What's feeding people got to do with me? (Jeremiah 23.5-8 John 6.5-14)

I sometimes feel a bit sorry for the Pharisees, I mean we all often get the wrong end of the stick. I’m sure we’ve often been in situations where we’ve heard the wrong thing. When you’ve been in front of a congregation and said ‘Can you hear me?’ and they reply ‘and also with you.’

Most of the time if we’ve got the wrong end of the stick, we will apologise or move on, or say Oh okay! Fair enough.

Our reading from Jeremiah is a prophesy, all about the future of Israel after the exile. It was written a long time before Jesus came. It’s a prophesy all about who Jesus is. Jesus is the righteous branch that comes to lead and set his people free. It says just before our reading today;  

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! says the Lord. ² Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who shepherd my people: It is you who have scattered my flock, and have driven them away, and you have not attended to them. So I will attend to you for your evil doings, says the Lord. ³ Then I myself will gather the remnant of my flock out of all the lands where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to their fold, and they shall be fruitful and multiply. ⁴ I will raise up shepherds over them who will shepherd them, and they shall not fear any longer, or be dismayed, nor shall any be missing, says the Lord.”

The Phraisees got the wrong end of the stick about Jesus. But unlike most of us when we get something wrong, they weren’t willing to look at what Jesus was doing, or listen to what he had to say. They were bad shepherds, they weren't feeding anyone but themselves. 

They thought that what they were going to get, was a big strong king. A warrior. Who would come along, and bash the Romans on the head. Who’d use violence to get his way, like every other earthly ruler.

Yet the kind of messiah Jesus was, was very different. Today is the feast day of Christ the King, the day when the church remembers the sovereignty of Jesus. Where we acknowledge his power. Look for the coming of His Kingdom.

The Pharisees should’ve looked through their scriptures a bit more. They say time and time again, expect the unexpected if God’s ever involved.

What does God’s kingdom look like? It looks like our Gospel passage from John today. In a world where most people were subsistence farmers, having enough food was a big thing. Being fed was a big thing.

The Kingdom of God is not one defined by rules or expectations. It’s a place where everyone is fed, and has enough. Just like at this banquet.

Jesus doesn’t use violence to change the world, but nurturing, feeding, compassion.

He doesn’t just leave the crowd on their own. He doesn’t say ‘Well feeding them just created dependency.’ But freely gives of himself to all who are present, just as he gave himself on the cross for us, and gives himself, as a gift to us, in the bread and wine of Holy Communion this morning.

When Jesus fed those people, he sent out a powerful message about what the nature of God was. About who he is as a leader.

That leadership doesn’t have to involve violence, that the world can be changed through simple love, and hospitality.

Jesus was never going to be the kind of king that uses brute force and violence to achieve his aims.

The only thing that we can do to emulate Jesus is respond with compassion and love like he did. To be with people like he was. We can’t walk on water, we can’t miraculously heal lepers, we can’t resurrect people from the dead.

What we can do is open our homes, our lives, our society if we want to.

We can change the world through feeding those who are not fed. We can bring about the kingdom for those around us.

We are never going to fix all the world’s problems. Even though Jesus died human greed, sin and violence still carried on.

However, we know that God’s kingdom and kingship goes beyond what we can understand, that God had the ultimate and glorious victory over sin and death when he nailed himself to the cross.

The kingdom is now. We just have to join in with it. So be a presence of comfort in your communities. Feed people, spiritually or literally. Offer companionship and share the hope within you. Get your friends and neighbours to pass that hope on, and you never know what might happen.

Never has Jesus' words to Peter, 'Feed my lambs' meant more. 

Love wins. It always will. Jesus fought for love, and not through violence, but with hospitality.

The Pharisees may have misunderstood, but for us we understand, that Christ gives us a mandate to feed others, and to be all that we can be.