We are told about living water in John 4. But this bread, which is Christ Himself, giveth life. It is the spiritual manna, giving the Lord’s tribe their new spiritual sustenance in the age to come.
“I am the bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is My flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” (John 6:48-51)
“Clearly,” the Blessed Theophylact wrote, “the Lord is speaking here about the mystical communion of His body.” He added later, “Note carefully that the breadwhich we eat in the sacrament of Communion is neither figure nor symbol of the Lord’s flesh. It is the Lord’s flesh.”
Just as bread was converted into the flesh of Christ when He walked on the earth as man, so is His body converted to His flesh, living in us physically and spiritually as we partake of His Holy Communion.
When the Lamb of Prosphora is being cut asunder by the priestly spear, let us gaze in wonder at God’s great mystery.
Christ is more than just nourishment, more than a protein snack taken en route to the gym, He is the hope that we won’t drive into the pit on the way; He is the mercy that keeps us forever conjoined to Him. He is the Living Flesh that became bread so that we might live on.
Homage to Holy Fools 