Reading: Matthew 16:21-22
16:21 From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. 16:22 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you."
Bread is important. We even pray for it to be given every day. However things are never simple. Western hemisphere people usually want butter‐bread. Eastern Europeans go boldly with the lard‐bread, like somebody just can not have enough of it, with flavored toppings on it, like ground red pepper, cut organic and very spicy green pepper, sliced tomato, etc.
The French invented the baguette probably for fencing purposes, the Germans flavor their black bread with white‐wurst‐sausage and cabbage. The Soviet‐Russian empire used the brick bread to make the cucumber and yogurt menu more solid.
Somewhere in the South things went south and they baked the corn into bread putting some molasses on it. The British were mightily able to transform the bread into pudding. How is that even imaginable? But, nevertheless, they managed it.
In the promised‐land‐world a question overcame the primordial question that "which came first, the hen or the egg?" And that is whether we should put eggs in the bread or not.
The first question is assumed of being answered by science, stating that a bird had been first, who was not a chicken, but laid a chicken egg according to the DNA mutation happened inside her body. It is just a scientific solution. The paradoxical question is still out there.
The second question regarding the eggs or no eggs in the bread, actually is a matter of choice, but probably it is a vegan or not vegan choice. The size and the shape of the bread can vary according to tradition, geographical location, from the couch wheel size Transylvanian one made with potato to the flat bread called pizza in Italy or pita in the Mediterranean.
The bread itself can be flat or spherical, a cube, brick-shaped or an oval loaf. It can be Guinness Record size or tiny, made of wheat, rye, barley, oath or pretty much of anything, and the dough can be practically mixed with anything since prehistoric times.
It looks like that bread took a central place in human life, just like our belly has a central place in our body. Some thinkers in the East (Yeast) thought that the belly is the center of the human thinking. And who dares to state that they are completely mistaken?
A poet could have written the bonmot, that happy are the men or women who the bread‐winners are. Albeit some might be caught in a bread‐line of a soup‐kitchen too.
As a non‐expected statement, however, the Master said at least once that the earthly bread is not that important as we initially thought, because "It is written:
'Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.'" In the desert the Master renounced to eat bread for forty days to show the power of the Word of God. Also he boldly told the disciples that “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? (Matthew 6:25)
Also there are some interpretations which state that even in the Lord's prayer when we pray the part that Father, give us this day our daily bread, it indicates in the original Greek language that o (Father), please, give us the bread of tomorrow, which practically means the bread in heaven.
In the desert the Israelites were fed with manna, which had been falling from the skies for forty years, and after that they were settled by God in the Promised Land of milk and honey. As God's Word nurtures our souls for the eternity, so the bread nurtures our bodies for the temporary. As we are anxious to feed our earthly bodies with earthly bread, so much more anxious we must be that our souls must be nurtured every day with the bread of tomorrow, which is the Word of God, the bread of Heaven.
Jesus taught the disciples that his body is food, his blood is a drink, as it is written in the Gospel of John, chapter six that “Jesus therefore said to them, "Most certainly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you don't have life in yourselves. He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. ”
Some people think that for Christians there is not really other thing to do but waiting for the Holy Spirit falling down from the Sky right into our mouth, as the manna in the desert, as a ready to eat and all-in-it food.
Some people think that at least the major Christian thing to believe that Jesus died for our sins, and by the power of his sacrifice God will forgive the sins of the sinners. And that is what we shall call salvation. Also some people think that in response, the only Christian duty is to
accept what Jesus did for you as a free gift, and to celebrate and enjoy.
However,even the thorough fulfillment of that concept might be only the first half-step on a thousand mile long pathway which is eventually leading toward salvation.
The salvation is not automated, it is not a crowd event, it is not a production line, it is essentially based on faith of course, but also we have to work hard not to become “Christian” couch-potatoes.
Sometimes we tend to forget that Christian salvation is a dynamic relationship with Jesus Christ, and this relationship is a discipleship, a fellowship with him and a followship of him. It is also a camaraderie of Christian “soldiers” led by the Master who are tasked to fight evil forces by good example, by prayers, by fasting, by elevating moral standards, by following Jesus.
Meeting with Jesus is not the end of the road, but the turning point on our life journey to follow him, where the followed direction is the most important. If we go in the opposite direction, no wonder that we will never arrive anywhere.
If we want to arrive at our divinely set destination, then we have to pursue the right path ceaselessly. The right path can be found only in the very footsteps of the Master.
It seems to be easy to accept the forgiveness of sins as a mere gift of Jesus without any corollaries, but the efficacy of our receptivity of this gift relies on our willingness of following him wherever he goes.
As the old cliché says, voiced by J.F. Kennedy in his inaugural speech, that "ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country."
Jesus expects nothing less from us but ask not what Heaven can do for you, ask what you can do for Heaven, just as it is written in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 16:
“24 Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.
Aiming salvation, Jesus not only offers forgiveness of sins by fath and by grace, but he also commissions us to take up our cross and take up his cause joining him and his disciples to change this world for the better and enter Heaven after this life.
It means at least a little bit or metaphorically that we have to earn our bread of tomorrow, it is not a completely free lunch for spiritual cheap-skaters. As the Apostle Paul wrote about it to the Philippian congregation in chapter two that “ So then, my beloved, (...), work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you both to will and to work, for his good pleasure. Do all things without complaining and arguing, that you may become blameless and harmless, children of God without defect in the middle of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you are seen as lights in the world, … ”
Thus, although the Christian faith is a free gift of God, it must be manifested in a changed life, changed habits, changed worldview, changed aims and goals, changed connecting points in relationships, elevated levels in responsibilities and duties toward others and ourselves.
Around this time of the year, in the northern hemisphere, we give thanks God for the bread, by saying, be blessed O Lord, our God, who bring forth bread from the ground.
It is true that we have to work hard for the bread, cultivating the land in every generation, however without the blessing of the fertility of field, without the blessing of the rain to the grain, without the blessing of the sunshine to the plants, without the blessing of the air to life, without the blessing of the strength in our arms, without the God given ability in our brains and heart to become as a community, logistical, neat, procedural and organized, we can not achieve anything, not even the bread on the table.
Also it must be understood by all, that without repentance and compassion, without sharing and charity, without living and giving for the sake of God, we will not only lose the bread on the table in permanent wars driven by greed, by we may also lose the bread of tomorrow, and Heaven may close its doors.
We must maintain, according to th Gospel, that bread and the workload should be fairly shared by all. However, we can see that the bread is not shared that much today, neither the workload justly, and also that the cake of the world is cut and taken rather by the mighty, giving less than nothing to the majority. Less than nothing means slavery, exploitation, taking away natural and logistical resources, causing misery, oppression, non-ending arms-race and wars, and of course destroying organic social structures like family, clan, tribe, nation, where the ultimate structure is the human nation, as one.
We can see that on statistical papers Christianity is still the largest religion on Earth, and in the last two thousand years hardly anything improved significantly on the planet, especially when we take the XXth century into account. The responsibility of Christianity is huge. Either we follow Jesus or not. Over-simplifiedly saying, but it is still true, the world, in general, is marching, as always, in the opposite direction. We have to confess, that as a religion, most of the time we did not march with Jesus, but with the world. That must change or nothing will change.
May we follow the Master, may our thanksgiving for the bread of Tomorrow, genuine. AMEN.
