READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Exodus 16:2-21
Galatians 4:21-31
- St. John 6:1-15
May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of
God and of Jesus our Lord. (2 Pet 1)
Who speaks to you on this day from His Gospel heard, saying:
“He said this to
test him, for He Himself knew what He would do”
We are to hear today’s Gospel to learn of the foolishness of
God. How He died for sinners who hate Him and yet it is the wisdom hidden from
before the ages. We do not need to make fools of ourselves, believing that is
how God acts. We simply believe and receive His wisdom in the folly of broken
Body, given for you, and His sainting of sinners.
They call it April Fools Day, this coming Tuesday, as if it
is something fun and silly, which is what we usually do with important history.
We foolishly forget details, but remember it only during partying. St.
Patrick’s Day and Valentine’s Day fall under this abuse.
The very first April fools were allegedly pranked in the
16th century, by Pope Gregory XIII when he decided the world needed a new
calendar. And since he was pope, he was in charge of the world. For foolish
reasons we won’t get into today, part of the change was moving the new year
from Easter (around April 1), to January 1. Those who weren’t in the know about
the time change, were called April fools, as they still hadn't adopted the new
New Year. Losers.
Thus, it used to be, even in our own lifetimes, that fools
were bad things. One did not want to be foolish or be called a fool. In fact,
many Christian families banned the word “fool” from their household because of
Jesus’s warning in St. Matthew 5:22, “But I say to you that whoever is angry
with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And
whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But
whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire.”
Today, pop-intelligence has changed all that and it is cool
to be called a fool. In literature and media, the foolish are to be coddled and
praised, for they are victims. In satanic arts, there is a Fool card and it
allegedly foretells of new adventure. That in purity and innocence, we all
start out a new chapter in life to learn its lessons. We may face mountains or
cliffs, but our optimism will get us through. A leap of faith, if you will!
Worse than all that, there are so-called Christians who also
want to be fools. Fools for Jesus, as if that makes it better. This is all
because of one fraction of one verse in 1 Corinthians 4:10 saying, “We are
fools for Christ's sake”. From this, they not only throw away intelligence
and debate of important topics in American Christianity, but also they have
sanctioned foolishness as sainthood in both the East and the West churches;
Orthodox and Rome.
And it is as ridiculous as you imagine, as canonized
sainthood usually gets. With foolish actions ranging from being homeless on
purpose, to sleeping naked on church-porches, to acting the lunatic. Of course,
the holy fool is not a real fool, he’s just pretending in order to make a point
or to shock people. Sounds like demon possession and hypocrisy to me.
“Fool” in the Bible is 99% a bad thing. From, “The fool
says in his heart there is no God”, in Psalm 14:1, to Jesus on Easter Day
rebuking the disciples saying, “O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe
all that the prophets have spoken!” (Lk 24:25)
So what’s different about that 1 Corinthians verse? St. Paul
is being sarcastic! Sarcasm in the Bible?! Nooooo.
Context will give us the truth. St. Paul begins these
thoughts with the dogma that Christ is the only foundation (1 Cor 3:11) and
that believers are God’s Temple, already built on that Foundation (3:16). All
things are already yours (3:21) and you are Christ’s (3:23). This means that no
one should be able to trick you into seeking and finding a righteousness that
is apart from Christ, such as a foolish righteousness.
As examples, St. Paul talks of the slaves of that Temple,
the pastors, of which he is one. He wants them to be known as stewards, not
fools. “Stewards of the mysteries of God”. Not mysteries as in “the unknown” or
“unintelligible”, but mysteries as in “how did God do that?”
How has God justified me by His Son when I do not fear,
love, and trust Him completely? How did God take on human flesh? How can water
do such great things? How can a man forgive my sins? How can bodily eating and
drinking do such great things??
Repent! There is no mystery in God’s will, as we said last
week, and there is no mystery in His plan and purpose for all things. And yet,
this is exactly where you assign mystery to God’s Work. Why? Because you don’t
want handouts. You don’t want regular old moldy bread from the hands of God,
you want adventure in the great wide somewhere. You don’t want fish. You don’t
want water.
And if you must take those things from God, you better be
able to conjure them up all the time to impress your friends, in His Name, of
course. God better make it so that His bread is super bread, so that His water
is super water, and so that His words are super words. You know propelling us
to heaven and making the sun stand still and stuff. Because you loathe this
worthless food, these worthless gifts God is handing out.
And there is the danger that St. Paul goes on to warn about.
When we involve ourselves in thinking bad is good or that being foolish is some
sort of super-holy-living, we go beyond what we have been taught and what has
been written.
“I have applied all these things to myself and Apollos
for your benefit, brothers,” he says back to 1 Corinthians, “that you
may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be
puffed up in favor of one against another. For who sees anything different in
you? What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do
you boast as if you did not receive it?” (4:6-7). Foolish.
For, “That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and
faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them
everywhere in every church” (4:17).
And what is it that St. Paul teaches? “For I received
from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night
when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and
said, ‘This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me…For as
often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death
until he comes” (1 Cor 11:23-26).
Meaning, true Christian foolishness for Christ is found in
us foolishly adhering to and clinging to the Word and Sacrament. When the world
says, that’s stupid, we say forgiveness. When the world says “thou fool!”, we
say “Blessed is He Who comes in the Name of the Lord”. When our sinful nature
says, “grumble grumble”, Christ says “eat to the full”.
For let us not forget the biggest fool of all: God. Forgive
me! In the beginning He created all things and just hands them over to
newborns! What did He expect to happen? Then, the descendants of those newborns
need rescue, so He floods the whole earth. Later on, He finds the most
stiff-necked (Ex 32:9), lying (Amos 2:4), harlotrous (Ez 16:25), and unreliable
(Hos 5:11) people on earth to make His own people.
Upon those people stumbling, sinning, and rejecting God to
His face, He then chooses to destroy them. But His choice of destruction, as He
promised, did not come in the usual way of the foolish world; drones and stuff.
It came first in the destruction of His own self. God’s wrath against sin
mobilized all His might to strike one man: Jesus Christ.
Yes, the Fool Who feeds the masses, Who heals the sick, Who
raises the dead, Who gets caught, suffers, and will not remove Himself from the
cross of shame. That Fool Who believes that His Body and Blood can pay for the
sin of the world. That fool Who dies for those Who hate Him. That Fool Who
creates His Church and leaves it to men.
The Holy One of God, that Famous-est Preacher and healer,
hides Himself in His Word and Sacrament. It is impossible to redeem such people
with Blood, but Christ does it. It is impossible to feed such ingrates with
bread, but Christ does it. It is impossible says the devil, the world, and our
sinful nature, for an almighty God to become flesh and accomplish His work, in
the flesh.
To be a true fool for Christ is to believe and receive His
work, accomplished for you, no matter what the world and our sinful senses
scream at us. To be a fool for Christ is to cling to His Holy Church throughout
the ages, when the devil wants us to progress and move beyond it. To be a fool
for Christ, is to not rant and rave as the world does, but to pray and receive
as the Church does.
And will always do! This is not the new way of doing Church,
neither was it new to the Apostles or the Prophets. The Lord has always chosen
the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. There is no special
reason Israel was chosen, except to show God’s glory in His own work, not
theirs.
There is no special reason Jesus became flesh and cares for
His Church today by Word and Sacrament alone, except to show us up. Where we
perceive ourselves to be the great movers and shakers of the Church, inventing
this new program or that new way of worship, Christ shows up with a splash of
water and says, “wait till you see what I can do with this”.
There just is no boasting in the Church with the world’s
foolishness of hypocrisy, for the fool believes there is no God Who would stoop
so low as to become the Servant of man. Jesus does not allow our works to
eclipse His works. His works may seem like foolishness, but they are
foolishness with power.
Man’s foolishness divides, believing that we receive more
favor from God by going beyond what He has taught and handed out Himself. God’s
foolishness is the power to save, for it is the word of the cross. It is the
Word of Christ Crucified, foolishness to the world, but the power and wisdom of
God, to those who are being saved (1 Cor 1:18, 23-24).
And since our Apostles, prophets, and pastors have
determined to know nothing except Jesus Christ and Him Crucified (1 Cor 2:2),
through the folly of that preaching (1:21) the Spirit’s power comes among us
and our faith rests not in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God (2:5).
The secret and hidden wisdom of God (2:7), hidden only from
the “wise” (2:14), is discerned only by the mind of Christ (2:16). And the mind
of Christ is, as stated, Christ’s alone. He has it. Just as you have your own
mind, words, and deeds, so Christ.
And part of that secret is revealed to us today as Jesus
hands out bread and fish of His own self. That His wisdom and secret are not to
remain secret, but to be known. For in His greatest, fool act, He unites
Himself to us, sharing His Body, sharing His Blood, and sharing His mind. We do
not progress into the mind of Christ, but are baptized into it.
In the feeding of the 5000, Jesus begins to reveal the joy
of being fed by Christ, not just externally, but now as a part of His Body. Fed
as He is fed. Nourished as He is nourished. Resurrected as He is
resurrected.
This union is important, because while we have to play the
fool in this life, being overly optimistic, throwing caution to the wind, and
beginning, ending and beginning things again in our lives, Christ does not
change, for us. Though we think we need to move the goalposts to continue to
please Him, He is not moved.
He continues to sit in the same spot, day after day, that
right hand of God to which He ascended, distributing handouts. And unlike
earthly handouts, His produce life and are Life. He calls out daily, hourly,
secondly; as at the first hour, so at the second, the third, and even the
11:59th, “Whoever is simple, let him turn in here! As for him who lacks
understanding, [HE] says to him,
‘Come, eat of my bread And drink of the wine I have
mixed. Forsake foolishness and live,
And go in the way of understanding’” (Proverbs 9:4-6).
“Rejoice with Jerusalem,” with the Church, our Lord proclaims
in our Introit for today. Rejoice with the Church “and be glad with her, all
you who love her; Rejoice for joy with her, all you who mourn for her;”
And Isaiah goes on to say why: “That you may feed and be
satisfied with the consolation of her bosom (Christ), that you may drink
deeply and be delighted with the abundance of her glory (Christ again). For
thus says the Lord: Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river, And the
glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream. Then you shall feed; On her sides
shall you be carried, and be dandled on her knees. As one whom his mother
comforts, So I will comfort you;
And you shall be comforted in Jerusalem.” (66:10-13)
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