Dt 8:2-3 14b-16a
1 Cor 10:16-17
Jn 6:51-58
 
 
This weekend we are celebrating The Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ, formerly known as the feast of Corpus Christi. These readings today have great significance for us today, just as they did when the they were first written down by the authors. We need to begin to understand the significance of what the Lord has done for us by providing us the eucharist. The deeper the understanding we have, the deeper the relationship we should have with Jesus, God the Father and the Holy Spirit.
 
In the first reading, Moses is reminding the people that they have a special place in the heart of the Lord because he has chosen them to be His people and He shall be their God. The Lord has just led them out of Egypt and they are about to go into the Promised Land. They spent 40 years in the desert with the Lord testing them and seeing if they were going to follow His commands and we know from history that the people did not always follow what the Lord asked them to do. Even on this journey out of Egypt we had heard the stories of how the people were not always following what the Lord had taught them and how he protected and guided them through adversity and conflict. As we read in Exodus 15:24 and Exodus 16:2-3 the people found it so easy to grumble and complain against Moses and Arron, especially when it came to having enough food and water. Even after the Lord gave them directions in Exodus 16:16, to collect manna from the desert, they did not all listen and tried to keep some overnight, hoarding what they had gathered. The food spoiled and Moses became displeased at their actions yet again. When they followed the Lord’s instructions they had enough food and drink.
 
What God wanted from the Israelites then and what he wants from us now, is one who will listen to His instructions, His words, and follow them faithfully. God is in the Exodus business, of bringing His people out of slavery, out of bondage, giving us the opportunity to follow Him in all things. God is going to deliver us out of the bondage we are in, out of the slavery we find ourselves under, bondage to the world around us, to the things that hold us back from worshipping the Lord as we have been taught, bondage to the jobs that we have, the things we spend our money on, the way we try to be Lord and Master of our own lives. We should have all been taught the importance of responding to God’s instructions, not mans’, and to follow them faithfully.
 
We have heard previously from St Paul in our 2 ^nd reading how he has heard some bad news while he is in Ephesus. It seems that some of those whom he had taught in Corinth had fallen back to their old ways and old practices, of worshipping idols, of not following the instructions he had given to them. Some were claiming to be disciples of one apostle and some were claiming to be of another. They had become a divided house of the Lord in that city.
 
So, Paul asks the questions: The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a participation of the blood of Christ? The bread we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? Paul expects the community to know the answers and if they know the right answer then they should be united as one community. They all are to share in the Body and Blood of Christ as the blessing that they had received from Jesus. There is no reason to be a divided house if they all believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
 
We have heard, both in scripture and church teaching, that we are to be united in the Body of Christ, not only in the Eucharist, but as a community of believers as well. We can not go off following specific individuals or certain leaders of the community just because of their charisma. The last thing that God wants is a group of people who are following individuals and not following Him as our Lord.
 
John has written his Gospel to put emphasis on the divinity of Jesus, to show among many things that Christian belief and practices are to be based upon and rooted deeply in Jesus. If everything they did was not based upon Jesus, then they were not accepting Jesus divinity nor did not have Him as their Lord and Savior, their Messiah.
 
If they were following the practices of the Jewish traditions, then they were not following Jesus. If they were following the rules of man, they were not following Jesus. Jesus has made it so clear in so many places in scripture that they were to change their hearts, to follow the examples he gave them, to listen to His teachings, to listen to His parables and learn from and act on what He had given to them. Following the laws of man was not going to gain them salvation.
 
In this 6 ^th chapter of John, Jesus has already multiplied the loaves at the Passover feast, has already crossed the Sea of Galilee and was heading to Capernaum when the crowds begin to show up again. They were all caught up in the works, the miracles that Jesus had performed and did not understand the underlying themes He was trying to give to them, so He begins again to teach them again on the Bread of Life.
 
One of the important themes the Jewish people used to put heavy emphasis on was the Exodus. When ever they wanted to make a strong point, they would point back to the Exodus experience to remind the people what the Lord had done for them and how He again was going to be there for them.
 
Jesus starts His Bread of Life discourse by doing the same thing. He reminds the people that God gave the people manna to eat when they were in the desert. They asked Jesus for this same manna and this is when Jesus tells them that He is the Bread of Life, that if they were to feed on Him they would have eternal life. The people could not handle that concept; they could not really believe that Jesus was going to feed them with His body and His blood, and so many left Him at that time. Others argued saying that it was not possible and Jesus tells them to stop murmuring. He tells them that His flesh is true food and Hid blood is true drink, and that everyone who eats this bread will have life eternal.
 
As we go forward from here today, we need to ask ourselves, “Am I following the Lord and what I have been taught, or am I following the desires of man and what man has taught, am I following mans’ laws and not God’s laws? Am I worshipping the Lord with my whole heart, with my whole soul, with my whole being, or am I just coming to mass just because it is something I am checking off on the list of things that I think will bring me salvation? Do I understand that Jesus is the true bread of life and I must participate in eating that bread for me to have eternal life? When we have come to that realization, then I will spend time everyday in prayer with Jesus, expecting to hear what He wants me to do.