Ex. 16:2-4, 12-15; Ps. 78:3-4, 23-25, 54; Eph. 4:17, 20-24; Jn. 6:24-35

The work of God is believing in Jesus.  Jesus is the I am who gives us the bread of life.  Our readings are a continuation from last week as the bread of life in which all things point to Jesus. 

Jesus captures the human condition when he says, “you are looking for me not because you saw signs but because you ate the loaves and were filled.”  We see it in the grumbling of the Israelites who hunger for food that is perishable and forget the God who set them free.  The lesson from Jesus is simple, to hunger first for righteousness and God will provide all that we need. 

Imagine taking Maslow’s pyramid of hierarchy of needs and turning it upside down.  Instead of the primary need being our physiological needs, our primary need is our self-actualization as a child of God, coming to know ourselves as God created us to be.  Our esteem comes from being in the image of God, putting on the mind of God, the passion of God, and the will of God.  In his image we can follow the way of the Lord by loving and belonging in relationship of giving of ourselves as we have received from the Lord.  The Lord provides us our safety knowing we are protected by our guardian angel and all the angels and saints.  Finally, our hunger and thirst is satisfied not with more for the bodily needs but with more food for the spirit. 

The Israelites asked “What is this?  It is described as “fine flakes” which Moses claims is the bread that the Lord has provided for them to eat.  The host we receive in the Eucharist also resemble fine flakes made with unleavened bread.  It is our food for the spirit coming as the body and blood of Jesus.  We have the blessing of being able to look back at salvation history and connect the story across time in a way the Israelites of the Old Testament and in Jesus’ time could not.  We can worship Jesus in the Eucharist and receive him as the bread of life.  This is our time to fulfill the work of God by believing and allowing him to transform our lives. 

Jesus is ready to do the work of God in us and through us if we allow him.  Be open to the will of God and he will reveal himself in our lives by the work that we are called to accomplish in his name.  This is the testimony we see as Jesus’ disciples are transformed into apostles with the power of the word in their hearts and minds.  This same word is given to us each time we come to Mass to not only transform us but to call us to the work of God by believing and trusting in his love to lead us in the more perfect way. 

Jesus came from heaven to give life to a world that is dying in secularism and agnosticism rejecting the one true God for a personalized ideological god.  Paul in his letter to the Ephesians calls the faithful to “no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds”.  He is also speaking to us today in a world that considers the “mind” as the ultimate reality unto itself.  Whatever the mind can reimagine itself to be is a reality others must accept.  The mind has the capacity to be delusional, paranoid, fearful, exaggerated, of living in fantasy while being seriously sincere yet seriously wrong.   The mind is a gift for the purpose of living in search of the truth.  The truth lies outside of the mind.  The truth lies in God. 

God is the source of all creation and all creation serves the creator.  Anything that comes between this link is a lie from the evil one who is here to cause division and confusion.  The world is filled with division and confusion.  It is our turn now to be the light of truth, not my truth or your truth but God’s truth.  It is the truth that sets us free and gives us our joy and peace.  Let us live it and we will be doing the work of God.