Believing in Jesus
John 6:24-35 + August 06, 2006

Have you ever done the right thing for the wrong reason? Do you know of anyone else who has ever done the right thing for the wrong reason? Today we meet Jesus the day after the feeding of the 5,000. Jesus chastises the crowd that follows him for doing the right thing for the wrong reason. You're following me because I fed you, because I filled your stomachs, and for free. Don't waste your energy on that. If that's why you're here, you might as well go home. That food I gave you yesterday, the bread and fish, that won't last. Work for the food that sticks with you, food that nourishes your lasting life, food that the Son of Man provides. That's where you'll get the real return on your investment. The Son of Man and what he does are guaranteed by God the Father to last."¹

Once again, Jesus is frustrated. Just like he was last week, second-guessing himself, trying new and different ways to get through to these people who don't see beyond what they want now. But Jesus is gaining traction here. Now, at least, they engage in a dialogue. Now, they ask, "Well, what do we have to do then to get in on God's works?" And in our translation today, Jesus says, "Believe in him whom he has sent." Last week I mentioned two themes that dominate John's Gospel. One is the idea that God is accessible to us in the person of Jesus. The other is that God comes to us in Jesus so that we might have life in all its fullness, in its abundance. Today I would add one more theme that dominates John's Gospel from start to finish: the notion of belief.

What does it mean to believe in Jesus -- to have faith in Jesus? We Lutherans speak a lot about justification by grace through faith. We emphasize that we are saved by faith, not works. So what is faith; what does it mean to believe? What does Jesus mean when he says today, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent?" (John 6:29) Today's sermon is the second in a series of five from chapter 6 of John's gospel on the Bread of Life. What we explore today will lay the groundwork for what we explore next week, namely who should be welcome at the Table of our Lord -- and who should get turned away? What role does faith play in Holy Communion?

What comes to your mind when you hear Jesus' summons to believe? Most of us think of belief as giving our mental assent to something, agreeing that something is true. In the Middle Ages in Europe, Christianity was not only the dominant religion, it was the conventional wisdom of the culture, and so it was relatively effortless to affirm or assent to Christian doctrine. It was not about whether you believed this to be true, but about your relationship to that sacred reality everybody took for granted as real.² In the Middle Ages, if the people were fish, Christian doctrine and practice was the water in which they swam. Would anyone ask a fish if she believed in water? Believing Christian doctrine to be true was a given.

But things change. Soon came the enlightenment of the 17th century and the birth of modern science. Gradually, the central claims of the Christian tradition no longer looked like bedrock truth to many people. They became questionable, and so belief, or faith, was distorted into the way we most often understand it today: giving your mental assent to the creed, to the Bible, to Christian doctrine.³ Before Benjamin Franklin flew his kite and discovered electricity, people believed that lightning was the means by which God expressed anger. And so the clergy opposed lightning rods on houses -- because they might thwart God's intentions. Franklin countered by pointing out that we put roofs on houses so that we're protected from the rain. Our worldview has changed. We completely miss the Gospel if we think that Jesus is asking us to reject scientific knowledge when he says, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."

For Lutherans especially, if faith means believing right things, we're completely contradicting ourselves. We are not saved by our works, by what we do, but rather by our faith. BUT, when we narrow faith down to mean assent to statements that in our post-enlightenment world are problematic, we turn faith itself into a work. We've lost the Gospel, and we start to do the right things for the wrong reasons. We secretly say to ourselves we don't quite buy all that stuff, but we can't tell anybody that, so we just don't talk about it. Or we might lift up our doubts during the silence in the confession. We think doubts are sins. We come to church because we want to see our friends and family, so we keep that belief stuff in its Sunday morning box. And secretly we're grateful that we go to a church that won't demand too much of us, that won't challenge our lifestyle choices or the way we think. And at the same time, we still get to go to heaven when it's all over. Quite a deal! And today, Jesus says to us, "You are looking for me, not because you saw signs -- not because you saw God in my actions, but because you got what you wanted out of the deal." You're doing the right thing for the wrong reasons. And you don't have to. I'm reminded of the poster that says, "Jesus died to save you from your sins, not your mind." The grace of God frees us to question our faith, and to talk about it in community.

The author Marcus Borg comments that when we tie faith up with believing right things, Christian faith becomes distorted and we become distracted. Remember that Luther, in the small catechism, says, "I cannot by my own understanding or strength believe in Jesus Christ my Lord?but instead the Holy Spirit has called me and kept me in true faith..." We make faith dependent on what WE think or don't think, and not on whoGod is, what God does, and how God does it. I'm reminded of the person who said to his pastor, "I don't believe in God." And the pastor said, "Tell me about the God you don't believe in. I probably don't believe in that God either."

So what is Jesus asking of us today? What does he mean when he says, "This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."? Eugene Peterson's translation in The Message puts it this way: "Throw your lot in with the One that God has sent. That kind of a commitment gets you in on God's works....I am the Bread of Life. The person who aligns with me hungers no more and thirsts no more, ever."

When we say the Apostles' Creed together, we begin with the words, "I believe." The Latin word "credo" is translated "I believe." That's where the word "creed" comes from. The roots of those words do not mean, "I agree with my intellect that the following statements are true." They mean, rather, "I give my heart to, I give my self at its deepest level to." To what do I give my heart -- these statements? No, I give my heart to God. In the English language before the Enlightenment -- Shakespeare and before -- the word "believe" invariably means "love." Ultimately, what we believe really means what we love.⁴ So -- "This is the work of God," Jesus says, "That you love -- that you hold as beloved, that you be faithful to your relationship with, that you hold in trust, that you give your heart to, the One whom God has sent." Just think, with that, it could become effortless to do the right things for the right reasons. AMEN.

Pastor Dana Runestad
6 August 2006
Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Livonia, Michigan

¹ Adapted from Eugene Peterson's interpretive translation in The Message.
² Marcus Borg, Hundere Professor of Religion and Culture, Oregon State University, in a sermon, "What is Faith?" preached as part of the Lenten Noonday Preaching Series, Calvary Episcopal Church, Memphis, Tennessee, 16 March, 2001.
³ Ibid.
⁴ Ibid.

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