Bread and the search for eternal life

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/050619.cfm
Acts 6:8-15
John 6:22-29

When I lived in north Texas, my work, family activities, or weekend errands would sometimes put me on Interstate 30, which runs east-west through downtown Fort Worth. Whenever I drove just west of downtown, I would be overwhelmed with the heavenly aromas being broadcast by the Mrs. Baird’s Bakery just off the highway.

What is it about freshly baked bread that makes it so irresistible? 

It can’t just be the wheat flour, because noodles being prepped in boiling water don’t have that great smell. So I dug a little deeper (Google is your friend here .  .  .)

I’m now probably half-qualified to be a chemist in a bakery. I found some “technical, but in terms that make you feel like you understand what’s going on” on a great website called Compound Interest. It sounds like a great name for a bank, savings account, or payday loan site, but Compound Interest is a site that, in their own words “aims to take a closer look at the chemical compounds we come across on a day-to-day basis, explaining them with easy-to-understand graphics.”

Two pages I found particularly interesting on the website are:

• Baking Bread: The Chemistry of Bread-Making
• Aroma Chemistry – The Smell of Freshly-Baked Bread

Bread is an important element throughout the Bible, just as it was in the basic diet of people in Biblical times. Bread is mentioned in some form nearly 500 times, including in the worship of God, primarily through tabernacle (then later temple) services to symbolize the Eternal's presence (Exodus 25:30, Leviticus 24:5 - 9). Bread was also used in the Bible to symbolize an enemy being totally conquered (Numbers 14:9), hospitality (Genesis 19:3), and the acceptance of wisdom (Proverbs 9:5).

The children of Israel were miraculously feed with "bread from heaven" or Manna as the wandered for forty years before entering the Promised Land (Exodus 16). This food initially symbolized God's love and care for his people, in spite of their sins.

So, what does that have to do with the reflection on today’s readings?

When I first read this Gospel, it was as presented for the daily reading. It starts out with the parenthetical

“[After Jesus had fed the five thousand men, his disciples saw him walking on the sea.]”

It was very kind of them to offer up a bit of context before diving into the next bit of information, but to me I’ve just been sent down the rabbit hole of distraction. All 4 gospel writers tell the story of feeding the crowd of 5000 men with five loaves of bread and a couple fish, give or take a few, and my mind drifts off to replay the details. I usually miss the next couple of verses as they are read from the pulpit.

But in my quest for meaning, I have the opportunity to re-read, parse, slice and dice, and otherwise look for subtle clues and guidance that I might miss from my usual spot in the congregation.

Most of the large crowd had been following Jesus on foot because they heard of the signs that something really special is going on. The first three signs were already well known by the crowd; turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana, healing the royal official’s son in Capernaum, and healing of the paralytic at Bethesda, just outside Jerusalem.

They could now claim “I was there!” for the fourth sign, the feeding of the masses, which happened only yesterday. We know:

Jesus said, “Have the people recline.” Now there was a great deal of grass in that place. So the men reclined, about five thousand in number.

Then Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were reclining, and also as much of the fish as they wanted. (John 6:10-11)

The group of 5000 men would have marveled at the miracle of more food left over than they started with. We are not told of how the food tasted, but everyone ate their fill. I’m going to assume that the bread had the wonderful aroma that I’ve smelled from Mrs. Baird’s Bakery because it was pretty much freshly created. And the fish, probably a type of tilapia (yes, I Googled it) would have gone well after a hike. Food always tastes better in the outdoors after a hike. But I digress.

Jesus heads back up the mountain to escape the crowd, who are now calling him “The Prophet” and are ready to make him king. The disciples head down to the shore to take a boat to Capernaum. They depart without Jesus. John’s Gospel has the short version of the “walking on water” story, in which Jesus walks up to the boat as they were getting close to Capernaum. “It is I. Do not be afraid” Jesus says.

So now we are caught up a bit more on the context for today’s reading.

The daily reading material didn’t include the section title that one might find in most Bibles. “The Bread of Life Discourse” is the name given to John 6:22-59. Today’s Gospel reading is only the first 8 of the 38 verses in the discourse. 

Imagine you are in the wandering crowd of followers. You may be in unfamiliar surroundings, the small towns, rural land, and mountains don’t have enough food and other basic support for the crowd that had been following Jesus. You’re not hungry yet, but it’s a new day and neither Jesus nor his disciples are anywhere to be found. Someone saw the disciples all leave together in a boat without Jesus. There were no other boats until several boats came north from Tiberias to the area where they had been fed. No one from Tiberias had seen either Jesus or the disciples, so as many men as possible boarded the boats and headed for Capernaum looking for Jesus.

They find Jesus and ask when he got there. The men never get a chance to ask how he got there.

Jesus starts his reply with “Amen, amen, I say to you,” which is Jesus-speak for “listen up, this is really, REALLY important,” and then states that the men are not looking for him because of the signs he has performed, “but because you ate the loaves and were filled.”

Jesus continues “Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him the Father, God, has set his seal.”

So they said to him, “What can we do to accomplish the works of God?”

Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.”

This is where our reading ends for today. Jesus is trying to explain the path to accomplishing the works of God is to believe in the one God sent. There is a definite lack of understanding and faith on the men’s part that Jesus is indeed the one God sent. Our reading was really a prelude to Jesus’ revelation “I am the bread of life” in the next 30 verses.

So next time you smell fresh baked bread, say a little prayer of thanks for your belief in Jesus, the bread of life!