Sunday, August 4, 2024
Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Sunday 18 Year B
First Reading: Exodus: 16: 2-4, 12-15
Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 78
Second Reading: Ephesians 4: 17, 20-24
Gospel: John 6: 24-35
When Jesus was in the wilderness and hungry, the devil tempted him to turn stone into bread to satisfy his hunger. But Jesus responded, “Man shall not live by bread alone ….” His response emphasizes the necessity of spiritual nourishment in addition to physical sustenance. His response is rooted on the truth that while physical nourishment is essential for bodily life, spiritual food is crucial for spiritual nourishment. We all have physical hunger which can include our need for food, material possessions and external experiences. But there is another hunger which goes far deeper; a hunger that relates to our deepest sense of self, belonging and fulfilment. Just as physical hunger drives us to eat physical food, spiritual hunger drives us to seek spiritual nourishment.
The physical hunger of the Israelites as they journey to the Promised Land make them grumble against Moses and Aaron. But their hunger goes deeper than mere hunger for physical nourishment. The provision of manna and the quails in the wilderness was a very important sign of God’s abundant provision, love and faithfulness towards His people as they journey through the wilderness to the Promised Land. Their grumbling was a sign of their lack of faith and hope. But God is always faithful. Despite their lack of faith that made them grumble against Him, God provided for His people. He gives them food for the journey; a food that not only alleviated the people’s hunger, but above all, was a sign that the God who brought them out from Egypt has not abandoned them but is right in their midst as their Lord and God. He has not brought them out to die in the wilderness but to make sure that they survive despite difficulties and conducted safely to the Promised Land.
When Jesus multiplied bread and fed the multitude, John tells us that the Passover was at hand (John 6:4). This is John’s way of letting us know that the Passover is the key to understanding what is going on here. In this context, the feeding of the multitude in the wilderness with bread is a sign that points to a new Exodus in which just as God fed his people with manna in the first Exodus, Jesus as divine provider now feeds the God’s people in a new and greater Exodus. Jesus declared himself, “The Bread of Life” and reveals to us that he is the true bread which has come down from heaven. He is the true food for the journey foreshadowed in the manna which the Israelites of old ate on their way to the Promised Land and it sustained them. Just as the manna was not only a means of nourishment and sustenance for the people on the journey to the Promised Land but was also a sign that God is in their midst as their Lord and God and a guarantee of his faithfulness; in a far more wonderful way, Jesus, the true Bread of Life is our spiritual food for the journey. He nourishes and sustains us as we journey toward our true Promised Land which is heaven and is a sign that God is in our midst as our Lord, and God and a guarantee of his faithfulness.
Jesus rebuked those who came looking for him to satisfy their physical hunger in these words, “Amen, amen, I say to you, you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled. Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, ….” Jesus is inviting us today to reflect on our deepest motivations and go beyond bodily satisfaction and material acquisition to attend to the needs of the spirit which is far more crucial than the needs of the body. He is the ultimate fulfillment of the spiritual nourishment that manna symbolized. Without this spiritual nourishment which Jesus gives us, we do not have the life of God in us. But if we eat of this bread, we have the life of the spirit, we have eternal life and share communion with him.
Happy Sunday,
Rev. Fr. Chidi Onwuka, m.ss.cc