John: The Bread of Life
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Intro
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The book is unfolding the manifold facets of who Jesus is. Written so that you may beleive and have life in Jesus name!
recently, Jesus fed the 5000 with 5 loaves & 2 fish on the other side of Lake Galilee
The people recognized this as a reflection of Moses who “fed” the people of Israel in the wilderness with Manna & Quail.
They were going to take Jesus and make him king by force, Jesus slips away while he sends the disciples over to Capernaum in the west.
Jesus catches up to them on the lake, striding across the waves!
Jesus brings his people safely to shore.
The crowds follow to search Jesus.
Brings us to our passage today:
All of Ch 6 fits together as a unit.
After the miracles, we now get a discussion that fleshes out the meaning behind it all. It’s a big Q&A sesh.
Like a rope - several strands running in parallel, may mixed metaphors. We aren’t going to trace each strand individually, or we’d be spending 3 Sundays in this text! (while that is valuable and worthwhile, I’m trying to move fast enough through John that you’re seeing how all the story flows and how the big paces fit together).
We’re going to trace the main unfolding of the text with the 6 Answers Jesus gives. These 6 answers will summarize what Jesus has to say to the Jews, and to us today historically and geographically removed from these events.
1. Work for Food that Endures
1. Work for Food that Endures
This is the first answer!
But we haven't even asked the question yet!
The crowd went across the lake in search of Jesus, even though they don’t know where he went. Let’s look:
When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”
The crowd is confused, because the hadn’t seen Jesus leave the other side of the lake. The disciples left without him, yet here he was!
Jesus cuts to past the question, ignoring their curiosity and cutting to their hearts:
Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.”
Oof! Straight between the eyes! You’re not here for Godly spiritual reasons, you’re here because of the miraculous food.
You want to feed your bellies! Jesus highlights where their motives are wrong. They have a good action - search for Jesus, but bad motive - get free food.
News would be spreading like wildfire, of the new prophet who performed this great miracle, but they’re not there to find out what God says through his prophet and understand the one that the signs reveal.
SO Jesus tell them what they should be doing: “Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life”
They’re trying mighty hard to find Jesus, chasing him across the countryside for a free feed, and Jesus is saying “Stop working for this food that can go bad, but work for something better - food that can never get moldy! Food that lasts for eternal life!
The manna in the wilderness would go bad after a day or two. The bread Jesus used to feed the 5000 was regular bread that would deteriorate. Jesus says work hard for something that doesn’t deteriorate!
Where are you going to find it? With the Son of Man - the divine figure from God. God has approved this Son of Man as the real deal and he is authorized to distribute this “food” that lasts.
Jesus often uses “Son of Man” as a roundabout way to talk about himself. It’s clear here that he’s talking about himself because the crowd is about to ask Jesus for that Eternal Food. Jesus is the one who has this enduring food, and he can give it.
So he gives this food, but he calls his hearers to work for it! That’s weird! How can you work for a gift?!? I think here Jesus means for them to “work” for it meaning they should try and get it. They can’t earn it, but they must seek it and look for it with great effort, just like the have been looking for Jesus these last couple of days.
It’s worth taking pause here to ask, what are you seeking from Jesus? We have asked this over the last couple weeks, but it’s important to drive this point home.
Many people will leave the faith, they will prove themselves to false converts, goats among the sheep so-to-speak.
When you ask these people why they don’t believe anymore, you will get a variety of answers, but the thing that they have in common is that there is a dissatisfaction with something that Jesus didn’t promise them.
They might cite
Sinners and hypocrites in the Church,
Christian teaching being out of step with popular opinion
An apparent contradiction between God’s word and the latest scientific opinion.
God didn’t give them the life they had hoped for.
But you notice what the pattern is? People are always dissatisfied with the Faith because they were looking to Jesus to give them something he doesn’t promise. There is a mis-match between their expectations and what Jesus holds out!
Seek the bread that leads to life, not the things that are fleeting. Put the effort in to gain that which Jesus will give you!
But what is the work? What must we do? That’s what the Jews ask that next!
2. The work is: Believe in the Sent One
2. The work is: Believe in the Sent One
So, to get this answer, they ask this follow up question apparently unaware that Jesus is talking metaphorically:
Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”
It’s a simple enough question. You said to work for the food that lasts to eternal life and you’ll give it to us. “What work must we do?”
The answer is surprising, because it doesn’t seem like work at all: “Believe on the one He has sent”!
The effort, the work is to trust. To believe. To have confidence in the one God has sent.
Putting two and two together from the previous verses, we can see that the Son of Man is the one approved by God, it’s not a big step to see that Jesus is not only the approved one, he is sent from God, and Jesus is inviting these people to put their trust in him.
3. The Father sends the Bread of Life
3. The Father sends the Bread of Life
So we come to the third part of the Q&A where the crowd starts comparing Jesus to Moses as they ask for a sign to prove that Jesus really is from God. Once again Jesus side steps the question for the more important thing that needs to be said:
So they asked him, “What sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
So, to summarize, The crowd says “Prove you’re a prophet of God like Moses. Can you do better than Moses?”
Jesus responds “Moses isn’t giving you bread from heaven right now, but God the Father is. He’s giving life giving bread.”
They’re still stuck on miracles and food, and Jesus is here trying to get them to focus on what God is giving right now! You remember that God delivered through Moses back in the day, and you wonder what amazing things Jesus could do in the future, but what about the true bread that is given that day.
Jesus is talking about a figurative bread that God is giving, that doesn’t just take away a little hunger in the desert, or on the shores of Lake Galilee, but instead it is Bread of Heaven that brings life to the world!
Even if the crowd doesn’t quite get it, the still understand that Jesus is talking about something good, and they want it!
4. Jesus is the Bread of Life
4. Jesus is the Bread of Life
This 4th answer clears up the figurative language. The ask from this heavenly bread, and Jesus will explain what it is:
“Sir,” they said, “always give us this bread.” Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe.
So Jesus states it plainly - he Is the Bread of Life that God is giving.
The food that endures to eternal life, you work for it by believing in the Sent One, that sent one is Jesus. He is the Bread of Life who brings that eternal life.
We need food and drink to survive, so the idea that we could have something that sustains us indefinitely means that we could live on. Like a battery that never runs out!
Jesus is the gift of life to the world for the person who believes! And not believing in some general faith about God, believing specifically on Jesus. He is the object of our faith as the sent on from God.
Now, we need mention that many English translations are somewhat unhelpful here, because they use words like “whoever” and “anyone”, words which don’t strictly speaking show up in the Greek. Here where it says “whoever believes” gives the impression of this expansive invitation, but in the Greek in this spot it is literally “the”. It is the definite article. To smooth it out a little, we could the “the one” or “the person” because contextually that is what we’re talking about. So it’s better rendered “the one who comes to me will never go hungry, and the one who believes in me will never be thirsty”
No why am I pointing this out? Because if we don’t make it clear, the following verses may feel like a contradiction.
You see, as we have been seeing across the pages of John - heaps of people will not believe. Stubbornly so, even when the evidence is staring them in the face! “You have seen me and you still do not believe”
What hope is there if they can’t see what’s staring them in the face? The hope is that God will act to bring his People to faith in Jesus:
All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day.
ALL those people who are given to Jesus will come, and they will not be left out.
There’re aren’t people knocking at Jesus door and he is refusing to let them in. All who come are received by Jesus, believing in him.
But who are those that come? Those who the Father gave to the Son.
Jesus will not loose anybody who is with Him. No man left behind. This is God’s will.
This is a great comfort, that God secures his people. God’s people do not need to fear being left behind, that there’s not enough room for them. There is security and safety in belonging to Jesus, you need not fret, because Jesus is going to save everybody that comes to him, all the people that the Father gives to Him.
Jesus reveals that it is God’s plan, the Father’s will to save his people, all who look to Jesus will be saved:
For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
Not “might be saved” not “maybe” but “Jesus will raise them infinitude on the last day.
ALL who look to Jesus will be saved. Who will they be? All those Given by the Father to the Son.
5. The Father enables Believing
5. The Father enables Believing
This naturally raises some tough questions about the nature of belief, and how our choices feed into God’s eternal plans. Lets keep looking at the text to see what God says.
The Jews aren’t real happy because of Jesus claims of divine provenance, that he was from heaven. They knew Jesus and His family, how can this be? Jesus explains that they won’t get it, unless God teaches them the truth
At this the Jews there began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?” “Stop grumbling among yourselves,” Jesus answered. “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day. It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me.
So the crowd know Jesus and his family. They’re in their home town! They don’t understand how Jesus could be Bread from Heaven when they knew his family.
Jesus says, that you’ll never get it unless God teaches you.
No One, Nobody can come to Jesus UNLESS they are drawn. It was futile to try and understand Jesus message unless God was at work to bring them understanding.
Draw = drag - but not mean and vindictive, it is loving and kind.
Jesus will raise up the ones the Father draws. There are not people who get drawn in, and then Jesus looses hold of them. Those who are drawn are raise up. That means, those who are drawn in will Believe on Jesus.
All who hear from God the Father, as he teaches them, will come to Jesus.
We know from John 3, that this is connected to the Spiritual Rebirth. You must be born again by the Holy Spirit so that you can see the kingdom for God - and that Spirit goes where God wants it to go. And later we will see that the HS teaches and instructs beleivers.
God must make us alive so that we can believe on Jesus. The Father must draw us in.
Jesus continues his argument about being from God and their need to accept him:
Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
Jesus is the Bread of Life, better than manna! It’s like the Holy Grail!
Jesus starts to explain a deeper meaning for what the “bread” is, it is Jesus flesh that he will give for the world!
Jesus gave his body as a sacrifice!
Given for the life of the world - the death that brings life!
6. Eat the Bread - live forever!
6. Eat the Bread - live forever!
The Idea of Eating flesh is weird, so the Jews took issue with it!
Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.
Very truly - super important
Unless - The only way!
Putting it positively and negatively
Eating and drinking leads to life - sacramental connections.
For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”
real/true = higher/better
Jesus lives in his people, like ingested food. But he’s also our source of life.
We’re being invited into a relationship like the Father & Son - united with God. Sustained by Him.
Repeated statements, driving home the eternality of the Bread of Life - better than the shadows in the wilderness!
So What?
So What?
Work for Food that Endures
The work is: Believe in the Sent One
The Father sends the Bread of Life
Jesus is the Bread of Life
The Father enables Believing
Eat the Bread - live forever!
References:
Carson’s Pillar Commentary on John.
Hutcheson’s commentary on John
Hendrickson’s commentary on John
Sermons by Richard D. Philips,
Sproul, R. C., ed. The Reformation Study Bible: English Standard Version. Orlando, FL; Lake Mary, FL: Ligonier Ministries, 2005.
Phillips, Richard D. John. Edited by Richard D. Phillips, Philip Graham Ryken, and Daniel M. Doriani. 1st ed. Vol. 1 & 2 of Reformed Expository Commentary. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 2014.