John 6:35-40 Bread of Life

 

John 6:35-40

The bread of life

Tonight’s message is one of those passages that is a bit confusing. This is understandable especially once we see how the crowd responds to it. I thought about including this in the previous Wednesday’s message or even making it a part of what will be next weeks message. Yet, understanding these 5 verses are key to us as Christians. They tie directly into both Passover and the Lord’s Supper.

³⁵ And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who 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 the one who comes to Me I will ^[f]by no means 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 This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. ⁴⁰ And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

John 6 starts with Jesus miraculous feed of the 5K. Everyone is so excited to be healed and filled that they immediately try to force Jesus into being King. Jesus exists stage right. The disciples head out to cross the sea. They end up in a deadly storm. Jesus shows up, walking on water, and calms the storm. The next day or so the crowd finds Jesus after looking all over for him. They want more bread. Jesus tells them that they are seeking the temporary when they should be focused on the Eternal.

In verse 34, the crowd still focused on their bellies, tell Jesus “Give us this bread always.” Jesus says I am the bread of life! He who comes to me shall never hunger or thirst. Ok, This statement sounds poetic but also confusing. I came to Jesus in early 1998 and I’ve been hungry and thirsty plenty of times. What is he talking about?

To understand what Jesus is talking about we also have to have an understanding of Passover.

John 6:4 “Now the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was near”

What is Passover? Passover is a Jewish holiday that commemorates the deliverance of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. It is named Passover after the 10^th plague, the death of the first born of all of Egypt. The Israelite families sacrificed a lamb and smeared its blood on their doorposts and the destroyer “passed over” their houses.

 It is a weeklong festival that as part of it is a dinner called The Seder. The annual Passover commemoration is celebrated by nearly the entire Jewish community, bonding families and communities to their Jewish roots. Each year Jewish people, religious and nonreligious, celebrate the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob by gathering and experiencing the Passover Seder. They celebrate the same time we celebrate Easter and that is not coincidence. There are a lot of elements to the Passover Seder. These elements feature bread and wine rather prominently.

In fact, Passover is also referred to as the Feast of Unleavened Bread per Deut 16:3. The bread in the Passover seder is called Matzah. It is an unleavened flat bread.

The matzoh is placed in a bag called an echad, which means “one” in Hebrew. But this one bag has three chambers. One piece of matzoh is placed into each chamber of the bag. The matzoh placed in the first chamber is never touched, never used, never seen. The second matzoh in the bag is broken in half  and pierced at the beginning of the Seder; half of the broken matzoh is placed back in the echad, and the other half, called the Afikomen, is placed in a linen cloth. The third matzoh in the bag is used to eat the elements on the Seder plate.

After the dinner is over the second piece of Matzah, the one that was broken, pierced and placed in a linen cloth is hidden until one of the children finds it and brings it back out again.

The crowd has one main thought on their mind, bread. However, the crowd prior to the day before with the huge bread and fish meal would have had one other thought on their mind, Passover. It was the big Jewish holiday. People traveled from all over the world back to Jerusalem to celebrate it. They would spend a week celebrating and hosting this feast of unleavened bread and then yesterday they ate all the bread they could eat! Bread was on their minds.

Jesus here in saying “I am the bread of life” is connecting His life and His ministry directly to the Passover seder. A dinner that was all about commemorating God’s deliverance of His people from bondage.   

While it might be lost on us not being Jewish the imagery was not lost on this crowd. Jesus is the Passover. There are 89 chapters across the 4 gospels. The make up the most read portion of the Bible. In those 4 Gospels only 10 things repeat themselves across all 4 gospels. 9 out of those 10 have to do with Jesus being the true Passover. The true eternal deliverance from bondage.

That is a whole lot of information to come out of 5 simple words. I am the bread of life.  

All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will ^[f]by no means cast out. ³⁸ For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. 

Let us now look at some of the promises. I think they are more relevant now than ever! Verse 37 All that the Father gives Me will come to Me and the one who comes to Me I will be no means cast out! You ever been kicked out of anywhere? I have been kicked out of plenty of places. That did not really start though until I met Pastor Dave. In fact, when we were in the youth, he taught us to say, “I’ve been kicked out better ____ thank this!”  It works with almost anything! Better laser tag, better Toys R Us’, better bowling alleys, better McDonald’s play places, better horse statues and of course, my personal favorite, better churches rooves.

Not only are we all on equal ground at the foot of the cross, there is always room for one more. As Jesus invited them to come to Him, He also reminded them that He was safe to come unto. He was not interested in His own agenda, but in His Father’s will.

Micah 6:8 “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”

Proverbs 16:4 “4 The LORD works out everything to its proper end— even the wicked for a day of disaster.”

As discussed in Chapter 5 Jesus is all about the will of the father. ³⁹ This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. ⁴⁰ And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.”

 

Jesus tells us that He is the bread of life who fully satisfies our hunger and thirst (John 6:35). He does this through our faith in Him, for He says that we gain eternal life only as we look on Him and believe in Him.  We receive grace and strength to help us persevere as we believe that Jesus endured the breaking of His body and the shedding of His blood for us. Our souls are sustained unto eternal life as we affirm that Jesus will never cast us out if we come to Him in faith and repentance (v. 37). At our conversion, we make a decisive break with sin and come into the safety of Christ’s fold. Still, there is a sense in which we must continue to come to Him every moment of our lives. As we actively believe in the gospel each day, we are sustained unto eternal life. One way we tangibly confirm and express our belief in Jesus is through the Lord’s Supper, and we can come to Him for sustenance in the sacrament by faith alone.