It happens all the time in big ways and small ways and sometimes on purpose. Like when my son Elijah says “thank you” in German -- Danke -- and I immediately reply Shein because of that old Neil Diamond song.** It drives him bonkers because he’s told me over and over that the appropriate response to Danke is bitte schön. But that is, of course, why I do it: It’s a game we play, and I love it. I think he does too, though he probably wouldn’t admit it. It happens in hilariously scripted and honest ways, too, when two people think they’re talking about the same thing but clearly aren’t, like in that old Abbott & Costello “Who’s on First” bit. And, of course, it happened a lot while we were in El Salvador, as I tried -- and failed -- to pull enough Spanish from memory to be conversational with our beloved siblings who don’t speak English. Sometimes, I knew just enough for them to get what I was saying, and to laugh as we all acknowledged I know un poquito Español. Other times, everything was lost in translation and we had no choice but to communicate through smiles, laughing, dancing, and that sacred unspeakable language of the soul that connects us when words cannot. But there are other times, still, when the misapprehension seems intentional. I’ve seen it a lot on social media where it’s so easy to hide behind avatars and forget that we’re relating to real humans on the other side of a screen. It’s easier, sometimes, to double down on ridiculous arguments even after we’ve been proven wrong, than to admit our mistake and move on. We try to save face but end up cutting off our own nose to spite it! I suspect that in today’s text -- which is the culmination of Jesus’s Bread of Life discourse in the synagogue at Capernaum -- that intentional misapprehension is at play, and Jesus knows it. Having gone back and forth with them multiple times, patiently suffering their grumbling retorts, he draws them at the close to a decision point with the simple and final declaration that those who receive the TRUE food and drink he offers abide in him, and he in them, and the Life which flows to him from the Eternal Father who IS Life, will flow into and sustain them for eternity. Here, I imagine the chat goes quiet for a bit, as they realize the debate is over. And many have to finally admit this is all too difficult, too harsh, too unyielding to comprehend or accept. To which Jesus says, “Yes! It is! But if this teaching offends you, how will you handle what’s to come?” And Jesus isn’t just talking in circles here. He is choosing and using precise language which he knows will create confusion, misunderstanding, and even offense for those who will not hear, so that those who do hear him will see the incarnate glory of the eternal Father -- and be prepared for the greater offense that is to come: When He will be raised upon the cross, “ascending to where he was before,” where the Powers and Principalities of this Age will devour his flesh, soak up his blood, and consume his suffering the way rust consumes everything it touches. The flesh, he goes on to say, isn’t the point; they all know he isn’t talking about cannibalism. Still, he affirms in verse 63 the Truth of Genesis 1: Life [zōē] comes as the Spirit [Pneuma], which hovered over the waters in the beginning, breathes into everything which The Living Word [Logos] spoke into existence. John’s readers will remember that This Living Word who was with God and was God from the Beginning, speaking all matter into being, then became matter. “The Word became Flesh and dwelt among us.” That’s what Jesus is telling them here: he is The Living WORD from eternity, who spoke all creation into being. And even after taking on Flesh, he is still speaking the words of eternal life which are Spirit Breath in all who believe. He is telling them, “Don’t get hung up on flesh here, because Flesh doesn’t give life; Flesh lives life. Flesh is the conduit through which Life [zōē]and Breath [Pneuma] flow, from the Living Father to the Living Word to all that is Their Living and Beloved Creation. If you’re confused, that’s okay! John’s gospel is confusing on purpose, always beckoning us to breathe it in and ask ourselves whether our desperation to comprehend the incomprehensible will drive us deeper into smoldering discontent? Or will it compel us to surrender to our inability to make sense of it all, receive it as an invitation to chew on [trōgōn], take in, and absorb [pinó / imbibe] the Life pulsing in the Word and his words, and to draw closer, trusting that knowing that comes not through intellect but through intimacy? Many walk away. They don’t like and don’t really want to understand what they’re hearing. It’s uncomfortable and offensive, and so they reject it. But Juxtaposed to that rejection, Peter’s confession is stunningly beautiful in its simplicity and humility: “Lord," he says, "to whom else can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe you are the Holy One of God” This belief is more than an affirmation or assent to what is true. It is an abiding closeness, affection, and intimacy that transcends the unknowable. They’ve bound themselves to Jesus -- and in Jesus to each other -- not because of what he says, nor even despite what they don’t understand, but because of who He is and the Life they experience both personally and mutually in his presence. Years ago, I wrote a love song for my now-husband when we were dating long distance. It’s called “Company.” And a few years ago, upon the request of his four daughters, I sang it at my dear friend Josh’s funeral. I thought it odd at first, but as I sang it that day, it made sense. This song written to express the love I share with my husband also expressed the love they knew with their dad -- and I think it expresses the transcendent closeness that binds Peter and the disciples to Jesus here in John 6. The chorus goes like this: It’s your company that I miss, the sweetness of your kiss, it’s your quiet tenderness. It’s you with me at the end of the longest day, and all the things that I cannot say This is what Jesus is inviting us into. It is not a promise of an easy or untroubled life -- in fact, it is quite the opposite. Yoked to Jesus, trouble and danger abound. Here I think of Pastora Gloribel who, just a few years ago, had to confront a violent gang by herself in order to bring home one of her congregants they had taken and presumably killed. Gloribel called both police and 911 multiple times asking for help, but they refused saying, “no, we will not go there. It’s too dangerous.” -- To them, her request was “too difficult to accept.” So she went on her own to where they were keeping her. She demanded entry and promised not to leave unless the woman came with her. At first they threatened to call the police and report her as a trespasser, to which she just said, “by all means please do!” Failing that, they threatened to kill her if she refused to leave, but still all she said was, “do what you must -- I am not leaving here without her.” And she stayed. For hours and hours, she stayed there alone at Evil’s doorstep, knowing full well the kind of violence they relished in, the kind of violence they might do to her if she didn’t give up and walk away. But she stayed. When she finally gained entrance and found this woman on the verge of death, 911 still would not send an ambulance to help. So she carried her in her own arms, through this gang house, laid her in her car and took her to the hospital -- where she died a couple days later. When I said I don’t know how she did that, Gloribel simply said, “God. God has called me to this work and God will sustain my life through it.” Where else could she go but to Christ, and, with Christ, to her people? We heard a lot of those stories during our time in El Salvador. And while I cannot comprehend their faith, I am desperate for it. Because theirs is a faith formed not by certainty, but its lack; not through ease but through fire. Our siblings there are fully awake to the cold, harsh, unyielding realities of this world, to all its danger, disease, war, death, to loss and all manner of difficult things, and their powerlessness to fix it and so they lean into the only source of Life that is constant and true: The Living Words of Christ. What I witnessed and experienced last week is, I think, the enfleshed, embodied, incarnation of all Jesus is screaming in this discourse, which is that Life always happens in relationship, whenever we show up. Messy, confused, imperfect — just show up. We cannot think ourselves into being or thriving — sorry, René Desartes. Nor can we experience aliveness exclusively in our own flesh. There is a reason people go crazy in solitary confinement — it’s because we cannot know or be known apart from each other. To Live, Jesus says, is to show up and stay close. To abide in and partake of the Word & Breath life-force of Christ, as Christ abides as One with the Creator and Spirit. To Live as Christ is to rebel against the cult of individuality in which survival is a series of transactions -- if I do this work of God, you will reward me with that prize -- and to choose instead, over and over, the Community of the Beloved. In Beloved Community, through mutuality, solidarity, and radical welcome, we bind up our lives, our liberation, our whole selves to each other’s. In Beloved Community, none of us is free until all of us are free; none of us lives unless all of us live, because it is all One Life. We are, together, living One Life. Friends, let me close with this: we do not go as white saviors to El Salvador, to trade charity for accolades. We go as siblings, friends, as family whose wounds are our wounds, and whose wins are our wins. We are partners in the gospel -- as Paul was with the Phillipians -- both giving and receiving God’s abundant Life in as many unique expressions as there are people who show up. But we’ve got to show up. So let us, Beloved of God: Let us show up. Amen.
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