25 August 2024
The reading from John we heard this morning was a little bit misleading. It came from the very end of the sixth chapter, which is very long. It starts out with two stories. The first one is the only miracle of Jesus that’s found in all four gospels—the Feeding of the Five Thousand by the lakeside. The second story is a miracle that’s found in Matthew, Mark, and John, but not in Luke. It’s when Jesus walked on water.
The rest of the chapter is a result of these two stories. The thousands of people were responding to a miracle. They liked the free food, and they liked the miraculous way they got it. But apparently Jesus’ intent wasn’t to win them over to his side by means of this miracle. He disappeared, and his disciples got tired of waiting for him, so they got in a boat and crossed to the other side of the lake without him. But a storm arose and they were afraid they were going to sink.
They were still far from shore when they saw a mysterious figure walking toward them on the waves. It was Jesus, walking on water. He told them not to be afraid because it was he who had come to them. He climbed into the boat, and somehow the miles disappeared and they immediately arrived at their destination.
When the people who’d eaten the bread and the fish realized that the disciples’ boat was missing, and that Jesus was gone as well, they all made their way to the other side themselves. When they found Jesus, he commenced to teaching them. And what he taught was difficult—probably his most difficult teachings anywhere in the gospels.
For all its difficulty, John 6 is thought of as one of the most important chapters in the entire Bible… at least it is if you judge by the common lectionary (the schedule of Bible readings used by most churches). Once every three years, John 6 comes up—not just for a week or two, but for a solid month of Sundays.
Today is the last Sunday of that month, and I’ve successfully avoided this chapter up till now. But I reckon it’s time I tackled John 6. It may be like a household chore that you want to avoid, but you have to do it, because the result is significant.
So what’s so significant about John 6? Well, once the people are satisfied with just five loaves and two fish, they find Jesus and the disciples on the other side of the lake, expecting more miracles. What they get instead is teaching. “Show us more signs like Moses did in the wilderness,” they say. But Jesus tells them that the manna wasn’t from Moses, but from God—this is the bread that gives life to the world.
“Sir, give us this bread every day,” they tell him.
“But I am the bread of life,” he tells them. “If you believe in me, you’ll never be hungry or thirsty again.”
This caused quite a bit of murmuring. Jesus may have performed a miracle or two, but they knew who he actually was and where he came from. Saying he’d come from heaven was a bit much, as far as they were concerned.
Jesus told them that his teachings came from God, and that God would decide who would come to him and receive the eternal life he was promising. “Anyone who eats the bread from heaven will never die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever; and this bread, which I will offer so the world may live, is my flesh.”
This was all too much for those who heard him that day. And it’s almost too much for us. We might actually feel judged by Jesus for our own milquetoast beliefs in the meaning of the bread and the cup. I think most of the people in our church would say that what you believe about the meaning of Lord’s Supper is between you and God. But here Jesus is, telling us that we have to eat his flesh and drink his blood.
But lest we think that churches with a more literal interpretation of the sacrament are right and we are wrong, it’s clear here that whatever communion exists between Jesus and believers is absolutely immediate. There’s no possibility here of intermediaries or ceremonies. We feed on Jesus by faith, and that faith doesn’t allow for go-betweens.
In the end, almost none of those who listened to Jesus that day by the lakeside could stomach what he had to say. Exasperated, they turned aside from following this miracle worker. And I think we understand. After twenty centuries, we are still taken aback by what Jesus has to say here. So how can we blame those who heard it for the first time?
The teachings about the bread and the wine, the flesh and the blood were difficult enough. But then he doubled down on a doctrine that we call sovereign grace. “The Spirit alone gives eternal life. Human effort accomplishes nothing. And the very words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.”
It wasn’t the eating and the drinking that did it in the end. In fact, Jesus seems to have resolved the question of the flesh and the blood when he taught that true life wasn’t found in the physical, but in the spiritual. In 6:68 we see that it was Jesus’ intrusion into their faith in their own efforts that caused the final break. It was only “at this point” that “many of his disciples turned away and deserted him.” Jesus then turned to the twelve. “Are you also going to leave?” he asked.
Peter, speaking on behalf of the other eleven answered, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe, and we know you are the Holy One of God.”
Who else would we turn to? Yours are the words of eternal life. Of all the responses to Jesus that we find in the Bible, I think this one, found in John 6:68, is the most beautiful. For some reason, it reminds me of something Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9:16—“Preaching the Good News is not something I can boast about. I am compelled by God to do it. How terrible for me if I didn’t preach the Good News!”
Both of these verses take choice out of the equation. And maybe the one in 1 Corinthians is meant for all Christians, lay and clergy. But it speaks to me about my calling as a minister of the gospel. I’ve never really felt that I had a choice in the matter: I am compelled to preach the good news; it would be a terrible thing for me if I couldn’t do it.
But whoever Paul was talking to or about, Peter’s words in John 6 can be placed—should be placed!—in the mouths of all Christians. We can’t claim to understand everything Jesus said. We can’t pretend that some of Jesus’ teachings don’t tear down the comfortable worlds we’ve built for ourselves out of human wisdom and accommodating the world. But when faced with a true choice between following Jesus or turning aside from the path, we, too, would have to ask, Who else can we turn to? Jesus’ words—clear or confusing, easy or difficult, popular or unpopular—are the words that lead to life.
I don’t think there’s a verse in the Bible that better describes us in this day and age than John 6:68. We feel discouraged, because churches continue to get smaller and smaller. Religion is increasingly ridiculed. Christianity is misrepresented in the media, who allow divisive preachers to speak for all of us. Whenever we mention to others the importance of our faith, a week seldom goes by that we’re not asked by someone, why do you keep going back? Why don’t you join the rest of us who get to count Sundays as free time?
Just remember Peter’s answer Jesus asked him a similar question. To whom else would I turn than the One whose words tell me of life? In the midst of all this materialism and all this trust in powers that can’t possibly save, there is One who offers something more, something deeper: Spirit and life.
True food and drink, sweeter than the drippings of the honeycomb, God’s word will last forever; God’s word is life.
—©2024 Sam Greening
