Elijah wasn’t the only person who prayed to die because he had enough of life. Perhaps you too have known someone with the blahs who felt that way. One such person was a woman named Kathy who shared a third story apartment with her friend, Mary. When struck with pneumonia, she lost her will to live, refusing to even take food or drink.
Mary came into Kathy’s bedroom and found her counting backwards. “Ten…nine…eight…seven…” Mary asked what she was doing and Kathy replied that she was counting the leaves on an old ivy plant on the brick wall. “A few days ago, there were hundreds of them. Now there are only a few left. I believe I will die when the last leaf falls.”
After trying in vain to talk this nonsense out of her friend’s mind, Mary left the room to find help. She encountered Benson, an elderly mediocre artist, who lived in a basement apartment and shared with him her friend’s condition. “Leave her to me,” he said. When Mary went back to Kathy’s room, she found her asleep. Looking out the window, she noticed a steady rain was falling and the wind was blowing.
The next morning when she entered Kathy’s room, Mary found her awake and staring out the window. To her surprise, despite the beating rain and gusty wind, there was still one leaf left on the ivy. “It’s the last one,” Kathy said sadly, “But surely it will fall today and I will die at the same time.” The day wore on and still the lone leaf clung to the branch. When evening came, it was still raining steadily.
At the first sign of dawn on the second morning, Kathy was amazed to see that the lone leaf, a mixture of yellow and green, was still there! She then said to Mary, “Something has made that leaf stay there to show me how wrong I was. Please bring me some soup.”
That was the beginning of her recovery. The next day, her doctor told her she was out of danger.
Leaving the room, he told Mary that her neighbor, Benson, had caught pneumonia two days earlier and was dying. Later that afternoon, Mary found Kathy up in bed knitting. “I have some sad news to share. Benson died this morning. Look out the window at the last leaf. Did you ever wonder why it never moved in the wind? Benson painted it there the night the last leaf fell.” By painting that leaf, such a small thing, he saved the girl from despair, but it cost him his life.
What Benson did for Kathy, Jesus did for us. He died on the cross to save us from sin. Seeing that lone leaf clinging to the vine gave Kathy a new lease on life. Likewise, for countless people, seeing what Jesus did on the cross, totally giving of himself, gives them a new lease on life.
Granted, many people fail to see, much less appreciate, the true beauty of what Jesus has to offer when he said, “Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life, the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”
As with the Jews who first heard what Jesus said, his lines don’t make sense to those who want a rational explanation. His words seem silly, puzzling, and even pretentious. “How can he say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” For them, a major stumbling block is accepting the notion that Jesus is fully divine and fully human. For the believer, there is nothing that limits Jesus in whatever he chooses to do, including giving us himself as living bread from heaven, anymore than there is anything that limits God for he is God.
The impact Eucharist can have on us varies from person to person. Much depends on where we are coming from when we receive communion. For the Catholic who truly believes, Holy Communion is the life giving experience that Jesus promises. For the communicant who comes poorly prepared, the grace and impact from this living bread may be as minimal as the amount of calories found in the host itself.
The key word when it comes to receiving communion is ‘believe.’ What exactly does John mean here? According to Fr. Scott Lewis, a theology professor at Regis College in Toronto, he isn’t speaking of an intellectual assent to creeds or doctrines. A better description of ‘believe’ would be ‘total surrender.’ By giving oneself completely to the reality of Jesus the Christ, and believing in Jesus “we allow our minds, hearts, and sacred imagination to be transformed into the pattern of Christ himself. Belief is a way of being and living. It should affect the way we relate to others, do business, study, speak, raise families, work and even the way we view the world. But most of all, belief in Christ is a willingness to pattern ourselves on him, revealing the same God in the person we become and the life we lead.”
Calling himself the Bread of Life, Jesus promises us a bread that will never go stale. Many people who have had the blahs have found strength and hope in this new manna which came down from heaven. This Bread of Life helped them to face life itself. The psalmist today said it so perfectly, “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” Good words where daily life for many people is a diet of despair.
So, how much do you trust him on this promise that we could live forever? How much do you hunger for this Bread of Life? If a man like Benson could care so much, don’t you think Christ will care a lot more about you?