Bread of Life

Robert E. Hall
Tarrytown United Methodist Church

August 16, 2009

John 6: 24-35

Jesus as portrayed in the Gospel of John is very much in charge of situations. And he has the ability to look below the surface of things.

The crowd of 5000 was fed with five barley loaves and two fishes and they all had as much as they wanted. And there were leftovers.

The next morning, the crowds found Jesus to the opposite shore of the Sea of Galilee. Arriving, they asked, “How did you come here?”

Jesus does not answer this question. He discerned why they had come looking for him.

Jesus says something like this: “You have not come to find me because you saw some deeper meaning in what happened yesterday---- when I fed you. No,  you are coming here simply because you got plenty to eat yesterday. You should go to great effort to work for lasting nourishment, not for everyday food that spoils in time.”

What could Jesus mean by this statement? Surely Jesus knows that the people in this crowd work every day to eke out a living, simply to have enough to feed themselves and those dependent on them! This is the same Jesus, after all, who taught his disciples to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread.” And who told us that when we feed the hungry, we are feeding him in the presence of the needy neighbor! Is Jesus only interested in spiritual matters, our souls and not our bodies?

No, Jesus loves the whole person, body, mind and soul.

Remember that Jesus’ heart went out to people in all of their needs, physical and spiritual.

But whether we have plenty or just enough, we can be obsessed with getting more, eating more, hoarding more, trusting that, if we just have more, we will be happy, we will be satisfied. What do I need? About 10% more than I make!

Jesus compares the food of eternal life (a life with God in it) with the food it takes to keep us physically healthy.

And we all, poor or rich, need this eternal food as well. William Temple wrote many years ago, “When we give bread, we bear witness that [neither we nor] they live by bread alone.”

The work we do with the hungry can sometimes be done in a way which communicates that we do not care for their souls, too.

We do not have to do the old style evangelism: Feed them and make them stay for a sermon. But we can bear witness that the greatest gift we have to give is the love of God offered in the name and spirit of Jesus Christ. We show and tell of the love of God.  We are too often mute when we should make a witness. They may indeed have the love of God dwelling in them in ways which put us to shame!

Jesus tells his visitors that the son of Man will give them this food which lasts, which will satisfy their hunger for God, fill in their god-shaped void

“Son of Man” is code for the Messiah, the one sent by God who will usher in God’s reign, free God’s people from oppression and cruelty and establish righteousness and justice.

This one will “give you” this food!

Well, they knew enough to know that nothing is free! Just as we do. To get on God’s good side, we must live right, follow the rules, observe the laws. So they are asking, what works must we do to be on God’s good side and get this lasting food?

In the prodigal son story, do you remember the errant son rehearsing his speech as he travels back home? “I will go back and tell my father that I have sinned, that I will work as a hired hand. Maybe my father will let me earn my way back into the family.”

Now there is a time for doing works which show that we have turned our lives around, proving ourselves: “fruits that befit repentance,” John the Baptist called them. But the food which Jesus is offering is a gift. Many works will be done in time, but first things first.

So Jesus tells them that the “work” which God requires of them is simply to “believe in the one God has sent.” That is, believe that he is the one God has sent, the Son of Man, the one in whom God’s word has taken shape in the midst.
“Jesus himself is God’s gift of sustenance for time and eternity.” (RSV, Oxford Annotated, footnote)

To believe is not so much a “work” as it is a submission to God’s work in Jesus.” (Brown)

“Believing” in the Gospel of John never appears as a noun. On the other hand, faith as a noun occurs 243 times in the rest of the New Testament. Meaning that “faith is active commitment, not [merely] internal disposition….Faith is the acceptance of Jesus and what he claims to be and the dedication of one’s life to him…..To have faith implies that one will abide in the word and commands of Jesus.” (Raymond Brown, The Gospel According to John, Volume One, pages 512-513)

In John, Jesus is portrayed as one who asks followers to believe in or into him, or as is the same, to believe in God.

There are in our lives persons in whom we believe. We believe in these persons not merely have an opinion that they are good leaders, or that they are smart. We believe in them to such a degree that we are committed to them.

What Jesus is asking is risky. He is inviting people to believe that God is present in him in a way that is unique; that somehow, in his words and actions, (which will culminate on a cross and issue in his being raised), God is here; that the hopes and dreams of all the years are met in him. Such faith means that we believe to be true that which is stated in the prologue of John: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth….In him was life, and that life was the light of [humankind.]” (John 1)

This is more than trusting that Jesus is a good example, a a wise teacher, an admirable leader. Many will admit that these are accurate. But believing in Jesus as the Word of God incarnate? This is a deeper level of commitment, for sure!

How would one go about taking such a step of faith?

The people listening are not ready to take this step without some better proof! So they ask Jesus, “What sign can you give us so that we can see it and believe you?” And they give a suggestion. They recall that Moses in the wilderness fed the starving, murmuring wanderers with manna (a translation, as best we can tell, of what they asked when they first saw it, “What is it?”) To which Moses replied, “It is the bread which the Lord has given you to eat.” (See Exodus 16: 15) It was a “fine, flake-like thing, fine as hoarfrost on the ground.” But edible! (Manna, I have learned “corresponds with the ‘honey dew’ excretion of two scale-insects which feed on twigs of the tamarisk tree.”) (See Oxford Annotated RSV)

The feeding of the people of God with manna in the wilderness was a lesson to them of their “complete dependence on God’s mercies.” (Brown) It was believed that, when Messiah would come, he would also be able to duplicate this miraculous feeding.

Jesus knows the story, but he gives it a different turn: the bread God is now giving “comes from heaven and gives life to the world.”

It will not sustain the people of God physically, but wilderness takes many forms.  Wildernesses can mean deserts of the soul and the spirit as well as deserts of the body. The people of God can and do wander into many strange pastures: such as equating Christianity with political and economic ideologies of the right or left.

And the giver is the gift! “I AM the bread of life. Whoever comes to be will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” (Verse 35)

To receive Jesus into our lives as our incomparable Companion is to be sustained for this life and empowered to see life as a gift to be received with praise and joy. And to abide in Jesus, to dwell in his love, which is the love of God, is to be a “partaker of the divine nature”(First Peter), to live in confidence that God does not abandon us, does not orphan us, but “has prepared a place for us” where Jesus abides.

To believe is to trust Jesus as the decisive representation of our Creator and to live in confidence in the everyday power of resurrection. “Surely it is God who saves us; we will trust in him and not be afraid; for the Lord is our stronghold and our sure defense, and he will be our Savior.” (Isaiah 11)

It is the paradox of “believing” that it is we who believe--- but it feels like a gift. Whether we encounter Jesus today in the Bible, in art, in music, or in some mystical experiences--- or through a thorough academic search (or some combination!)-----if we come to believe, it will happen because we have experienced the Ultimate Giver of life through him, in him. And though we will always learn from others, Christ will be the the cornerstone of our lives. For in Jesus we learn that, “though there are many lords and gods,” there is only one Lord for us. We stake our lives on the truth of this belief.

To come to Jesus is to enter into and maintain a life-long dialogue with Jesus as manifested in Scripture, tradition and service. It means that we listen for the voice of Jesus in all of the other voices we hear; look for the face of Jesus in all the persons whom we help (or help us). To come to Jesus means to be dedicated to the vision which he exemplified. To come to Jesus means that we find courage to face all that comes to us without being paralyzed by fear and doubt.

From St. Ephrem the Syrian, 306-373 AD, I have learned this to be true of Jesus, the Living Bread (though he is commenting on the sacramental bread): “In the bread, we eat the power which cannot be eaten; in the wine, we drink the fire which cannot be drunk.”

Our lasting prayer can only be the request of the listeners:

“Give us this bread, now and always!”