18B21.     Exodus 16:2-4, 12-15.    “The whole Israelite community grumbled” thinking that they might die of famine in the desert.  Rain was sparse in the desert but the Lord promised that he would be so magnanimous or generous that more than water he would rain down bread or manna in the desert in the morning and give flesh to eat in the twilight.  The Lord provides for our needs.  When we cannot provide for ourselves, we are forced to go outside of ourselves to seek what we need.  Our neediness ends up being a gift that drives us into the arms of our Lord.  We do not realize that, when we are able to provide for ourselves, that capacity or strength itself comes from the Lord.  Living each moment with a deep sense of faith in and dependence upon God is to live in genuine truth or reality.  Everything else is a mirage or delusion.

John 24-35.  The crowd was seeking Jesus because they wanted to get more of the food that had just been miraculously provided for them.  However, Jesus makes it clear to them that he provided the earthly food as a sign or indication that he was really there to provide them with the heavenly food that was his very self that gives eternal life.  “Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me will never hunger, and whoever believes in me will never thirst.’”  As God provided the bread or manna in the desert, so does God provide us with the person of Jesus who is the bread of the spiritual life that is eternal.  Jesus was telling them and now us that the bread of heaven is infinitely more important than earthly bread that only maintains life to the grave.

Ephesians 4:17, 20-24.  Paul writes: “You must no longer live as the Gentiles do.” “You should put away the old self of your former way of life.”  “Be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created in God’s way in righteousness and holiness of truth.”  The old self is the natural person of this world who stubbornly tries to live independently from God.  Our old self belongs to our bodies and this earth only; whereas the new self belongs to Jesus and to a wondrous eternal life. The new self is the self that lives as a branch attached to and dependent upon God, the vine.