In the ancient Middle East,
bread would have been a staple of every family's meal,
even though in America today sometimes we shy away from carbs
or from too much bread for Jesus' listeners.
Bread would have been the foundational part of the meal.
And so when Jesus looks to those who follow him and says
I am the bread of life or when he talks about bread from heaven,
they would have immediately thought
about the manna in the wilderness.
So our key verse
today comes from John chapter six, verse 35.
Then Jesus declared, I am the bread of life.
Whoever comes to me will never go hungry,
and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.
God provided manna to the starving Israelites
in the wilderness to save them from certain starvation.
They would have died had he not provided the manna.
And so Jesus sets up this parallel when he feeds
the 5000 men plus women and children with the loaves and the fish.
That story that all of our children are familiar with from Sunday school.
That is a story that points to Jesus because Jesus
says someone greater than Moses is here.
The bread I give is greater than that manna, because whoever eats of this bread
will never go hungry.
And so God provided this bread of life through Jesus
because we were condemned to certain death, just like the Israelites
would have died without manna in the wilderness so we would die
without Jesus' provision of his body for us.
That's the same imagery that Jesus uses at the Last Supper when he holds up
a piece, a piece of bread, and he says, This is my body broken for you.
Take and eat to remember me by.
This bread of life, this bread from heaven
is, yes, spiritual nourishment to us,
just like we would eat a piece of bread and it goes into our bodies
and we metabolize it and it gives us energy for life.
So when we eat, of the bread of life,
when we take Jesus into us,
he becomes part of who we are.
We become part of him.
It is a spiritual bread that metabolizes into us
and gives us energy for the work that he gives us to do.
This bread of life
is meant to be a gift, something to be enjoyed and something
to be taken every single day through the word of God.
That is why we teach our children to read their Bibles
so that they might also get spiritual nourishment
as they fellowship with Jesus over the bread of life.
So this week, bread of life,
giver of joy and all that is good and delicious in the world.
I hope you and your family enjoy
some deliciousness this week as a reminder that God has given us food,
physical food to point us to spiritual realities of who Jesus is.
Our family has enjoyed baking sourdough bread.
Yes, we're one of those families
that got on the sourdough train during the lockdown last year.
And yet it's something that we continue to do together.
And as we bake bread together, we have conversations about the bread of
life.
Another great way to do this is to consider perhaps making cookies
for someone in your neighborhood or someone in your church,
someone who might feel lonely or isolated.
Pray for them as a family and deliver
a gift of cookies or sour dough bread, something that would remind them
that Jesus, the bread of life cares for them to you
and wants to provide for them as well.
Whatever you do
this Christmas season, I hope you find so much joy
in Jesus as you unwrap his names one by one.