Bread Crumbs

Bread Crumbs

In a fairy tale remembered from childhood, Hansel and Gretel leave a trail of bread crumbs behind them to find their way home out of a dark and threatening forest.

Sometimes life’s challenges mount in ways that leave us a little lost—or a lot. Aches multiply. Sorrows crowd us. Fears press in. And their cumulative, prolonged effect causes a loss of perspective that is understandable, yes, but frightening nonetheless.

You don’t need to hear my list of woes. Each of us has her own. But what you might need to hear is this: the Bread of Life is present, and he himself is the way back home. When the pain of settled darkness seems too much to bear—when we don’t know whether to go right or left, to lie down or get up—he leaves us precious pieces of himself to comfort, guide, and encourage. He came, after all, to give himself away.

My trail of bread crumbs from the Father’s hand has included a snippet of long-loved music on the car radio. Words on a page found just in time. A leap into my lap, a deep sigh, and a full-body snuggle from forty-seven-pound Burley when I was swimming in lonely tears. A vase of flowers on my doorstep. A kind word from a stranger. A bright-blue, cloudless sky and a few moments to sit underneath it. Found photographs. A saved voice mail of my mother’s voice. My father’s voice sounding normal again. My sister’s laugh. These may seem insignificant, but such crumbs are life to me—and although my own hand has not laid them down, I am picking them up and savoring each one. I know where they lead, and I want to be in that place.

Darkness comes. It always has. It always will. But the Bread of Life has come, and he keeps on coming too. He heaps morning manna. Breaks Communion loaves. Drops grains of wheat at the far corners of a harvested field. He leaves markers of himself through the dimmest of days and weaves a ribbon of remembrance of his goodness over time. We have history, he and I, and he shows me every day that he means to bring me out and guide me safely home.

Jesus replied, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry again.”

John 6:35