Feeding and being fed

It is so comforting to read the Bible. Except when it isn’t. There is so much that we read about the love of God, his action for us and his saving power. That’s the comforting part. And then there are the other parts - the ones that challenge us and give us a good dressing down. One of the values of following some systematic system of reading the Bible, such as a lectionary, is that it keeps us from just returning to the comfort and forces us to encounter the challenge. Both are necessary.

For example, I was reading in Hebrews today (from the BCP lectionary) and read this:

About this I have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food. (Hebrews 5:11-12)

Now wouldn’t that go over well coming from the pulpit on a Sunday morning? It is not the sort of thing we usually hear, although there must be circumstances in the 2000 years since the writing of this epistle that something very similar needed to be said.

The heart of the challenge is to grow up spiritually. The author had been writing about Jesus as high priest, offering himself in suffering, learning obedience through that suffering and being made perfect. That is indeed hard to explain to us who are comfort lovers.

Later in chapter 6 he has an image of what these milk-feeders are like:

For the land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it, and produces a crop useful for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned. (Hebrews 6:7-8)

Very pointed and not very comforting. I have heard the complaint from many a Christian that “I am not being fed.” I wonder what the writer to the Hebrews would have thought of that. Not much, is my guess. By now you should be feeding others, not being fed yourself. You are taking in the rain and producing weeds.

Once, at the end of a long day of Jesus’ teaching before thousands of people, the disciples, likely tired and hungry, suggest to Jesus that he send them away to buy food. And Jesus says, “you give them something to eat.” (Matthew 14:16) They have very little to offer, but Jesus takes it and makes it enough. What is interesting is that the people are filled and satisfied and so are the disciples.

Are you hungry? “By this time you ought to be teachers.” Try feeding others. You might find that you become filled yourself.