John
6:24-35
So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there,
they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus.
When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him,
"Rabbi, when did you come here?" Jesus answered them, "Very
truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but
because you ate your fill of the loaves.
Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures
for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For it is on him that God
the Father has set his seal." Then they said to him, "What must we do
to perform the works of God?" Jesus answered them, "This is the work
of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent." So they said to him,
"What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and
believe you? What work are you performing? Our ancestors ate the manna in the
wilderness; as it is written, "He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'
"
Then Jesus said to them, "Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses
who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true
bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven
and gives life to the world." They
said to him, "Sir, give us this bread always." Jesus said to them,
"I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and
whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
"This
is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent."
·
For the
Sundays in August, we’ll hear more of this discussion of Jesus as the bread of
life. We’ll hear of Jesus’ listeners misinterpreting what Jesus says to them
and eventually some of them walking away because they can’t stomach what Jesus
is telling them. They were willing to stomach the loaves and fish, but
they were not interested in any deeper meaning. Bread in unending quantity on
earth was good but bread from heaven would make no sense.
·
In John’s
Gospel, this sort of misunderstanding is common. Nicodemus could not comprehend
being born again. Jesus’ closest disciples could not bear the idea of a
crucified Messiah. Thomas… well, we know what Thomas wanted to do.
·
For Jesus
to say I am the bread of life
was something the people were not ready to hear. Bread is bread and it sustains
life. Every culture and people eat bread in some form or other. It’s a common
human thing and it is even a symbolic term for what it takes to make life
livable. It has been used as a term for money in some places. For Jesus to say I am the bread of life would
mean that he himself is the sustainer of life and in this case, eternal life: For the bread of God is that which comes
down from heaven and gives life to the world. For those with ears
in the sense of faith, this will make sense. For those looking only for lunch,
it is confusing.
·
Jesus is
telling them that what they are looking for (bread) is not what they really
need. (the bread of life) They want to know how to perform the works of God, meaning perhaps the
multiplication of loaves and fish, since that was the wonder event and “sign”
done closest to the conversation. For Jesus, the work of God is faith - This is the work of God, that you believe
in him whom he has sent. This was not what the crowd wanted to
hear. Even when Jesus says that God rather than Moses gave the manna in the
wilderness and that the Father is giving them the true bread from heaven, they
crowd does not catch on.
·
Finally
Jesus says that he will fulfill all hunger and thirst for those who come to him
and believe in him. He is the bread of life and he will satisfy the deepest
desires of the human heart, those hungers we all share – love, unity,
acceptance, salvation, meaning in life. These are hungers and thirsts we often
try to fulfill or pave over with other things in our lives – money, success,
pleasure, or even pain, relationships - all the things that people crave
without understanding that our craving cannot be fulfilled by passing things
alone.
·
It was
Saint Augustine, a bishop and Christian teacher of the fourth century in North
Africa who said when speaking of God: You
have created us for yourself, and our heart is not quiet until it rests in you.
We truly wish for the bread of life that will satisfy the longings of our
hearts and that bread of life is Jesus Christ. This might be conveyed in signs,
but it is none-the-less real.
·
The
simplest and yet the most powerful sign we have of this is the sacrament of the
Lord’s Supper: Bread and wine as the remembrance of what Jesus did for us all,
just like he said to do at the table on the night before he was crucified. We
could debate for hours about the full meaning of the sacrament… and the church
has for years and years. I think we could all agree that this is how we
remember what Jesus did for us, even in calling himself “the bread of life.”
And somehow this symbol carries to us what Jesus said he would be…
Jesus
said to them, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be
hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.”
