What is it?

Pr. Craig M. Mueller

What is it?

Imagine it. The plate is placed on the table in front of you. You look at the food. Perhaps with curiosity. Or anticipation. Maybe even apprehension. The food looks kind of weird to you. And then you think it, or you say it: What is it?

Depending on how you say it, it will sound differently to the cook or the host or your dining companion. What is it? What is it? Some of my cooking is greeted that way—with wonderment, or with gratitude, or sometimes a little bit of “I don’t know if I want to eat that right now.”

Maybe you are a finicky eater. You can take an online quiz (of course) to see how many foods you check off and whether you are a picky eater! Some foods on the list: black olives, anchovies, eggplant, brussels sprouts, avocado, blue cheese, tofu, mango, turnips, liver. How do you score so far?

We are a society that obsesses over food. Many live with food insecurity. A new book called Franchise explores the role of McDonald’s and fast food in African American communities, and the rising rates of obesity and diabetes. Meanwhile, others are reading labels and going on diets—worrying about health, or obsessed with the perfect body images we see in advertising.

What is it? Either we overindulge or we don’t allow ourselves to enjoy this simple pleasure of life?

One writer says, “it would not be a gross exaggeration to say that the Bible is a culinary manual, concerned from start to finish about how to eat, what to eat, when to eat” (Laura Winner) and to who to eat with.

What is it? It’s my favorite line from the story of the Israelites wandering in the wilderness. How quickly they forget that they were slaves in Egypt. That life was hard. They’re longing for the meat and the melons and the fresh baked bread they had there. And they do what we do, right. They complain. They whine. They murmur against Moses. You brought us out here to die. We detest, we despise this miserable desert food, like cactus soup every meal. Take us back to the good old days!

Yet God hears their cry. God provides what they need—God provides what we need, even if it’s not always what we want. God rains down bread from heaven. That’s what the text says. Every morning there is this fine, flaky substance on the ground. And you know what the people say when they see it: what is it? Man hu, manna in Hebrew, means “what is it?” But I wonder. Was it a cynical “what is it?” A curious “what is it?” Or a grateful “what is it?”

What is it? Such a great question. What is it about these times? What is it about masks and viruses and vaccines? What is it about the growing, never-ending antagonism Americans feel toward one another? Or the fear, the cynicism, the Covid exhaustion? Weather patterns out of control. Take us back to Egypt. Take us back to the good old days. Sure, they weren’t perfect. We had what we needed. Now we’re not so sure. We’re not even so sure what we even need. Sure, God provides manna. What is God providing us? The miracle of the feeding of the five thousand last week? Is Jesus going to pull off that kind of magic in our secular, cynical time? What is it? What is going to get us through this.

Read between the lines. Jesus is a bit cynical, too, in the gospel. After the great multiplication of loaves and fish, the crowds are hungry for more. Sure. Jesus heals people and feeds people and reaches out to needy people. But now he is ready to go deeper. “You’re just back to find me because you liked the miracle bread. And you got enough to fill your belly. But you have a deeper hunger as well. A hunger for true and abundant life. A hunger for meaning. A hunger for justice. A hunger that only God can fill.”

And then this Jesus of the gospel John, drops a doosie. One of the 26 “I am” statements in John. Calling to mind the “I am” God of the Hebrew scriptures. “What is it” becomes “who is it.” I am the bread of life, Jesus says. I am the manna that God provides. Come to me and you will never hunger. Come to me and you will be satisfied.

The medieval mystic, Catherine of Sienna wrote, “You, eternal Trinity, are Table and Food and Waiter for us.” What is it? What kind of bread is this? Wonder bread? Whole wheat? Multi-grain? Pita, naan, tortilla? Makes me think of bread at communion. How can it not? There’s the manna-like wafer that some of us grew up with, that literally melted in your mouth. There’s home- baked communion bread. And now in the covid age, some churches use little pre-packaged sanitary bread and wine combo kits. Tear off one side and there is a wafer. Turn it over. Tear off the top of the other end and there is a mini shot glass of wine. How many ways you can you say: what is it?

For Lutherans and sacramental Christians, the eucharist is what God provides. To feed, nourish, strengthen and sustain us through the wilderness of this world. During the pandemic churches had to make quick decisions and do the best they could. Some churches fasted from communion. Others served it outside or in a parking lot. Others experimented with online communion. What have we learned? How does God provide? What is community? Can it happen online? How do we gather as the body of Christ? Churches and pastors and bishops and theologians will be talking these things for years to come, I assure you.

A century ago some Lutherans had communion four times a year. For decades we moved toward celebrating the eucharist every Sunday—as the very heart of our life together. And now many of us are out of the habit. Or we’re not in person at church like we used to be. Or for some, sadly, they realized they could live without it.

What is it? What is this mystery of Christ’s real presence among us? The body of Christ not only in the bread, but in the community surrounding us, supporting us. And in the faces of the poor and all those in need.

Yes, we learned than we can experience more than we thought online. The eucharist, however, is an embodied sacrament, a communal meal, a gift of God we most fully experience together. I hope I’m not just longing for the good old days. I hope it will be safe for us all of us to regularly and often return in person. For there is something here that God provides. Sacred space. Singing together. And receiving the bread of life together.

What is it? Let’s keep asking the question. For God is manna. Food. Grace. The bread of life that satisfies our hunger.

Even and especially for our time.