August
13, 2000
John 6:35, 41-51 (CEV)
Jesus replied [to the people asking for the bread from heaven]:
"I am the bread that gives life! No one who comes to me will
ever be hungry. No one who has faith in me will ever be thirsty.
The people started grumbling because Jesus had said he was the
bread that had come down from heaven. They were asking each other,
"Isn't he Jesus, the son of Joseph? Don't we know his father
and mother? How can he say that he has come down from heaven?"
Jesus told them: "Stop grumbling! No one can come to me,
unless the Father who sent me makes them want to come. But if
they do come, I will raise them to life on the last day. One of
the prophets wrote, "God will teach all of them." And
so everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him will
come to me.
"The only one who has seen the Father is the one who has
come from him. No one else has ever seen the Father. I tell you
for certain that everyone who has faith in me has eternal life.
"I am the bread that gives life! Your ancestors ate manna
in the desert, and later they died. But the bread from heaven
has come down, so that no one who eats it will every die. I am
that bread from heaven! Everyone who eats it will live forever."
=======
1.
The imagery of Jesus as bread can go in many different directions.
While the recurring refrain is that of eternal life there is a
question always lurking in the background, "What are you
going to do with your eternal life?"
Some folks take it to mean that the current Body of Christ, the
Bread of the World, needs to be involved, quite literally, with
being sure that none who approach Jesus will be hungry. To have
received the bread of life is to commit oneself to seeing that
others have bread and are encouraged to investigate other breads,
even Jesus. Various groups have cared for this in political lobbying
fashions as well as direct action for individuals and relief for
whole communities. If you are part of those who sense the need
to have this scripture be true in the present you will be interested
in these and related links:
Bread
for the World
WAFER
Food Pantry in La Crosse
United
Methodist Committee on Relief
2.
The Spiritual Formation Bible connects the bread of the world
with worship in a suggested exercise. "Think about how it
feels to be hungry - hungry in your stomach and hungry in your
soul. Then think of the best bread you have ever tasted. Smell
its yeasty aroma. What does it look like? Feel its crust and its
soft interior with your fingers. Taste it. Savor the experience.
What kinds of things are like bread for you - savory, filling,
satisfying? Write down some descriptive words that come to you.
What does it mean for you to 'eat' the bread Jesus offers? At
your earliest opportunity (according to your custom), take your
place at the communion table of the Lord and receive the bread
of remembrance, the bread of life.
3.
Jacques Ellul (The Presence of the Kingdom) suggests that
the Revolutionary Christian lives as Jesus lived. "Every
Christian who has received the Holy Spirit is now a prophet of
the Return of Christ, and by this very fact he has a revolutionary
mission in politics: for the prophet is not one who confines himself
to foretelling with more or less precision an event more or less
distant; he is one who already 'lives' it, and already makes it
actual and present in his own environment."
So the Bread of Life leads some to relief, some to worship, some
to embodiment. As you chomp away on the bread of life, as you
feast on Jesus, is your path one of these or a fourth or fifth
way?