Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.” John 6:29

There tends to be a restlessness in all of us. That restlessness drives us to make contact with other people; it often leads us to set out on a journey of one kind or another, whether it is a physical journey, or an inner journey. There is something of the searcher, the seeker, in us all. At the deepest level of our being, we are searching for God. It was Saint Augustine who said that our hearts are restless until they rest in God. 

At the beginning of today’s gospel reading we find the people of Galilee searching for Jesus. They got into boats by the shore of the Sea of Galilee after Jesus and his disciples and crossed to Capernaum looking for him. When they find Jesus, he addresses them and declares that they are looking for him for the wrong reasons. They want more of the bread that he multiplied in the wilderness. Jesus challenges them to look for him not as the provider of food that cannot last but as the provider of food that endures to eternal life.

As Christians, we are all searching for Jesus in some sense. The gospel reading invites us to pay attention to why we are searching for him. What are we looking to him for? What do we expect from him? Perhaps, like the people of Galilee, our expectations are too small. What Jesus can offer us, more than anything else, is eternal life, a sharing in God’s own life. This sharing in God’s life begins here and now for those who turn to Jesus in faith, and comes to fullness in the life beyond death.

Blessings, 

Deacon Jack

St. Clare of Assisi

Houston, TX