"To Whom Shall We Go?"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

“Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” With these words, Jesus summarizes His preaching in this discourse.

His preaching here has a rather simple dichotomy: eat earthly bread and die, or eat spiritual bread and live. Your fathers ate manna in the wilderness, and they still died, but you can eat the bread of life and live forever. All you must do is come to Him who calls you, and eat His flesh and drink His blood as He gives them to you.

However, “When many of his disciples heard it, they said, 'This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?'” Admittedly, this is a confusing discourse which St. John records for us. Jesus says some strange things. Things which are difficult to understand, and even more difficult to actually put into practice, at least if you take Him at face value.

"This Bread Is My Flesh"

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Elijah faced a great deal of hardship in his life. Of course, it did not help his safety that he regularly challenged the pagan religious establishment backed by King Ahab and his queen, Jezebel. Elijah even had the gall to upstage the prophets of Baal and Asherah on Mount Carmel, and then slaughter the host of them. Because of this outrage, Elijah had to flee for his life, because Jezebel had sworn to put the prophet to death.

So Elijah fled to Beersheba, which is on the southern border of Judah, and there he left his servant, but the prophet himself continued on a day's journey into the wilderness. Then he lay down under a broom tree and prayed to God for death. He fled death at the hands of the pagan queen, but sought death at the hands of the Holy Lord God. He was completely spent from his battles with the forces of evil and his flight from destruction.

Eating the Bread of Life

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

A few weeks ago, you heard how Jesus fed the multitudes on the hillside near the Sea of Galilee. With such a great crowd about, even pushing the disciples off into the boat and into the water could not keep people from connecting the dots and realizing that Jesus was the one who had provided them with bread and fish to their fill. And so they came and sought Him, and would have made Jesus be their king, because He had filled their bellies.

However, Jesus can see right through their superficial interests. “Jesus answered them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.'” The throngs pressing in on Jesus were not there to be cleansed by the Lamb of God, or even to be healed by the Great Physician. They were there to be fed by the bread-king, with whom they wanted to replace their current, inept temporal rulers.

But this is not an isolated incident. After all, the people of this world seek after foolish things. How much time and energy are spent scrambling after things which are temporary and do not satisfy.