The bread of life

Today's card reading is about Jesus being the Way to everlasting life. 

In the Gospel of John, the most beautiful and mystical gospel, Jesus refers to himself as "manna", in order to explain that He is the Way to eternal life (John 6.35). This is a comparison in the New Testament to the Old, and is a common teaching tool, to when the Israelites were fleeing from Egypt. God provided them with bread from heaven in the morning (Exodus 16.4), but this was only to keep their bodies alive. Jesus was the Messiah for the soul - he was no great warrior, and this is why the Israelites rejected him as their Messiah. The Christ would not defeat their human enemies, he would only defeat our spiritual enemies, for we battle not against flesh, but against principalities from above (Ephesians 6.12).

When we accept Christ, we not only receive peace within, but we are confident in our inheritance that he prepared for us, which is the mansion that we will live in (John 14.2). No matter what our Cross to bear is, remember that Jesus went before us, for us, and he will help you carry your burden (John 15.18 + Matthew 11.28-30).

I believe that every person has one (and only one) cross, but that cross can manifest in multiple, and at times overwhelming, ways in our days and nights. I have spoken with Jesus about the cross that I had to bear during a stressful time in my life about a year and a half ago, and I can testify that when we ask for His help, we will be relieved immediately. There are many theories to the meaning of life, but when we truly believe that our time on Earth is but a passageway, it is much more easy for us to believe in God.

This why we are taught to pause throughout our day, because then we can not only recognize and then reflect on the solitary thorn in our sides, putting it into perspective, but more so because in that stillness we know that God is present (Psalm 46.10). We are then relieved of the fear that Christ came to free us of, and life becomes less heavy once again. This is because we are not here for temporal life, but for everlasting life. Amen.