Readings
1 Kings 19:4-8
Psalm 34:1-8
Ephesians 4:25-5:2
John 6:35, 41-51
Who here remembers Wonder Bread? It was my favorite bread as a kid. It was soft and just a little sweet. It was, in my young opinion, the best bread ever for making sandwiches. Now it is nowhere as popular as it once was and often difficult to find. That’s due to a lot of reasons including the fact that it is nowhere near as nutritious as we were led to believe, and it contributed to a number of allergic and digestive issues. But I’m okay with its relative demise. Why? Because there are hearty breads that are far more satisfying and nutritious. Those dense, fiber rich breads are not only nutritious but far tastier than Wonder Bread could ever be. Even the white breads we can buy in the grocery store today are more satisfying and nutritious than that icon of the past.
For the third week in a row, we hear Jesus referring to himself as the bread of life. Remember we have had the feeding of the 5000 two weeks ago and Jesus’ introduction to the existential dimensions of what it means for him to be the bread of life last week. So once again Jesus says to the crowd that he is the bread of life.
But unlike the previous parts of the story, in this one there are folks present who question his statement. Like in the story of Jesus in the synagogue in his hometown, folks who represent the religious establishment are saying “Isn’t this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?” They are questioning what appears to them the outlandish idea that Jesus is the bread come down from heaven. What follows is a response from Jesus that is, in some ways, challenging for even the most devout believer. Jesus speaks of those who can accept his statement as being drawn by the Father and having heard and learned from the Father. On the surface it seems that Jesus is excluding these religious authorities from God’s salvation and transformation. Isn’t Jesus one who draws everyone to himself? Isn’t he the one who is here for the salvation of the whole world?
Now to understand this particular passage of scripture we need to understand what the author of the Gospel of John is doing in his version of Jesus’ story, in fact, in the entirety of his Gospel.
For the author of the Gospel of John, he is absolutely clear that Jesus is God incarnate, but because he is “clothed in flesh” there are those who cannot see the truth of who he is. John believes that what distinguishes those who see and those who do not is the presence of faith.
Jesus is portrayed throughout the Gospel making statements about his real identity using the words “I am.” Jesus saying that he is the bread of life is one of those moments. Jesus is revealing something about his nature as the Son of God by saying “I am the bread of life.”
John’s presumption is that those whose faith is in God will see the truth of who Jesus is and those who do not have such a faith will not. He is, in fact, making a direct critique of the institutional religion of his day and of those who represent it.
So, what kind of bread do we think Jesus is? His final remark about the bread being his flesh that he will give for the life of the world cannot be mistaken. This is Jesus foreshadowing his institution of the Eucharist. It is a recognition that regular bread will become more than it is. By eating Jesus, we are bringing into ourselves more than just a piece of bread.
Let’s go back to the conversation at the beginning of this homily. Wonder Bread was visually pleasing and tasted good but wasn’t particularly good for us and lacked the substance we need for our diet. Hearty breads, even hearty white breads, are a different matter. They feed us in deeply nutritional ways and become a healthy part of our daily intake.
The bread which Jesus gives is far more than our ritual gestures on Sunday morning. We are being invited to engage in a level of faith that goes beyond ritual observance or simple mental acquiescence to the premises we find in scripture. In other words, it’s not good enough to just take communion. It’s not good enough to simply say that Jesus is the Son of God. It’s not good enough to mentally accept the idea that he is our savior. Doing that is the spiritual equivalent of Wonder Bread.
No, the faith that we are being called to in today’s scripture passage is far more significant. We are being called to believe in Jesus.
Now we’ve talked about this before, but it bears repeating. The word “believe” is an interesting word. Again, it would be easy to think that believe means to intellectually accept something as true. It would be easy to think that it means to accept the evidence of something. But in the time of Jesus to believe meant something altogether different. The word “believe” is in Latin “credo,” the root of which is “cor.” “Cor” means “heart.” It’s where we also get the word “cardio.” All of this means is that for our spiritual forebears to believe in something or someone meant that you give your heart to it.
The message today is an invitation for us to give our hearts to Jesus, to the way he acted, to the world as he envisioned it. To believe in Jesus is nothing less than throwing our whole self in with him and his way of life.
The promise he makes is that we will be fed with the bread of life. When we throw our whole selves into his way of living we will experience life in a new way. We will touch eternity. We will not fear the annihilation of death. He offers us a life that is not marked by fear, but by hope, joy, meaning, and purpose.
Like I said last week, this is a life marked by justice, peace, and compassion. We are being called to make the small gestures that will transform the world. We are being called to step into our lives authentically and transform the world one gesture and one relationship at a time. We are called to the difficult things that our world does not want to address. We are called to elevate the poor and dispossessed, not simply feeding them but giving them a reasonable and holy hope for the future. We are called to treat everyone, even those very different from us, with respect and dignity. And even more difficultly, considering our current social and political environment, we are called to bridge what divides us and heal those divisions. In short, each of us is called to embody a way of living that offers mutuality, respect, and community.
Such a way of living is the faith that leads us to recognizing Christ in the world; that makes explicit the incarnate one in the flesh of the world. It is this faith that allows us to accept what Jesus is offering in this passage. It brings meaning to our Eucharistic celebrations and meaning and purpose to our lives.
This is the hearty bread that Jesus offers us. It is a bread that nourishes and sustains. It is nothing less than the bread of life.