The Potato Eaters: The Power of Meals in the Presence of God

Q + R Slide (with phone number)

College Lunch

Series Slide

Vincent Van Gogh knew his first masterpiece when he saw it.

But not because people loved it.

In fact, of the 900 paintings he painted, he only sold ONE in his lifetime.

Maybe that’s why I love Van Gogh so much. Because he didn’t judge his work based on how much affirmation he got from it…or how much money he could make with it.

He just believed his work was a calling…and if it was beautiful, it was worthwhile.

That’s how he knew his first masterpiece before the world recognized it.

He knew what was universally beautiful…even when its hidden beneath the dirt.

I’m going to show you that painting this morning, but first…

There’s a few things you need to know about Vincent Van Gogh to properly understand his work.

First, he came from an upper class rich family in Holland.

He was also the son of a Dutch Reformed pastor.

The majority of his notable work came in the last 2 years of his life.

That’s because he spent a good portion of his life trying to be a pastor himself. But he was kicked out of seminary for not passing some theology tests along with his unorthodox style.

Van Gogh was particularly drawn to serve the poor. He rejected his bourgeois lifestyle to serve a coal-mining town before he got into painting. In fact, he used to cut up his bed sheets to make bandages for workers who were burned in the mines…and often he would refuse to bathe because he didn’t want to live a more privileged life than the people he served.

Now, with all that in mind, we’re all going to be art critics this morning.

And we’re going to take a lot at Van Gogh’s first masterpiece…the painting that he called the favorite piece of art he ever created

Put painting on screen

He titled it “The Potato Eaters”

Let me point out a few features.

First, all of the faces are very plain. No one is particularly beautiful, they are all very plain faces.

And their hands are working hands. Bony and calloused.

He said in a letter to his brother Theo, that he wanted to paint these characters as people that “have tilled the earth themselves with these hands they are putting in the dish ... that they have thus honestly earned their food’. 

The painting initially drew a lot of negative criticism because its colors were so dark and the figures were QUOTE “full of mistakes”.

But that sort of missed Van Gogh’s point.

His aim was to point something out about the differences of lavishness of a rich consumeristic lifestyle and the simple pleasures of the life of cultivators. Particularly…dirty, insignificant potato farmers.

See, there’s one more thing I want to point out about this painting…and to do that, I want to show you 2 other Van Gogh paintings.

Put up Starry Night painting

The first one is one you’re probably familiar with. I’ve even used it in another sermon.

This is “The Starry Night”. In many of Van Gogh’s paintings, he used the color yellow to indicate the reality and the presence of God. So notice, here that the sky is lit up with yellow light. Additionally, so are many of the houses in the valley below. But, there is no yellow in the windows of the church.

This is Van Gogh’s commentary on what he saw as the state of the church at the time (a church, remember, that had kept him from pursuing being a minister). For Van Gogh, God’s presence isn’t in the church building. It was in his creation …and its in the homes of the families in the town.

Now here’s one more, just to drive home this point.

Put up “Church in Auvers” on screen

This is Van Gogh’s “The Church in Auvers”

Notice that outside the church building, where the woman is going about her daily business on the worn down paths that go around the church building…not TO the church building…this is where the yellow tones are. In fact, all the yellow tones ON the church are coming from outside. The windows are dark.

Its like a close up of the church in Starry Night. The presence of God (as Van Gogh saw the church in his day) had left the church…and where could you find it?

Well, in the windows of the homes from Starry Night.

Back to “Potato Eaters”

The Potato Eaters is like looking inside the windows of one of the homes in the Starry Night valley.

And when we look inside, we find humble, dirty, poor, mistake-ridden cultivators of the earth

…a poor family…

…around a dinner table…

with potatoes and coffee or tea…

…sharing a meal…

…under a yellow flame.

Van Gogh was showing you that if you want to find the presence of God, you won’t find it on Tuesday in an empty, ornate church building…just because you think “its church.”

Title Slide- “The Potato Eaters: The Power of Meals in the Presence of God”- John 12, Matt 26, Luke 7:34, 1 Peter 4:7-11

Instead, you’ll find God with the humble. Around a dinner table. You’ll find God with the struggling…the mistake ridden, barely hanging-on family who is going about the daily work of cultivation.

You’ll find God eating a simple meal of Potatoes and tea with the family who will never be invited to dine with the queen.

Van Gogh was communicating through this piece, that God is found at the table of the lowly cultivators.

The Potato Eaters.

Today, I want you to see something significantly deep about gathering around a table.

…and about how much God invests into eating…together.

John 12:1-8Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany where Lazarus was, the one Jesus had raised from the dead.

2 So they gave a dinner for him there; Martha was serving them, and Lazarus was one of those reclining at the table with him. 3 Then Mary took a pound of perfume, pure and expensive nard, anointed Jesus’s feet, and wiped his feet with her hair. So the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

4 Then one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot (who was about to betray him), said, 5 “Why wasn’t this perfume sold for three hundred denarii and given to the poor? ” 6 He didn’t say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief. He was in charge of the money-bag and would steal part of what was put in it.

7 Jesus answered, “Leave her alone; she has kept it for the day of my burial. 8 For you always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”

Matthew 26:20-30When evening came, he was reclining at the table with the Twelve. 21 While they were eating, he said,“Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me.”

22 Deeply distressed, each one began to say to him, “Surely not I, Lord? ”

23 He replied, “The one who dipped his hand with me in the bowl — he will betray me. 24 The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for him if he had not been born.”

25 Judas, his betrayer, replied, “Surely not I, Rabbi? ”

“You have said it,” he told him.

26 As they were eating, Jesus took bread, blessed and broke it, gave it to the disciples, and said,“Take and eat it; this is my body.” 27 Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks, he gave it to them and said,“Drink from it, all of you. 28 For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. 29 But I tell you, I will not drink from this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.” 30 After singing a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Luke 7:34-35The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners! ’ 35 Yet wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”

1 Peter 4:7–11

7 The end of all things is near; therefore, be alert and sober-minded for prayer. 8 Above all, maintain constant love for one another, since love covers a multitude of sins. 9 Be hospitable to one another without complaining. 10 Just as each one has received a gift, use it to serve others, as good stewards of the varied grace of God. 11 If anyone speaks, let it be as one who speaks God’s words; if anyone serves, let it be from the strength God provides, so that God may be glorified through Jesus Christ in everything. To him be the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.

Today, I want you see the crown jewel of hospitality.

The meal.

I want to show you today the extraordinary power of broken people gathered around broken bread…

…and the way God shows up in the middle of it all.

1) Meals are practice for the New Creation.

There is a very unexpected paradox in Van Gogh’s Potato Eaters. The presence of God hovering over a humble table.

That paradox is in these passages we just read. When Jesus is anointed at Bethany, Matthew tells us it happens at

the home of a guy who is known as Simon the Leper.

Think about that. God, in the flesh, at the table of a man who is known for his flesh-

eating disease.

On the night Jesus is arrested to be crucified, he’s not running scared. He’s eating dinner with the guy he knows is going to betray him.

Or think about that verse from 1 Peter 4 1 Peter 4:7a (end at near) & 9 The end is near…SO…invite people over for dinner and don’t

complain about it.

Look, if you knew the world was about to end, would you host a dinner party?

Why something so ordinary, for such an extraordinary event…like the end of the world?

Why have a meal with your betrayer, when you know you could hide…or fight?

Why eat at the table of a social and religious outcast, if you have everything it takes to be at the top of the social, religious, and political food chain?

It's a paradox.

Luke 7:34-35 Then, there’s the thing that Jesus says about himself. “The Son of Man came eating and drinking”

You may not realize just how crazy a paradox this is until you know what Jesus is referring to when he calls himself “The Son of Man”

Daniel 7:13a (end at heaven) In the apocalyptic section of the book of Daniel, you know where it

goes very “Hunger Games”, There’s talk about a river of fire…and beasts with all these horns and iron teeth…

And then there is a picture of God sitting on a throne of fire with thousands of angels before him..

And then this person described as “the Son of Man” descends from the clouds and rules the whole earth.

Luke 7:34-35 And when Jesus describes himself, he calls himself “the Son of

Man”. And what does the Son of Man do? …destroy Russian tanks with his laser eyes? …Leap tall buildings with a single bound? …Set up a throne atop the highest mountain and make war on all

the evil in the world?

No. [PAUSE] He has dinner with people. He comes “eating and drinking”. He is called by the people that misunderstand him, “A glutton and a

drunkard”. He is ridiculed for having a seat at the table with lepers, and

sinners… thieves and cheats.

Not what you expected, right? The Son of Man…eating potatoes.

So the question is- Why? Why did the Son of Man come eating and drinking?

Why is “showing hospitality to one another” a response to “the end of all things being near”?

Isn’t there something more practical? Something more useful? Something more…I don’t know…helpful we can do?

Well, notice the way Jesus follows up his statement about the Son of Man eating and drinking by saying “Wisdom is vindicated by all her children.”

What Jesus means by this is that his actions will be proven worthwhile by the disciples, the followers, the children…that come from it.

In other words, it is by eating and drinking… It IS THROUGH hospitality, meals, gathered around a table, that

people will be prepared for what the Son of Man brings when he comes on the clouds…

Its what’s referred to in Scripture as New Creation. Or New Heavens and New Earth. Or, the Kingdom of God.

Matthew 26:29 Jesus referenced it towards the end of the Inaugural Lord’s Supper. The meal he ate with his disciples the night before he died.

He told them, I’ll eat and drink with you again…when we gather in my Father’s kingdom.

Back to 1) See, one of the chief reason’s Jesus came eating and drinking, and

why the church, in response to the end of all things being near…is supposed “show hospitality without complaining”…

…is because in a meal, there are 3 things revealed…or previewed about the coming Kingdom of God. The New CREATION.

The way the world will be when Jesus returns.

Meals show the Beauty, Order, and Abundance of New Creation.

BEAUTY- You ever notice how unnecessary taste is? You ever wonder why God didn’t just have us eat nutrition pellets?

Why is honey sweet? Why is bacon delicious? Why does kale taste like armpits?

The taste of food transforms something that should just be utilitarian. Eat to live. Into an experience of beauty.

Eating engages all 5 senses. The word of God is compared to Bread…and honey…and milk…and

meat in the Scripture. Its described as sweet and fragrant and able to sustain you.

And that’s exactly what God’s coming Kingdom is like. Its not just a world where you are sustained. And safe. Its beautiful. Sweet. Enjoyable. When Jesus comes back he’s not just protecting you from evil…or

keeping you alive. Eternal life is not just about quantity of time… …its about QUALITY of life.

And that’s why a meal done right…one where the appearance and the smell, and the taste and the texture of the food is aimed at being beautiful…it communicates something.

Not only that, you are literally sitting across from people who are made in the image of God. When you sit across the table from a human being eating a well-prepared meal…you are doing one of the most beautiful things in the world.

Meals with people communicate that beauty is not EXTRA. Its not some luxury if we can get it. No, Beauty…TASTE...enjoyment…is the destination of the people of

God in the Kingdom of God.

New Creation is not going to be boring or dull…its going to be delicious.

Then there’s Order. Order is the opposite of chaos. In a description of New Creation in the book of Revelation John says

“There will be no sea anymore.” He doesn’t mean you can’t swim after Jesus comes back. The sea was a symbol of chaos for ancient near easterners.

He was saying, “There is no chaos in God’s Kingdom. There is only order.”

The sense you get of things being out of control…of hurricanes devastating us, and shootings popping up out of nowhere in schools…in New Creation, that’s gone.

That’s reflected by the order that typically happens in a meal. There is a table in the middle. There is measured and equal distribution. There is a code. Whether that’s “no seconds until everyone has

eaten firsts” or “Please pass the pepper”…Meals settle us down and put us in a routine where we default to order…and not chaos.

Finally, Abundance. The opposite of Abundance is Scarcity. Scarcity is what produces fear. And Fear often produces selfishness and an unwillingness to share.

It makes us cling for control But when we have abundance, we overflow. We share. God’s coming New Creation is described as a place of abundance.

Think about Jesus feeding the 5,000. What looked like a situation of scarcity, where people would have to scratch and claw to get fed…turned into a occasion of abundance…where not only did everyone get their fill…but there were 12 baskets of leftovers.

Look at the way the Prophet Isaiah describes the Kingdom of God.

Isaiah 55:1 & 2b

“Come, everyone who is thirsty, come to the water; and you without silver, come, buy, and eat! Come, buy wine and milk without silver and without cost! … Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and you will enjoy the choicest of foods.

It's a meal of abundance. The choicest foods are so abundant that they are FREE!

John 12:3 Did you notice that when Mary anoints Jesus’ feet at Simon the

Leper’s house…that she uses the WHOLE Jar? It was common to put a little perfume on the feet of honored guests

in your home…but she breaks THE WHOLE JAR.

This would have been her family’s life savings. …and she spends the whole thing on Jesus’ feet…and fills the room

with the fragrant, beautiful smell of the perfume.

You know why? Because Mary realizes that she has abundance in the New Creation

that Jesus is brining…so she doesn’t have to cling to her money.

And she knows that this act of beauty, will show to everyone else in the room, that Jesus, and his Kingdom, are beautiful…and he is worth the sacrifice.

TRANSITION: But there was another person at that table, who didn’t see it that way. Judas Iscariot. The one who would betray Jesus… See, Judas didn’t realize that…

2) The power of a meal is cultivation, not consumption.

When Van Gogh painted the Potato Eaters, one of his chief aims was to show the beauty of cultivation over consumption.

He came from the upper class. People who benefited from the work of others, without participating

in it. They didn’t plant the food they ate. They just paid for it.

They were served by hired hands. They didn’t have callouses on their palms.

Van Gogh wanted to shatter the idea that the good life was found in opulent, extravagant living…CONSUMPTION.

And that it was actually found around the simple table of those who were cultivators.

At Simon’s table in John 12, you see the stark contrast between cultivation and consumption.

John 12:4-6 Judas says “We could have sold that perfume and given it to the

poor! Now its all wasted!” Which would have been an act of cultivation.

It would have been using that money to sow into another persons life to bring something fruitful.

But John tell s us, that Judas wasn’t really interested in that. Rather, he was interested in stealing the money.

A act of consumption. One that only benefits the thief to the detriment of the rest of the disciples.

Of course, Judas ends up selling Jesus out for thirty pieces of silver…another act of consumption.

But remember, we are made to be cultivators. We are made to give ourselves away to produce something in

others and in the world.

Instead of take from people for our own good.

1 Peter 4:10 & 15 In Peter’s letter to the church, right after he talks about showing

hospitality to one another, he tells us to be “good stewards” of God’s varied grace.

That just means that the way God shows his graciousness comes in lots of different forms.

Sometimes, it comes in a conversation.

Sometimes, a hug or encouragement. Sometimes, it even comes in a sharp rebuke. Not all grace is “NICE”…but it is all given out for the glory of God. It is all to CULTIVATE something in other people.

Then in v 15, being a steward of God’s varied grace is contrasted with Murder, Stealing, and meddling.

Which are all acts of “consumption” They are all acts of TAKING from someone.

When you murder (or hate or slander) you are taking someone’s life from them in order to make your life seem better or easier.

When you steal, you are taking someone’s money or property for your own good to their detriment.

You know what meddling is? Its getting in somebody’s business. Its gossip. Putting your nose in someone else’s business so that you can share it with others in order to feel good about yourself.

Or so that you can give them advice…not for their good, but so that YOU LOOK good.

All acts NOT of cultivation, but consumption. And evil doing? You know what that word literally means? It means to MAKE EVIL. It means when you consume, you are an “anti-cultivator”. You are

CULTIVATING EVIL.

And Judas does ALL 3 of these.

He sells Jesus out to be murdered. He steals from the pot. And at Simons’ house, he meddles. He gets in Mary’s business and gives this high and mighty advice, not because he cares about the poor, but because he wants to look good.

Judas is the CONSUMER par excellence.

…and there he sits, right next to the CULTIVATOR Par Excellence.

Jesus Christ.

Back to 2) The one who lowers himself to serve others. The one who left heaven to eat and drink with sinners and tax

collectors… …not because it benefited him… but because it benefited us.

Meals are interesting. A sort of paradox in an of themselves. Though, on the surface they seem like acts of consumption, they

are actually one of the greatest tools of cultivation that we have.

I mean, just go home today and Google, “The importance of eating together”

You will have a thousand articles with scientific results that will tell you eating meals together…

o Makes relationships strongero Improves eating choiceso Saves you money

o Leads to better grades in schoolo Makes you happiero Makes you healthiero Relieves stresso Cuts down on the likeliehood that you will be addicted to

drugs and alcohol.

Its almost like God wove something inherently beneficial into the act of a shared meal.

So how does Jesus use meals to cultivate? Well, he rebukes his disciples. (One of you will betray me) His disciples use it for self-reflection and examination. (Is it I Lord?) He encourages others with it. (He eats with Matthew when he has

just come to trust Jesus after being a tax collector) Its used to cultivate worship. (Mary breaks open the jar of perfume) He uses meals to provide for the needy. (He fed 5,000 and 4,000

people with only a little bit of food.) He uses it to celebrate and show people the joy of New Creation (He

turns water into wine at a wedding).

In fact, meals were so important to Jesus’ ministry, that after he resurrected, he wasn’t even fully recognized by his disciples until he broke bread with them on the Road to Emmaus and ate broiled fish with them on the beach.

Jesus revealed WHO he was when he ate with people. The Son of Man. Come to Seek and Save the lost.

You know something incredible about The Potato Eaters painting? It was stolen twice. People stole it in acts of consumption. They were going to sell it for

a profit, meanwhile depriving the world of the beauty that it was telling of.

You know what happened to those thieves? The first time it was recovered without any ransom being paid. The second time, the thieves got a flat tire and couldn’t get away,

so they were aprhended and the painting was restored to its curators and put back on display.

In other words, even when it appears that consumption has won, the cultivator of beauty, and order, and abundance always comes out on top.

Lords Supper Slide You know, the word “companion” comes from the latin words “cum” and “panis”.

Cum means TOGETHER.PANIS means bread.

A companion is someone who comes with bread.

The Son of Man came eating and drinking.

Even though he knew the cross was coming…he slowed down…he didn’t run…he sat a table.

He was a companion. With Bread.

You know, Consumption is fast.But cultivation is slow.

Just ask anybody who has ever prepared a good meal. You spend 3 hours in the kitchen and sometimes your family eats it in 5 minutes.

But meals are not designed to be scarfed down in the car on the way to soccer practice.

Meals are supposed to slow us down. Because cultivation is slow. Conversation is slow. Unraveling the identity of the person across the table from you, getting to know them…that's slow work.

Encouragement, rebuke, ….LOVE is slow work.It takes a MINUTE to tear someone down.

It takes years to build someone up.

Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God is like a mustard seed, that when planted seems utterly insignificant. But over time, when it grows, it becomes a tree large enough to give shade to the exhausted and make a home for the birds”

…and probably…you could have a picnic under it.

Jesus is the ultimate cultivator. You know why? Because when he was crucified, when his body was broken, when

his blood ran out…it was seed that fell in the earth. It was for the forgiveness of your sins

He was crushed so you could spring up out of the grave.

Judas’ blood? It spilled out in an empty field when he killed himself because his

consumption didn’t lead to the joy he thought it would. Instead, it left him empty.

Consumption always ends this way. Selfishness, self-worship always ends this way.Consumption ends in death.

But Christ, he resurrected. Cultivation produced life. Cultivation always perpetuates itself in new life.

That’s why Jesus told his disciples, “The way you will remember me, is by perpetually eating the meal that reminds you that I am a cultivator.”

My body was broken…in your place. My blood was spilled to cover your sin and make you new.

I am coming back, to drink this cup with you again, when I make All Creation New. And I’ll make YOU NEW WITH IT.

I’ll give you my Spirit, who will, though the outer self is wasting away, being consumed. Inside you, my spirit will be cultivating…growing and changing you spiritually.

So, until I come, I leave you with bread and wine. To gather around humble tables, Potato Eaters…waiting for me bring the harvest.