Baked Fresh Daily

As a kid in my home state of Arizona, like here, it was “Rainbow;” across Texas, it is “Mrs. Bairds;” perhaps nationwide, it is “Wonder Bread.” These are major bakeries that put out bread for households across the land. Of course, these days, the marketing of bread is broader and more specialized. As a kid, I remember the choices of white and whole wheat. Today the shelves are full of choices: twelve grain, honey oat, Russian rye, double fiber, and who knows what all. When you were young did you eat the crust or leave the crust? I ate the crust and my sibling's crusts too.

Anticipating the Holy Eucharist readings for the upcoming Tenth Sunday after Pentecost, we should think this week about the powerful biblical image of bread. We will see it in the Exodus and Psalm 78 passages, speaking of the manna provided to the congregation of Israel in the wilderness for their survival. We will also contemplate it in the passage from the Gospel according to John, as Jesus identifies himself as the “true bread,” the bread of life come down from heaven, giving life to the world.

We can recall how poignant is God’s provision to the wilderness sojourners with Moses, as they are filled with fear. They long for the food they had as slaves in Egypt because they hunger so. God comes through for them with the surprising daily substance, appearing on the ground each morning. They think of it as daily bread, and they call it manna, a gift of God. As they gather it, they think of God as tangibly present with them to quell fears. Manna is one of the three items they eventually keep in the ark of the Lord’s presence. So the substance was not only their literal sustenance as they struggled to reach the land of promise, it was the ongoing symbol of God as the life-giver.

When St. John recalls the life and teaching of Jesus, he is careful to point to Jesus as the true bread, surpassing the miracle of the manna. Jesus feeds us by his mystical union with us through belief. Jesus declares that the ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, bread from heaven, and further asserts, that it was not Moses that gave the bread, but his heavenly Father. It is God who now gives them the true bread from heaven: “For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” When his hearers ask for this bread to be perpetually given them, he says, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.

Let us promise each other with this in mind that we will spend the week receptive to the Spirit to learn more than ever how to come to Christ, and how to believe in Christ. I know it will be about our will rather than any formula or technique. It will be in our own quiet and deep spirit of receptivity. Expect to be fed, satisfied, and made fully alive.