April 17: God’s Ways

There are times when the Scriptures of the Bible offer us what seem to be insignificant details, but they turn out to be important clues to understanding God and His ways. One such seemingly insignificant detail is found in John 6, 1-15: “Jesus said, ‘Make the people sit down.’”

Sitting on the ground was a symbol in the ancient world (and might still be today) of poverty and powerlessness; it meant then that people had no illusions of grandeur. Even if we don’t often sit very often on the ground nowadays, when we are at Mass, we are spiritually those disciples in John 6, sitting on the ground of humility and simplicity, sharing our poverty ... and (because of it) sharing the Lord’s gift.

Isn’t it true that miracles seem to happen in situations of scarcity rather than plenty? Where there is plenty there is no need of miracles. Where there is plenty we don’t have to struggle, We don’t have to depend entirely upon God.

The people in John 6 had almost nothing: only five loaves to feed thousands. The Gospel says they were barley loaves, the cheapest kind of bread. In fact, barley was really considered animal-feed; it was only the very poor who would eat barley loaves. Is this yet another seemingly insignificant detail that really let’s us know something important about God and His ways?  Worth some reflection today: whatever divides us from one another (self-sufficiency, greed, illusions of grandeur, hopes to accumulate more and more “things” for our own comfort) divides us also from God and God’s gift.