Free Food or Food that Endures

Why do we look for Jesus? After the feeding of the five thousand, as recorded in John 6:1-35, people got into boats and came looking for Jesus. Jesus accused them of looking for more “free food,” rather than signs of the presence of God. He then admonished them to “work not for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.”(John 6:27) They then challenge Jesus to perform a miracle so that they can believe him, reminding him that Moses fed them with Manna in the wilderness. Then Jesus said to them, “Very truly, I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”(John 6:32-33)

It was not Moses, it was not Caesar, it was not even Jesus who gave them and gives us the bread of heaven. It is God. And Jesus is that bread! “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.’”(John 6:35)

When we receive, when we eat the ‘bread of heaven,’ we are fed physically, spiritually, emotionally, mentally and truthfully. We receive forgiveness of sin and are raised to a new life of grace. Life that changes when we die physically, but never ends. God sustains us with the Holy Spirit that leads us and guides us into all truth. The following prayer for the recently baptized sums this up for all of us.

“Heavenly Father, we thank you that by water and the Holy Spirit you have bestowed upon us your servants the forgiveness of sin, and have raised us to the new life of grace. Sustain us, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give us an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works. Amen.” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 308)