Come and Believe

I love the passage in the Bible where Jesus reveals Himself as the Bread of Life (John Chapter 6). I am definitely still learning what this means, that He is the Bread that truly satisfies our inner hunger. I was reading this the other day when I felt challenged by verse 35. I felt that the Lord was showing me that, although this is a beautiful promise, I actually restrict Him in this by not fully doing my part. Yet I am still expecting Him to do His. I am learning more and more what it really means to come to Jesus, but I often hold back when it comes to believing. And these are both things that we need to do in order to allow Jesus to meet those inner aches.

I suppose the reason I, and probably many of us, hold back in this area is because it means risk. To believe that Jesus is the Bread of Life and to really know this in our lives requires us to be vulnerable. It takes risk to be able to offer Him our whole heart and say, “Lord I am hungry for you”, or “This is something that I am longing for”, instead of looking to other ‘food’ to meet the hunger.

To really come to Him with it and then believe that He can and will meet us in that place can feel risky. I think this is because part of believing and allowing Him to be the One who meets our hunger means leaving our aches open to Him. It is one thing to acknowledge the longings and hunger to Him, but it is something else to leave them open to Him and to believe that He wants to and will meet us there.

He may not meet us in the way we expect or would prefer, but He is the Bread of Life, and He promises that, when we come to Him and believe, we will never hunger or thirst again.
By not believing when we come to Him, or not believing and trusting Him to fill these places, we are restricting Him. We are not really allowing Him to be who He is in those areas. I’m not saying that genuine reasons that we struggle to trust or be vulnerable don’t matter. They do. But it really struck me that, at least for myself, there comes a point when I need to go further than bringing my aches as part of ‘coming’ to the Lord, but then stuffing them down again.

I need to leave them with Him, keep bringing them to Him, and believe that He wants to, and will, meet me in those places. It takes risk to give Him our whole heart, but it is so worth it. He sees it anyway. Psalm 38:9 says, ‘All my longings lie open before you, Lord: my sighing is not hidden from you.’ God already sees our longings, our aches, our inner hunger, but He is the one who satisfies. We can come to Him and believe and trust that we can let Him in to these areas, because He is the answer. He is the Bread, and He promises, when we let Him in, we won’t go hungry.

Prayer: Lord thank You that You are the Bread of Life and that You want to meet my inner hunger. Please forgive me when I don’t allow You to meet me in these places because it feels safer not to, or for when I look elsewhere. Please show me what it really means to never go hungry or thirsty when I come to You. But help me also to believe that You are who You say You are. Help me take the risk of trusting and being real with You, Father. Please help me to really know You in this way Lord. In Jesus’ name, Amen.