Bread

May 2--and we awakened to snow yesterday. It's early today (6:30 a.m.), and, looking out from our sun porch windows, it looks beautiful outside. The snow is all but gone and the grass is greener for it, no wind, clear sky, the trees are budding out, the birds are chirping. Doesn't it seem that things we must wait for (especially those we admit to having no control over) are sweeter once we have them? However, the things we wait for and experience here on earth, as sweet as they are, are fleeting, temporary, and never really quench our longing for more. We wait for good weather, for weekends and holidays and vacations, for better health or a better body, for a career or retirement, for marriage or divorce, for children, for birthdays (depending on which one it is), for that next toy that will make us happy and content.

I wonder why I so seldom wait for God, but most often busy myself with the cares of this world. The outcomes and benefits of waiting for God are not fleeting or temporary, but lasting and permanent. I don't think waiting for God is a passive activity, I think it's more like waiting in anticipation, listening for Him, watching for Him, seeking and longing to see His glory, to see Him and to know him in our daily lives, seeking His wisdom and understanding, so different from ours. Meditating on Isaiah 55 again these past few days--God's invitation to the Thirsty,

1 Come, all you who are thirsty,
  come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
  come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
  without money and without
      cost.
2 Why spend money on what is not
      bread,
   and your labor on what does
       not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what
     is good,
and your soul will delight in the
    richest of fare.
3 Give ear and come to me;
  hear me, that your soul may live.
. . . 6 Seek the Lord while he may be
         found;
   call on him while he is near.

Bread and wine and milk--staples for the Israelites, essential for sustaining life, physical life. But God has given us, his created beings, souls as well as bodies, souls that need sustenance. Restless souls. Our heart is restless, St. Augustine wrote, until it rests in thee. (see this passage from his Confessions, where Augustine wrestles with how to seek/experience God).

In John 6: 25-59, Jesus claims he is the bread of life. His words hearken back to Isaiah 55 (above). The time was after the feeding of the 5,000, and such a miracle did cause the people to seek out Jesus. When they found him, he told them they were not seeking him because they saw miraculous signs, but because they had eaten the loaves and had their fill. Jesus goes on to say,

27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. . . . The work of God is this: to believe in the one he sent.

But the people wanted more miraculous signs and asked Jesus what he would do so they could see and believe. They reminded Jesus of the miracle of manna in the desert, still concerned with their physical needs, and ironically, not realizing they were speaking to the very One who provided the manna in the desert.

Jesus replies that God gives us the true bread from heaven and that it is He, Jesus, "who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."

35 Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty. . . . 44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him . . . Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me . . . 47 I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."

As if these words were not radical enough, Jesus went on to say, "The Spirit gives life, the flesh counts for nothing" (v. 63). Shocking statement. The flesh counts for nothing? What are we without our flesh, our physical bodies living in a physical world? All my strivings, my acquisitions, my accomplishments are as nothing? A turning point in Jesus' ministry, "many disciples turned back and no longer followed him" after hearing this "hard teaching."

I think it's the same today. Much of Jesus' teaching is still hard teaching. We still seek blessings we can see and hear, taste and touch. Prosperity, long life (how we cling to life), security, justice (on our terms), happiness and good health and easy paths to what we desire. And, even as Christians, we often hear what we want to hear, overlooking the hard parts of Jesus' teaching.

My prayer today is that I may truly seek God and worship Him in Spirit and in Truth, as He desires. Without the Holy Spirit, who guides us into all truth, my efforts would be futile, but I trust in God's faithfulness.

From Isaiah 33

6 He [is] the sure foundation for
       [my] times,
a rich store of salvation and
       wisdom and knowledge;
the fear of the LORD is the key
         to this treasure.