Have you ever been hungry? I mean like, really hungry. Your stomach aches You can only think of one thing… food. Most of us have never really gotten to that point.

The word “hunger,” by definition, means, “having a strong desire, craving, displaying the need for food.” In reality, however, hunger is not just for food. Humans also crave physical, emotional, intellectual, and spiritual nourishment. We, humans, are needy beings — in addition to food and water — we need many more things to live well: money, job, sports, love, wisdom, knowledge, security, approval, achievement, fulfillment, etc.

What we most hunger for probably varies over the course of our lives.

Jesus often uses the image of hunger to describe the longing for the Kingdom of God. Think of the Beatitudes and John’s Gospel.

The summer of John

Every three summers Catholics spend five weeks listening to Gospels drawn from chapter 6 of John’s Gospel. This year I decided to read the entire chapter of some 71 verses in one sitting. I found it fascinating to step back and see how Jesus uses physical hunger to explain hunger for God and God’s Kingdom.

As John tells the story…

• Jesus miraculously provides 5000 people bread in the desert. Their initial reaction is a desire to make him a king. But Jesus goes off by himself to the other side of the Sea of Galilee.
• When the crowd finally catches up him across the sea they ask “when did you get here“? He turns the tables by telling them why they were following him. They were just looking for more bread and wonders.
• In effect they were looking for the shiny dime rather than a crumpled piece of paper. Remember, in these days they konged for a political leader who would free them from the oppression of Rome.
• He tells they should hunger for more than mere bread. He offers them himself. He tells them he is so much more.  “I am the Bread of Life!” Bread that will be blessed and broken.
• They struggled … “how can this be”. Jesus doubles down simply saying “unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you do not have life within you”. They react … “This saying is hard; who can accept it?”
• He propheticaly challenges them, “Does this shock you? What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?^*
• This was just too much. “Many [of] his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him”.
• Jesus asks the twelve, “Do you also want to leave?” Simon Peter answered, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.

Have you ever been spiritually hungry?

The crowd did not know they were spritually hungry. Jesus’ inner circle had some awareness but even they were confused. Think of the Last Supper when Jesus pointedly askd them “Dp you understand what I your Lord and Master have done. If you do will wash one another’s feet. Yet not soon after in one way or another they too abandoned Jesus.

We know from other writings they were scared even as they hoped and hungered in an upper room. They had to learn that their spiritual hunger would be filled in “the breaking of the bread” Even when they were transformed by the gift of the spirit the Acts of the Apostle showed they faced quite a learning curve. What was essential in living in the kingdom? Were dietary laws and other customs necessary signs of living in God’s Kingdom? They too would become bread that was broken!

Food for thought!

• Among the many hungers in our lives what are you most hungry for?
• Do we really hunger for the coming of God’s kingdom where even now we recognize and treat each and every one of us, no matter how scarred, as brothers and sisters?
• “How can this be?”

Click below for an audio version of this Vincentian Mindwalk