Other Sunday and Holy Day Readings
19th SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (Cycle B)
Readings:
1 Kings 19:4-8
Psalm 34:2-9
Ephesians 4:30-5:2
John 6:41-51
Abbreviations: NABR (New American Bible Revised Edition), NJB (New Jerusalem Bible), RSVCE (Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition), IBHE (Interlinear Bible Hebrew-English), IBGE (Interlinear Bible Greek-English), or LXX (Greek Septuagint Old Testament translation). CCC designates a citation from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The words LORD or GOD rendered in all capital letters is, in the Hebrew text, God's Divine Name, YHWH (Yahweh).
God reveals His divine plan for humanity in the two Testaments; therefore, we read and relive the events of salvation history in the Old and New Testaments in the Church's Liturgy. The Catechism teaches that our Liturgy reveals the unfolding mystery of God's plan as we read the Old Testament in light of the New and the New Testament in light of the Old (CCC 1094-1095).
The Theme of the Readings: Food for the Journey
God knows our needs and is attentive to fulfilling them.
However, what we think we need isn't always what He knows we need. In the First
Reading, the prophet Elijah did not suffer a crisis of faith but a crisis of
expectation after he triumphed over the false prophets of Baal. He expected
that the victory God helped him win against the pagan priests and their false
god would result in repentance and turning back to the one true God for the
people of the Northern Kingdom of Israel and their king. When national
repentance did not occur, Elijah believed he had failed God and his people. God
responded to his prophet's grief by giving him supernatural food for his
journey to receive a spiritual renewal in a private revelation of the divine at
Yahweh's "holy mountain."
In the Responsorial Psalm, the psalmist tells of having experienced the power of the Lord's mercy in a time of distress. He testifies to the Lord's faithfulness, deliverance, and protection. And he invites everyone who reads his testimony to "taste" God's goodness for themselves by appealing to His mercy, taking refuge in the Lord God, and celebrating communion with God in the sacred meal of the Toda (pronounced to-dah, which in Hebrew means "thanksgiving"), the sacrifice and sacred meal that reestablished peace and fellowship with God.
In our Second Reading, St. Paul reminds the Christians of Ephesus that God the Holy Spirit has "sealed" us "for the day of redemption" in the Sacrament of Baptism. Submitting to Christian Baptism is an act of faith necessary for our salvation in which the Christian dies to sin and experiences a resurrection to a new life in Christ Jesus (see Mt 16:16; Eph 1:13 and 2 Cor 1:22). However, baptized Christians can "grieve the Holy Spirit" when they do not live in the image of Christ in their new life but instead exhibit traits of the old, sinful life. When we receive the sacred meal of the Eucharist, in imitation of Christ, we surrender our lives to God, and He gives us "food for the journey" through this life so we can arrive at His "holy mountain" in Heaven.
In the Gospel reading, Jesus used the symbolism of bread, which was the "staff of life" for the people of His time. He revealed that we need His glorified, resurrected flesh and blood as the "food" that nourishes and sustains us on our journey through life (Jn 6:54) as He testified, saying, "I AM the bread of life" (Jn 6:35).
Jesus promised that a person who possessed His glorified life would not die the death of alienation from God. Therefore, we can have confidence in what Jesus promised when He said: "I am the living bread that came down from Heaven ... whoever eats this bread will live forever" (Jn 6:51). The "living bread" is Christ's gift to us in the New Covenant sacred meal of the Eucharist that replaced the Old Covenant sacred meal of the Toda (Lev 6:15, 19b-20; Lk 22:20). Thus, the Old Covenant communion meal of the Toda that reestablished peace with God foreshadowed the supernatural gift of Christ in the New Covenant sacred meal of the Eucharist (from the Greek word eucharistia, meaning "thanksgiving").
When we come forward to the altar in a state of grace to receive Christ in the Eucharist, we offer Him our lives. Then He touches us like the angel of God touched Elijah in the First Reading. He commands us to "taste and see the goodness of the Lord" (Psalm response) by taking and eating His supernatural, glorified flesh, given for the life of the world (Mt 26:26). The gift of His life in the Eucharist comes with the command from the closing words of the Mass, to arise and "go forth," continuing the journey we began in the Sacrament of Baptism: "to love and serve the Lord." Like Elijah, we must continue our mission until our earthly journey ends and we receive our private revelation of God in the heavenly Kingdom.
The First Reading 1 Kings 19:4-8 ~ Supernatural Food
4 Elijah went a day's journey into the desert until he
came to a broom tree and sat beneath it. He prayed for death, saying: "This is
enough, O LORD! Take my life, for I am no better than my fathers." 5 He lay
down and fell asleep under the broom tree, but then an angel touched him and
ordered him to get up and eat. 6 Elijah looked, and there at his head was a
hearth cake and a jug of water. After he ate and drank, he lay down again, 7
but the angel of the LORD came back a second time, touched him, and ordered,
"Get up and eat, else the journey will be too long for you!" 8 He got up, ate,
and drank; then strengthened by that food, he walked forty days and forty
nights to the mountain of God, Horeb.
In the failure of Israel to repent after his victory at Mt. Carmel over the pagan priests, the ninth-century BC prophet Elijah did not experience a crisis of faith but a crisis of expectation. He expected that his great victory over the false prophets of the Canaanite and Phoenician god Baal would result in the Israelites of the Northern Kingdom and their king repenting their sins of idol worship and apostasy from God's holy covenant. He expected that they would turn back to Yahweh, destroying their pagan altars and driving out the false prophets. When this did not happen, Elijah felt his entire mission to call the Northern Kingdom of Israel to repentance failed. Overcome with grief, he believed he had failed God and his people. But Elijah had not failed. On the contrary, he successfully completed the mission God gave him; it was the people of the Northern Kingdom and their king who failed.
The life of a prophet of Yahweh was very difficult. He faced rejection by his fellow citizens, who often were so immersed in their sins that they refused his message, and it was a life filled with loneliness. After the failure of the people to repent, Elijah went into the desert and, sitting under the shade of a broom tree, confessed to God what he considered his and his people's failures. Elijah was discouraged for two reasons:
In verse 4, Elijah asked God to take his life because, in his depression, he saw no point in continuing to live. He cried out that he was no better than his sinful ancestors, referring to the Israelites who constantly complained and rebelled against God's divine plan in the Biblical period of the Exodus liberation and the wilderness years (Ex 19:6; Lev 11:44-45; 19:2; 20:7; Num 15:40; Dt 7:6; 14:2, 21b; 26:19; 28:9). The first generation of Israelites of the Exodus failed in their mission to be a "holy people" (e.g., Ex 19:6; Lev 11:44-45). Their first failure was in worshiping the image of the Golden Calf; it was the same covenant failure repeated by the people of the Northern Kingdom that he had tried to save.
5 but then an angel touched him and ordered him to
get up and eat. 6 Elijah looked, and there at his head was a hearth cake and a
jug of water, 7 but the angel of the LORD came back a second time, touched him,
and ordered, "Get up and eat, else the journey will be too long for you!" 8 He
got up, ate, and drank; then strengthened by that food, he walked forty days
and forty nights to the mountain of God, Horeb.
Yahweh came to the aid of His faithful prophet, supernaturally
providing bread and water. God's angel explained to Elijah that he would need the
nourishment for the strength to journey to Yahweh's holy mountain. Horeb, also
called Mt. Sinai, was where God first revealed Himself to the Israelites and called
them out from among the Gentile nations to enter into a covenant relationship
with Him. God formed them as a corporate covenant people who pledged to be obedient
vassals to their Divine King and His Law (Ex 24:7-8). It is also where God gave
Moses a private revelation of Himself when a distressed Moses asked Yahweh to
"Please show me your glory" after the people's sin of worshipping the idol of the
Golden Calf (Ex 33:18).
When Moses requested a revelation of Yahweh's glory, God told him, "my face ... you cannot see, for no human being can see me and survive." Therefore, God put Moses in a cave and shielded him until God "passed by." God did the same for Elijah (Ex 33:19-23; 1 Kng 19:9-18). The miraculous feeding and the revelation of God gave Elijah the courage to continue his mission.
Like the Israelites of the Northern Kingdom, God calls us to turn away from sin and back to a relationship with Him. He calls us out of our earthly exile to repentance and restored fellowship through the Sacrament of Reconciliation on our journey to the Promised Land of Heaven. God gives us the supernatural "bread of Life," Jesus Christ (Jn 6:48), to strengthen and sustain us on our journey. The Eucharistic bread and wine that becomes our spiritual food and the revelation of Christ in the Eucharist gives us the strength to face a hostile world. The Eucharist also gives us the spiritual nourishment we need as we continue our mission to share the Gospel of salvation on our faith journey to the "mountain of God" in the heavenly Kingdom where, unlike Elijah, we will have the privilege of seeing God face to face.
Responsorial Psalm 34:2-9 ~ There is Refuge in the LORD
Response: "Taste and see the goodness of the Lord."
2 I will bless the LORD at all times; his praise shall be
ever in my mouth. 3 Let my soul glory in the LORD; the lowly will hear me and
be glad.
Response:
4 Glorify the LORD with me, let us together extol his
name. 5 I sought the LORD, and he answered me and delivered me from all my
fears.
Response:
6 Look to him that you may be radiant with joy, and your
faces may not blush with shame. 7 When the afflicted man called out, the LORD
heard, and from all his distress, he saved him.
Response:
8 The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him
and delivers them. 9 Taste and see how good the LORD is; blessed the man who
takes refuge in him.
Response:
The superscription identifies Psalm 34 as a Psalm of David: Of David, when he feigned insanity before Abimelech, and Abimelech sent him away (NJB, Ps 34:1 in NABRE). The psalmist begins by praising God as he invites the afflicted to unite to Yahweh, who hears their cries and will deliver them from adversity (verses 2-4, 6). The other verses give his reasons why the faithful should praise the Lord. He has experienced the power of the Lord in his life in times of distress, and he bears witness to God's faithfulness, deliverance, and protection. Finally, he invites others to "taste and see how good Yahweh is," perhaps meaning to experience God's goodness for themselves by appealing to God's mercy and taking refuge in Him. Or he may be referring to literally "tasting" God's mercy in the sacred "thanksgiving" communion meal of the Toda that reestablished peace and fellowship with God (Lev 7:11-15/7:1-5).
The Second Reading Ephesians 4:30-5:2 ~ Be Imitators of God
30 Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with
which you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 All bitterness, fury,
anger, shouting, and reviling must be removed from you, along with all malice. 32
And be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another as God has
forgiven you in Christ. 5:1 So be imitators of God, as beloved children, 2 and
live in love, as Christ loved us and handed himself
over for us as a sacrificial offering to God for a fragrant aroma.
God the Holy Spirit has "sealed" us "for the day of redemption" in the Sacrament of Baptism, in which the Christian dies to sin and is resurrected to new life in Christ Jesus (see 1:13 and 2 Cor 1:22). Baptized Christians can "grieve the Holy Spirit" when they do not live in the image of Christ in their new life but instead exhibit traits of the old, sinful life. St. Paul lists those traits of the past life in verse 31, as he also lists the characteristics of living in imitation of Christ in verse 32. We become imitators of God (5:1) in forgiving and loving as Christ loved us when He gave up His life on the altar of the Cross so that those who belong to Him might live eternally in His presence. It is a sacrifice of love that He also asks of us when, in the Eucharistic procession, we come forward to offer up our lives as a sacrifice to Him and to receive His life, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the Eucharist.
2 and live in love, as Christ loved us and handed himself
over for us as a sacrificial offering to God for a fragrant aroma.
St. Paul reminds the Ephesian Christians that, at the Last
Supper, our Savior instituted the Eucharist to perpetuate the sacrifice of His
Body and Blood on the Cross throughout the centuries until He returns in glory (Sacrosanctum
Concilium, 47). The fact that the celebration of the Eucharist is a true
sacrifice is also affirmed in the Eucharistic prayers from Mass. For example, when
the priest prays to God the Father, saying, "We offer to You, God of glory and
majesty, this holy and perfect sacrifice: the bread of life and the cup of
eternal salvation ... Almighty God, we pray that Your angel may take this
sacrifice to Your altar in Heaven" (Eucharistic Prayer I).
The "fragrant aroma" in verse 5:2 recalls how the Old Testament represents sacrifices as "food" or a "pleasing aroma" for Yahweh (Gen 8:21; Ex 29:18; Lev 1:9; Num 28:2). However, the covenant people understood that an omnificent God did not need earthly nourishment or the pleasing smell of sacrifices (Ps 50:12-14; Sir 35:6-7/5-9). However, it was the "spiritual food" of the self-surrender of the covenant people that pleased God: For thou hast no delight in sacrifice; were I to give a burnt offering, thou wouldst not be pleased. The sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise (Ps 51:16-17 RSV; also see 1 Sam 15:22-23). God's desire was for the quality of the sacrifice to unite to the righteousness of the offeror, requesting forgiveness for his sins and restoration of fellowship with God.
In the Old Covenant of Sinai, as in the New Covenant in Christ Jesus, God deserves the sacrifice of personal surrender, and not the empty ritual of the material gift of the offeror. A sacrifice offered without prayer and the genuine contrition of a repentant heart is like a body without a soul; it is an empty and soulless gesture not worthy of a holy God. In the sacrifice of Christ in the Eucharist, we surrender our lives to Christ, and in turn, God gives us the life of God the Son to nourish us spiritually on our journey to God's holy mountain in Heaven.
The Gospel of John 6:41-51 ~ Jesus, the Living Bread
41 The Jews murmured about
Jesus because he said, "I am the bread that came down from heaven," 42 and they
said, "Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph? Do we not know his father and
mother? Then how can he say 'I have come down from heaven?'" 43 Jesus answered
and said to them, "Stop murmuring among yourselves. 44 No one can come to me
unless the Father who sent me draw him, and I will raise him on the last day. 45
It is written in the prophets: 'They shall all be taught by God.' Everyone who
listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. 6 Not that anyone has
seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. 47 Amen,
amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of
life. 49 Your ancestors ate the manna in the desert, but they died; 50 this is
the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat it and not die. 51 I
am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will
live forever, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the
world."
This passage is from the beginning of Jesus's Bread of Life Discourse (Jn 6:22-65), which contains the promise of the reality of the life of Christ in the Eucharist. Jesus addressed the Jewish crowd the day after He miraculously fed the more than five thousand men, and the crowd finally found Him again coming out of the Synagogue at Capernaum. They want Him to make another miracle. Since His feeding miracle the day before recalled the miracle feeding of the manna in the time of Moses, they asked Jesus to do the same miracle again and bring down bread from Heaven like Moses. Jesus corrected them and said that it was not Moses who made the miracle but God. Then, He told them that He is the true bread that came down from Heaven and He has the power to give eternal life (Jn 6:22-40). The crowd responded negatively to His claim because they knew about Jesus's earthly origins. They knew His family, and what Jesus told the crowd disturbed them, especially the statement, "I am the bread that has come down from heaven," a declaration of His divine origin.
43 Jesus answered and said
to them, "Stop murmuring among yourselves. 44 No one can come to me unless the
Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him on the last day. 45 It is
written in the prophets: 'They shall all be taught by God.' Everyone who
listens to my Father and learns from him comes to me. 46 Not that anyone has
seen the Father except the one who is from God; he has seen the Father. 47
Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life.
In their murmuring, they behaved like their ancestors during
the Exodus liberation by complaining and limiting what they believed God could
do on their behalf (see Ex 16:2, 17:2-3;
Num 11:1; 14:27; and 1 Cor 10:10).
Jesus continued to claim His divinity when He quoted Isaiah 54:13, where the prophet described the promised "new Jerusalem" in the Messianic Era: All your children will be taught by Yahweh and great will be your children's prosperity (Is 54:13 NJB). In verse 14, Isaiah's prophecy continued with the promise: In saving justice, you will be made free from oppression. The Isaiah passage continued in 55:1 with the invitation, Oh, come to the water all you who are thirsty, which is the promise of the Sacrament of Baptism. Then, Jesus declared in John 7:37, quoting Isaiah 55:2, that promised: Listen carefully to me, (repeating John 6:45) and you will have good things to eat and rich food to enjoy. Pay attention, come to me; listen and you will live" is the promise of the Sacrament of Eucharist (see Jn 6:42, 48) and eternal life (see Jn 6:44, 47).
48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your ancestors ate the
manna in the desert, but they died; 50 this is the bread that comes down from Heaven
so that one may eat it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down
from Heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever, and the bread that I
will give is my flesh for the life of the world."
Verse 48 is Jesus's second statement identifying Himself as
the "Bread of Life" (see verse 35). The giving of Christ's flesh in sacrifice
for the life of the world connects the Incarnation, "the Word made flesh"
(Jn 1:14), with the Eucharist. Since its earliest years, the Church recognized
John 6:51 as a true Eucharistic formula. Both the Old Latin and the Syriac liturgies
contain verse 51: This bread that I will give is my body for the life of the
world (Navarre Commentary, page 105).
Notice the future tense in verse 51: the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world. The future tense in verse 51 points to Jesus's sacrifice on the altar of the Cross and to the miracle of the Eucharist, where His sacrifice becomes present for every generation, beginning at the Last Supper. Jesus is the true bread not only because He is God's Word but also because He is the spotless victim whose flesh and blood is offered in sacrifice for the life of the world, as announced by St. John the Baptist: Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (Jn 1:29). Ever since man's fall from grace, God established blood sacrifices for the atonement of sin. The animal offered in sacrifice died in place of the sinner as a substitute:
Jesus promised a new covenant meal that is literally and not symbolically His flesh and blood. The idea of a mystical, sacred meal was not foreign to believers of the Old Covenant. In the Temple in Jerusalem, the blood of the sacrificed animal was poured out on the altar. Then, the animal was skinned, and either its whole body or only the fat burned on the altar as a gift to God. However, except for the individual or a festival whole-burnt offerings and the twice-daily Tamid communal sacrifice in the worship services, the priests ate the sin sacrifices. And, during the festivals, the people ate sacred meals like the Passover victim or the Toda ("Thanksgiving") communion offering at the Temple in a holy meal of praise that reestablished peace with God (Lev 7:11-15; Num 15:8-10).
In the Old Covenant, the sprinkling of the blood on the altar of sacrifice was symbolic of justification (being made "just" or "right" with God), and the burning of the flesh of the animal was symbolic of sanctification (consecration to God in holiness). Therefore, eating the sacrifice symbolized a redeemed covenant people in a mystical union with Yahweh. Every part of the Old Covenant sacrificial system prefigured Christ's sacrifice and the sanctification and redemption of humanity. Pope Benedict XVI (the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger), in his book, Feast of Faith, wrote about the connection between the sacred meal offered by Christ of Himself in the Holy Eucharist and the communion Toda ("thanksgiving" in Hebrew and expressed as "eucharistia" in the Greek Old Testament translation) of the Old Covenant sacrificial system.
In the Toda communion peace offering, a man or woman who had experienced some form of providential deliverance offered Yahweh a sacrifice in thanksgiving and ate it in a sacred meal within the Temple along with his family and other members of the covenant family. The Toda offering was not only a bloody sacrifice of flesh but also the unbloody offering of unleavened bread and wine consumed with the sacred meal in the presence of God. Pope Benedict XVI wrote that the New Covenant Lord's Supper becomes the Toda of Christ. He also pointed out it was a Rabbinic tradition that, when the Messiah came, all sacrifices would end except the Toda/Todah: "The Todah of Jesus vindicates the rabbinic dictum: 'In the coming (Messianic) time, all sacrifices will cease except the Todah Sacrifice. This will never cease in all eternity. All (religious) songs will cease too, but the songs of Todah will never cease in all eternity'" (Feast of Faith page 58; Levine, JPS Torah Commentary: Leviticus, page 43; also see Jesus and the Mystery of the Tamid Sacrifice, Chapter X).
All animal sacrifices ended with the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in AD 70. But the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, offered on the altar of the Cross once and for all time, is present in the New Covenant Toda/"thanksgiving" sacred meal of the Eucharist. It is a true sacrifice continually represented as an unbloody offering of Christ for the forgiveness of sin and the sanctification of the covenant people in a sacred meal on the altars of every Catholic Church. But for that sacrifice to be effective, the Lamb of God must still be eaten, not just by the priests but by every faithful New Covenant believer because they have all been called by our High Priest, Jesus Christ, into a royal priesthood of believers. St. Peter wrote: But you are a chosen race, a kingdom of priests, a holy nation, a people to be a personal possession (1 Pt 2:9; also see 1 Pt 2:5; Rev 1:6; 5:1-10, and CCC#1546). The New Covenant requires that we eat the sacrifice in a sacred meal to reestablish peace with God. At the Last Supper, Jesus commanded us to "do this" (Lk 22:19-20; 1 Cor 11:23-25) to receive His promise of eternal life, as He said in the Bread of Life Discourse: "whoever eats this bread will live forever, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world" (Jn 6:51). In our New Covenant Toda of the Eucharist, Jesus gives us food for our journey so that we can reach our goal of eternity on God's holy mountain in the heavenly Kingdom that He has promised us.
Catechism References (* indicates Scripture quoted or
paraphrased in the citation):
1 Kings 19:4-8 (CCC 2853*);
19:5 (CCC 332*)
Psalm 34:3 (CCC 716*); 34:8 (CCC 336*)
Ephesians 4:30 (CCC 698, 1274, 1296*); 4:32 (CCC 2842); 5:1 (CCC 1694); 5:2 (CCC 616*)
John 6 (CCC 1338*); 6:44 (CCC 259*, 591*, 1001, 1428*); 6:46 (CCC 151); 6:51 (CCC 728*, 1355, 1406, 2837*)
"Do this in memory of me" (CCC 1341-1344)
"Take and eat" (CCC 1384-1390)
Michal E Hunt, Copyright © 2015; revised 2024 Agape Bible Study. Permissions All Rights Reserved.