Have you got some bread?

• Calvary
• Cross
• Dr Eliezer Gonzalez
• Eternal Life
• Faith
• Gospel
• Jesus
• New Testament
• Old Testament
• Sanctification

Feb 13, 2014 2779

In the story of Ruth, she and Naomi, her mother-in-law, travel from Moab to Bethlehem because they have heard that there is food in Bethlehem (1:6). That shouldn’t be so strange, because the name “Bethlehem” means literally, the “House of Bread.” The whole story of Ruth, points us powerfully toward the coming, bread-providing Messiah, who would feed His people, the One who would be literally be born in Bethlehem.

At the start of His public ministry, Jesus said, “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matt. 4:4). The Word of God gives more sustenance than bread made of wheat, because the life that it gives is eternal. Jesus declared Himself to be “the bread of life” (John 6:35).

How can we be nourished by the Bread of Life? We receive it not just by hearing it with our ears, but by accepting it by faith so that it becomes part of our lives. When His disciples came back from buying food in the Samaritan village, they expected to find Jesus famished at the well. They were shocked to find Him full of energy, talking to the Samaritan woman, and they scratched their heads when He told them, “I am fed by doing the will of the one who sent me and by completing his work. (John 4:34). Jesus was trying to teach the disciples that the Bread of Life that came from Bethlehem was not only for Bethlehem, but that it was to feed the whole world – yes, even a woman… a woman of Samaria.

Can you and I be fed in this way too? Jesus declared, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever, and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” (John 6:51). It is all because of the cross, where the body of Christ was crushed and bruised for our sin, as the grain must be crushed to make bread.

Because of Calvary, none of us need ever go hungry again. There is always bread in Bethlehem.

Eliezer Gonzalez