Bread for Life

“Syrians flee as rebels plan counter-attack.” “Inequality widens as Indonesia’s economy booms.” “Troops lured to death with dinner invitation” in Afghanistan. These are just some of the headlines from the news of the past week.

And lest we think it’s all out there, here’s a few home-grown ones: “Doctor from ‘Dickensian’ hostel suspended” in Sydney. “Taxi industry putting profits ahead of safety” in Victoria. “States fail to regulate skills training” around Australia.

We’ve come a long way technologically since Jesus was first identified as the “bread of life” for the world. We live in a time of tremendous advances in health and medicine, communications, agriculture… in fact almost any field we might care to name. Yet we still live in a time which has great variations between rich and poor, between safety and threat, between those have what they need and those who do not. We’re a long way from the lifestyle of the people of Capernaum listening to Jesus and yet there is much hunger still… hunger for bread, hunger for safety, hunger for hope.

What does it mean to affirm in our time that Jesus is the “bread of life”?

Bread might be a common food, but it’s just one among many that form our basic diet. Some people lack bread and face starvation; others have plenty of bread, but lack the other food they need for good nutrition. Yet bread in the Gospel of John, and indeed in the sacramental meal of the Lord’s Supper which we will celebrate shortly, is most certainly a symbol of that which is the staple food of life—the thing that fills our bellies and keeps us going; that provides a core part of our diet around which other things can be arranged. For the Gospel of John, bread is life; and life is found in Jesus.

In preparation for the 5^th Assembly of the World Council of Churches held in Vancouver in 1982, people around the world were invited to participate in a series of studies entitled “Images of Life”. The 4^th theme of the study series was “Bread of Life”. In it, participants were invited to consider two stories and what life and the “bread of life” might mean in each situation. Listen to those stories:

A poor family. Mother serves most of the food left over from the previous evening to father, who leaves early in the morning for work in a factory. Mother distributes the remaining rice among the seven children and sends them off to school. Only some rice water remains for her. But she will get lunch at the building site where she works... In the afternoon, the children come home, and await the return of the parents for the evening meal. While mother cooks the food with the help of the older children, the younger ones fall asleep. The children eat and go to bed. Without eating, the mother waits for the father’s return. Late at night, she learns that her husband has been arrested by the police for taking part in a demonstration against the dismissal of a co-worker. She goes to bed hungry.

An affluent family. The children rush past the breakfast table barely stopping to pick up a piece of toast and to complain that the right cereal hasn’t been purchased. Mother and father sit without speaking, tired from the demands of their jobs and of their commitments, their family and their home. There is a mad rush as everyone leaves for school and work. The children say they hate school. They come home grumpy, quarrelling over afternoon tea. Father must work late again. Tea time is no better than breakfast. They go to bed having eaten but still hungry.

For people existing on the very edges of life, struggling to survive physically, life is as urgent as clean water, as simple as a nutritious meal, as significant as the right to human dignity. For people existing on the very edges of live, struggling to survive in the midst of armed conflict, life is as complicated as international conflict resolution, as difficult as finding a safe place to survive, literally life or death. For people existing on the very edges of live, struggling to find meaning in the midst of a world fixated on consumerism, productivity, efficiency and excitement, life is as elusive as the still place in the middle of the cyclone, as fleeting as a few moments of precious shared relationship, as mundane as learning to savour and to share the abundance which is ours.

What does it mean to affirm Jesus as the “Bread of Life” in the midst of all this?

Jesus is the centre of the Christian life and Christian understandings of life. Everything is arranged around the one whom we affirm as fully human and fully divine. It is in Jesus that we understand God to be fully revealed. It is in Jesus that we are confronted by a God who has created us, who loves us, who redeems us, who sustains us. In Jesus, we are confronted by a God who affirms human dignity, the value of the whole of Creation (even the parts that seem most flawed), and the importance of the bonds of relationship that ensure the sharing of resources and the proper flourishing of life. Jesus is the “Bread of Life”.

Recognising this bread, acknowledging this staple of the “good life”, of God’s life, invites us to re-evaluate our lives… invites us to consider whether they are organised around this staple of life, this bread that is so essential to our living and our survival. It invites us to work for the bread that is real food for those who hunger, and real safety for those in peril, and real hope for those in despair. It invites us to fully partake of the life that is offered in Jesus.

And that is the invitation offered to us as we approach the sacrament: to reach out our hands for bread and wine, and to hungry people; to hold the elements in our hands, and the pain of God’s groaning Creation; to receive the body and blood of Christ as the body of Christ, and to embody for the world the hope that is real life, real living.

Let us pray:

Eternal and gracious One,
though we live in a world of need,
here may we taste your goodness and hunger for a world more just.
Though afflicted by brokenness and division,
here may we hear your call to be a people of healing community.
Though daily we touch our limits,
here may we receive the fullness of your grace,
that we might embody your life in our world.
Through Jesus Christ, Bread of Life. Amen.
(Adapted from a prayer after communion by Peter Wyatt, Celebrate God’s Presence, ©1984 the United Church of Canada.)