A Gospel for all - whether they know it or not

Readings for Proper 13 A - Isaiah 55.1-5; Rom 9.1-5; Matt 14.13-21

People cannot sign up for the things they do not know they need. Sometimes they do not sign up even for things that they acknowledge might be a benefit in their lives, which is of course why so many European churches attract so many fewer people than once filled their pews; and not even the cheesiest grin proclaiming the cheeriest welcome with the warmest insistence that ‘yes! you would be very welcome among us’ is, demonstrably, quite enough to bridge the psychological moat which seems to surround churches for millions of our fellow citizens.

Yet here we are again, faced with readings from Scripture which go out of their way to insist that God calls everyone to the feast. The prophet Isaiah, writing in the aftermath of the Babylonian Exile, and the complete crisis in confidence felt by those who had known themselves to be the Chosen People of God, living in covenant through the succeeding monarchs of the royal House of David, assures his readers that the covenant now is with all of them: any and every one of the servants of the Lord is welcome to the rich food and wine, and the refreshing water of the divine banquet that celebrates life in God.

The gospel accounts of the feeding of the multitudes, presented in Mark and Matthew as a pair of stories, are in the same business of banging the gong and shouting ‘Come all ye!’ The feeding of the Five Thousand, yielding twelve baskets of scraps, represents the coming of Christ for the twelve tribes of Israel with their five books of the law.

The feeding of the Four Thousand – those from all the world’s compass-points – yields seven baskets of fishy leftovers, representing the seven ancient tribes of the non-Jewish world – the Amorites, Canaanites, Hivites and Hittites; old uncle Tom Cobley and all.

And between the two stories is the healing of the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman. You see, whatever Jesus might say, he hasn’t just come ‘for the lost sheep of the House of Israel’, but for all of us. And we absolutely share Saint Paul’s incomprehension and sadness (expressed extensively in Romans 9 to 11) that his and our fellow countrymen prefer not to accept Christ’s invitation.

But I am not sure that such a response gets us very far. Indeed, perhaps it simply takes our eye off the ball. Perhaps each of us can and should assess only our own response to Christ’s call, and deal with our own wayward propensity to focus on ‘that which is not bread’ and to labour for that which does not ultimately satisfy us.

The loaves and fishes, bread and wine, are here for us all. All you and I can do is to make sure that we are here to receive them, and to be filled, formed and fashioned by them into whatever Christ would have us be.