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Manila Bulletin devider Opinion devider God is also revealed in the ordinary

God is also revealed in the ordinary

Published Aug 10, 2024 04:02 pm

REFLECTIONS TODAY

Gird your loins

Gospel • John 6:41-51 

It is a human tendency to look for God in extraordinary events, unmindful that God can also be found in the ordinariness of our everyday life. If we are attentive enough, he reveals himself to us every day. In the Gospel of John, Jesus Christ is presented as the Revealer of the Father. He is the living bread that came down from heaven. 


The one who has made the Father known is the one who came down from heaven. We may reflect that on the onset, John’s Prologue asserts that the Logos (Word) became flesh and pitched his tent in us and among us (1:14). The believers of the incarnate Word experienced his glory, the glory of the only Son of God. They saw and experienced God revealing himself in the flesh in the person of Jesus Christ. 


In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells the Jews that he is the bread that came down from heaven. They murmur and question Jesus in this particular claim since they think they know him well. They claim to know his father and mother. They are having difficulty reconciling the omnipotent God with the incarnate Word. 


The bread that came down from heaven could not be perceived dealing with them in the ordinariness of their everyday life. We may further reflect that God is a self-communicating God, always communicating himself and his goodness to the world because he loves the world so much (Jn 3:16). He sent his only Son not to condemn the world but to save it (Jn 3:17).


Jesus revealed God as a loving Father. Hence, Jesus’ entire earthly life is a revelation of God’s love and goodness in the flesh, manifested in the ordinariness of daily life. Do we wonder why Jesus has chosen to perpetuate the offering of himself in the form of ordinary bread in the Holy Eucharist? Have we ever reflected on the Eucharist as God’s concrete revelation of his great and extraordinary love? Thus, the challenge being posed to us by God’s divine revelation in the Holy Eucharist is to allow this revelation to transform our lives in such a way that we ourselves would manifest God’s love and goodness in the world today. 


St. Clare of Assisi became one of our models in having an ardent love for the Eucharist, which transformed her ordinary life to live out an extraordinary faith. She invites us to love the Eucharist that has the power to transform our lives. “We become what we love,” says St. Clare, “and who we love shapes what we become.”

Source: “366 Days with the Lord 2024,” St. Paul’s, 7708 St. Paul Rd., SAV, Makati City (Phils.); Tel.: 632-895-9701; E-mail: [email protected]; Website: http://www.stpauls.ph.

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