John 6:41-59 Complaining to myself

 

John 6:41-59

Complaining to myself.

I haven’t wrestled with preaching a Chapter of scripture like I have wrestled with John 6. I think this sermon had about 4 different titles. It also had a fully typed out intro that fit at first but as I continue to dig into the text, I decided to delete it. Finally, I just have this rambling opening about how hard a time I’ve had with this chapter. I spent a lot of time just staring at my laptop hoping the words would appear! Alas, that was not the case. I had no one to complain to but myself and then thus came tonight’s title. Complaining to myself.

The Jews then ^[g]complained about Him, because He said, “I am the bread which came down from heaven.” ⁴² And they said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He says, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

 Last time Jesus refused to feed people a second time. They got mad. Then they left. Verse 41 starts with some time passed between verses as best we can tell. We know this from Verse 59. It tells us that verses 41-59 happen in the Synagogue at Capernaum.

It starts with a verse that could have been pulled straight from the headlines “Then they complained about Him.” We complain about everything these days don’t we? Pastor Dave called us all out Sunday with our tendency to just look for a reason to complain. I can guarantee you In the next two months there will be at least one news story about someone being offended because someone told them Merry Christmas instead of Happy Holidays and another where someone got upset because they were told Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas. If you find yourself doing either know that becoming upset because someone wished, you well is a terrible way to witness. Show some love and grace to other especially now in a year that is devoid of both.

Why do we complain? First, we want attention. The squeaky wheel gets the great!  Second, it gives us a certain moment of power. Part of the appeal of the cancel movement is that normal everyday people like us can get someone important fired. For a brief moment we can feel like we are in control and have power. Thirdly, it allows us to remove responsibility for our actions. I don’t have the time, it’s impossible to do that, someone else got in the way, etc.

Social Media has been designed with all of this in mind. It easily and quickly allows you to do all three of these. The more you complain, the more you’ll click and the more you click the more you’ll complain. There’s nothing new about this.

What is the crowd mad about? That Jesus did not give them a humongous free meal for a second time! Imagine someone staying late at your house one evening because you were going out of your way to help them with something. It gets late so you offer them dinner. Then they go on about their way. The next day while you are out at work they show up and go Hey, I’m hungry. Cook me something. When you like any reasonable person says “No. I’m at work” They flip out and insult you. The next week you here a whole crowd of people complaining and insulting you at church.

This is essentially the situation Jesus finds Himself in. What would your response be? What will be His?

⁴³ Jesus therefore answered and said to them, ^[h]“Do not murmur among yourselves. ⁴⁴ No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. ⁴⁵ It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Therefore everyone who ^[i]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 Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes ^[j]in Me has everlasting life. ⁴⁸ I am the bread of life. ⁴⁹ Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead. ⁵⁰ This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. ⁵¹ I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.”

No matter how they set Him up, Jesus never takes the bait! Can you imagine the patience and mercy on display here! Literally every breathe they take is an act of mercy from Jesus. He created them, knows them better than they know themselves, He loves them! Yet, He gets nothing in return but scorn and hatred. His response? Grace!

Stop complaining among yourselves! Your still upset you didn’t get a second free meal. Stop thinking about your stomachs! Stop thinking about yourselves. Before you is what really matters. What you all need and have been waiting for. Yet, you refuse to see it.

There is a lot of shock about that, but I just want you to notice they understood exactly what He was saying.  The Jews are grumbling because He said, “I am the bread that came down out of heaven.”  In verse 42, they are wondering how this man whose parents they know can say, “I have come down out of heaven.”

Verse 46, again says, “Not that anyone has seen the Father except the One who is from God.”  He has come down out of heaven.  Verse 50, “This is the bread which comes down out of heaven.”  Verse 51, “I am the living bread that came down out of heaven.”  Verse 58, “This is the bread which came down out of heaven.”  Every time you see that, and it’s repeated again and again, you are hearing a statement affirming the incarnation of a preexistent person.  He didn’t come into existence.  He came down out of heaven.  Anyone who claims that falsely is a lunatic or a deceiver, who would have a hard time convincing people.

Over and over and over Jesus speaks of His preexistence.  John began his Gospel, “In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God,” the Word meaning Christ.  Therefore, Christ was there preexistent with God, coexistent with God, self-existent with God eternally.  You cannot ever reduce Jesus to a created being.  Yes, His body was prepared by God for Him, but as a person He is the eternal Son of God.  He existed everlastingly in the presence of God the Father and God the Holy Spirit.  He is God of very God.  That’s why John 1:14 says, “We beheld His glory and it was the same glory as the Father.” 

Despite the way they are treating Him, talking about Him, He is still offering them eternal life.

⁵² The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?”

⁵³ Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, 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 eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day. ⁵⁵ For My flesh is ^[k]food indeed, and My blood is ^[l]drink indeed. ⁵⁶ He who eats 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 he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. ⁵⁸ This is the bread which came down from heaven—not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.”

⁵⁹ These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum.

Yet, they still do not get it. In fact, they look for a reason to be offended! The find it easily. For the Jews to even touch blood was an unclean and disgusting thing. Jesus is not advocating cannibalism or vampirism here. This is the context of the Passover seder, this is in the context of what would soon be instituted as the Lord’s Supper.

You have to be able to eat His flesh in the sense that you take Him as the one who nourishes the soul.  And you have to be willing to drink His blood in the sense that you accept his sacrificial death.  This is all way too much, way too much for the people to handle, and you can see their reaction later in the chapter. 

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 all our needs by faith alone.