Maundy Thursday 2021

Food Satisfies

Benjamin at the restaurant with my friend. “There is nothing more satisfying that seeing a hungry child fed.”

those fed in the feeding of 5,000 wanted to be fed, but they wanted to be fed by Manna from heaven. As a sign.

- Jesus corrects them, that Moses did not feed them, but God did and than goes on to say that Manna only was temporary satisfaction.

As the deer pants for the water, so my soul pants for thee, O God, for the living God - Psalm 42:1-2

My soul thirsts for thee, my flesh yearns for thee, in a dry and weary land where there is no water - Psalm 63:1

- Like all things in the world that we seek to satisfy ourselves with. Food, Entertainment, buying stuff, experiences, etc.

Only Jesus Nourishes Real Life.

This is really what Jesus is saying in this passage, when He says he is the real manna from heaven, and that we need to eat his flesh and drink his blood.

He is not talking about his actual flesh and blood, but like Feuerbach has said, “Humans are what they eat.”

When you eat bread, it becomes a part of you. It must be killed, it must be broken, it must be chewed, it is then converted into fuel for our bodies. It becomes a part of us and fuels our life.

When we eat Jesus, he too had to be killed, he too was broken, and when we receive him, he fills us and makes us whole.

C.S. Lewis - The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses, pp. 1-2

Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.

All the things we consume in this world are temporary, they may fulfill a temporary satisfaction, but they can not fully satisfy our Real life now and for eternity. Only Jesus can do that.

A.W. Tozer - The Pursuit of God

O God, I have tasted thy goodness, and it has both satisfied me and made me thirsty for more. I am painfully conscious of my need for further grace. I am ashamed of my lack of desire. O God, the Triune God, I want to want Thee; I long to be filled with longing; I thirst to be made more thirsty still. Show me Thy glory, I pray Thee, so that I may know thee indeed. Begin in mercy a new work of love within me. Say to my soul, "Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away." Then give me grace to rise and follow thee up from this misty lowland where I have wandered so long.