JOHN 6, 41-51
At this the Jews 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 him, and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me. No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father. I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
When I was younger, I remember coming home from school very dejected. I had forgotten to read the assignment for the day, and when the teacher asked me some simple questions about it, I didn’t know the answer, and the whole class laughed at me. And then, in gym class, we were playing kickball and all I needed to do was to catch the ball that was kicked to me and we would win the game. But I dropped it, the other team scored and we lost, and all my teammates were steamed at me. For a kid in sixth grade, it doesn’t get any worse than that. I wanted to run away and join the circus because my life here was over!
When I got home, my grandmother asked what was wrong. And so, I described the tragic events of my day, and how my educational career is now over, she smiled and said, “You know what you need? A couple of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies and a glass of milk.” And as she went to get them, I was upset and offended. My whole life is over, I can’t show my face again in that school, and she thinks a couple of chocolate chip cookies will make it all better?”
But as I sat down and enjoyed those still warm chocolate chip cookies and that glass of cold milk, I realized Grandma was right. Eating chocolate chip cookies can make the worst day ever, a whole lot better.
The crowd in these verses were having the worst day! Jesus is asking them to believe something that makes no sense. He is asking them to trust in something that is impossible! And Jesus can hear the confusion in their voices, and see the frustration on their faces. But Jesus comes up with the same advice that my grandmother did. Jesus tells the crowd, WHAT YOU NEED IS SOMETHING GOOD TO EAT!
I
The crowd has been talking with Jesus about this “Bread from heaven” for a while now. But suddenly, the attitude of the crowd begins to change. Jesus had told them, “For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.” Suddenly they start to grumble. “At this the Jews 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’?” What Jesus was saying made no sense. It was impossible! It just couldn’t be true!
They knew Jesus and His family. They knew Joseph the carpenter, and Mary his wife. They knew their children, and Jesus was one of them. They saw Jesus grow up. There was nothing special about His childhood. Nothing special about His birth. He was like any other child! He was the product of biology. So, how could Jesus say that He came down from Heaven. They had all the proof they needed to convince themselves that Jesus is lying. He cannot possible have come down from Heaven.
Jesus doesn’t argue with them. Rather He gives them a call to repentance. “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” Of course, you can’t comprehend with I’m saying! You are not hooked up to the Father. You should be! You claim to be God’s people. But you have nothing to do with the Father. You don’t listen to what God says. You use human logic and reasoning to figure out God. And that doesn’t work. Human logic and reasoning will never lead you to God. Because God’s ways have nothing to do with human reasoning, and logic. It has to do with the grace, and mercy, and love of God.
God creates a beautiful world and man destroys it. God gets angry with mankind and punishes them. And if there is to be any reconciliation between God and man, man must do the mending. God is going to sit in heaven and wait for man to do something that will make him acceptable again. That logical! That’s reasonable! That’s the human way!
But that’s not God’s way. God creates a beautiful world, and man destroys it. God gets angry and punishes mankind. But then God says, I will find a way to work out a plan of reconciliation between God and man. And then God sends His almighty Son to this earth, to suffer the wrath of God, for the sins of the world, and then watches as that Son is murdered on a cross. And then raises Him from the dead. That makes no sense to human logic! That is ridiculous to human reasoning. What God would ever do something so foolish as this. But that is God’s way! Not by human logic or reasoning. But by the grace and mercy and love of God.
That’s why the people in that crowd were having the worst day ever. What Jesus said, made no sense at all. They just couldn’t understand. And so, Jesus looked at them, and like my grandma said, “You look troubled and upset. WHAT YOU NEED IS SOMETHING GOOD TO EAT!
II
Jesus told them, “I am the bread of life.” Jesus told them, “You don’t need another miracle meal where I feed you all with some boy’s lunch. You don’t need manna from heaven every morning! You don’t need to see a bunch of miracles to prove to you who I am!” What you need is to simply spend time with Jesus, and feast on that living bread that will give you eternal life, bring you into God’s family, and give you the faith you need to understand how God saved you.
Then Jesus zeroes in on what that living bread from heaven truly is. “This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” The only way to come to God, is through Jesus. And the only way to God is for Jesus to offer Himself on a cross. Yes, His flesh, will be nailed to that cross. His body will bear the scars of a crucifixion. Jesus will endure the wrath of God and feel the pangs of hell because of the sins we committed. And now because of that we have eternal life. We have peace with God!
Jesus told these people, that’s the good food you need to eat. That’s what you need to concentrate on. Take your human reason, and logic, and just throw them in the trash. Simply believe what Jesus said. He did come down from Heaven! He is the living bread, that gives eternal life to all. He is the Son of God, and the Sacrifice for sin. And He is our only hope for heaven.
The sad thing is that many people in that crowd, closed their ears to anything else Jesus would ever say. They stuck with human logic and reason and neglected the grace and mercy of God. And that “worst day ever” grew until it became the “worst eternity ever!” Thankfully, we understand what Jesus said here! Oh, we might not understand everything Jesus said. We may still have to struggle with different things Jesus told us in the Bible. But we understand the important thing. Or more to the point, we believe the important thing. We believe that the Bread of Life that gives us eternal life, is the body that Jesus gave up on that cross to take away our sins. The body that God raised back to life again on Easter Sunday. And we keep feasting on that Bread of Life, to keep us strong in our faith.
And yet, even though we are God’s precious children, we have bad days. We get frustrated because when we try to share the gospel, we seem to fail, like Elijah. And then God comes to us and say, “Quit complaining! We don’t have time for sitting here and feeling sorry for ourselves. We’ve got things to do. So, get up and get going.” And we look to God, and say, “Really, Lord? That’s all you’ve got to say to me.
God says, “You must forgive that jerk who really hurt you even though he’s not sorry! You must be kind and considerate to those people who don’t like you.” And we say, “Really, Lord? Are You serious?”
We’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing, we’re even going above and beyond, in helping others, and then tragedy strikes. We get hurt in some accident. Someone we love is suffering and there’s nothing we can do about it. And the Lord says, “Rejoice in all things! Thank God for everything that happens in your life, because God is in control!” And we say, “Really, Lord? That’s all you’ve got to say to me?”
Some days we do have the “WORST DAY EVER!” Sometimes, the Lord’s ways don’t make sense to us. And we get frustrated! And our Lord comes to us and says, “Looks like you’re having a bad day. You know what! WHAT YOU NEED IS SOMETHING GOOD TO EAT! You need to come to church and worship and praise God. You need to attend the Lord’s Supper and feel the Lord’s presence as He forgives you. You need to feed on the Scripture, and just read what Jesus has done for you.”
And like I felt when my grandma said that, we may begin to question the Lord. “Lord, with all the garbage I’m going through, with all the hurts I’m enduring, with all the wicked things that are happening to me, you think simply going to church, or reading the Bible, or going to communion is really going to make everything better? You really think, all I need is something good to eat? Really, Lord?”
But you know what? As we are tasting that gospel message one more time, and as we are sharing that time of communion with Jesus, as we are fellowshipping with our fellow saints, and listening to what God says, we suddenly realize, “Yeah! Feasting on God’s Word is a fantastic cure for the worst day ever!
Grandma was right! Whether it be chocolate chip cookies, or feasting on the Bread of life. When you’re going through the worst day ever, WHAT YOU NEED IS SOMETHING GOOD TO EAT!
