Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God the Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen!
Do you ever sit back and think about the glaring hypocrisy of our society? Take for example, environmentalism. Today, we want to be green. We all want to be Captain Planet. There’s even a political party based on this! All of the big tech industries that produce the electronic wizardry of our time, they all brag about how green their operations are. Our packaging is made from recycled water bottles! 32% of our power is made from solar and wind! We saved 6 sea turtles by using a soggy paper straw! And on an on it goes. All well and fine. But just think about the products. How many years does an iPhone last before the battery gives up the ghost? You can’t replace it easily, and the screen probably has crack oh and look, they just brought out the updated model. Might as well just get a new one, right? What about appliances? Have you bought a new fridge or a stove recently? What about a washing machine? They’re all smart and green and only run on .35A of power! But how long do they last before the fancy electronic bells and whistles quit working? 5 years maybe? Then you call the repair guy and what does he tell you? “Oh, ya, those Samsung Ice Makers are known for that. It’s cheaper to buy a new fridge than it is to fix it!” And so what do people do? They buy a new fridge. Or washing machine. Or whatever. And the old one? It ends up in the landfill. The planned obsolescence electronics graveyard that is filled to the brim! It ain’t easy, being green!
Our Gospel lesson today inspires us in the opposite direction. It is pushing us towards stuff that lasts. And I’m not referring to your 1974 Maytag that still runs great. No, we are talking today about spiritual things over physical things. Things that don’t wear out or are purposely designed to fail after so many uses. Jesus says “Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life” (JN 6:27). You remember the context for this from last Sunday. 5 loaves. 2 fish. Big miracle. 5,000 men miraculously eating their fill, smack dab in the middle of a desolate place. It was a snazzy miracle to say the least! The enormous crowd was thinking it would be right corking if Jesus was going to remain this walking, talking Tim Horton’s O’ Plenty! Gimme some more free vittles, Jesus!
This big crowd had come a long way across the lake to see Jesus. They fully expected to be filled with the miraculous manna from heaven, just like their ancestors were in the desert. They wanted this earthly bread. Their effort and persistence was commendable but they were barking up the wrong tree. It’s not merely physical bread and food they should be worried about, but rather the greater spiritual bread. The crowd was right in seeking Jesus, but they were seeking Him for all the wrong reasons. The food and kingdom they were seeking was earthly, carnal, temporary. Planned obsolescence. The bread they hoped He would give them again wouldn’t last. It would dry out and crumble. It would nourish but only for a brief time. Temporal life which would ultimately end in death. Likewise for the earthly, political kingdom. They rise one day and are conquered and gone the next.
This kind of stuff is hither and thither. Instead, Jesus tells them to be concerned with the stuff that lasts forever, the stuff that the Son of Man Himself will give them. Immediately the crowd hear’s Jesus call to work. They needed to do something, some good deeds or keep some law. They ask “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” (28). What can we do to earn eternal life? How can we merit God’s favour? How can we garner brownie points with Him?! But Jesus’ answer to them is instant and emphatic. The eternal life He was offering them did not come from checking all the boxes on the long list of the Law. The Kingdom came through Him, not Moses. “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (29). What was necessary was belief. Faith. Trust. Discipleship to Jesus was the condition for receiving eternal life and being part of the Kingdom of God - not the accumulation of the commandments as the Pharisees taught.
The crowd kinda chokes a little bit on this one, kinda like when you realize your paper straw comes in a plastic cup. How could this carpenter from Nazareth be greater than the Law of God, and able to give eternal life?! They demand proof. “What sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform?” They were contrasting Jesus and Moses in their minds. They figured that Jesus was claiming to be greater than Moses. And if you make such a claim, you better be able to substantiate it. The proof is in the puddin,’ as they say. Moses proved himself a true prophet with the manna in the wilderness. If Jesus was truly greater, then He better start producing a fat stack of cinnamon mini-donuts right now before their very eyes!
Jesus gives the crowd a divine correction, drawing their attention to God the Father as the source of the manna, not Moses. In the same way, it is the Father Who even now gives the people true bread from heaven. “For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world” (33). They wanted a repeat of the 5 loaves and 2 fishes. But the true miracle was standing right in front of them! Jesus Himself was and is that true bread of God that came down from Heaven, and would give life, not just to the Jews, but also to the entire world!
And then Jesus drops the mic. “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst” (35). He is the eternal one. The gifts He gives last forever. These are spiritual and eternal blessings, not physical and fleeting. The person who comes to Jesus in faith will never hunger and never thirst again because He truly is our all in all. The life He gives will not fail nor will it ever end. Our Baptism never dries up. His table is always full with an abundance of bread from heaven. When everything else all around us seems to be throw away, obsolete and replaceable, how awesome it is to know that we have been given the pearl of great price! The Lord Jesus, crucified for us and resurrected, He Himself is a limitless well of grace, strength, help, forgiveness and blessing.
When I was in Seminary, there were only 3 other students in my class: a Chinese guy and 2 Koreans. We used to go out to eat authentic Asian meals in Edmonton and it was fabulous. Far beyond chicken balls and deep fried shrimp, we feasted sumptuously on Kimchi and Bulgogi, Dim Sum and Char Siu! Far Eastern cuisine at its finest! But you know what was exactly the same as the Chinese food around here? … 30 minutes later, you hungry again! And looking for a gallon of water to flush out all that MSG!
The point is clear. Earthly life is nothing but obsolescence. You ate today, you’ll need to eat tomorrow. But Jesus provides us with the fullness of heaven. Blessings that last and last and last forever. Nothing else on earth can do this. No earthly food or drink or possessions or luxuries, not even sauerkraut and schnitzel! Rather it is our Lord’s incredible grace and mercy in Christ. This amazing gift that was planned from before the foundation of the world to never be obsolescent and never expires. Just as Jesus says to the crowd, so He says to us: ““I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” Amen!
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