I am the living bread that came down from heaven.

John 6: 41-51

The Jews murmured about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven,” and they said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph? Do we not know his father and mother? Then how can he say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Stop murmuring among yourselves. No one can come to me unless the Father, who sent me draw him, and I will raise him on the last day”. It is written in the prophets: “They shall all be taught by God.” Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died; This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

Discussion Questions: 

1. Beyond receiving the Eucharist, where do you experience Jesus’ invitation to eat “bread that satisfies hunger forever”? How do you recognize this kind of bread in daily life? Explain.
2. In this passage, the Jews have a fixed image and understanding of who Jesus is. In what ways might you limit the freedom of God, or create God in your own image?
3. The “bread of life” sustenance Jesus is talking about is “His participation and sharing of His relationship with the Father”. How is receiving the Eucharist, and your relationship with God helping you become “bread of life” for others? Where is this happening for you?
4. Jesus says: “No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father who sent me”. Describe an experience of “being drawn” to the One who is the Bread of Life? What nourishing word is being offered to you?”
5. Who is living bread for you? Who are some of the people, relationships, or experiences that have fed, nourished, and sustained your life? 

Biblical Context

John 6:41-51
Mary M. McGlone CSJ

In this follow-up from last week’s Gospel with Jesus and his fellow Galileans in the synagogue, the allusions to the Exodus continue. In an ironic twist of tradition, John tells us that the people “murmured against Jesus because he said, ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven.’” That’s an inverted echo of the Israelites who murmured about a lack of bread in Exodus 16. In last week’s segment of this Gospel, the challenge for the Israelites was to understand that the manna was God’s gift given through ordinary means. In today’s Gospel, the challenge is to recognize God’s gift in the person of Jesus.

Jesus’ critics fall back into their penchant for the extraordinary. Rather than judge Jesus by how his message or works reflect God’s ways, they claim he is too common to have come from God. This parallels Luke’s scene in the synagogue at Nazareth when the people doubted Jesus because they thought they knew him. (See Luke 4:16-30; Matthew 13:53-58, Mark 6:1-6.)

In response to that, Jesus challenges the people to use their tradition to understand what God is offering through him. The Jews are the people with whom God has dealt directly for centuries; they of all peoples should recognize God’s ways. When Jesus says that no one can come to him unless the Father draw them, he’s asserting that those who truly know the Father will recognize him as the one sent by their common Father. Those who love the Father will be intuitively drawn to him.

This idea is the crux of the matter. Jesus says that the Father is the one who draws those who come to him. While the people are asking for incontrovertible signs, Jesus invites them to let themselves be drawn, be enticed or lured by God as was Jeremiah (27:7). Quoting an idea from Isaiah (54:13), Jesus reminds his listeners that their tradition says they will be taught by God. (Jesus broadens Isaiah’s prophecy; Isaiah referred to the children of Israel and Jesus says, “They shall all be taught by God.”)

While Jesus is insisting that their shared tradition bears witness to him, the members of his audience are allowing themselves to be caught in a mire of their own making. On one hand they are asking for divine proof, on the other hand they resist probing and mining their tradition for the very evidence they say they want. It’s as if they demand messages from heaven but they want to dictate how they will come and what they will convey.

Today’s Scriptures invite us to search our hearts and to act from our deepest hopes and desires. Elijah’s saga invites us to ponder both how to pray and how God responds to our prayer. Elijah tells us that there is no sentiment we need hold back in prayer. He also cautions us that God will never settle for less than all we can become. The Letter to the Ephesians reminds us that God’s Spirit is active among us and that we have the power to collaborate with or to grieve the Spirit alive in the community. This week’s selection from John 6 adds to Elijah’s story, calling us to abandon our minimized hopes and terminal expectations so that we can be opened to God’s unlimited offer of life.

Holy Bread for Holy Hunger

Reflection
Fr. Michael Marsh

It was supposed to be another feeding, or so they thought. That’s why everyone showed up in today’s gospel. Instead of more bread they got Jesus and conflict. The two often go together. It seems that when we run into Jesus, we often get conflict; between what is and what might be, between our understanding and his understanding, between knowing about Jesus and really knowing him.

“The Jews began to complain about Jesus. “He didn’t come from heaven. We know all about him. He’s Mary and Joseph’s boy.” They know facts about Jesus, but they don’t really know him or where he comes from. He doesn’t look a thing like the bread they or their ancestors have eaten. When it comes to bread, they don’t expect any more than what their ancestors got, manna in the wilderness.

Jesus tells them to be quiet and stop complaining. “Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died…. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” Jesus offers them a choice, living bread or manna, life or death. That is the same choice he sets before us.

On the surface it seems to be a conflict between Jesus and the Jews. In reality the conflict is not outside of the Jews. It is within them. That’s how it is with conflict. It originates within us and gets projected onto and fought with another.

The conflict for the Jews is not so much about Jesus but about their frame of reference, the box they have created for God. Jesus is challenging them to step outside of the established, comfortable, and familiar context they have created for themselves. He refuses to be limited by either their understandings or their misunderstandings. He invites them to live a new life, a larger life, a life that springs from but is not bound by the past or the context they have created for themselves. He invites them to eat new bread.
When John speaks of the Jews, he is not referring to the Jewish people, individually or collectively. He is referring to any person or group who opposes Jesus, who refuses to see and understand the signs, who would separate the gift of bread from the giver of life. The Jews could be anyone who acts in this way. In this case it just happens to be the religious leaders and authorities of Jesus’ day.

We are not so different from the Jews. We too have our own frames of reference. Sometimes we use our frame of reference to try to contain or control God. Other times we use it to exclude God. The problem is not that we have a frame of reference, but that it originates with us rather than with God.

When we live only from our personal frame of reference, we live hungry, empty lives. We work for manna rather than opening ourselves to receive the gift of the bread of life. No matter how much manna we collect and eat we can never satisfy ourselves. Manna might fill our bellies, but it leaves our souls grumbling.

Often the things we have done and left undone prevent us from eating the bread of life. Sometimes our patterns of thinking, believing, the way we see the world, each other, or ourselves convince us there is no other bread and we should just settle for the same old manna our ancestors ate in the wilderness. Other times our history, fears, anxieties, guilt, regrets, pain, and losses become so firmly established we are deceived into believing that we are not even hungry.

It does not have to be like that. The table of God is set and there is a place for each one of us. We are not destined to eat manna the rest of our lives. Our frame of reference, our past, our history, neither earn us nor keep us from the bread of life. Rather, the living bread has come down from heaven to feed each one of us. Every moment of every day God invites us to eat new bread, to step out of the old context into a new way of living and being.

God gives us bread from heaven, knowing that we are hungry. Our conflicts, our restlessness, our deep longings, our desires to love and be loved are hunger pains by which the Father draws us to his Son; the one who said, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” Holy bread for holy hunger. The gift of God for the people of God.

Reflection excerpt from, Interrupting the Silence: Fr. Michael K. Marsh. used by permission. www.interruptingthesilence.com