Jesus is Loaf-Ward
Sometimes because of our experiences with people who misuse power and abuse their leadership, or because of the way the harm has been done by the church in Jesus’ name, or because our culture has been taught to question and distrust authority, confessing the Lordship of Christ is difficult. Even as scripture reveals Jesus as a gentle shepherd, a servant healer, a friend who weeps, attributing Lordship to him seems to invoke a characteristic of a distant ruler, controlling us to do his will against ours. We may not want to sing the word Lord in our hymns. We may rather imagine Jesus’ importance in other ways.
As some may know, Aaron and I were classmates studying English language and literature together in university. Our most challenging course was Anglo Saxon, not just learning the early history of the development of the English language, but attempting to understand Old English itself, a befuddling mixture of German and French with only a mere hint of the language we speak today. Twenty years on and two brains between us, we’ve retained barely anything worth mentioning, surely to the chagrin of our beloved professor who we credit with providing the opportunity of an 8:00 AM class to nurture our young love. But there is one Anglo Saxon word that long lingers in our fading vocabulary, which is the origin of the word Lord: hlāford, from hlāfweard, which means “bread-keeper.”
I’m fairly certain that we didn’t learn what the role of the bread-keeper was in 8th century Britain, but surely it must be as it sounds –the one with the bread! How important! As the one revealed to us as the Bread of Life, as the one who we remember at the communion table when we eat and drink of Jesus’ offering, confessing Jesus as bread-keeper may not be a stretch! The righteousness that comes from faith that Paul encourages us to both express from our lips and experience in our hearts, is the Word that is as close as our bodies. The body of Christ, the bread-keeper who sustains us, is Jesus our Lord.
Generous God, we give you thanks for Jesus, the broken bread of heaven who nourishes us anew. Raised from the dead, we confess Christ as the keeper of what has returned us to You. In Jesus’ holy name we pray. Amen.
Kate Miller