Non-Perishable Food

 “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” (John 6:27)

I love to photograph birds in the wild. I focus (pardon the pun) mostly on large birds, because small birds tend to move around too much. I love to watch hawks majestically perched high up in a tree. And along the salt marshes of the Lowcountry, herons and egrets are plentiful. 

Birds spend most of their time in search of their next meal. Their eyes are squarely focused on their prey. Hawks will sit on their perch for hours until they spot a mouse, or frog, or other small animal. Likewise, the water birds will stand still as statues waiting for the unsuspecting fish to swim into the radius of its reach.

Every once in a while I am fortunate enough to capture the moment when the bird captures its prey, like the time when I happened upon this hawk carrying a frog (it looks like the hawk has the legs of a frog, so at first I thought that this was a sighting of the very rare frawk):

Or when I had my camera focused on this heron as it swallowed the fish it had just caught:

Birds, for the most part, are completely consumed by their pursuit of food. It is understandable, though, isn’t it? After all, they need their next meal for survival, and for the survival of their young. Their focus on food is what keeps them alive.

It makes me wonder, on what do I focus for nourishment and sustenance? I’m not talking so much about food for the body, but food to feed my spirit? The world in which we live dangles a lot of appealing things before us, all with the claim to satisfy us.

But do those things really satisfy us?

Jesus said, “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” (John 6:27) I want that kind of food – food that will not perish, food that lasts forever. I have come to realize that much of what we pursue for meaning and purpose and fulfillment don’t really give us meaning or purpose or fulfillment; they never really do satisfy the hunger we have deep down in our soul.

I’m with Saint Augustine, who said in prayer-like confession to Jesus, “My heart was restless until it found its rest in thee.” (Augustine lived a long time ago, so he used words like “thee” instead of “you”) Long ago I determined that the hunger in my heart could only be satisfied by Jesus. When I focus the longing of my heart on Jesus, other things tend to wane in importance. Jesus puts things in perspective for me, and Jesus feeds the hunger of my soul.

Just a few verses after Jesus urged us to pursue the food that endures to eternal life, he said this: “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” (John 6:25). I think he’s telling us that once we’ve found him to feed our soul, we don’t need to look anywhere else.

Do not work for the food that perishes (and leaves you feeling empty), but for the food that endures to eternal life (and that truly satisfies you). Let your search end with Jesus; then let the soul feast begin.