The gospel reading for the eighteenth Sunday, Year B begins the discourse of Jesus on the bread of life. The miracle of multiplication was just an introduction to this very important speech of Jesus. Having realized what had happened, the people went to look for him and they found him in the synagogue in Capernaum. As Jesus himself admitted, they looked for him because he gave them food to eat. He satisfied their basic needs, and now they wanted him to do it again and again. They sought to make him their king, so they didn’t need to be exposed anymore to any precariousness of life. And this is not what the mission of Jesus is about. He knows perfectly well that human weakness always tries to manipulate God for its own particular purposes. It tries to tailor God into its own human concepts and plans, while Jesus came to do something different—to usher us into a completely new reality.

Jesus’ interlocutors operate within the limits of earthly understanding and aspirations. They look at him from the position of their purely human and earthly desires. That’s why their hunger cannot be fully satisfied. So, Jesus tries to challenge them to think about themselves in a new way, from a different perspective. He tries to raise their minds and the desires of their hearts to a new level to see a bigger picture for their lives. Jesus paints in front of them that picture which is God’s definitive plan for all humanity—eternity.

The people in Capernaum demand from Jesus credentials to prove that he is truly able to provide the food from heaven. There is a double irony in their request. They seem not to remember that he just made a miracle a day ago and they confirm it by seeking him as far as Capernaum. By pointing out to Moses, they demand from him the new manna, not understanding that Jesus himself is exactly that what they are asking for.

The people in the synagogue had a difficulty in crossing their limited perception grounded in their purely human expectations. And yet, in that sense they are like each one of us. Like them we demand from Jesus signs and wonders to fix our problems right away. At times God does so for us in order to help us to discover a bigger plan for our lives. Whatever situation we may find ourselves in: sickness, financial struggles, loneliness, family problems—God uses those things to bring us closer to him, to help us to discover more deeply and more fully his love for us. However, before that happens, he wants us to discover him first in the Eucharist. The Jews asked Jesus to give them this food always. Every day, the Lord is giving himself to us under the species of bead and wine. He does so to help us to cross the limits of our little faith, to transform our earthly desire into his own ones.