bread of life

Well, I hope you like bread. Why? Because we'll be hearing about it quite a bit over the next five Sundays, as the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL) dishes up selections from John 6, beginning this Sunday with Jesus feeding the 5,000.

Photo by Wesual Click on Unsplash

Bread is considered a staple food in many cultures. It is relatively simple to make, requires few ingredients, can be used as a utensil to scoop or mop up other foods, and is filling. 

Bread is also a comfort food for many people. Perhaps eating bread transports you back to a distant kitchen where you spent time baking together with a beloved grandparent. Or, maybe you have memories of sharing in conversation and a freshly baked loaf of bread with friends or family members.

In the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000, which appears in all four gospels, Jesus's words and actions attend to both the physical hunger and the spiritual hunger of the gathered crowd. To say it another way, Jesus addresses both the "staple food" and "comfort food" aspects of bread.

In John 6, the story begins with Jesus noticing the large crowds that are following him and the disciples. He anticipates their hunger, asking Philip, "Where are we to buy bread for these people to eat?" After multiplying a boy's lunch of five barley loaves and two fish, the food is shared among the people, so that everyone eats as much as they want. 

As the chapter continues, Jesus begins to speak more metaphorically. As the crowds seek him out again, he offers himself as the bread of life: "I am the living bread that came down from heaven," Jesus says. "Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

We are hungry for many things - for physical nourishment, certainly, but also hungry for comfort, for connection, for a sense of normalcy; hungry for hope, for healing, for relief; hungry for peace, for justice, and for safety. Like Jesus saw the crowds, Jesus sees our hunger, too. We are given the living bread, the body of Christ, in the form of the communion meal, in which we receive salvation, forgiveness, and new life. We are given the living bread, the body of Christ, in the form of the gathered community, the Church. It is through these relationships, in fellow members of the body of Christ offering support and care and a listening ear, that we are nourished and filled.

Here's a refrain to take with you this week, from the hymn Baptized and Set Free: "We are fed and we're nourished, filled and refreshed. / Then our hunger returns and again we are blessed. / For whatever the need, God is greater indeed: / endless ocean, always deeper than all of our need."

Bonus resources: 

• From Barn Geese Worship, an Eating Meditation to use while enjoying your favorite kind of bread.
• While some form of bread is a staple food in many cultures, rice is the staple food in most Asian cultures. Here's a great video from seminarian Evangeline Dai giving helpful cultural background and sharing the hymn The Rice of Life, found in the ELCA hymnal All Creation Sings. 
• The website for King Arthur Flour has - no joke - 566 recipes for bread! It includes recipes that are gluten-free, vegan, whole grain, and more. Try your hand at one and send me a photo (or, even better, a slice!).
• Learn to bake bread as a spiritual practice in this "Bake and Pray" online course, from baker and writer Kendall Vanderslice.