1 Kings 19: 4-8; Psalm 34; Ephesians 4:30-5:2 (RM) or 4:25-5:2 (RCL); John 6: 41-51 (RM or 35, 41-51 (RCL).
Be careful what you pray for. God might just give it to you. Only on God’s terms, not yours. Not what you originally had in mind. Not in a way you might think is a very good idea. Not negotiable.
Elijah found that out when he was on the run from Queen Jezebel’s death edict after he had proven that his god, YHWH / Adonai, was stronger than Ba’al. Elijah proceeded to slaughter the 450 priests of Ba’al (as the story goes.) Fortunately for Elijah, the death edict expired after 24 hours, and by then he was deep into the southern territory of Judah, far away from the land governed by King Ahab. So he escaped the consequences of an egregious example of what we called last week “oppositional behaviour.”
But the text tells us he lay down under a broom tree and prayed,
“This is enough. Take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.”
He fell asleep hoping never to wake up. But wouldn’t you know, a messenger sent from God appeared with fresh baked bread and a canteen of water. Elijah ate and drank, then fell asleep again, but did not die. After a while the angel came back with more food, telling him clearly that he needed to gain strength for the journey ahead. He was now on a pilgrimage that would confirm his call, the mission of a prophet in the line of his prophet-ancestors. Which meant he was not going to die. Darn it all.
This brief story is paired with the Gospel that continues the reading from Jesus’ “Bread of Life” discourse in John. Jesus is still aware of the grumbling and the opposition from his local townspeople and he doesn’t flinch. He speaks even more clearly:
“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.”
Jesus is pushing the boundaries of reasonable thinking by insisting that he, himself, is “bread” come down from heaven, bread that gives eternal life. He radically shifts the people’s understanding of “bread,” in tandem with a radically new understanding of who Jesus himself was. Jesus’ statements on what is necessary for salvation shift between having belief (or faith), and eating the “bread that comes down from heaven,” the bread of eternal life. As Scripture scholar Gerard Sloyan put it,
“Previously, belief in Jesus could achieve eternal life… Now there is a food and drink requirement.”
In principle, the way the stories have been framed by the authors of the Gospels has much to do with the lived experience of their own early Christian communities. Clearly if the Gospel of John emphasizes Jesus as the bread of life and the wine of the new covenant, the community for whom this was written was experiencing some serious controversy over the Eucharist. It might have been due to pressure from those who believed that Jesus was really only divine in nature, merely appearing to be human, much like the conventional mythology of Greek and Roman gods. If so, the whole idea of a crucified divinity giving his body and blood to be consumed by his followers would have been somewhere between unthinkable and unspeakably shocking
It’s telling that Jesus does not project “eternal life” to the end of time. It’s here and now. The promise of eternal life begins now and extends into the future. “Whoever eats of this bread will live forever.”
None of this makes much sense on a rational level. And by pushing it to the limits, one pushes past the unreasoning, unasked-for, unfathomable love of God. A love that provides food when you just want to lie down and die. A love that sets up contradictions reminiscent of Zen masters who tried to provoke their students to see beyond logic and sensory data. A love that draws one to sense something more, something deeper… someone deeper.
Eternal life in Christ. Not a riddle to be solved, but a mystery to be pondered.
© Susan K. Roll
This Reflection was revised from that of August 8, 2021, with text from my homily for “God’s Word Many Voices” of the same date.
Susan Roll retired from the Faculty of Theology at Saint Paul University, Ottawa, in 2018, where she served as Director of the Sophia Research Centre. Her research and publications are centred in the fields of liturgy, sacraments, and feminist theology. She holds a Ph.D. from the Catholic University of Leuven (Louvain), Belgium, and has been involved with international academic societies in liturgy and theology, as well as university chaplaincy, Indigenous ministry and church reform projects.
The line that stays with me is that the “promise of eternal life begins now and extends into the future.” And that this promise has a “food and drink requirement.”
I find this challenge to live consciously and consistently in the present, in the midst of the exigencies of matter, both daunting and exhilarating.