Homilies on the Gospel of John

“My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His work.”

He here calls the salvation of men “meat,” showing what an earnest desire He has of providing for us; for as we long for food, so He that we may be saved. And hear how in all places He reveals not all off-hand, but first throwes the hearer into perplexity, in order that having begun to seek the meaning of what has been said, and then being perplexed and in difficulty, he may when what he sought appears, receive it the more readily, and be made more attentive to listening. For wherefore said He not at once, “My meat is to do the will of My Father?” (though not even this would have been clear, yet clearer than the other.) But what says He? “I have meat to eat that you know not of”; for He desires, as I said, first to make them more attentive through their uncertainty, and by dark sayings like these to accustom them to listen to His words. But what is “the will of the Father”? He next speaks of this, and explains.