Voices Found: Breaking the Bread of Life, WLWC Lent III, VF 72, 73,

 

   

After Miriam led the Israelites across the Red Sea following Moses into the desert, the whole congregation of women and men grumbled against the leaders. They missed the meat, bread,  and garlic of Egypt.  The Wellspring of Life told Moses that She would provide them with bread raining down from heaven and that the people would have enough to eat, even in the desert.  Moses told his people, 

"When the Gracious One gives you all by evening meat to eat and bread in the morning, to the point of satisfaction, because the God Who Hears  has heard the grumbling that you grumble against God, what are we?  Your grumbling is not against us, but against the Mother of Creation."

Exodus 16: 8, tr. Gafney 

                                 

Many centuries later, St. Julian of Norwich wrote of God as Mother Creator;  Julian's  image of feminine Divinity from the 15th Century evokes the vision of  the Gracious One in the Hebrew Scriptures, the Mother of Creation who who fed Moses and his flock with manna and meat in the desert of the Exodus. 

Voices Found # 72

Mothering God you gave me birth 

In the bright morning of this earth. 

Creator, source of every breath, 

You are my rain, my wind, my sun. 

Mothering Christ, you took my form,

offering me your food of light, 

grain of life, and grape of love, 

your very body for my peace.

Words: Jean Wiebe Janzen after Julian of Norwich (ca. 1342-ca.1416)

Music: Ana Hernandez

                         

Jesus was teaching and preaching to a large crowd of about five thousand on the shores of Galilee.  At the end of the day, people were tired and hungry.  Jesus told the twelve male apostles to give the people something to eat; they said, 

"We have no more than five loaves and two fish lest we go buying food for all these people." ... Then Jesus said to his disciples (a larger group that included women), "Sit them down in groups of about fifty each."  The disciples did so and the people complied.  And taking the five loaves and two fish, Jesus looked up to heaven  and blessed and broke them, and gave them to the disciples to set before the crowd.  And all--including women and children--ate and were filled.  and the remainder was gathered up, twelve baskets of broken pieces.  Luke 9:13-17, tr. Gafney

                                                     

Four centuries after St. Julian,  Mary A. Lathbury, known as "Poet Laureate and Saint of Chautauqua," wrote hymns and educational materials for the Methodist Church in the 19th century.  In this hymn, Mary, like Julian,  sings of the nurturing Christ the Lord who feeds his   hungry people.

Prayer:

Voices Found # 73

Break thou the bread of life, dear Lord, to me,

as thou didst break the loaves beside the sea;

beyond the sacred page I see thee, Lord;

my spirit pants for thee, O living Lord.

Words: Mary A. Lathbury (1841-1913)

Music: William F. Sherwin (1826-1888)

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For background and performance suggestions please see The Leader's Guide to Voices Found