YEAR OF MISSION EIGHTEENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

Just notice what the people are doing at the start of today’s Gospel! They are looking for Jesus. They are hungry for what he has to offer them. Like the Samaritan woman whose thirst cannot be taken away with mere water from the well, so the crowd’s hunger cannot be truly satisfied with any old bread. They yearn and hunger for the ‘bread’ that is Jesus. Only he can nourish them and satisfy them completely… that’s why, maybe, they are eager to find him. The challenge is ‘to come’ to Jesus and ‘to believe’ in Jesus. Only when we come to him, allow him into our lives, give our all to him will we find our hunger and thirst taken away. Knowing him as our nourishment then, surely, we are charged with allowing others to be guided towards him who can satisfy the longings of the human heart. Maybe our mission this week is to allow others to come to understand what nourishes us, what sustains us, what feeds us and to allow them to journey towards the Christ who reaches out to them in their hunger and their thirst.