KBKM The Bread Of life

As you all know we have been studying through the theme “Names Of Jesus” with the hope and desire that we are able to draw closer to Jesus through this study. Up to this point we have examined a number of different names and or titles give to Jesus such as “Only Begotten Son,” “LORD,” and many more. Today I want us to turn our attention to a series of names or titles Jesus game himself in the book of John. These names are often called the “Great I Ams” of John. Jesus, in discussing his deity, makes the comment in John 8, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” This, of course, is in reference to God saying his name, while talking with Moses in the burning bush, is “I AM.” Today we are going to focus our attention on Jesus calling himself “The Bread Of Life” in John 6:35 but what led up to Jesus calling himself this? In John 6:1-15 we read of Jesus feeding over 5000, through miraculous means, as it was only the men that were counted here. The significant point of this, from the fed people’s side was that they were fed by this man, Jesus, and there was plenty left over. They even tried to take Jesus by force and make him their king (John 6:15). In John 6:16-21 we read that Jesus had gone back into the mountain, way from the crowd, and his disciples took a boat from Tiberias and set sail across the Sea of Galilee toward Capernaum. While heading that way the sea became rough with strong winds and this is where we find Jesus walking on the water out to his disciples. Jesus calms his disciples and they continue to Capernaum. In John 6:22-59 we find our text for our study. The people, the next day, are looking everywhere for Jesus in Tiberias and notice that some boats are missing. They then get into boats themselves and go to Capernaum where they find Jesus teaching in the synagogue (John 6:59) and they begin to question Jesus. Jesus knows why they are looking for him and says he knows they are only interested in him because he fed them (John 6:26-27). Jesus, knowing they are focused on the physical, tries to get them to see the spiritual. The people, however, only want a sign or miracle that “is like that which Moses got” with the manna from heaven. Again, this people is only thinking of their stomachs. Jesus corrects their thinking that it was Moses who gave the bread and says it was rather God and God has sent him, his only begotten son, to be their “true bread from heaven” (John 6:32-33). This has the people respond perfectly, if they had understood this spiritually in John 6:34.

John 6:34 ESV

34 They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

Jesus then responds in the next verse, “I am the Bread of Life.” This fact not only told the crowd there listen to Jesus but also us that Jesus is the only one that can “sustain us forever.” Notice what Jesus says in John 6:35 in its entirety.

John 6:35 ESV

35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.

The only way we can have the “best life on this earth” i.e., full of joy and peace, and the “best afterlife,” with God forever is if we feed on Jesus. Now Jesus isn’t being literal he is simply using the crowds obsession and drive for food as a metaphor for where their obsession and drive ought to be and that is on him and the words he is speaking. Again remember what Jesus said in John 12:48.

John 12:48 ESV

48 The one who rejects me and does not receive my words has a judge; the word that I have spoken will judge him on the last day.

We must “consume” Jesus which means we must make our lives complete and ultimately about him which summed up in the words of the great apostle Paul, “it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20).