, not as God’s puppet. He came to power with Yahweh’s favor, but he makes his own decisions, some good, some not so good. At several points in the story, we read of God’s great displeasure, and the consequences are not good for David. His beloved sons are killed, he must fight and scheme to stay on the throne, and what he wanted most as the crowning achievement of his reign, the building of the Temple, is denied to him. Even David, beloved of God, has offended God’s justice. There is more than honor and shame and vengeance; there is right and there is wrong, and the heroic ones act in God’s name to restore God’s justice.

In our gospel lesson today, Jesus offers what God has been offering all along: life. Not vengeance or jealousy or violence or brutality – not hunger or thirst or want or deprivation. God offers life. God also offers freedom – God created humans with the ability to do things – with agency. People may do terrible things, as David did, but people can also do wonderful things, like cultivate wheat, and make bread – bread that is made by human hands is so wonderful that when Jesus tries to describe to his followers what the love of God is like he uses bread. You ask what I am like? I am like bread. I am bread. The bread of life.

But curiously, bread is a completely human creation. Annie Dillard writes in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, her close observation of nature, that if the human race were to die out, so would wheat.

“Even ten square miles of wheat gladdens the hearts of most people,” she writes, "although it is really as unnatural and freakish as the Frankenstein monster; if man were to die, I read, wheat wouldn't survive him more than three years."

Wheat, it seems, must be cultivated to produce grain to make bread. Wheat left to its own devices produce smaller and smaller grains, unable to support itself, much less the human race.

God gives us the wheat, just as God gives us love and justice and compassion and courage and the ability to know right from wrong. It is up to us to take those gifts, to cultivate them as carefully as we do wheat, and to use them, as God intended, to bring life to the world.