by Fr. Tommy Lane
Last Sunday we listened to John’s account of Jesus multiplying five barley loaves and two fish to feed thousands of people, and the leftovers, twelve baskets, were even more than what they had before they began (John 6:1-15). In today’s Gospel (John 6:24-35), the day after that multiplication miracle, the people hurry to where they think Jesus might be. Clearly, they were impressed by Jesus yesterday. They start a conversation with Jesus. The conversation goes like this: they ask a question and Jesus answers; they ask a second question and Jesus answers; they ask a third question and Jesus answers.
The first question is only an opener, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” but Jesus could see through it and knew they were looking for Jesus because they got a free meal yesterday. So, Jesus responded that they should not work for the food that perishes but work for the food that endures for eternal life, which Jesus will give them. We could derive much benefit from pondering on that ourselves. Is everything we do working for the food that endures for eternal life? Parents want the best for their children. The best you can give your child is to pass on the gift of faith. You will pass on the gift of faith well or badly. Are you passing it on well? During future difficult times, your children will need the gift of faith more than anything else you can give them.
Jesus’ response urging the crowd to work for the food that endures for eternal life leads into their second question about work and God. Jesus’ answer is straightforward: the work is to “believe in the one he sent.” Believe in Jesus. Jesus’ answer is becoming more relevant with every passing year. Believe in Jesus.
That leads to the crowd’s third question, when they asked what sign Jesus would do so they would believe in him. They were challenging Jesus. They said their ancestors had the gift of manna to eat in the desert. The manna in the desert confirmed Moses as God’s leader at that time. Now they want a sign that they should believe in Jesus. This is really mindboggling because Jesus multiplied the loaves and fish for them yesterday, and that was why they went looking for Jesus today. Why don’t they get it? It is even more astounding because there was a Jewish expectation that there would be a new gift of manna during the time of the Messiah. We could see the Eucharist fulfilling that expectation but surely Jesus’ multiplication miracle yesterday was also a gift of manna confirming Jesus as the Messiah. When Jesus answered, he corrected them. He said it was not Moses who gave them bread, but his Father gives them the true bread from heaven. So, it is a double correction: it is not in the past, it is now—the Father gives you bread now, true bread from heaven, which gives life to the world.
That leads them to ask Jesus to give them that bread always. Jesus’ response, telling them he is the bread of life, is long and will continue to the end of this chapter 6 in John with more focused teaching on the Eucharist as the chapter progresses. We will be listening to it up to the Twenty-First Sunday in Ordinary Time. This year we have been reading Mark’s Gospel. We manage to read only about 60% of Mark’s Gospel every third year when we read it during Sunday Mass, but we interrupt our reading of Mark every third year to hear Jesus’ teaching on the Eucharist in John 6 because it is so important.
Jesus is the bread of life. Whoever comes to him will never hunger and whoever believes in him will never thirst. So, if we do not go to Jesus, we will be hungry, and if we do not believe in him, we will be thirsty. Isn’t that precisely what we see in our world today? The world is hungry for Jesus but doesn’t seem to know it. The world is thirsty for Jesus but doesn’t seem to know it. Sometimes we have the impression that the world would like to have even less of the little bit of Jesus that it has remaining even though Jesus is the answer the world seeks. The more the world will reject Jesus, the more it will be in a mess and the more hungry and thirsty it will be.
Jesus is our bread—he is our nourishment. His words to us in the Gospels are our nourishment and our bread, and Jesus in the Eucharist is our nourishment. All the words of Jesus in the Gospels are our food: his parables, his sayings, what he teaches us through his miracles, what he teaches us through his passion and resurrection. It is all bread to us, sustenance to us. Just think of the beauty of the parable of the prodigal son. The famous American priest and writer, Thomas Dubay, who died in 2010, wrote, “the parable of the prodigal son, a work of consummate literary brilliance and divine tenderness, has no equal in all of human literature. It had to come from the mind and heart of a divine artist.” (Deep Conversion/Deep Prayer p24) Some say that one of the greatest novelists of the nineteenth century is the Russian, Dostoyevsky. In one of his letters in a book of letters we read, “I believe that there is nothing lovelier, deeper, more sympathetic, more rational, more manly, and more perfect than the Saviour; I say to myself with jealous love that not only is there no one else like Him, but that there could be no one.” (Letters of Fyodor Michailovitch Dostoyevsky to his Family and Friends Kindle Location 1277)
Jesus is the bread of life. His words to us in the Gospels are our nourishment and our bread, and Jesus in the Eucharist is our nourishment. Jesus is the bread of life. Whoever comes to him will never hunger and whoever believes in him will never thirst. So, if we do not go to Jesus, we will be hungry, and if we do not believe in Jesus, we will be thirsty. Go to Jesus.
© Fr. Tommy Lane 2021
This homily was delivered in a parish in Ireland.
More Homilies for the Eighteenth Sunday of Year B
Keep me company in the Blessed Sacrament
Related Homilies: Jesus’ sermon on the Eucharist 2011
Homilies on the Eucharist Stories about the Eucharist