Have you anything here to eat? - April 18th, 2021

Have you anything here to eat?

A sermon preached by Rev. Ginger E. Gaines-Cirelli with Foundry UMC, April 18, 2021, Third Sunday of Easter, “Give Me A Word” series.

            Text: Luke 24:36a-48

“The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what, we must eat to live.” This line from Native American poet, Joy Harjo, came to mind as I pondered Jesus’ question in our text today: “Have you anything here to eat?” As a member of my Bible Study said this week, these words are so wonderfully human. 

The Jesus we meet today has been through so much—life, friendship, struggle, suffering, death on the cross, time in the tomb, and resurrection. He has walked the seven mile stretch from Jerusalem to Emmaus and shared a meal with some disciples who only recognize him when they’ve all sat down at the table to share a meal. 

Jesus promptly disappears from that table—and while off camera—he appears to Simon Peter. (Lk 24:34) And then, in our text today, Jesus shows up among the disciples in Jerusalem who are busy sharing stories of these encounters.

They were literally talking about having seen Jesus alive and yet, in this moment, they still can’t perceive who is with them. There might be any number of reasons for this—things happening too fast, emotional whiplash, being caught by surprise, seeing someone you’re not expecting in a time or place or way that is out of the ordinary… But whatever the case, Jesus makes very clear that he is really there, no mere apparition. He’s there in the flesh. Just as in the story last week from John, Jesus invites them to see and to touch the wounds in his flesh. And, oh, by the way, do y’all have anything around here to eat? 

Evidently, ushering in a whole new world makes a person hungry! Or perhaps, in his wisdom, Jesus realizes that, as in Emmaus, the way to open eyes and minds is to share a meal together. Isn’t this also wonderfully human? Not only sharing a meal with others, but talking about food helps us know and understand one another in deep ways. It opens up conversations about culture and values and family rituals. Who has the best BBQ? What is appropriately applied to grits? Where can you find the best tamales or dim sum or bulgogi or fried chicken or jollof rice or palm butter? Is lettuce technically “food?” Food is so elemental and formational in our lives. In so many ways “the world begins at a kitchen table”—or its cultural equivalent. Jesus did, in fact, show up at table after table and showed how to make a feast for thousands out of a bagged lunch. Food is key. Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised to hear Jesus ask, “Have you anything here to eat?”

It’s the question that sticks out of the story in a way that I can’t help but believe is intentional. It seems that resurrection life is not only a head trip or a spiritual experience in some disembodied way. It seems that resurrection life is not something that is experienced only in the hereafter when we have shaken off “this mortal coil.” We so often think of resurrection as only about what happens after physical death. And certainly the life with God and loved ones that awaits and the assurance that we need not be afraid of death are beautiful parts of the resurrection promise.

Yet in our story today Jesus reveals that resurrection life is also experienced in this world and is connected to bodies, to the needs of bodies, to the human lives and everyday concerns of bodies. Flesh and bone need care, need food. Consistently, the Jesus revealed in Luke is clear that the hunger and thirst in the world is not for righteousness, sustenance, and peace only in the next life but for those good gifts in this one. 

Remember it’s in Luke where we find Jesus’s first recorded sermon. He took as his text the words of Isaiah:

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
    because he has anointed me
        to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
    and recovery of sight to the blind,
        to let the oppressed go free,

 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Lk 4:18-19)

//  Please understand, I know Jesus said that thing in the wilderness about how “One does not live by bread alone.” (Lk 4:4) (I often debate Jesus on this point. I’m with Oprah. I love bread.) I am not suggesting that resurrection is only a physical experience. I’m simply amplifying the author of Luke who clearly stresses that God not only has the power to bring new life into this created world and into our own very human lives but is determined to use it.

And this resurrection power—the recreative power of God’s love—is at work in Jesus from the beginning. It’s there in his first sermon proclaiming fulfillment of liberation for the oppressed and restoration of health and economic justice—new life! Resurrection power is at work every time Jesus noticed the ones that others ignored, listened to the ones others shut down, welcomed the ones that others excluded, received the care of the ones others denied, touched the ones others avoided, ate with the ones others called “sinners.” Resurrection power—life-giving power—new creation power—was at work in Jesus’s life on both sides of the grave. 

We tend to focus on how what we do in this life will get us our resurrection ticket. Jesus encourages us to focus on how what is freely given in the resurrection affects what we do in this life. Notice that in our text Jesus doesn’t speak to the disciples about their life beyond the created world, but gives direction for their witness in the created world. 

Jesus reminds them of what he has said and what they have witnessed: 

They were there for the whole story—they experienced Jesus’s love and grace and wisdom and healing power. And they saw Jesus die a martyr’s death, an innocent victim of state violence. They know what happened. Jesus didn’t run. Didn’t get angry. Didn’t resist arrest. He turned toward those who’d decided he was the enemy with open hands and arms outstretched. He had truly done nothing wrong and, in solidarity and in peace he suffered the blows that the poor, oppressed, and victimized have suffered since the beginning. 

And now he stands before them again, a hungry, wounded savior asking, “What do you have here that will care for my body?” And in this, Jesus gently guides his disciples, then and now, toward caring for every hungry, wounded, victimized, oppressed body. Let this be your witness. Let this be part of your proclamation of “repentance and forgiveness of sins” (24:47)… Because the world failed Jesus. We didn’t get it right. But God’s unfailing love and the sacred resistance that is God’s refusal to abandon us, God’s stubborn belief in our capacity to change—is what Jesus confirms when he shows up on the far side of the tomb. We’ve been forgiven our failure and are invited to repent—to do it differently now, to change. 

Again and again, we are offered this grace, we are freely offered the broken body of Jesus… to perceive, to receive. If we are faithful, we will be witnesses not just to the story of Jesus, but also to the ongoing realities in our world for which we need to repent, the places of struggle, suffering, and pain our living Lord calls us to address with love and courage. In perceiving and receiving the risen, wounded Jesus, allow your hearts to be broken open so that love pours forth in concrete new-life making ways: nourishing food, accessible healthcare, safe working conditions, living wages, restorative justice, and dignity and care for bodies of all kinds. Suffering, hungry, wounded, neglected bodies all around us come asking, “Have you anything here to eat?”

This past week, police killed 20 year old Daunte Wright and 13 year old Adam Toledo while the trial of Derek Chauvin, the police officer charged with the murder of George Floyd, is underway. I cannot help but perceive Daunte, Adam, George, Breonna, Sandra, Ahmaud, Tamir, and a host of other victims of violences of every kind appearing among the disciples of Jesus and saying, “Look at me. Touch my wounds. Do you have anything here that can care for my body? Do you have anything that can give my body life? Can you do better next time?” The resurrection reveals to us more than a future promise for ourselves, it reveals to us a present call to healing, feeding, and justice.

Today we encounter the risen Jesus who extends to us love and friendship and mercy, who embodies the promise that God’s love is stronger than sin and death and who gives us this word for our contemplation and action: Do you have anything here to eat? 

Consider: another chance, new vision, new possibility, new freedom, new hope, a whole new world begins at a table with Jesus. Joy Harjo’s poem is not, as far as I know, meant to describe this particular table. But that’s what I receive when she says:

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

May the world end as we now know it…while we eat together and discover the whole new world God’s always had in store…

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