Breaking the bread of life

from the Christian Science Sentinel

“Everywhere, the cost of food is rising sharply,” reported The New York Times in a recent story. “Whether the world is in for a long period of continued increases has become one of the most urgent issues in economics.” Some say that rising food prices could be more of a problem for the American economy than rising fuel prices, because food accounts for over three times what fuel does in people’s budgets.

But that Times article also mentions signs that can be seen as hopeful: “In recent years, the world’s developing countries have been growing about 7 percent a year, an unusually rapid rate by historical standards.” While it’s true that this is creating higher demands and driving up the price of agricultural commodities, it’s also true that “the high growth rate means hundreds of millions of people are, for the first time, getting access to the basics of life, including a better diet” (“A global need for grain that farms can’t fill,” by David Streitfeld, March 9, 2008).

All this raises some fundamental questions: Must the very advancements that improve some lives result in greater problems for others? Is it all just a case of competition for a limited share of the global food pie?

Prayer brings ideas, and ideas bring solutions.

Questions such as those deserve thoughtful answers. The kinds of answers that inevitably come from increased spiritual understanding. The issue of short food supplies and rising prices may appear so open-ended, so daunting, that prayer can seem almost incidental. But prayer brings ideas, and ideas bring solutions. The best ideas—the ones that heal—come from the divine Mind. Seek the things of God first, said the master Christian in his great Sermon, and the needful things “shall be added unto you” (Matt. 6:33). Jesus was referring specifically to the necessities of life, among them food.

Speaking of higher laws than those of economics, Sentinel founder Mary Baker Eddy made an observation that goes beyond the apparent brick wall of limited resources and “too many mouths to feed.” The Science of Christianity, which she discovered in 1866, holds the promise that humanity can rise above all forms of limitation, through understanding the simple truths Jesus taught and practiced. And the Bible records that on more than one occasion Jesus produced food for everyone, even in times of stark shortage. While we may or may not instantly solve today’s food challenges on the scale that Jesus did, we can expect to contribute practical solutions to the individual and collective need to feed ourselves affordably. Nobody on the face of the planet is left out of God’s promise, and nobody receives at another’s expense. As Mrs. Eddy wrote, “In the scientific relation of God to man, we find that whatever blesses one blesses all, as Jesus showed with the loaves and the fishes,—Spirit, not matter, being the source of supply” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 206).

The spiritual ideas that will empower prayer and help us tackle this issue come through the influence of the Christ, Truth, which Jesus expressed beyond measure—through God’s message speaking to human consciousness. As the Christ leavens human consciousness, ideas come to light that bring hope and progress, just as they did in Jesus’ time.

Spiritual ideas multiply and spread the blessings.

And today, as in Jesus’ time, contrary mental currents push and pull to advance a matter-based view of life with all its limits and grasping for monopoly power. Christ-borne ideas are recognizable for the universality of their benefits. Spiritual ideas multiply and spread the blessings, while materialistic aims divide and hoard resources; they spread only fear. Which influence will have sway in today’s hearts and minds?

Grains such as corn and wheat are commodities that lie at the heart of rising food costs; simply put, the world can’t seem to grow enough grain for bread, the fundamental food of human existence. This drives prices up and appears to separate the haves from the have-nots. But is the fundamental need really for more seeds to grind into flour and ship around in sacks to those prepared to pay the highest price? Or is it for more of that leavening truth of the Christ? Don’t we most need to understand, day by day, a little more of the truth taught by the one who told his disciples, “I am that bread of life” (John 6:48)?

With an enlarged understanding of the truths Christ Jesus taught, society’s perspective will change to one that is solution-oriented, infused with healing rather than filled with worry and concern. We’re not pawns in a food-chain chess match—not when we accept the “bread of life” as representing the sum and substance of our being. And then go about breaking spiritual bread with our neighbors.