Psalm 78: 23-29 Exodus 16: 2-4, 9-15
Ephesians 4: 1-16 John 6: 24-35
May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. Amen.
Eight year old Chase was at the Greenwood Seafair Parade with his family when he caught a glimpse of what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. He wanted to ride a unicycle. You see, Chase saw a group of middle school students riding in the parade, each of them proudly perched on the seat of a unicycle, doing that very peculiar and very particular unicycle move (here, it is demonstrated by the preacher!)
Immediately Chase began to beg his parents for a unicycle. Oh, please, please, please, please, please….if he could just have a unicycle to ride he would be the happiest boy on earth! No amount of distraction could dissuade Chase from his pursuit of happiness on one wheel. It did not matter to him that sitting in the garage were a bicycle, a tricycle, a pair of rollerblades, and a skateboard…all of which he had wanted with equal passion. No, Chase was certain that the key to his future happiness and success in life was going to be found on one wheel.
So, his parents, acquiesced…grew weary…gave in…call it what you want…and bought the unicycle. There it was leaning against the side of the house when Chase came home. As any eight year old boy who has been longing for a unicycle would do, Chase fearlessly ran up to the unicycle and realized…he had no idea….none, how to get on the thing. And when his father put him on it, Chase soon realized he had no idea how to stay on the thing.
How many of you have ever wanted something so badly that you gave no thought to the possibility that once you had it, you’d have no idea what to do with it? I had that thought shortly after the birth of my first child. But for the piano purchased with dreams of a quick concerto, or the video game system purchased without a thought to how the games are played….the story of learning to ride the unicycle is repeated many times over.
In the reading from Exodus today, we hear the story of the Israelites complaining to Moses and Aaron that they really, really, really wish they had something decent to eat, even if it means being held as slaves by the Egyptians again. Really, if they could just have some FOOD, everything would be ok.
Of course, the problem wasn’t really that they didn’t have food, the problem was that they didn’t have a good grasp of how to be the people that God had called them to be. They didn’t know how to live as free people….all they knew was how to live as captives, prisoners, slaves.
So they whine to Moses and Aaron, who intervene on their behalf with God, who promises to send them food. Probably not exactly the food they had hoped for, certainly not the food they were used to. But this story says that God is not giving them food because they whined and complained…but that God is giving them food in order to determine whether they will be able to follow God’s instruction. Oh, sure, they thought they just wanted to eat and be full, but God has something more in mind.
This story from Exodus closely connects to the Gospel story today. The crowds of people are searching for Jesus. In fact, they look for him with such diligence that they go to the other side of the sea, which was likely more like a small lake, to find him. And Jesus calls them out by saying that they didn’t really come looking for him, they came because they had eaten until their bellies were full from just those five loaves and two fish. That’s what they really want. More food, not more Jesus.
In both readings, the people of God, Israel in the Exodus reading and the crowds in the reading from John, are trying to figure out how to be the people of God. In Exodus, how to live in freedom as God’s chosen people and in John how to follow Jesus, not because of what was in it for them, but because of what was in it for others.
Now, I’m going to return to the unicycle analogy. Because learning how to be the people of God and learning how to follow Jesus…well, that might be even harder, if Scripture and history and personal experience are any indicators, than riding a unicycle.
So, just how does one learn to ride a unicycle, you might be wondering right about now. To find out the answer to just this question, I went to www.howtorideaunicycle.net. No, really, I did. And this website had lots of useful information. It probably would have even been useful to the Israelites or to the crowd following Jesus. It might even prove useful to us today.
According to our friends at howtorideaunicycle.net, there are three basics: 1) Be familiar with the unicycle; 2) Look for a good place to practice; and 3) Get ready to mount the unicycle.
Being familiar with one’s faith, just as one is familiar with a unicycle is a fine place to figure out what it means to be the people of God. And we become familiar with our faith in many ways. By our presence in worship. In reading and studying Scripture…over and over again, as our summer study group is learning. In conversation with others, even of different faiths. In asking questions and in listening to one another. In prayer. We must be familiar with our unicycle!
And of course, looking for a good place to practice? There are two places that I think are good places to practice our faith: In here and Out there. In Here we do the work of the people in our liturgy. We pray, sing, confess, hear the word, preach the word, give and forgive. We eat and drink and wash in the waters. We take the bread of life, Jesus Christ himself. We gather and greet and share peace and send. That’s what we do In Here.
Then we go Out There and we serve. We serve meals and love and compassion and we give of ourselves over and over again just as Jesus gave of himself for us.
And whether we are practicing in here or out there, we do well to heed the words of Ephesians today. That in our serving we are humble and gentle, patient and loving.
And finally, we get ready to mount the unicycle. The instructions for this basic task says that it is most important to find a way to balance and that the most helpful way to do this is by having people on both sides of you, holding you up. (Pause)
There is no better way to come to understand our faith than by doing so in community. We are placed here, in this congregation, with our varied gifts…some are, as the letter to the Ephesians notes, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. And some of us are students and soccer players and mothers and fathers and children and partners. And one of us here, whom we welcome today…is our intern. Some of us are accountants and nurses and photographers and contractors and realtors and…well, you get the idea. But as we mount the unicycle, it is necessary, so critically, blessedly necessary…that we have people on both sides of us, holding us up when we begin to teeter in any direction.
Howtorideaunicycle.net goes on to offer some more specific tips. As I was reading, I was not sure whether we were still talking about unicycles at all. There were suggestions like:
Don’t ride too slowly, because it becomes more difficult to maintain your balance.
Falling off the front of the unicycle is likely and the only way to prevent this from happening is to pedal continuously.
Don’t worry about how you look while you are learning.
And finally, my favorite, and one for us to ponder awhile as we learn more about what it means to walk or ride, along this faith journey: If you do these things and still fall, get up and ride again. Everyone falls while they are learning.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
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