Sunday Gospel Reflection, August 1, 2021: He gave them bread from heaven to eat...

He gave them bread from heaven to eat…

Do you have faith in God’s providence?

   In the Book of Exodus, just one month into their forty-year journey from Egypt to the Promised Land, the whole Israelite community is grumbling and wondering, will we all die of famine? Although it got them out of Egypt, the people’s faith isn’t really sustaining them along the way. There is no doubt that God has provided for them and will continue to provide for them, yet God’s past activity does not seem to increase their faith. In response to their grumbling, God sends manna and quail for them to eat: In the evening twilight you shall eat flesh, and in the morning you shall have your fill of bread. Even when God’s plan is not going well, God wants the people to survive; God has an ongoing desire to redeem them, even when they show no inclination to have faith in God. Psalm 78 recalls that, despite the people’s infidelity, God does indeed provide: he rained manna upon them for food and gave them heavenly bread, the bread of angels. God is with God’s people whether they experience God consciously or not, and God will meet their needs, always, even if they lack faith.

   Jesus confronts the people’s lack of faith in John’s Gospel as well. Although they ate the loaves and were filled, they want further tangible proof in order to have faith in him. The food that endures for eternal life is faith itself.  Jesus comes to give them access to God; to come to believe in him requires that they open themselves to God and to what God is doing right in front of them: my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. Jesus came to reveal the depth of God’s love, a love he is inviting them to; Jesus is the bread of life, and they must have faith in his ability to feed them, always. Only then will they be able to put away the old self of their former way of life, and put on a new self, as Paul tells the Ephesians. They are dependent on their old beliefs, dependent on what they themselves can create, but Jesus wants them to accept the revelation of a God they cannot create with their own minds, a God they can only know through faith. 

   How open are we to God’s providence in our lives? And just how difficult is it to have faith – faith in God’s promises, faith in Jesus, the true bread from heaven, the bread of life thanks to which we will never hunger and never thirst? 

This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class. 

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