Digging Deeper: I Am the Bread of Life

Immediately after Jesus miraculously feeds the 5000 people, he knows that the crowd is about to declare him King of Israel by force and start a revolution, so he runs off and hides in the mountains. The disciples cross to the other side of the lake without Jesus and later Jesus follows them across in the night, walking on the water… which gives the disciples a good scare, but they eventually realize it’s Jesus and not a ghost and they welcome him back.

The day after Jesus had fed the 5000, the crowd that had stayed on the opposite shore of the lake finally realized that neither Jesus nor his disciples were still there, so they got into some other boats and went to Capernaum in search of Jesus. 

When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” 

And Jesus immediately calls their motivations into question.

Jesus says, “You’re looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill.”

And he adds, “Don’t work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” 

When Jesus makes this statement, he is referring back to a passage from Deuteronomy 8, which says:

“And you shall remember the whole way that the LORD your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.”

When the people hear Jesus talking about work, and they quickly think that God must have a new to-do list for them to follow, and they want to know every last detail of that to-do list.

They asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?” 

But Jesus’ answer is short and simple. He answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.” 

That’s not such a hard list to follow, right?

They then ask Jesus for a sign, and they hint not so subtly that they would prefer another bread miracle… like Moses did with the manna in the desert. 

Jesus says to them, “It wasn’t Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

And they say to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” 

And Jesus says, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty." 

He adds, “For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” 

But then the Jews get cranky and they say, “How can this guy say he came from heaven? We know who his parents are!” 

Jesus tells them to stop grumbling, and he gives them a short little sermon at the Synagogue, explaining to them in more detail what he is talking about.

He says:

“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day. It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me. No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father. Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” 

But this little sermon just made the Jews even angrier, and they were like, “What’s this cannibalism nonsense he’s blabbing about?” 

And so Jesus declares that everyone who doesn’t eat his flesh and drink his blood is dead.

But they still don’t get it, and most of the people end up leaving Jesus because his words were just too hard for them to swallow.