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"I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE" |
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Everyone seeks it, but what so few people find it. Author Kin Hubbard writes: “It’s pretty hard to tell what does bring happiness. Poverty and wealth have both failed.” According to actor George Burns – “Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family… in another city.” What is happiness? How can we find fulfillment? How can we be truly satisfied? We talked about fulfillment at middle school Bible study on Thursday. Heidi highlighted the fact that God created us for a love relationship with Himself, and that we will never be happy until we seek it in a relationship with Him. She also led the kids through a list of names of God. God’s names reveal His character, and God’s character is such that he satisfies our needs. Consider these names of God found in the Old Testament; think about the fact that every one of these names of God fulfills a need that we have today: The Lord will provide The Lord who heals The Lord who sanctifies The Lord our peace The Lord our righteousness The Lord our shepherd The Lord is there The Lord of hosts Most High Mighty One Holy One Judge God of seeing Deliverer Savior Redeemer Shield Strength Righteous One Everlasting God God of the covenant Mighty God God our Rock King Father The first and the last And lastly, we must mention the most important name of God, the name that God calls Himself while speaking to Moses in Exodus 3:13-14; listen to this: But Moses protested, "If I go to the people of Israel and tell them, 'The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,' they won't believe me. They will ask, 'Which god are you talking about? What is his name?' Then what should I tell them?" God replied, "I AM THE ONE WHO ALWAYS IS. Just tell them, 'I AM has sent me to you.' " God gives Himself the name: I Am. This is the Hebrew word YHWH, which is from the Hebrew word “to be”. Notice the context in which God says this to Moses. We read in Exodus 3:11-12: "But who am I to appear before Pharaoh?" Moses asked God. "How can you expect me to lead the Israelites out of Egypt?" Then God told him, "I will be with you.” What is God’s answer to Moses’ fear? Then God told him, "I will be with you.” “I am God who is always present.” Our God is the forever “I am.” Whatever your need, His answer is, “I am.” We need Him, and He is always present to fill our need. God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him. When we find pleasure in God, He is shown to be the all-satisfying God, the Great I Am. It is not a surprise, then, that we find Jesus calling himself the all-satisfying I am! In John 8, we find Jesus talking with some Jews. Jesus is teaching them about himself, that he is the all-satisfying God, but they won’t believe. All they can think about is how special they are because they are Abraham’s descendents. Jesus responds by telling them that he is greater than Abraham; listen to their conversation in John 8:56-59. Jesus says: Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad." "You are not yet fifty years old," the Jews said to him, "and you have seen Abraham!" "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!" 59 At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds. Jesus calls himself the “I Am!” And it is obvious that they understood, for they are ready to kill him for blasphemy. Jesus is the ever-present I am. Jesus is the one and only self-existent God. Do you have a need? Jesus responds, “I am.” There are seven “I am” statements of Jesus found in the Gospel of John. Today we begin a 6-week series on these “I am” statements of Jesus. How can we have LIFE? How can we be satisfied? By coming to Jesus. Remember John 10:10? Jesus said, “My purpose is to give life in all its fullness." This morning we will be looking at Jesus, the Bread of Life, in John 6:25-40. Instead of reading the passage together, we are going to watch it. For a bit of background: Jesus has just fed 5,000 with just five small barley loaves and two small fish. Knowing that the crowds want to make him King by force, Jesus takes off to be alone. The disciples hop in the only boat to cross the lake, and Jesus walks on water to join them. We begin our passage with the crowds finding Jesus on the other side of the lake, wondering how he got there… (VIDEO) In John 6:25-40, we find three things that we need to do in order to come to Jesus and be satisfied. In a nutshell, we need to come to Jesus and EAT. The first thing we need to do is: Enjoy Jesus for the right reasons. Consider verses 25-27: When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, "Rabbi, when did you get here?" Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs 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. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval." The crowds ask Jesus: "Rabbi, when did you get here?" Notice Jesus does not answer their question. Instead, he says: "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill." Some people tend to think that Jesus wants us to be with him no matter what the motive. This passage makes it pretty clear that such is not the case. The crowds want to be with Jesus because he fed their stomachs. And what motive does Jesus want them to have? The answer lies in the word “miraculous sign.” As you likely know: My kid’s love In ‘n Out. The other day, we were driving on the freeway and the kids saw that beautiful In ‘n Out sign in the distance. “Dad, can we go to In ‘n Out?” What do you think would have happened if we went to In ‘n Out and parked under the sign and I said, “There it is, kids. Isn’t that a great sign! What a nice sign. Well, time to go home!” The purpose of a sign is to point to something else. The sign isn’t the real thing, it only points us to the real thing. John emphasizes this when he writes about Jesus’ miracles. To John, they’re not just wonders and miracles, they are “miraculous signs.” Jesus miraculously fed lots and lots of people. He filled their stomachs. But his purpose wasn’t to feed their stomachs; his purpose was to point to the fact that he is the Messiah, the “I Am” who is always present to satisfy our souls. In verse 27, Jesus continues: "Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval." The Father did not send Jesus to fill our tummies and send us on our way. Jesus fed 5,000 the day before, and guess what – now they are hungry again! Jesus exhorts them not to spend their energy seeking things that don’t last. Instead, he says: “Work for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you." People of this world spend their energy seeking the pleasures of this world: money, comfort, and the list goes on. Some people even go to Jesus because they think he will offer these things: worldly pleasures, money, comfort…. Where do you spend your energy? Do you spend your energy seeking the perishable things of this world? Or do you spend your energy seeking to find fulfillment in a love relationship with Jesus? The best way to get really practical with this question is to examine what we do with our most precious resource - time. Do we really want to know God? The one who wants to know God will spend time seeking God. When we have free time, do we spend it seeking to Know Jesus? Reading His Word? Obeying His commands? Or do we spend our free time trying to entertain ourselves with the things of this world. True, God gives us gifts – pleasures in this world. But the point of these gifts is to draw us to the Giver. Don’t settle for perishable things, spend your energy seeking a love relationship with Jesus – only then can we be satisfied. Enjoy Jesus for the right reasons! And the second thing that we need to do according to this passage is: Ask what God requires, and do it! In verses 28-29, we read: 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." As we were eating lunch a few days ago, Olivia asked me, can I have some dessert? I said “yes.” And then she promptly asked, “Even if I don’t eat my lunch?" “Nope,” I said, “first eat your lunch.” “But I don’t like it! Do I have to finish it all?” She had a pretty substantial bowl of chicken stew in front of her, so I told her that she could still have dessert if she finished half of her stew. And guess what? The next five minutes was like this: “Did I finish half?” “Nope, eat more.” “Now have I eaten half?” “Nope. More.” “Half?” “More.” “Half?” “More.” “Half?” “Three more spoonfuls.” “Two more spoonfuls.” “Wait a minute… real spoonfuls!” “One more.” “Okay, now you can have dessert.” Isn’t that just the way people are? What can we get away with? How much work do we have to do? Unfortunately, we often approach God with the same attitude. “How much do I really have to do, God, to be ‘blessed’? How much do I have to do to go to heaven? What is the minimum, God, because I’d be happy just scraping by." So many people approach God as if He is unwanted chicken stew that must be swallowed in order to get the good stuff. God is not unwanted stew! He is the giver of life. "What must we do to do the works God requires?" All too often we approach God as the one we don’t want but have to live with. He is the angry judge in the sky that we have to obey so don’t get smushed. What’s the minimum we have to do to please this God so we can go on our merry way and live the way we want to? This thinking inevitably leads to two possible approaches to God: 1) ignore Him and pretend he doesn’t exist 2) come up with a bunch of rules that we can obey so we can otherwise ignore him and pretend he doesn’t exist What’s the solution? To realize the truth that God is the giver of life and the satisfier of our souls. And does God really need you, anyway? Does he need you to obey Him? Do you really think that God needs something from you? Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent." Jesus is perfectly clear: there is nothing you can do to earn your salvation. God doesn’t need us. He loves us and wants to give us life. And there is nothing we can do to earn it. Life is a gift from God. God is not glorified when you have to work to earn His love. He is shown to be the all-satisfying God that He is when we don’t have to work at all, but just come to Him for the pleasure of knowing Him. That is how we Glorify God – by enjoying the love relationship that He offers us. No strings attached. No work. Well, if you insist on talking about work: "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent." Don’t carry on wasting your life trying to please God, thinking that the task is a necessary evil. Know that there is only one thing that is required of you. Ask God what it is; and he’ll tell you that the only work that he requires is for you to believe in Jesus. And the last thing that we see from this passage that we need to do to be satisfied is this: Trust that Jesus is the True Bread. We read - verse 30: So they asked him, "What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? Our forefathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written: 'He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'" Can you believe it? Jesus had just fed 5,000 people with a few loaves and fish, and they are asking for a sign! “Oh, Moses is so great,” they say, “look what he did!” But notice: Jesus goes straight to the point: what they need only the Father can provide - verse 32: Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, 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." And what is this true bread from heaven, we might ask? Verse 33: "For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world." Notice where Jesus is going with this: Jesus is the true bread from God. And what is His purpose? And He gives life to the world. Do you want life? Bread is the most basic provision of nourishment for our physical bodies. Physical bread is bread of the stomach. But Jesus is the Bread of Life. Do you want nourishment for your soul? Do you want your soul to be satisfied? Jesus is The Bread for your soul. Verse 34: "Sir," they said, "from now on give us this bread." They want this bread! At least they say they want this bread. Question: do you want this bread? Do you want life? Here is what we have been waiting for – the “I am statement”: Verse 35 - Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty." Come to Jesus, and you will find complete satisfaction. That is, after all, what God created us for in the first place – a love relationship with Him. Verse 36: "But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe." Why are they so stupid! Ever wonder that? Why do they refuse to see that Jesus is the giver of life. Why don’t they get it that all they were created to be finds fulfillment in a relationship with Jesus, the Bread of Life? Why are we so stupid! Ever wonder that? Why do we refuse to see that Jesus is the giver of life. Why don’t we get it that we were all created to find fulfillment in a relationship with Jesus, the Bread of Life? We can be assured that if we don’t have life, it is not God’s fault. He won’t drive us away when we come to Him for life. And once we come, He will hold onto us – forever. When we come to him, we are his forever. Verse 37: "All that 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 that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. 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 him up at the last day." Jesus is the true bread. There is no other. Trust him. Come to Him. How do we do this? We trust Him by obeying Him. We trust Him by recognizing that His commands give us Life. We trust Him by seeking first the Kingdom of God. We trust Him by living out the truth that knowing Jesus is all that matters – we devour the Word of God. We seek ways to obey Him. We obey the Great Commission, seeking to share the gospel with others. “My food,” said Jesus, “Is to do the will of Him who sent me.” Can we say the same thing? Do we find obeying Jesus to be the greatest pleasure? Jesus is the giver of life. Believe it. Jesus wants to satisfy you. Believe it. Jesus wants you to have a love relationship with Him… that’s what you were made for. Believe Him. Jesus said, “I have come to give LIFE.” Believe him. Jesus says, “Come to me.” Give yourself over to obeying Jesus no matter what the cost. Trust Him. This is Life. Jesus said, “I am the bread of Life.” Do you believe it? You can know God. You can have a love relationship with your creator. How. EAT. Come to Jesus and eat. Let us pray. |