The Rev. Dr. Pamela Dolan

“I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry and whoever believes in me will never thirst.”

My friends, I have to ask: what are you hungry for? Is there a hunger or thirst that keeps you awake at night, parched and anxious?

I recently read that sometimes people gain weight because they misinterpret hunger cues. For example, sometimes we think we’re hungry when we’re really thirsty, or tired, or feeling some kind of feeling we’d rather avoid.

There are also different kinds of hunger—there’s regular, physical hunger that you might call “stomach hunger” but there’s also another physical sensation that some call mouth hunger, which is that feeling when your body is not actually in need of calories but you want the experience of eating, maybe of crunching on something salty or savoring something sweet.

And the thing is, if you misunderstand your own hunger signals, you tend to make bad choices. If you’re craving chocolate but you decide to eat a three-course meal, for instance, then even if that meal is full of healthful things like vegetables and whole grains and lean proteins, it might not be a good choice.

If you walk away still craving chocolate, then no matter how full you are, you’re still not satisfied. As counter-intuitive as it is, the better choice in that moment might have been to grab a square of Ghiradelli dark and let it melt in your mouth, and save that three-course meal for when your stomach needed it.

Beyond physical hunger, there are also different types of emotional hunger, spiritual hunger, relationship hunger, and so on. Many of us try to satisfy those hungers with food tool, and of course that never works out very well, either.

So, let me ask you again: what are you hungry for? And another question—how will you know when you’re satisfied?

When we hear Jesus say “I am the living bread that came down from heaven,” we know that somehow Jesus is comparing himself to manna, the heavenly bread that fed the Israelites as they wandered through the wilderness in search of freedom.

It might seem obvious, but let’s consider some of the particulars of this comparison.

Manna was sent by God, and so was Jesus. As it says in the first chapter of John’s Gospel, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us.”

Manna was bread for the journey—it sustained people who were in exile. Jesus is bread for the journey, sustaining us on our earthly pilgrimage.

Manna was a physical sign of God’s presence and continuing care—God did not just make people and then let them fend for themselves. Jesus as the Word incarnate was also a physical sign of God’s presence and continuing care; in his time on earth he healed, fed, and befriended people, sharing his table and his teachings to all who were willing to partake.

Manna allowed God’s people to fulfill the promise of salvation; without it, they would have perished in the wilderness instead of arriving, eventually, in the promised land. Jesus continues to open up the way of freedom and life for all people; without him we would all perish in the wilderness of sin, selfishness, greed, and death.

Finally, even the people who were sustained and nourished by manna complained bitterly, wanting more and different food, salivating over the remembered fleshpots of Egypt. In today’s reading, the people who have been following Jesus, trying to figure him out, the people who have seen him perform signs and wonders, miraculous healings and feedings and even walking on water, these same people murmur against him and complain that he’s not who he says he is.

(As an important aside, let’s remember who these people are. The NRSV unhelpfully refers to “the Jews,” as if Jesus and his true followers were something other than Jewish. They were not. Jesus and his disciples were Jews. The people who murmured against him, in this scene at least, were also Jewish. Some people find it more helpful to call the people complaining, “the religious authorities,” reminding us that it was the establishment, the people who uphold the status quo, who were the main opponents of Jesus. Their being Jewish had nothing to do with it.)

Understanding more clearly how Jesus is like manna, we can begin to explore what it might mean to eat of the bread of life. The idea is that Jesus can fill our deepest hungers in a way that nothing else can. This is kind of embarrassing for Episcopalians to talk about. It sounds like something that an evangelical might say. But honestly, there it is, in our lectionary-assigned Gospel reading. I promise I’m not making this stuff up!

This doesn’t have to be weird. I mean, think again about your deepest hungers. The living bread of Jesus is God’s way of feeding us—not just through Communion, but through scripture and song, through encounters with other people and the beauty of creation.

The bread of life is given to us by God. It is meant to sustain us no matter where our journey leads or how far we stray. The living bread fulfills our desire for companionship, for relationship, for connection.

The living bread feeds our souls and our spirits in a way that nothing else can. It gives us the courage and the conviction to act on our deepest commitments, our core values.

When what your heart desires is deep, abiding joy, when what you hunger for is justice and peace, when what you thirst after is liberation and the realization of the beloved community, then there is nothing that will fulfill those desires better than the bread of life. Eat, and be satisfied. And then go out and feed others in his name. Amen.