We saw our Lord feed 5,000 plus people with a few loaves
and fishes. And then we saw him last week
walk on water, seeing that everything is put
beneath his feet. Everything put beneath his feet.
And now he's in Capernaum. And those who had seen the miracles,
they wanted to make him king, they sought him out. They looked
around, he wasn't there, and they sought him out. And they
sought him out with much effort. There was a lot of effort going
into what they were doing, trying to find him. But they sought
him out for all the wrong reasons. THEIR REASONS WERE CARNAL, AND
HE EXPOSES THEIR REASONS, THEIR MOTIVE. IT WAS PURELY FLESH, THAT'S ALL
IT WAS, CARNAL FLESH, APPETITES OF THE FLESH. AS IT SAYS IN THE
SCRIPTURES, THEIR BELLY IS THEIR GOD, THEIR BELLY IS THEIR GOD. MANY SEEK THE LORD FOR THE BENEFITS,
BUT THEY DON'T SEEK HIM. They do not seek to know Him,
but the benefits they can get from Him. And there are many preachers
today peddling His benefits. They peddle Him as an insurance
policy that keeps you from going to hell when you die. Jesus Christ is big business.
He's big business for many. Would you like to go and take
a holy land tour? That's big business. There ain't
no holy land on this earth. There's a holy church. There's
a church of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is holy. But there's no
holy land. Christ is big business. You go
over there, they give those tours over there. Those who despise
and hate Jesus Christ to this day, they despise him, but I
tell you what, he's good business. You can make a lot of money off
of him. You can make a lot of money off the ignorance of people,
the spiritual ignorance of people. You can make a lot of money.
Play on their conscience, you can make a lot of money. He is big business for many.
But for you, he's not. You who believe he's life, isn't
it? Jesus Christ is life eternal.
Jesus Christ is my God, my Lord and my God, my Savior in that
order. He's my Lord and my Savior. Now here in verse 22, The day
following, after he fed them in the storm that night that
came, many of the people which stood on the other side of the
sea, those who wanted to make him king because he fed them,
he turned bread and just kept making more bread, and he fed
them, the fish. And because of that, they wanted
to make him king because of the miracles. This man can deliver
us from the Roman government. He can deliver us. Not deliver
us from sin, there's a big difference. I need to be delivered from my
sins. That's the only thing that separates me from God. The government
doesn't separate me from God, my sins do. The government may
like to do so, but it's not possible. But my sins, they need taken
care of. And we'll see, that's the reason
to come to Christ. And the day following, when the
people which stood on the other side of the sea saw that there
was none other boat there, there was only one boat there, and
that's the one the disciples got into, and they saw that the
Lord Jesus Christ did not enter into that boat with them. He
sent them off, and he sent the crowd away. That's what they
saw. And then, how be it though, the
next day, verse 23, how be it, there came other boats from Tiberias
nigh to the place where they did eat bread. After that, the
Lord had given thanks. Normally, I just pass over that,
but that jumped out at me this week. John, in detail, mentions
the Lord feeding them after he had given thanks. What an example
the Lord Jesus Christ is to us. Let's not pass over that little
bit. I'm learning as I get older and hopefully growing in grace
and knowledge of Christ to give attention to the little statements,
to the little statements, because they are very important. They
are very important. John mentions how the Lord gave
thanks and then they ate. There's no doubt this was to
show the involvement of the father in the miracle of the bread and
the fishes He said remember he said my father worketh hitherto
and I work and he's showing their involvement John is here and
Then listen when the people therefore saw that Jesus was not there
when they were they were looking for him Going all over the place
looking for him and they saw his disciples were not there.
They didn't come back and get him and They also took shipping with
those little boats that were around there. They put forth,
no doubt, some money. They had to pay some fare to
get the people that owned the boat to take them to the other
side. There's a lot of effort going into this. There's a lot
of effort going into this of finding this man who fed them
with the loaves and the fishes. And they wanted to make him king,
and they were still set on making him king. They still wanted to
do that. And so they go over to Capernaum,
and when they found him on the other side of the sea, they said
to him, Rabbi, teacher, teacher, when camest thou hither? How
did you get over here, and when did you come over here? How did
you get across the water? There was no boat, but the boat
the disciples got into. How did you get here? You see,
what they saw was a miracle worker, and they wanted to see more miracles.
They wanted to hear miracles, they wanted to see miracles.
And they still wanted to make Him their King. And the Lord
did not say to them, He didn't answer their question. Because
there was no use in it. Actually, if He had answered
their question, He would have just fueled the fire of them
wanting to see more miracles. He could have said, you know,
I walked over here. I walked on the sea. I walked across the
water. And boy, they would have been
like, whoa, you not only turn bread into, you know, bread into
more bread, but you walked on water. Our Lord didn't come into
this world to entertain us. He came to save, not to entertain. Miracles, for the most part,
they saw them as entertainment, as curiosity, because they say
on down here later, well, show us a sign. The same people who
ate the bread, who's looking for him, whenever he really identifies
himself, you know what they ask for? Another miracle. Another
miracle. You could see 10,000 miracles.
You can, you can, you can see the, watch the Lord raise every
dead person in that cemetery over there, every dead body.
It won't save a soul. Won't save anybody. Salvation
is not by seeing miracles. It's Christ. It's Christ. And he's going to teach them
this lesson. And I hope we learn it this morning. And it says in verse 26, Jesus
answered them and said, Verily, verily, truly, truly, listen
to me. It's what he's saying. Listen to, I'm telling you the
truth. I'm telling you the truth. I say to you, you seek me. You seek me. You've been looking
for me. He knew what they were doing on the other side. He knew
the effort they went through to get to where he's at and to
find him. He knew that. He's God. He's
God. He sees the heart. But you seek
me not because you saw the miracles and you say, this truly is the
Son of God. This truly is the Messiah. No,
here's why you seek me, because you did eat of the loaves and
were filled. You got your belly filled. You
got your belly. That's why you seek me. Christ
revealed their heart, their motive. They didn't seek him for who
he is and who he was and who he is. They didn't seek him for
that purpose in any way, shape or form. They sought him purely
for benefit. For benefit. Listen, it's far, far more important
why we do what we do than what we do. The motive is truly more
important. God sees the heart. God looks
upon the heart. We look upon the hour countenance,
but God looks upon the heart. God sees why I'm here. God sees
why you are here. He sees the heart. God knows
everyone this morning who's worshiping him and who's not. He knows who
believes and who does not. I don't. I don't. But he does. And he says, this is why you're
seeking me. You got your bellies full. You're seeking me from
a fleshly, now listen, from a fleshly appetite and not a spiritual
appetite. You're not hungry for me, the
bread of life. You're hungry for the miracles.
You're hungry for the free food you got. That's why you're looking
for me. It's the benefits. This country's
benefit-driven, isn't it? I've had two or three jobs over
the years before I owned my own business. And you know what? One of the things I was interested
in? The benefit package. When you look for a job, do you
not look at the benefit package? Christ is not the benefit package.
Christ is God. Now there are spiritual benefits
and I'll get to that in a little bit. There are, but not fleshly. He's not serving the flesh. John Calvin said this, they were
not acquainted with the true and proper reason of what he
did, which was to make himself known as the bread of life. Because
they sought in Christ something else than Christ himself. They sought in him something
more than him because what they were looking for. If we are just
looking at the outward action, those people look sincere, didn't
they? They look very sincere. They put forth a lot of effort
and seeking the Lord, but their interest was all fleshly. It was all fleshly. It all had
to do with materialism and earthly kingdom and earthly comforts.
That's all it had to do with. If I'm sick, let's say I'm physically
sick, and I mean sick, I got a real problem. Which is more
important, the Lord healing my body or my soul? Is it physical healing or spiritual
healing? Which is more important? You
know, we prayed for a brother, D. Parks, whom the Lord took
home. 44 years old, the Lord took him
home. Prayed that the Lord would heal him. He did. He did. He's completely whole
now. You know, Lazarus, when the Lord
raised him from the dead, you know why? He had to die again.
But now he'd have to die no more. Lazarus is there with him. He's
there with him. Their mind and heart was set
on nothing but this earth and nothing but this flesh, what
satisfies it, what takes care of it. That's completely secondary,
third dairy or whatever dairy. My soul healing is first. That's what's first. They had no concern for their
souls, nor their relationship with the living God. That's why
the Lord said he didn't commit himself to man because he knew
what was in man. He knew there was no interest.
Now he says in verse 27, and they put forth a lot of labor
in this, finding him. He said, labor not for the meat,
which perishes. But for that meat which endureth
unto everlasting life, which the Son of Man shall give you,
for him hath God the Father sealed. First he gives a negative. There's
gonna be a negative and then a positive. And I've learned
that it takes a negative and a positive to have true light.
If you're gonna have light, you're gonna have a negative and a positive. If we didn't have a negative
and positive, we wouldn't have light this morning. So he tells us here
what we are not to do. Here's what we're not to do.
Labor not for the meat which perishes. Now he's not promoting
laziness, carelessness. That's not what he's saying.
Solomon said, whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your
might. But as believers, we do it with all our might as unto
the Lord. That's how we do it, as unto the Lord. We're working
in his kingdom, his vineyard. and we do what we do for his
glory and not just for our good, our temporal good. That's the
right attitude, see, that's the right attitude. But he's not
condemning or he's not promoting laziness, but here's what he's
doing, he's condemning motive, motive, the spirit in which we
seek these things, the spirit in which we seek him. He's saying
this, labor not for it inordinately, immoderately, exclusively, or
excessively. Do not lay out your life for
this life. Do not lay out your life for
this one. It's perishing. Perishing things
of clay. How do we know? How do we know
when we are laboring for something immoderately? How do we know
that? When whatever it is we are laboring
for hinders us and keeps us from the worship of God, when it keeps
us away from the worship of God, when that object occupies my
mind constantly, constantly, it's all I think about. And whenever
those things fill us with distractions, we're full of distractions. We
can't pay attention, can't get your mind off of them, That's
laboring inordinately, immoderately, exclusively, and excessively.
And he's saying, don't do that. Don't do that. But now, what
are we to do? He tells us what not to do. Now
he tells us what to do. But he says, for that meat, that
is, labor for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life. Strive for this. Lay out your
life for this. And you could do that, putting
in a good day's work out there. It's all in the motive. It's all in the motive. We are
to strive for that spiritual meat, which is the Lord Jesus
Christ, the bread of life, as we'll see in the next few couple
of weeks. He says, that's what you strive
for, that spiritual, that meat, that meat. What is that meat? Look over in verse 50 of this
chapter. So we'll understand what this
meat is that we are to strive for as we go through the rest
of this. In verse 50. This is the bread which cometh
down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die.
I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man
eat of this bread, he shall live forever. And the bread that I
will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the
world, Gentiles as well as Jews. The Jews therefore strove among
themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except
you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you
have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh and drinketh
my blood hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last
day. For my flesh is meat. That's why we preach Jesus Christ
and Him crucified every week. My flesh is meat, indeed, and
my blood is drink, indeed. You say, that sounds like cannibalism. Look in verse 63. It is the spirit that quickeneth,
the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak unto you,
they are spirit and they are lie. He said, what I'm saying
to you is a spiritual. It's a spiritual application.
See, when they heard this, this is the carnal mind, they thought
that he was actually saying, eat his flesh. This is spiritual. By faith, we eat his flesh and
drink his blood. By faith, we do that. We receive
Christ into us. We feed on him by faith. That's what he's saying. Let
me give you this little nugget. VALUE THINGS AS THEY RELATE TO
ETERNAL THINGS. DON'T SELL YOUR SOUL FOR SOME
TEMPORAL PLEASURE. Don't do that. Matthew 16, 26,
But what is the man profited if he shall gain the whole world
and lose his soul? Or why shall a man give in exchange
for his soul? What is your soul worth? Yeah,
put a price on it. Oh, what's it profit if I have
the whole world? Right now, for the rest of my
life, I've got everything in the world. As a man told me one
time, he said, when I was young, I wanted to be so rich that I
could just say, I'll just take that, that, that, that, and not
worry about the price. Well, what if you get that? What
if you get it? You're still, at the end of the
day, when you die, the second you die, you're penniless. You're
broke, and now you stand before God. Go stand before God. I want the true riches, which
is Christ and all that I have in Him. Those are durable riches,
durable. Here are a few reasons to labor
to feed on that meat, Christ, which endureth unto eternal life,
endures forever. Perishing meat or bread, I'm
gonna use the word bread because this is what it leads into. And
he's talking here about bread. Perishing bread only nourishes
the body. Heavenly bread nourishes the
soul. I mean, I love bread, I do, I like my bread. They say, if
you wanna have a good diet, don't eat bread. I'm eating bread. I'm gonna eat it, my bread and
potatoes. But that only nourishes my body. Christ, the bread of life, nourishes
my soul. Perishing bread comforts the
body. I call it comfort foods. Ding-dongs. That's a comfort
food for me. Perishing bread comforts the
body. Heavenly bread comforts my soul. One, it nourishes and
it comforts my soul. Perishing bread sustains the
life of the body. Heavenly bread gives life, eternal
life to my soul. Perishing bread is of the earth.
Heavenly bread is from heaven. This is the bread that cometh
down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die.
You believe you're not going to die? Doug, you believe you're
not going to die? I'm not. I'm going to take this decayed
body This aging body, what you see, what you see age right in
front of you, it's decaying is what it's doing. It's decaying. That's why the Lord said, the
scripture says, beauty's vain. It's just very temporary. It's
just gonna, it's like we're melting into the ground. But boy, what we have in Christ
is eternal. So put no greater value on something
than the eternal value of it. One man wrote this, he titled
it, Earthly Pursuits In Miserably. As a river leads a man through
sweet meadows, green woods, fertile pastures, fruit-laden fields,
by glorious buildings, strong forts, famous cities, yet at
last brings him to the salt sea. So the stream of this world carries
along through rich commodities, voluptuous delights, stately
dignities, all possible content to flesh and blood, but after
all this brings a man to death, and after death to judgment,
and after judgment to hell. If you miss Christ, that's the
honest truth. That's the truth. But now he
gives this, he gives this searching, laboring for that
spiritual meat, which is Christ. He gives a promise. It's not
going to end in disaster. It's not going to end miserably.
Every person in here that believes God, you have an outstanding
future. An outstanding future. You have
a bright past. I was trying to think of what's
written on the police cars in Ashton. It's a bright future. I can't think of what the past
is. A proud past and a bright future. I have a disastrous past as far
as my human nature and life on this earth. In Christ, it's not
disastrous, but if God leaves me alone, it's disastrous. But
I have a bright future. I have a bright, bright future.
I'm not going to die. I'm not going to die. Or to write that on my casket
lid, I am not dead. I am not dead. Cheer up. I'm not dead. I'm not going to die. Because
Christ is my life. You have to kill him. You literally
have to extinguish him for me to die. I'm going to lay this
house down. It's termed in the scriptures
as a house, tabernacle. I'm going to lay it down and
I'm going to have a new one. I'm going to have a new one.
And it's not going to have any diseases, no sickness, no sorrow,
no more doctor visits. You know, I've been to the doctor
three times now trying to get over this cough. One day I'll
never have a cough again. I won't. That's the truth. That's the truth. And we're given
this promise in Christ. He said, which the son of man
shall give to you. I love that statement. He didn't
say the Son of Man shall offer you. I'm gonna offer this to
you. It's not an offer. It's a gift and I'm giving it
to you. Eternal life is a gift. It's not an offer. God has never
offered anyone life. He gives life. Do you offer life
to a dead person? You'd be the village idiot if
you did. You don't have it to give, first
of all. You don't have it to give. I see some people have
this thing written on the back of their car, speak life, speak
the life, like you and I have power to speak the life. We don't
have power to do that, that's the Lord. He's life. And he gives this promise, that
the Son of Man shall give it to you. The Son of Man, the Lord
Jesus Christ gives this meat to all who come. Come to me,
I'll give you rest. Oh, you're laboring heavy laden.
You're laboring heavy laden. Come to me. I'll give you rest.
That's a promise. I'll give it to you. I'll give
you righteousness. I'll give you rest, pardon, forgiveness,
acceptance. I'll give you all that you need.
As Pharaoh said to everybody there in Egypt, go to Joseph. The whole storehouse is in his
hands. Go to him. Go to the Lord Jesus Christ and
you have all that heaven can give. It's all vested in Him. And we have it with the promise
that He'll do it. And it ends with a declaration. For Him, the Son of Man, Jesus
Christ, the Son of God, Son of Man, hath God the Father sealed,
put His stamp on His image, You know, back in that day where
they would seal something, they'd put it, it'd have some wax or
some wax off a candle, and they'd put their, the king would put
his signet, his ring, and it would have the impression upon
that Christ is the image of God. You've seen me, you've seen the
Father. And God the Father has sealed me. He's sealed me. He's appointed me as your Lord
and Savior, as your surety. You're high priest, you're mediator,
you're representative. He was sealed, I'm gonna give
you three ways in which he was sealed, that God the Father put
his seal upon him. First of all, he did it at the
Trinity. The dove, I mean at the Trinity, at his baptism.
He did so at his baptism. The dove, which was the Holy
Spirit, came down as a symbol of the Holy Spirit, came down
and lit on his shoulders. And then God spoke from heaven.
God said, this is my beloved son. Hear him. God spoke from heaven. He put
his seal on him. And then this, the resurrection.
His resurrection from the dead. that is God the Father's seal
on him of his acceptance and all that he did and all that
he did and all whom he did it for his miracles were a seal
they were a seal as to who he is all all has been vested in
him and then i'm gonna i'm gonna wind this down and then they
said unto him what shall we do that we might work or perform
the works of God What can we do that we can do this? They
had the law and they believed they kept the law. So it's like,
what else besides these, like that young man said, Christ said,
keep the commandments. He said, I've kept them all.
What lack I yet? What must I do to inherit eternal
life? Which this shows that they were
just carnal, lost men. They were looking for him, they
found him, but they didn't know him, and they sought him for
all the wrong reasons. You want forgiveness? Seek the Lord. That
comes first and foremost. What we see in these men now
is that self-righteous nature coming out. Tell us what to do. Tell us what to do. They suppose
there was something yet to be done in order to have this blessing. And our Lord says this to them
in verse 29. They said to him, what shall
we do? You know what the Philippian jailer said, what must I do to
be saved? That's what he said. Jesus answered and said to them,
this is the work of God. Let's talk about his work. Let's
talk about his work. Here's the work of God. Here
it is. That you believe on him whom
he has sent. That's God's work. Faith is God's work. It's the
operation of the spirit of God. If you believe this morning on
the Lord Jesus Christ, that's God's work. It's his work. They were looking for something
to do. Instead, he presented them with someone to believe. God, that you believe on Him,
you trust Him, you look to Him. As Paul said this morning in
the Bible class, I'm persuaded He's able to keep that which
I've committed unto Him against that day. I'm persuaded that
Jesus Christ is the Messiah. I'm persuaded that He's God in
the flesh. I'm persuaded He's my salvation. I'm persuaded everything
I need, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption, I
have in Jesus Christ. That's the work of God. That's
why I'm persuaded. That's what I'm persuading. Faith is of the operation of
God. To believe on the Lord Jesus Christ sounds simple. John Trapp
said this, and I'm gonna close. John Trapp said, it sounds simple,
but doing so is as difficult and as impossible as keeping
the law of yourself. It's impossible.
Because your very nature and my very nature is not to believe
God. We are at enmity with God by
nature. Salvation is the work of God. If you, this morning, if you
seek the Lord for mercy, for forgiveness, for acceptance,
that is the evidence of the work of God in you already. Or you'd
never desire it. All right.