What Do You Hunger For?
For most of my life I’ve had dental woes. Lately, things are getting worse, partly due to aging I suppose. This is seriously stressing me out.
I don’t like things in my mouth that are breaking, loose, falling out. Not to mention, wasting huge amounts of time and money on dental visits and long-suffering until my appointments.
This is preventing me from eating some of the things I enjoy, so it’s frustrating and challenging. I am not new to issues with food, more recently having raised three kids with severe food allergies.
As I continue to hunger for the foods I enjoy, I think it is God’s way of turning my attention to spiritual food and hunger for Him. Nothing on this earth will ultimately satisfy. The human heart longs for more than what earthly food can give.
Thus, I have been pondering spiritual food, specifically Communion, the body and blood of Christ, which fills and sustains us just like the physical food we eat.
Spiritual food is the only truly life-giving food that can save us for all eternity and give us strength for our days on earth.
While I (patiently?!) wait and hope for my teeth to be repaired, Jesus “repairs” us through our communion with Him, the most intimate way we can connect with Christ this side of heaven.
The Lord’s Prayer invokes “give us today our daily bread” which many times we forget means spiritual bread as well. (Matt. 6:11)
Food is necessary to keep us alive but we must eat proper, healthy food. A person with food allergies who eats the wrong food, has the potential for death. So too we need the right kind of spiritual food (Communion, God’s word, prayer, etc.) to avoid spiritual death.
God is known for feeding His people throughout the Bible, from manna in the desert in the Old Testament to the loaves and fishes in the New.
As a good earthly father feeds his children, why wouldn’t our Heavenly Father do the same for us, and even more? Especially since He is no longer physically walking with us in human form.
“Which one of you would hand his son a stone when he asks for a loaf of bread, or a snake when he asks for a fish? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him?” (Matt. 7:10-11)
I recently learned of Blessed Alexandrina Maria da Costa of Portugal who lived on the Eucharist alone for 13 years after being paralyzed and later bedridden, from jumping out a window to escape an attacker. This has been medically proven.
On July 30, 1935 Jesus appeared to her, saying: “I have put you in the world so that you may draw life only from Me, to bear witness to the world how precious the Eucharist is…..The strongest chain that keeps souls in bondage to Satan is the flesh and sins of impurity.” (The Eucharistic Miracles of the World, pg. 294)
Our flesh must be crucified with Christ so we don’t give in to the devil.
This holy woman’s story is a testament to the Eucharist and spiritual food being of utmost importance. Of course I am not suggesting anyone try to live on communion bread alone, but after hearing this story and many others throughout the ages, how can we not believe or partake as often as we can in this great gift of Jesus Himself?
Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life within you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in him.” (John 53-56)
I admit it has occurred to me, that maybe I am crazy to think a piece of Styrofoam bread is Jesus, but people for 2,000 years before me have believed it and still do today. This is where faith comes in.
Plus, I have had experiences that were otherwise unexplainable pointing to this reality. You can read about one I shared here.
Things are not always as they appear to the naked eye and our feeble human minds are not able to comprehend all things. I would rather believe and get strength from a piece of spiritual bread even if I were to be wrong, than follow the sinful, evil, false teachings of the world and get nowhere, with no peace, no spiritual food, no eternal life.
When the focus is on Jesus you can’t go wrong. He will take you where you need to go.
We must remember we are not worshipping a piece of bread, we are communing with Jesus. There is the popular saying “you are what you eat.” In receiving Jesus in this way, we are drawing closer to Him who loves us and made us, and hopefully becoming more like Him in the process.
We are that which we consume, whether it be positive or negative, so we need to be careful about what we “eat” in every sense and choose our diet wisely.
As we become strengthened through Christ’s body and blood along with His word, we are then prepared to go forth and feed others so that they too may be spiritually fed and gain eternal life.
