I Am the Bread of Life

John 6:22-59,

On the next day the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea saw that there had been only one boat there, and that Jesus had not entered the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone away alone. 23 Other boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. 24 So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum, seeking Jesus.

25 When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?” 26 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. 27 Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.” 28 Then they said to him, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” 29 Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” 30 So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? 31 Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” 32 Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” 34 They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. 36 But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. 37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

41 So the Jews grumbled about him, because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42 They said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” 43 Jesus answered them, “Do not grumble among yourselves. 44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets, ‘And they will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me— 46 not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from God; he has seen the Father. 47 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50 This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” 53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” 59 Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.

As I have looked at the passage before us, John 6:22–59, I have prayed that we wouldn’t labor so hard for bread that perishes, and that we would all labor even harder for the only Bread the satisfies. That’s my whole sermon in a sentence: Don’t labor so hard for bread that perishes, and labor with all your heart and time and money and strength for the only bread that satisfies. 

So many people — and sadly, so many Christians — live their whole lives for the wrong kind of bread.

Pastor Jonathan talked last week about how chapters 5–8 are establishing Jesus as the Son of God, with all of the authority and power of heaven. And the verses we looked at last week in chapter 6, verses 17–21, are the height of this long, glorious look at Jesus. It was dark and windy and dangerous in the boat, and the disciples were far out to sea, no one in sight. And then someone was in sight, someone they knew. And then he wasn’t just in sight, he was in the boat.

And then, immediately, the boat that was lost at sea was safe on shore. . . . He has authority over wind and waves, over gravity and currents, over time and space. When no one could get to the boat, he could get to the boat. He can get to your boat. No matter how dark it is, and how far at sea you feel, he can get to your boat — and he can get your boat home.

And now we come to our passage this morning. Crowds were gathering. I mean, why wouldn’t they gather? He’s just fed five thousand men and their families (and we know, in this church, that there were some boys in those families that ate as much or more than the men). Of course the crowd goes looking for him. They even tried to make him king, we saw, in verse 15. What else would we expect them to do? If a man is doing the things Jesus was doing, shouldn’t they want to be near him? Shouldn’t they want to see what he’s going to do next? Shouldn’t they want someone like him to be in power? How else should these people respond?

And yet Jesus doesn’t like how they’re responding.

Verse 25: When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him,

“Rabbi, when did you come here?”

Jesus answered them,

“Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life.”

Oh this is so important for us, church, as we walk through the Gospel of John and meet Jesus. This crowd teaches us that it’s possible to be utterly fascinated by Jesus, follow Jesus, even believe Jesus can do spectacular things for us, and yet totally miss Jesus. You can be looking for Jesus, and not really looking for Jesus. He acknowledges here, “You are seeking me,” but you’re not really seeking me. You’re here for the wrong kind of bread.

And that’s the question this text asks us: Why are you here? Why are you in this room this morning? What do you really want from Jesus? I see three bad answers to that question in these verses.

Bad Reasons to Seek Jesus

This crowd came looking for Jesus, but he isn’t happy about how they’re coming.

“You are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.”

You’re seeking me for the wrong reasons. And what are those wrong reasons? I see three bad reasons for seeking Jesus in these verses — you could think of them as three moldy loaves of bread — and those are my three main points this morning.

1. They were seeking Jesus to solve earthly problems.

First, the most obvious one: They were seeking Jesus to solve earthly problems.

“Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. 27 Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life.” 

The first bread that perishes is actual bread. They chased him down because he fed them, and they wanted him to do that again (and they worked pretty hard to get that bread — traveling over land and sea to find him again). They came to Jesus to solve an earthly problem.

And their problem was a real problem. They really needed bread. Jesus himself said so back in verse 5. He asked Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?” These people needed to eat, and Jesus knew that they needed food, and he performed a miracle to feed them. He really fed them. And yet when they come looking for another meal, he calls them out. “You didn’t get the point of all that bread.”

We might scoff at them for being so worried about bread, but I wonder if, deep down, some of us are really here for the same reason. We’re looking for Jesus because we need him to do something for us. Maybe it’s literally the next meal — you’re not sure where the next few paychecks are coming from. And if you are sure, you’re not confident they’re going to cover the basics. You’re here because you really need someone to turn a few loaves and a couple fish into something much bigger, and you heard Jesus can do that. 

This wasn’t just about bread, though. You know how I know that? Because they tried to make him king. Verse 15:

“Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king.”

They wanted the next meal, yes, but this is about way more than flour and yeast and metabolism. They don’t just want Jesus to solve their lunch problem; they want him to solve all their problems. Their sickness problems. Their money problems. Their living-under-Roman-government problems. This was their chance for God’s people to be back in power again. If he could do all that with a little bread, what else could he do for us?

They were seeking Jesus to solve their earthly problems — but Jesus came to solve much deeper ones. What does Jesus say to them? Verse 27:

“Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life.”

We’ll see in a minute that this exposes a second bad reason they were looking for Jesus, but for now, what is this bread that never perishes, the bread that endures to eternal life? Jesus says, verse 35:

“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.”

Do you want to know the point of all those loaves and fish, the 5,000 men and their families, the twelve baskets left over? Do you want to know the point of the boat, and the storm, and all that darkness? Do you want to know what I was really trying to say?

“I am the bread of life.”

I was giving you lots and lots of bread so that you know you needed something more than you need bread. You think you need bread, you need money, you need healing, you need a king, but you really need me. And if you have me, in a real, meaningful way, you have everything you need — no matter what else you need right now. And you have everything you need not only for this short life of bread and bills and fears, but for endless years to come — forever.

And to make sure we hear the point, he keeps repeating himself. Okay, you missed the point when I made all that bread for you. I’ll use words now:

Verse 33: “The bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

Verse 35: “I am the bread of life.”

Verse 48: “I am the bread of life.”

Verse 58: “This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

He repeats it over and over and over. I gave you bread to feed you, yes, but also to tell you that bread will never satisfy and sustain you. But I can save you, satisfy you, and sustain you. You have a deeper, more fundamental hunger, and it’s to know and enjoy me, through faith. You’ll always be deeply, unshakably hungry until you learn to feast here. Are you hearing what the bread is saying? The crowd knew Jesus could feed them, heal them, even rule over them. They didn’t know that Jesus himself was the greatest thing Jesus could ever give them. Do you?

2. They were seeking Jesus for a list of things to do.

There are two more bad reasons, though. First, as we just saw, they were seeking Jesus to solve earthly problems. Jesus said to them,

“Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. 27 Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life.”

And how do they respond? 

When he tells them to stop chasing him for the next meal and to work for the food that endures to eternal life, they latch onto the “work.” They ask, verse 28,

“What must we do, to be doing the works of God?”

Okay, Jesus, if we’re doing the wrong thing, then tell us what to do. They came to Jesus for a way to prove themselves to God. Just tell us what to do to please God, and we’ll do it. They wanted a religion they could control, perform, and earn. Just tell me what to do, Jesus.

Why would they respond like that? He’s telling them, “I am the bread of life. I am the bread of life. I can satisfy you.” And they’re like, “Yeah, but just tell me what to do so that I’m okay with God.” Why would they think like that? We should know, if we’re honest enough with ourselves. They might have lived in the Middle East a couple thousand years ago, but this isn’t foreign to us. They think like this because they want a religion, a salvation that only requires them to do enough — to do this and not that, to give this much, to show up this often, to practice certain habits and avoid certain sins. That’s a religion, a Christianity they can stomach, because it’s a religion they think they can control.

Don’t you want a religion you can control? God, just tell me what to do. Be here on Sundays. Join a community group. Give some money to the church. Read your Bible. Be kind to people. Be honest at your job. Avoid certain websites and channels. That’s a controllable Christianity — but that kind of list, by itself, isn’t Christianity. What must we do? Again, Jesus doesn’t like that kind of seeking.

They ask what they must do, and he answers, verse 29,

“This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”

You want something to do? Believe in me. That’s all that’s required. If you’re really seeking me, believe that I am the Son of God sent to save my people from their sins and fill the deep, gnawing holes in their souls. I am the bread of life, and all you have to do is sit down and eat. You must believe in me. You must want me. You must lay down all your self-righteous doing, and be justified and satisfied through faith alone. They were seeking Jesus for a list of things to do for God, but Jesus didn’t want their list of self-righteousness (they didn’t have any righteousness to offer, anyway). No, he wanted their heart, their faith. We aren’t justified by what we do, but by believing who he is and what he’s done for us.

He is the bread of life. Our work is to believe in him. Jesus says, “Do not work for the food that perishes, but [do work] for the food that endures to eternal life.” Labor for this food — not to earn it, but to taste it, enjoy it, be filled up with it. Are you laboring to see and enjoy the bread of life? Are you waking up early enough to see him? Are you surrounding yourself with people who help you see and enjoy him? Are you cutting things out of your life that get in the way of seeing him? Again, I want us to stop laboring so hard for all the bread that perishes — and to labor with all our heart, time, money, and strength for the only bread that satisfies. 

How hard are you working, in this particular season, to know, enjoy, and share the bread of life?

3. They were seeking Jesus to erase all their doubts.

Okay, two bad reasons down, still one to go. He rebukes them for their focus on their earthly needs. He rebukes them for trying to please God with a to-do list of works. What do they do next? How do they respond this time? They go after a third moldy bread. They said to him, verse 30,

“Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform?”

This one might be the most wild. I mean, where have you been? He just fed five thousand men and their families with five Wonder breads and a couple walleye. What more do you need to see? You didn’t just see, you ate — and you ate as much as you wanted. But it wasn’t enough, was it? No, third, they were seeking Jesus to have him erase all of their doubts. Okay, well if you want us to believe, you better give us some more reasons to believe. We’re going to need some more signs, Jesus, some more miracles.

It’s wild to think they needed to see more than they’d already seen — and yet it’s not that wild, right? Because we all want to see a little more. We know we live by faith and not by sight, but we’d sure like a little more sight. It doesn’t matter how much God has done for us, we’re always going to crave a little more certainty. Could you just do the thing with the bread one more time? 

Yeah, but could you do it again? This is what battling unbelief is like, and it’ll be a battle until faith becomes sight. We’ll always have to face doubts of various kinds, because if Jesus erased all our doubts, we wouldn’t have to believe. And Jesus says here that that’s the one thing we must do: believe.

So how does Jesus handle their asking for more signs? They were seeking Jesus to have him erase all their doubts with more miracles, but Jesus answered their doubts instead with promises. Let’s start in verse 35:

Jesus said to them,

“I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. 36 But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe.”

You’re seeking me for things to do, and what you need to do is believe. But you don’t believe. You think it’s because you haven’t seen enough yet. That’s not the real reason, though. He goes on, next verse:

“All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.”

He doesn’t turn the hungry away. There’s enough to feed everyone, and he won’t stop giving until you’ve had all you wanted. But you won’t come unless the Father gives you to me — unless he draws you to me. That’s exactly what he says a few verses later, in verse 44:

“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” 

Why does anyone believe? Why do you believe, if you believe? It’s either true or it isn’t, and if it isn’t, we can’t just flip a switch. Anyone can decide to attend church, or read the Bible, or be kind to neighbors or co-workers. We can’t decide to be spiritually hungry. We can’t ultimately decide what we believe. Why does anyone believe in Jesus? Jesus says it’s because God draws them — because he gives, by the Spirit, the appetite he requires. God demands the impossible — that we believe — and then he does the impossible: He makes us hungry for him.

That means if you came hungry for Jesus this morning, you should thank God! He drew you. He didn’t have to draw you, and he drew you to himself. He gave you the gift of your hunger for Jesus. This crowd didn’t have what you have, not yet anyway. Some people in this room don’t have what you have. We should fall on our faces every day with thankfulness. He drew me.

He drew me, and he’ll keep me. Here’s the promise. Do you want a promise for lingering doubts that plague you? It won’t be another miracle, another big answered prayer. No, next verse:

I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.

Only those who the Father draws will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never cast out. And once they’ve come to me, I’ll never lose them, no not one. Why do you believe in Jesus? Because the Father drew you to see what you see and want what you want. Why will you believe in Jesus tomorrow? Because the same God that drew you and satisfied you, he knows how to keep you believing. You may feel fragile and vulnerable. He’s not fragile, and no one and nothing will snatch you from his hand.

Why Are You Here?

So again, I’ll ask, why are you here this morning? What do you really want from Jesus? Do you see yourself somewhere in this crowd? Are you here mainly hoping Jesus will solve some heartache in your life? Are you here hoping Jesus will just tell you some things to do so that you can be okay with God and get out of hell? Are you just hoping Jesus will do something to erase all your doubts about him? I hope you hear Jesus saying again this morning, verse 51: 

“I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 

And this, this brings us to the table. These next verses, John 6:52–59, inspired the words we use to serve the bread and the cup during communion every single week:

The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him.

Or, in our words, “His body is the true bread. His blood is the true drink.” He wasn’t talking about literally eating his flesh and drinking his blood — they didn’t do that then and we don’t do that now — but it’s a real metaphor for what happens when we believe in and savor Jesus through faith. God gave you food, bread, so that you would know you need Jesus. God gave you drink, so that you would know you need Jesus. And as we eat the bread and drink the cup together, we remind ourselves and each other: He’s the only one who satisfies. He is the bread of life for anyone who believes.

Why do we cut up the bread into 500 pieces? (Well, to avoid 500 people manhandling the loaf one by one.) But also to say there’s enough of Jesus for everyone. Come and eat until you’re full. The message might be clearer if we gave out whole loaves until you were full, with lots of baskets left over — like Jesus did — but we think this says it well enough. You don’t have to go home hungry today. If you enjoy this meal, by faith in Jesus Christ, you don’t ever have to be hungry again.