"Jesus the Bread of Life" (John 6): Eating your way in

It is no surprise to a food-lover, like myself, that God's intended future for the world has a lot to do with food. Isaiah has several images of a banquet prepared by God, Revelation 19 describes the victory over the power of death as a wedding feast, and Jesus often uses images of food for the Kingdom. We eat our way into the Kingdom, that's for sure.

In the Old Testament, we ate our way into covenant relationship with God. The sacrificial system was about more than killing things; it was about the act of eating together, even eating with God. This is evidenced by the first meeting of God with the people, which was a major feast on the top of Mount Sinai. Whenever you broke covenant, you ate with God in order to make it right. Imagine if you took everyone with whom you had a conflict out to dinner to mend it. I imagine my conflicts would become less important and the possibility of reconciliation would become pretty big.

In the New Testament, we are introduced to a new meal of the community- the Lord's Supper. It was a regular part of the first meeting of Christians (Acts 2) and led to a major teaching in 1 Corinthians. Paul called these dinners "love feasts," giving us the image of community and plenty. That is, everyone should have been able to eat their fill at these meals. Plenty of food hearkens us back to John 6, where Jesus fed the masses and everyone had enough. In the Lord's Supper, we acknowledge in Jesus Christ- his life, death and resurrection, we indeed have enough.

So grab a snack and consider the God in whom we have enough, and let's eat our way into the Kingdom today.