As children growing up, my sister and I were carefully taught proper manners from our mother. Since we were “PK’s” (“preacher’s kids”) we were expected to act politely and properly at all times, but especially when our family was a guest in parishioners’ homes. One of the important rules I remember was, “When served food, you should never ask, ‘What is that?’” Mother’s admonition has stayed with me lo these many years and I have attempted to resist asking that question at many a church potluck.
In the 6th chapter of St. John’s Gospel Jesus alludes to the Israelites in the wilderness after their Exodus from bondage in Egypt. As they proceed on their journey, the people despair over the wilderness and long for the plenty of their former life in Egypt, albeit one of slavery. They search three days for drinkable water, only to find a bitter spring. They travel further and still cannot find food.
They are beginning to despair that God’s promise of a wonderful new land will never come to fruition. Eventually the Lord provides them with an unidentified strange substance they find stuck to the ground in the morning. Predictably, they break the politeness rule my mother taught and ask, “What is it?”
As we were informed by our guest preacher last week, the substance called manna can be translated as “What is it?” Manna was sufficient for the people’s nourishment but it was not, however, sufficient food for eternal life. It was food, period. Jesus contrasts manna with another kind of food, the bread of life. It is human nature to know what food we’re being served, so may well want to ask the question of Jesus: What is this “bread of life” that “came down from heaven”?
We correctly interpret these words eucharistically, but can also think about the broader meanings. The word bread can also stand for sustenance; in the Lord’s Prayer, our daily bread generally means “what we need for life.” Flesh and Blood can also mean a vital, biological, actual life. So, Jesus’ bread of life is his own life, his own vitality. He gives us his life freely and with it access to God, forgiveness of our sins, and eternal life. We as Christians share our life with Christ more deeply than we share it with anyone else.
What does it mean to “live”? We may think on a physical level at least, that is a relatively straight forward question to answer. However, the definitions have become more problematic, rather than clearer with scientific and medical advances.
Death used to be defined as when one’s heart stopped or breathing ceased, but we know now it is a longer gradual process. We are all-too familiar with the wrangling political debates about when life begins, as well. Equally problematic is whether people with advanced Alzheimer’s disease, persons in deep comas, and those who cannot exist without life support machines are really living.
But, of course, that is only the physical side of living. What about lives filled with so much hurt, unsolved dilemmas, heartaches, disappointments, addictions, troubles, anxieties, and terrors? What does it really mean to “live” and to “have life”? We are here today because this fellow Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it abundantly.” Yet still we sometimes struggle with being truly satisfied by Jesus’ life-giving bread and we confuse being satisfied with the “comfort food” of manna. But Christ’s bread is our constant benefactor giving us a deep sustenance and hope in difficult situations.
Have you ever experienced a particular challenge that may bring despair only to find a solution you had never thought would come, or find that lovely wonderful people come into your life at such a time, or discover a sense of peace you never thought you could ever experience? I certainly have in some dark times in my own life – that is God’s grace. I open myself to that grace when I continually make Christ present in my life, by being open spiritually even when I am not sure where He might lead me and importantly receiving Him physically in the Sacrament of Holy Communion. Perhaps the reason the Israelites in the early stage of their journey had difficulty in trusting God, despite the impressive miracles the Lord had provided them; was that the people had not lived into a long term relationship with God that makes for deeper trust.
Jesus could well have said, “You are what you eat.” He was saying in essence that if you don’t take into yourselves that which is Christ, you will have no real life and you will become malnourished and die spiritually. In our practice of Christianity we place great value on receiving Holy Communion, in fact that is the central purpose of our gathering faith community every week around the Lord’s Table. We cherish this outward and visible sign of a profound inward spiritual truth. Through the common substances of bread and wine and the everyday experience of eating together, and through the power of God and our commitment and faith, we can become what we eat. The living bread that sustains us should always be our quest: Jesus, whose life and deeds show us the way; Jesus whose flesh and blood instill new life within us; Jesus who lives in us that we might live forever.
We are reminded of that so well in our opening collect for this Sunday, “Give us grace to receive thankfully the fruits of his redeeming work and to follow in the blessed steps of his most holy life.”
Amen.
