Meditatoin Minute

My Dearest Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

“Gather up the fragments left over, that nothing may be lost.” In today’s Gospel reading (John 6:1-15), we hear the story of the miracle of the loaves and fishes. Jesus has been teaching the crowds and he has developed quite a following. It was the feast of Passover and Jesus realizing that the crowd hungered, decided he needed to feed them. To test his disciples, Jesus said to Phillip, “But how do we feed such a crowd.” Andrew indicated that there was a small boy with five loaves and two fish; “but what are they among so many.” Jesus takes the small insignificant amount of food, blesses the food and feeds the crowd. The abundance of his gift overflows into the crowd. After they had eaten their filled, Jesus had them gather up the fragments. They gathered twelve baskets of fragments from the five barley loaves. When we hunger and long for Christ, the same thing happens to us. The small longing to experience Christ grows into an overflowing of life. When we hunger for the Word of God, our lives are filled to excess with Christ. In this story, Jesus took the little bit they had and through the glory and power of the Holy Spirit, multiplied the bounty. They were filled until they could eat no more. Christ is the true bread of life. In Him, we find the true nourishment which satisfies our spiritual needs. The Passover was time when the lamb of God came to protect the Israelites. Now the Lamb of God was again feeding the masses. He is the source of all we need. His generosity is unending. He has enough to feed everyone with an abundance left over. It is time to reach out to the Word of God and be nourished.

A Simple Prayer

Lord Christ, you are the bread of life.

You are the source of spiritual food.

Let me hear the Word of God

to the point that I overflow with the Holy Spirit.

Yours in Christ

Michael Marcon