Reading for the Day:
Reflection:
This reading in today's Daily Office Lectionary comes at the end of a long dialogue between Jesus and others after the feeding of the 5,000.
Those questioning Jesus are looking for a sign (one might say another sign) so that they might believe. They speak of the manna that the ancient Israelites ate in the time of Moses. Jesus then tells them of bread that will give them life. When the people ask Jesus to give them this bread always, He says to them, "I am the bread of life."
What Jesus says reminds us of two things:
1) We need Jesus in order to live. Just as the Israelites needed manna in the desert, and just as the people speaking to Jesus need food, we too need sustenance in order to live. We rely on that which is beyond ourselves in order to continue to exist. Jesus gives us the final sustenance we need in order that we might not only live now, but also live forever.
2) The Eucharist is our continued reminder of the life Jesus has given us. In the Eucharist, we speak of the bread and wine as Jesus' Body and Blood. The act of Eucharist recalls the events of the Last Supper and of Jesus' death and Resurrection and makes them present for us, just as Jesus tells us he is present in the bread and wine in our Gospel reading. It helps us take part in Jesus' life-giving action in the world, which he did for our sake.
It is sometimes hard to wrap our heads around what Jesus is doing in the Eucharist, just as it was hard for those listen to Jesus in this Gospel reading to fully understand what He was saying. But, as Jesus says before this passage, if we believe in Him, then we know we will have this life that He gives.