The lessons for each Sunday in the church year proclaim God’s grace in Jesus Christ. Also derived from a Sunday’s texts are lessons for the Christ-inspired and Christ-like life of God’s people. The comments here will help you find hunger-related threads – sermon starters – among the themes of this day’s texts. (We're presuming you have already done your exegetical work on the texts.) God bless your proclamation (and teaching) of what is most certainly true!

This Sunday many of the youth in this church will be reflecting on what it means to be “citizens with the saints” at the 2012 National Youth Gathering. A key focus of their time will be the reconciliation that comes in Christ and the way in which the barriers that divide us have been struck down. Hunger and poverty are often justified by the various “isms” that plague us today—racism, sexism, classism, and so on. Christ has broken those barriers and there is no reason why anyone should be marginalized and vulnerable. What barriers do we allow to stand? What barriers might God be calling us to break today?

The Old Testament lesson and the Psalm provide an important lens through which to read this week’s Gospel. Jeremiah tells of a time when a “good shepherd” will come and execute justice. Other shepherds did not care for the sheep but this new shepherd will. In the Gospel, prior to Jesus feeding the 5000, he has compassion on them because they are like sheep without a shepherd. As the shepherd of God’s flock, Jesus feeds (and then in vv.53-56 heals) them. We are called to continue in this feeding and healing activity.

The feeding of the 5,000 (men) is one of the few miracles recorded in all four Gospels. This alone suggests the importance of the daily Christian life. The Jesus’ ministry is punctuated by meeting the concrete needs of those who were hungry. We are called to faithfully follow Christ's example.

In today's Gospel, we see several unique features (as often happens in John's Gospel, the evangelist has his own story to tell). Two of the features have bearing on how we understand the church's role in addressing hunger and poverty. First, the detail about the boy with two fish and five barley loaves is unique to John. His account is likely influenced by the OT reading assigned today wherein Elisha fed 100 men with 20 barley loaves (in spite of the protest from the servant). The point for us today is that the boy gave faithfully what he had (and it was not much!) and Jesus used it far beyond what was imaginable. The question for us is what do we have? How might God multiply it to feed those who are hungry?

Second, John ties this miraculous feeding to later Eucharistic practices, bringing in language of thanksgiving and later explaining that Jesus is the "bread of life" and that everyone must eat (literally "munch") his flesh and drink his blood. This is an important reminder that our Eucharistic practices are much more that ritual. The sacramental feeding at the table spurs us to real feeding in the world. How might our ritual practices obscure this? What changes do we need to make at the table (perhaps even just for this week) to reflect this larger call?