What's for Lunch?

Read John 4

Jesus had talked with this Samaritan woman at the well in Sychar, which is in Samaria. The disciples had been in town rounding up some grub.  I guess it takes 12 men to find something to eat. 

When they returned, they witnessed the tail end of a conversation between Jesus and a Samaritan woman.  This was not something you would expect to see, but the disciples neither asked Jesus nor chastised the woman.

They did ask Jesus if he wanted something to eat.  He replied, “I’m good.”

Actually, he said that he had food that the disciples didn’t know about.

What?  Did he get delivery? Had he been packing extra rations for the trip?

Jesus said that his food was to do the will of his Father. 

“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”

Have you ever been working at something so intently that you forgot to eat?  It’s not that you couldn’t spare the hour, it’s that your task or mission was so consuming that it sustained you.

Doing the will of his Father sustained Jesus.  It’s not that he did not eat.  He did.  He ate with religious leaders and with sinners.  The Last Supper is surely the most widely known meal in history.

Jesus lived a human life and ate and drank and did everything that human metabolism required, but on this occasion, he was sustained simply by doing what his Father sent him to do.

The conversation then shifted from what Jesus had for lunch to the harvest of souls for eternal life.  One sows.  One harvests.  The two work together.

The disciples could relate to seed time and harvest. 

Today we find ourselves in the same situation.  Some sow and some harvest.  Some will plant the seeds of life in Jesus Christ; yet it is another who finally leads the person to salvation.

The true work is from the Holy Spirit, but we have our parts.  Too often, we limit ourselves to those that sow seeds, but sometimes we are called to be part of the harvest. 

As we consider the present disruption of the comfort zones of many people who previously served the gods of Apathy and Ambivalence, we should see it’s time for us to be a part of the harvest.  Seeds have already been sown in most.

Fulfilling our commissions should be sustaining to us.  That doesn’t mean that we don’t need to eat.  We do.  It means that what we eat, drink, wear, and do with our days is subordinated to doing the will of our Father in heaven.

Jesus gave us a commission.  If we spent our days fulfilling it in every way, we might be tired at the end of that day, but living for the Lord will sustain us.

Human wisdom tells us that if we give everything that we have to something, that something will consume us.  We will burn out.

But God’s wisdom tells us that if we give all that we have to him, he will sustain us.

Enjoy your lunch when you can but let doing the will of the Father be our true sustenance.  He has work for us to do.  We sow and we reap for him and he will provision us and sustain us for that work.

Amen.