Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint John 6, 44-51
Jesus said to the crowds:
“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him,
and I will raise him on the last day.
It is written in the prophets:
They shall all be taught by God.
Everyone who listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me.
Not that anyone has seen the Father
except the one who is from God;
he has seen the Father.
Amen, amen, I say to you,
whoever believes has eternal life.
I am the bread of life.
Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died;
this is the bread that comes down from heaven
so that one may eat it and not die.
I am the living bread that came down from heaven;
whoever eats this bread will live forever;
and the bread that I will give
is my Flesh for the life of the world.”
I am the bread of life
1. People. The Christian lifestyle is not about what people say or don’t say. Following Jesus is not a matter of fashion. Being a Christian doesn’t imply that we seek to attract more people, in order to “have more members”. Being a Christian is a lifestyle that one embraces after an encounter with Jesus; it’s a decision and not an association. Being a Christian doesn’t mean being part of a group of people who fulfill norms in order to feel purer than others, or who comply with meaningless rituals. Being a Christian is to live with Christ, in Christ and for Christ.
2. Come to Jesus. Recently, it has dawned on me that I want to figure it all out on my own, like I don’t go to Jesus, but I always go to other people or things. I look for calm watching Netflix for hours on end, futile entertainment on my cell phone or even in food or in drink. Those things may calm me down for a moment, but it’s like anesthetizing my life rather than finding solutions to my life. Face the challenges of life knowing that Christ is present, and with Him accept your life with all the sacrifices that it implies.
3. In the desert. There are times when you are in the desert because you don’t want to face things for fear of what will come your way. Once, a friend of mine went to the doctor because of the muscular pains he had. He’d spent days without any sleep and couldn’t even sit down. The doctor told him to rest assured that he was going to give him something that would calm his pain. He wrote the following on the prescription: “make decisions, there are only two of them, but make them”. So today, think calmly and make decisions so as not to live in an eternal desert.
Never forget that something good is on the way!
God bless you and protect you in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
