Pay Attention Today at Mass to the First Reading and the Gospel



First the First Reading from

Bible Gateway : 2KGS 4:42-44;:



"A man came from Baal Shalishah, bringing the man of God twenty loaves of barley bread baked from the first ripe grain, along with some heads of new grain. 'Give it to the people to eat,' Elisha said.

'How can I set this before a hundred men?' his servant asked.

But Elisha answered, 'Give it to the people to eat. For this is what the LORD says: 'They will eat and have some left over.' ' Then he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of the LORD . "



Then the Gospel from John 6:1-15:



Jesus said to Philip, “How are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” This he said to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, “Two hundred denarii would not buy enough bread for each of them to get a little”. One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said to him, “There is a lad here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what are they among so many?” Jesus said, “Make the people sit down”. Now there was much grass in the place; so the men sat down, in number about five thousand. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated; so also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, “Gather up the fragments left over, that nothing may be lost”. So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves, left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign which he had done, they said, “This is indeed the prophet who is to come into the world!”



Notice the response of the crowd to Jesus' miracle? "This indeed is the prophet who is come into the world!" They immediately see that Jesus is like Elisha the Prophet (what we heard in the first reading) but at the end of this section of John's Gospel, Jesus will show that he is greater than Elisha for he will give Himself as Bread (of course many will and do find this too much to believe and leave him).



Monitor the sermon you hear today and see if the preacher brings out the obvious connection.