Word for the day by Christian Education Forum

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The Sacrament of Holy Qurbana


Philip Manuel and Laila Anie Philip
Carmel MTC, Boston MA

58 This is the bread that came down from heaven...... the one who eats this bread will live forever.” 

To understand the giving passage we need to take a closer look at the context. Large crowds were following Jesus not because of their love and faith in Him but because of the miracles He was performing. Jesus sees the big crowd and not wanting to send them away physically hungry, decides to feed them. So we see with five loaves and two fish Jesus feeds the 5000 and the disciples gather up twelve baskets of leftovers.  Now because the crowd had been fed, they want more. They want to be provided with more freebies and in order to do so they even want to make Jesus a king. Jesus want to set their thinking straight and He tells them that He is  ““the bread that came down from heaven.” vs.41
Previously Jesus had told them "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty"  vs.35. To drive away the unbelievers Jesus takes this analogy a little further and says “Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you." vs.53
One can just imagine the chagrin of the listeners when they were told to drink the blood of Jesus. They had been brought up on the Mosaic faith where Moses had told them “ Only  be sure that you do not eat the blood; for the blood is the life, and you shall not eat the life with the meat”. Deuteronomy 12:23
Jesus here is speaking about the spiritual eating and drinking. So we need to
1. Develop a spiritual hunger and thirst.
Unless we develop a physical hunger and thirst we will not look for food. In the same manner we need to develop a spiritual hunger and thirst for Jesus and the Word of God. We need to have an ardent desire to be with Christ and love Him alone.
2. Consume the food and drink.
Looking at  well prepared food will not satisfy our hunger or quench our thirst.  We need to consume it, similarly we need to accept and believe in Christ.
3.Take delight in the food and drink.
We need to savor and relish the good food we eat. Only then will we crave for more good food. The more we read and study the Word of God, we will crave for a deeper understanding of His word.
4. To sustain life and nourishment
Just like we need food to sustain and nourish our physical life, we need to seek nourishment from Christ and His words and depend on Him completely for support, strength and vigor in our spiritual life.

Jesus  takes the above analogy and transfers it to a sacrament - the Holy Qurbana in which "the Holy Body and the Holy Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ broken and shed on the cross for the forgiveness of sins is given to us for the health of our body and soul." We are asked to take part in the Holy Qurbana  as often as we can "to proclaim the Lord's death until He comes".

PRAYER

Heavenly Father, We thank you for sending Your Son to save us. Help us always to lead a life that will glorify your Holy name. Amen. 
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
"My Hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus blood and righteousness"
Edward Mote. 1834

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