What feeds you? What
gives you life?
In our day-to-day existence, we turn to food several times
through the day – it keeps us going, gives us energy, supplies the nutrients we
need to move forward. But is it the only
kind of sustenance we need?
When Jesus feeds the 5000 with the loaves and fishes, the
crowds think that’s pretty cool. And of
course they keep showing up, hoping for another free meal. But in this Sunday’s Gospel, Jesus is trying
to get them refocused: it’s not the
tangible (edible) food that is important, but the intangible Love of God. And what is the expression of that Love? The very person of Jesus: I am
the Bread of Life…
Like the Israelites who wandered in the desert with Moses
and Aaron, the Jews of Jesus’ time fail to see that their opportunity for
relationship with God is far more important than what goes into their
bellies. But God, who loved us into
existence, uses the tangible to bring us back to the intangible – first, the manna in the desert (Exodus), then, the Bread of Life (John) that is Jesus. All God asks is that we pay attention to the
care God lavishes upon us, and that we tell the world: We will
declare … the glorious deeds of the Lord and his strength and the wonders that
he wrought (Psalm 78).
God feeds us every day with His Love,
if only we are open to receiving it.
(This reflection is based on notes from Fr. Pat's Thursday night Scripture class.)
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