I AM the Bread of Life

My love affair with bread is genetic, of this I am sure.  That percentage of me which is Italian has dominated the larger Irish to create an insatiable desire for bread, pasta and olives and any combination thereof.  Yes, I know that too many carbohydrates are not good, yet there is something akin to euphoria that rises in me along with the fresh loaf of bread.

Why so many references to bread in both the Old Testament and the New?  Bread is a symbol of what sustains life, both physically and spiritually.  Nothing high-tech here:  Gather the grain, pulverize the wheat with mortar and pestle in order to make the flour, add the simple ingredients of oil, water, salt and leaven to form dough, knead with vigor, let it rise and bake.

Bread of the Presence, or showbread in the Holy Place within the Wilderness Tabernacle and later in Solomon's Temple, was baked and set before the LORD each sabbath as an offering from Israel.  When the new bread was presented, the old was eaten by the priests and their households as they were consecrated and set apart for the Lord.

It's interesting to see the similarity in our taking bread as communion, that through salvation by grace we have become a holy nation of royal priests, belonging to God (1 Peter 2:9). Jesus established the bread and wine communion with the disciples in the midst of the Passover meal, itself a commemoration of the Mosaic Covenant, and proclaims prophetically the New Covenant that is about to ensue. Imagine the influence His words had on these men as they sat suspended between the old and new covenants about to witness and experience the deliverance of God through His Son.  Do you think they had a recollection of His earlier reference to being bread?

Jesus, the Bread of Life
In John Chapter 6, on the day after He feeds 5,000 from a few loaves and fishes, Jesus proclaims Himself the Bread of Life.  The crowds had followed Him across the sea because they were enthralled with the miracle of the feeding, but they basically came looking for more, asking Jesus to show them another sign that He was who He claimed.

At that Jesus discerned their priorities were wrong, so He challenged them to make the leap of faith—to believe that God had sent Him from heaven to become the "true bread of life" by which they could obtain eternal life.  In order to do so, they would have to eat the bread of heaven.

Because of the difficulty they had understanding all this, many disciples parted ways with the Lord at that time.  We have the benefit of the knowledge of the full gospel and can see the implied reference to Jesus as the showbread (offering) and the most perfect manna.

As the bread of life, He has become the way to heaven and eternal life; as we partake of Him, our souls are nourished and His living word becomes our daily manna.  I've decided that there is nothing inherently wrong with loving bread, since God instituted the making of it and deemed it important enough to discuss; and besides that, it makes me happy.  Eat and be satisfied.