Friday, November 25, 2005
John 6:51 "I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever, and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world."
JESUS, BREAD MOST WONDERFUL
The bread with which Jesus fed the 5,000 was not the most important thing He wanted to give them. The Son of God would perform a far greater miracle to give them a far greater gift. Jesus' provision for their bodily needs -- and for ours as well -- has a greater end in sight than simply good health or a long life here on earth. Jesus wants us to live with Him forever in the new creation.
Jesus blesses us bodily. He preserves us physically out of His divine goodness and mercy. That same goodness, that same mercy, would lead Him to lay down His life for us and cause Him to send the Spirit so that we might learn of our Savior's redeeming work, and that our hearts might be turned to Him in faith.
In His mercy Christ our Lord uses food and medicines to preserve our lives here so that He might use the time He gives us to make us His own. It is a wondrous thing to know that He who provides for you so bountifully for your bodily needs wants to have a close personal relationship with you -- to be your closest Friend. He wants to use His forgiveness to heal your sin-sick heart. In love He would ease our pain, the pain of traveling through this sin-torn world. He even enables us, as His disciples, to have a part in reaching our to others in His name, like the disciples did who distributed bread and fish so long ago in Galilee. But that's still not all, is it?
It's truly wonderful to have Jesus as a life-long friend but He wants to be even more to us than that. "If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever." Jesus preserves us spiritually, keeps us in faith, in order to give us eternal life -- an eternal unity with Himself and the Father and the Spirit. This unity will be undisturbed by any evil, unbroken by any sin, uninterrupted by death.
"O give thanks to the LORD for He is good; His mercy endures forever."
