Come back to John chapter 6. I have this message, Christ,
the bread of life. He's the one who gives life. He's the one who gives all life.
He's the one who gives spiritual life. He's also the sustainer
of it. We feed on him, the believer
feeds on him daily, just like we need to feed on bread daily.
He is our food. He is our drink. He said, I'm
the water of life. I'm the bread of life. He's everything
we need. Everything we need. In John chapter
6, Christ is presented as the Son incarnate. He is spoken of as the Son of
Man in verse 27 and 53. He is spoken of as coming down
from heaven, which shows his preexistence, the eternal Son
of God, God among us. God with us. He's God. He's God coming down from heaven
and giving life unto the world. And we see Him feeding 5,000.
Now, I know you think that had to
be a miracle to see that feeding 5,000 men, plus the women and children,
Well, how many do you reckon he fed today? There's over 6
billion people in the world. I eat three times a day. I have
breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So how many did he feed today? The one who fed 5,000 is still
the same one that feeds over 6 billion every day. That's just people. That's not counting animals.
It's not counting the plant life and all that there is on this
earth. I mean, think about it. And this
man, this son of man, feeds him every day. Every day he takes
care of his own. Every day. So we see him feeding
5,000. He takes a few loaves and he
blesses them. First, he gives thanks. He gives
thanks unto the Father. And then he feeds a multitude.
And there's a lesson here. No matter how small the things
may be that you and I have, if the Lord blesses them, we will be amazed what we can
do. If he blesses the one talent
I have, My soul. What can be done? What can be
done? Then in verse 25, we find these
people seeking the Lord. They put forth some effort. They
get in a boat and they track Him down. They don't know where
He's at. Then they find out where He's
at. They get in a boat and they go to Capernaum. They look for
Him. They put some real effort. real effort in seeking Him, but
they are seeking Him for the wrong reasons. Most people, I
tell you, most people who profess to be Christians are seeking
Him for what they can get out of Him and not for Him. And He
reveals this to these people in verse 26. Ye seek me not because
of the miracles. You see, they saw the miracles
that he performed on them that were diseased. But because you
did eat of the loaves and you were filled. You had a good lunch. I tell you what, I bet that was
the best lunch they ever had. It's like the marriage supper.
The best wine they ever drank. At that governor of the feast,
he said, that's the best wine. He said, usually, you know, you
serve that first and everybody gets drunk, then you give them
the bad stuff. He said, man, this is the best stuff. And that
meal they ate that day, I guarantee you, is the best meal they ever
had. Best they ever tasted. And so they seek Him. And He
lets them know why they're seeking Him. He knows why I am seeking
Him. He knows what I am seeking Him
for. The Lord knows that. He knows why I am here. He knows
that. You know, the older I get and
the more I learn from the Scriptures, I think to myself, who are you
kidding? The Lord knows you. The Lord
knows you. He knows me. He knows you. He
knows us. But He says to these people, You didn't realize the spiritual
significance of the miracles that I performed, that you saw
me perform on the diseased. If they had realized it, if they
had realized it, they would have fell at his feet and worshiped
him. That's what they would have done.
They wouldn't be looking for a free lunch. They'd be looking
for him. They'd be asking for the same
cure except for spiritually. That's what they'd be asking
for. But as natural men always do, They look at the temporal
side of things, at the material side of things, and that's what
they seek after. These men didn't realize that
the miracles that Christ performed had spiritual implications, such
as healing the spiritually blind, the spiritually lame, the spiritually
dead. Those are the implications of
His miracles. And He says to them, and to us.
Labor not. Labor not for the meat that perishes,
but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life. Lay out
yourself for this. Seek ye first the kingdom of
God and His righteousness. And all these things will be
added unto you. All these things you and I need will be added to us
along the way. But put your mind and your heart, set your mind
and your heart, your affection on things above. And you can
do that, still do a good job at work. Actually, I'm telling you, if
you can do that, if the Lord enables you to do that, I promise
you, you'll be the best employee that that employer has ever had. I guarantee it. If your mind
and your heart and your affection is set on Christ, you're going
to do everything in your walk to glorify your Lord. You will. It'll just be automatic. But
he says here, labor not for the meat that perishes, but for that
meat which endures unto everlasting life. He's not teaching here
that they are the work for salvation. Not at all. No man is saved by
his works. But here's what he's saying.
Don't give your time and effort in trying to obtain life by what
you do. That's not the way life is obtained. If you have life, it's because
God in grace has given it to you. You and I didn't earn it,
and we didn't get it because we asked for it. We asked for
it because we already had it. Dead people don't ask. Dead people
don't ask for life. Dead people don't ask for forgiveness.
Dead people don't ask for righteousness. They don't seek after His righteousness. The living ask. The living pray. The living cry. You take a baby, when it's born,
the first thing it starts doing is crying. Crying, wanting to
be fed. That's signs of life. Signs of
life. So if you have life, it's because
He's given it to you. And if you haven't, you have
Him. Who is life? You cannot have life. You cannot
have spiritual life and not have Christ. He is the life. He's the life. He's the life.
He's the bread. He's the water. He's everything. He's absolutely
everything. It says in verse 20, let me find
my place, verse 27, "...or labor not for the meat which perishes,
but for that meat which endures unto everlasting life, which
the Son of Man shall give unto you. For him hath God the Father
sealed." That's to say, the Father has
identified Him as the Savior. He's identified Him as the Messiah,
as the Redeemer. The Father has identified Him,
He's accredited Him as the appointed, anointed Savior. He said in one
place, this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. He didn't say about anybody else.
He said that's about the Lord Jesus Christ. And again, when
the Holy Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove, he
said he's still on him. He said he's still on him. Him hath God the Father sealed,
set his seal of approval on. Then said they unto him, what
shall we do that we might work the works of God? Tell us what
to do. Tell us what we can do in order
to please God, in order to obtain life. This is the natural man
speaking. And these people are religious
to the hilt. You can't get any more religious than these people
are. I mean, they thought they were it. They believed they were
saved, that God was their Father. They said that to Him. God is
our Father. They were lost as a goose in
a snowstorm. Loss of the day they're born.
Loss. Tell us what we might do that
we might please God. Here is the old, self-righteous,
legalistic spirit raising its ugly head once again. Wanting
to know what to do. Give us something to do to impress
God. See, we do things to impress
each other. We do. I'm telling you, we can't impress
God. There's been one that has impressed
God, and that's Jesus Christ. He has impressed God. This shows how depraved and dead
men are to even ask such a question. It only shows the ignorance of
a man to believe that this wormy creature can do something to
impress God, I mean, just look at the universe. Look at the
universe, look at creation. Look at all this vastness that
God has created. And I'm going to do something
in this sinful flesh to impress God. I showed you how dark and dead
and depraved human nature is. But our Lord straightens them
out. He doesn't say. He does not say to them, well,
here's what you do. Here's what you can do. He tells
them what God does. This is the work of God. They
said here, what shall we do that we might work the works of God?
And he just said, no. He said, this is the work of
God. Here's the work of God. That you believe on him whom
he has sent. Here's what God requires. Faith
in His Son. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
It says in Hebrews 11, without faith it is impossible to please
God. Impossible. God requires faith
in the One whom He has sent. They say, what shall we do? It's
not what shall you do, it's believe. Believe. What must I do to be
saved? This is so simple, but impossible
without His work, without His work. This is the work of God.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. You
know what's so, you know, human nature is so messed up. We want
everything free except salvation. We want everything free. They followed Him because they
got a free lunch. He said, you follow me not because of the
miracles you saw and you recognize who I am. You follow me because
of the fishes and the loaves. You had a good lunch. They were
probably trying to get supper out of him. That's why they kept
following him. And that's why he said, that's
what you're after. You're after your belly. You're after trying
to satisfy this flesh. You're not after me. You don't
see who I am. You don't know who I am. I am
the bread of life. I'm the bread that you need.
Not just stuff on the table. I can eat as much of it as I
want. It looks like I have it. I can eat as much of it as I
want, but I'm still going to die. I'm going to die. But not if
I eat the bread of life. I ain't the bread of life, I'm
not going to die. His whole body's going to go
in the grave, and I'm telling you, I'm not going to die. And
that's the thing that we as believers ought to get a hold of this. We are not going to die. And
I know in this world we're going to die in this world. We're going
to go put this body in the grave. But the instant that happens,
it's like, it's a change. It's a glorious change. It's like, you know, you're going
from here to glory in a twinkling of an eye. No purgatory. No middle ground. It's just instant.
To be absent from the body is to be what? Present with the
Lord. That's where we're going. Well, let me see where I'm at. Then they said unto him in verse
30, Show us a sign We may see and
believe. Now, these are the ones who had
just witnessed all the miracles that he performed on those that
were diseased. And he just fed 5,000 of them. And now they're saying, OK, show
us a sign. You want us to believe on you?
You want us to follow you, trust you? Show us a sign. Let us see something. Show your
power. They just saw it. They just saw
it. This demonstrates total depravity
here. Total depravity. And it also
shows us how impossible it is for the natural man to simply
believe. Oh, they said, show us a sign.
They wanted to see and believe, but David said, I had fainted
unless I had what? Believed to see. the goodness
of the Lord in the land of the living. It didn't say, unless
I had seen and then believed. No, David said, unless I had
believed to see. You believe, believe in the light,
walk in the light that you have, and he said it'd do what? Give
you more light. No, it showed me. Let's see a
sign. You know, they want to see a
sign. The Lord said, believe, and they said, show us a sign. We'll see some kind of miracle
first. Give us something we can see or feel. Thomas, Thomas,
one of the apostles, disciples there said, I'm not going to
believe until I can touch Him. Oh, if I could just, if I could
just feel it, if I could just feel something, if I could just
feel a change in me. And I think that's what a lot
of people, you know, they look for. They're looking for this,
this like lightning striking them or something. You know,
this real, it's not, it's just simple faith. Just believe, taking
him at his word. Taking him at his word. Here's what they're saying. You
want us to accept you as the one sin of God? Then show us
a sign. Show us your authority. I thought
they were saying, forgetting what they'd already seen. He
gave them many, many signs before this. Many proofs. They wanted
to see more. And they challenged. They said,
in verse 31 here, Our fathers ate manna in the desert as it
is written. He gave them bread from heaven. Now they're going to compare
him to Moses. Going to take and compare him
to Moses. What they wanted to know was this. What proof have
we that you are greater than Moses? The two great men that they considered,
especially two of them, was Abraham and Moses. You may have fed 5,000. But Moses fed the children of
Israel in the wilderness for 40 years. For 40 years. Our Lord clears up this matter
on who gave them that bread that they ate in the wilderness. He
says in verse 32, Moses gave you not that bread. Moses did
not have that kind of power. Moses didn't give you that. His heavenly Father gave them
that. That manna that came from heaven they went out and picked
every morning. Moses didn't give you that bread.
The Father gave you that bread. His Father
gave you that. He's the one that gave them that
bread. See, our problem is we can't
get past the We have a hard time getting past
the instrument. God's the first cause of all things. He might
use me to do something. He may use you to do something,
but God's the first cause. We are instruments in His hands.
That's what we are. He's the first cause. He might
use a Moses, but He's the cause. He's the cause. What you have,
God gave you. What you are, God made you. Where
you are, God placed you. He's the One. He's the One. He said, but My Father... See,
He don't give Him the glory that's due unto His name. As the Scripture
tells us, give unto Him the glory due unto His name. So our Lord
stands here before these men and He says, My Father giveth
you the true bread from heaven, which is Himself. He is the true
bread from heaven. That manna that they were talking
about was only a type. And there's no life in a type.
No life in a type. Every one of those that ate the
manna died. Died. All but two of them, that was
the original group, the older ones, came out as Joshua and
Caleb. They're the only two who went to Canaan land other than
those who were 20 years old and younger. The rest of them died
in the wilderness. And they ate that manna every
day. They believe Moses gave it to
them. God gave it. God gave it. And he said, My
Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of
God is he which cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto the
world. He is the true bread. He is the
life-giving bread. The Father's provision for a
lost and a dying world was to send his only begotten Son, that
those who eat his flesh and drink his blood by faith may have everlasting
life. Christ came that we might have
life and that we might have it more abundantly. The father, he said here, your
fathers ate the manna in the desert and they died. But those
who eat the true bread shall never die. They're never going
to die. Those who drink the living water, those who eat the true
bread, you're never going to die. You're going to switch places. You're never going to die. That manna was only for Israel
and it was for no one else. But the true bread, the true
bread that cometh down from heaven gives life, listen, to the world,
to Gentiles as well as Jews. Gives life to us. Aren't you
glad of that? You know, the greatest part of
our ancestry was left in darkness. But here we have life given to
us. See, the true bread gives life unto the world. Gentiles
as well as Jews. Then he speaks of himself here
in verse 32. Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I
say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from heaven, but
my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread
of God is he which cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto
the world. Then said they unto him, Lord
evermore, give us this bread. Someone else said something like
that before. That woman at the well. Oh, Lord evermore, give
me this water that I don't have to what? Come here and draw water
again. Lazy, I'm telling you. We are
just lazy and want it for free. That's what she said. Give me
this water that I don't have to come here and draw again. And they said, Lord evermore,
give us this bread too. Give us this bread. And Jesus
said unto them, I am the bread of life. Don't look for a loaf
of bread on a table. Don't look for anything in an
ordinance. Look to me. I am the bread that came down
from heaven. In another place they said, we
know who you are. You're the carpenter's son. You didn't come
from heaven. We know you're brothers and sisters.
We know you're a poor family. No, you don't. No, you don't. He's a son of God. He's a son
of God. And he said, I am the bread of
life, and this I am is the I am. This is the I am that Moses spoke
to. Moses, you tell them I am that
I am, sent you. And the same I Am is standing
here before these men saying, I Am the bread of life. He's
the sustainer of life. He's the giver of life. And he
that cometh to Me shall never hunger. He that believeth on Me shall
never thirst. You'll never be satisfied. You
will never have any true, real satisfaction, soul satisfaction,
any real happiness, any real joy. You'll never have it until
you come to Him, until you find it in Him. That's where you get
it. But I said unto you that ye also
have seen me, and believe not. Faith is a gift of God. Oh, show
us a sign. Work a miracle. You can get a crowd. You can
see them on TV. You can get a crowd if you get
into the miracle business. If you get into all that hoodoo,
voodoo stuff, you can get a crowd. We can fill this place up if
we get into that. He said, I said to you, you have seen me and
you believe not. The Lord knoweth them that are
His. He knoweth them, the Scripture says, that trust in Him. He knows
them. He knows every heart that trusts
Him. He knows everyone that's looking
to Him. He knows them. He says, here, you don't believe.
And He knows everyone that doesn't believe. He knows every poser
there is. He knows them. Now listen, all
that the Father giveth me shall come to me. He's not a loser. He's not a loser. He's not going
to lose a one. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. They will come to me. They shall
come to me. Not a one of them is going to
be left behind. And him that cometh to me, And this has been
one of my favorite verses since I believed the gospel. I will
no wise cast out. Lord, you said, you said, whosoever
comes to you, you would not cast him out. You said it. That's a promise. That's a promise. For I came
down from heaven. And I tell you what, these men
are hearing a message, aren't they? I tell you, they were really
listening to a message. Of course, the vast part of them
just went back home. But he told them the truth. I
came down from heaven, not to do my own will, not that it's
any different. The will of the Father, the will
of the Son, and the will of the Holy Spirit is the same. He's not
saying here that his will was any different. He just submitted
to the Father's will. They're one. They are one. But I came down here to do the
will of Him that sent me. I'm here on business. I'm here
on my Father's business. I'm here to do my Father's will. That's what I'm here for. And
what is that? Well, you'd think we would really
want to know what that is. Every believer does. And this
is the Father's will which is sent me, that of all which he
hath given me." And my soul, that is a number no man can number. Multitude of sinners, no man
can number. He's given them to me to take
care of, to bring home, to represent, to mediate for. He's given them
to me. Think about this, now, if you
truly believe that the Lord has saved you. God gave you to his
Son before the world was created. He thought upon you. He took
care of you. Nothing was left undone. Nothing
was left for you to do. You were put into the hands of
Christ, and you became His responsibility. He became your surrogate to bring
you home. Spotless. Spotless. Can you bring anybody home like
that? That's His responsibility. This
is the Father's will which has sent me, that of all which He
hath given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it
up again at the last day. And this is the will of Him that
sent me. And He's going to open the door wide open here. That
everyone, whosoever will, let him come. That everyone who has
sent the Son and believes on Him may have everlasting life. Now, you have it now. If you don't have it now, you
won't have it later. If you don't have it in this life, you won't
have it in the life after. And I will raise Him up at the
last day. What a message! What a message
they heard. Isn't that something? Well, it says in verse 41, the
Jews murmured. The Jews then murmured at him
because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven.
They got upset with this message. What a message. But our Lord, our Lord is the
bread of life. And he that cometh to me, I will
in no wise, in no way, in no way cast him out." I sure hope he enables us to
feast on him.