Obviously, it must not have been easy to hear a man say:
I am the bread that came down
from heaven;
today, we would think him mad and laugh him out of court!
And so, the first thing to notice about today’s Gospel reading is that
the Jews did not do any such thing. No! They had had experience of
Jesus: having frequently heard Him speak, closely observed His personal
bearing, and at least heard reports of certain miraculous ‘works of His hands’;
above all, however, they themselves had just witnessed Him feed 5,000 people
from a child’s lunch provision. Consequently, they were not drawn to
laughter when He made a claim even so extraordinary as:
I am the bread that came down
from Heaven.
The truth was that they were deeply perplexed – yes, even felt a certain
apprehension -- in His presence. Having
intended to make Him king a short while ago, they felt irritated with
themselves and each other at the present situation, and began to complain and
grumble among themselves:
Is not this
Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he
now say, ‘I have come down from heaven?’
They knew only one thing for certain: this Jesus was not a man to be
laughed at!
Only the hypocritically self-righteous chief priests, scribes and elders
would ever laugh at Him, but their
laughter was always superficial and
contrived: being meant to protect and serve their ever-increasing fear
for their own security with regard to the Roman occupying authorities, and also
to ensure their position as ‘revered’ leaders of the Jewish people.
As regards the ordinary people, indifference
to anything that was not directly pertinent to their own worldly concerns was
their greatest fault, because it made them so very malleable -- so very
‘mob-able’ -- for those hypocritical and increasingly deadly enemies, of Jesus.
There were a few others, however, who made known their own reasons for
believing most seriously that Jesus was not one to be laughed at. He was one whom they -- as both widely
experienced and secretly observant, individuals -- found to be far different
from any other man they had ever come across: there was a mysterious Personal
'righteousness’ which signalled Jesus out as someone either awesome or very
dangerous. Such, indeed, were the
feelings of the wife of Pilate who warned her husband:
Have nothing to do with that
righteous Man;
and of the centurion who, having watched Jesus intently in His suffering
and death on the Cross, spontaneously acknowledged his own sinfulness in the
face of such righteousness saying:
This Man was innocent beyond
doubt!
It was this Personal ‘something’ about Jesus that was secretly troubling
the Jews speaking with Him in our Gospel reading; it was a suspicion, indeed,
even a certain deeply-felt personal disquiet, that somehow, something, was
being asked of them that they were not able or ready to answer; and so, being
disturbed in their own hearts, they murmured and argued among themselves, until Jesus found it necessary
to answer their disquiet:
Do not
grumble among yourselves. No one can come to Me
unless the Father Who sent Me draws him.
Instead of complaints to bolster a prejudiced opinion, there had to be a
desire to know God’s truth, together with a willingness to recognize that such
spiritual truth about Jesus, His work and His teaching, might stretch or even
transcend the limits of their earthly wits and appreciation. The truth
about Jesus could only be received, ultimately, as a gift – the supreme Gift -- from the Father.
And it was in order to afford them a motive that might induce them to
welcome and embrace such a gift that Jesus finally added words of power:
And I will raise him up on the
last day.
The prophet Jeremiah had foretold that, in the days of the coming
Messiah, all men would be taught by God; and here Jesus – having quoted the
prophet -- added what were His very own mysterious and provocative
words:
Everyone who listens to My
Father and learns from Him comes to Me.
And that, dear People of God, is the awaited cue for our own
entry into the drama of today’s Gospel reading!
The Jews seeking Jesus were ‘murmuring’ among themselves about His
words, and Jesus said, quite bluntly, ‘Stop that. Try to listen to
your God and My Father and learn from Him.’
Notice those words very, very carefully, People of God; Jesus advised
that, for life’s more important decisions, we should try to listen to
God and want to learn from Him, not argue among ourselves or with
others. Salvation is absolutely
personal and relational, involving a truly humble awareness of God’s
‘availability’ for all situations of our life, and our absolute need of His
presence – acknowledged and embraced -- for our ultimate
fulfilment. Note that Jesus did not even say, ‘Pray to the Father’, because such prayer
can, with too many people, so easily become a matter of ‘discussing’ or
‘praying’ with themselves firmly lodged in the driving seat. Therefore,
Jesus concentrated the Jews attention on one word, LISTEN, to their God
and His Father: that is, that they should calm their heart, by humble
acceptance of its need before Him, and still their fevered imagination and
wayward thoughts, by unconditional trust in Him. Jesus advised
them, and He advises us, to patiently wait upon the Father’s mercy, and hope
for His blessing; having only our gratitude and praise to offer in return for
His goodness.
And now we come to a great truth about the world we live in, People of
God:
I am the
bread of life. Your ancestors ate manna in the desert, but they
died. I am the living bread that came down from heaven so
that one may eat it and not die.
The Father was already teaching and preparing the Jews as they were
being led from slavery in Egypt. He was preparing them for Jesus’ future
coming, by teaching them to look for life in ‘food from heaven’. They
knew that all food came ‘from heaven’ in so far as it was ultimately given them
by God. But all such food originated
from, and only sustained life on, earth;
they had now to learn to understand, expect, and ultimately recognize
their need for living bread originating from heaven, which alone
could give them heavenly, eternal life.
For over more than a thousand years God had been guiding Israel towards
that possibility of their being able to understand and appreciate something of
truly living Bread coming from Heaven; and such, dear Brothers and Sisters in
Christ, is God’s guiding Providence for us today!
There is a spiritual purpose “attached to”, “involved in” our earthly
existence and life’s experiences! They are all, under God’s
Providence, able to guide us -- if welcomed
prayerfully and humbly -- to an initial appreciation of the ultimate
realities of heaven. That is what can make our present every-day
life and living, such a wonderful experience: that is how we, with St.
Paul, can manage to glimpse behind the veil
covering the beauty of God!
Everyone who listens to My
Father and learns from Him comes to Me.
Listening to God means not just listening with our ears, it involves the
desire of our heart, it concerns the ‘background’ attention of our mind
hovering around God, and our willingness and ability to drop earthly concerns
when Jesus passes nearby, as witnessed blind Bartimaeus:
As Jesus was leaving Jericho with His
disciples and a sizable crowd, Bartimaeus, a blind man, sat by the roadside
begging. On hearing that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry
out and say, “Jesus, son of David, have pity on me.” And many rebuked
him, telling him to be silent. But he kept calling out all the more, “Son of
David, have pity on me.” Jesus stopped and said, “Call him.” So, they
called the blind man, saying to him, “Take courage; get up, He is calling
you.” He threw aside his cloak, sprang up, and came to Jesus. Jesus
said to him in reply, “What do you want Me to do for you?” The blind man
replied to Him, “Master, I want to see.” Jesus told him, “Go your way;
your faith has saved you.” Immediately he received his sight and followed Him
on the way. (Mark 10:46-52)
Bartimaeus there gave a most beautiful master-class in the Christian art
of listening, for and to God, though he himself -- in his life situation
-- had to shout hard to make himself known to whoever might be able to help
him to Jesus.
Such ‘listening’ can make life and our daily living-it-out a truly
wonderful experience, offering personal pointers to heavenly realities. And when we learn so to look at, question and
taste, the joys and sorrows, bitter and sweet things of life, then everything
becomes able to beckon us ever on and ever more engagingly.
Jesus has yet one more piece of life-enhancing advice for us though:
Whoever eats
this bread will live forever; and the Bread that I will give is My Flesh for
the life of the world.
Whoever eats this bread which is My Flesh … once again we have one
supremely important word which is, this time, ‘eats’.
And notice, once again, that Jesus does not say ‘receives’, but
‘eats’. We have not only to open our mouths or put forward our hands to
receive such food, but we have to positively ‘eat’ it, as some might rightly
say we have to ‘chew’ it. The essential point of our ‘eating’ is that we,
each of us, recognize the food as essential to, necessary for, my very life.
Moreover, it is not to be anonymously received, but eaten with
heart-felt joy and gratitude for the One Who so generously gives it.
According to the book of Proverbs, having been generously given such food, we
should give a thought to our returning like for like, in other words we should
be stirred to want to give ourselves
in return to the Lord Who gives us all.
My dear People of God, living such a life, full of intriguing
invitations and loving calls, receiving such daily Personal Food, we are most
certainly not alone on our journey through life, but are developing -- as the
years pass by -- an ever-greater companionship and intimacy with One Who is of
Himself, and wills to become for us, the
Love, Truth, and Life of our life. May we participate fruitfully in this
Holy Mass and hopefully receive Holy Communion with such faith and love as to
experience that intimacy and companionship as never before. Amen.
