It Can Get Personal
Message one of five
I Am the Living Bread
March 04, 2012
Michael Wiley
Introduction:
Fill in the blank on the top of your note sheet:
God is ________________ --- what ever you’re thinking right now.
When many people in the world think of God, they think of an impersonal kill joy. A God who is real, but a God who is aloof, and distant. A God who is sitting up on His royal throne watching our every move, waiting to pounce on us when we fail.
Listen, if you don’t get anything else out of this series, I want you to get this. The God who may seem distant and unapproachable, came to earth as the great I AM. God the father, came to us as God the son, to have a personal relationship with us, in real time, in real space, and today, He invites you to come to Him, in Relationship.
Transition:
Jesus described Himself many times in Scripture as the Great I Am. In that He was saying, “I am God.” In the flesh, here on earth to call you into a personal relationship with me.
In our Scripture today, John chapter 6, He says, “I am the Living Bread.”
Before we look at that, let’s look back.
Manna From the Sky
I want to look back for a moment, because a part of Israel’s history is brought up in John 6-- The feeding of the Israelites with manna from the sky.
Just for review, God had used Moses and Aaron to bring the Israelites out of 300 years of bondage in Egypt. The trek from Egypt to the land he had promises them crossed what the Bible refers to as the wilderness. He brings them into the wilderness (approximately 1 million people) on foot, where there was no food and water supply to take care of them. They begin to whine and complain to Moses. At least we had food in Egypt – they said.
How many of you know that bondage can be comfortable. The Israelites were a free people now, but when a little trouble came up. They forgot about the slavery part, and could only remember their daily rations of food. The two go together in thought because when you’re a slave, you work for your master, he feeds you so you can work for your master. That’s all you get is food.
So God fed them with manna that would fall early every morning. Manna, was a small wafer of bread that was sweet like honey. They would collect it each morning and then what was left would disappear off the ground.
Now turn with me to the gospel of John chapter 6
John 6 begins with the miraculous feeding of the 5000 people on the banks of the sea of Galilee.
At the time, the people were following a miracle worker. That is all they thought He was.
Verse 5 says, “John 6:5 (ESV)
5 Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, “Where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?”
The first point I want to bring out is that:
Jesus Cares about Your Needs
He saw the people and He knew they were hungry. He then tests His Apostle Phillip by asking him where they were going to get enough food to feed them. Phillip says, well we don’t have the money to feed them but there is a little boy here with five loaves of bread and two small fish.
Jesus has every one sit down, He takes the five loaves of bread and two fish, and feeds the 5000 people. When all was said and done, the Apostles picked up twelve baskets of leftovers. So not only did Jesus supply their needs, but also He supplied an over abundance.
Listen, Jesus knows your every need and wants to supply your needs in abundance.
Jesus knew the people were following Him out of wrong motives. Verse 2 tells us they were following Him because they saw the signs He was performing on the sick. They were following Him, not out of belief, but out of curiosity, kind of like a circus act, or a sideshow… What is He going to do next? Let’s follow Him and see what He does.
Today we would call these people SEEKERS. A seeker is a person that is checking out Christ—checking out the Christian faith --- hasn’t really committed yet, but comes Sunday morning to see what’s going on. There may be some here today that fit this description. I’m so glad you are here.
Bottom line is this. No matter why you are here --- Christ cares for you. He knows your need; He wants to supply your need.
In Matthew 6:33 (NLT) Jesus says
33 Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.
Later that evening Jesus sneaks away and ends up on the other side of the lake in the city of Capernaum.
The people wake up, realize He’s gone and jump in their boats to chase Him down.
This is where I really want to grab the story.
READ 25-29
Listen
One of the hardest concepts for many people to grasp is this:
You Cannot Earn Heaven
There is no secret formula, no secret task list, there is nothing you can do – to go to heaven and enjoy eternal life.
A great concept of this life is what Paul told the Galatians in chapter 6. You reap what you sow…
If you sow an apple seed – you reap apples
If you sow a tomato seed – you reap tomatoes.
If you sow money into a savings account – you reap interest.
If you sow bad habits – you reap the consequence of those habits.
If you commit a crime – you reap the just penalty for that crime.
However, that concept breaks down when it is applied to reaping heaven. Why? You can’t sow enough!
You may try – try to read your Bible, try to go to church, try to pray the right prayers, but heaven is a perfect place and only perfect people can go there. None of us here are perfect.
In the Bible the penalty for sin is death! If you sow sin – you reap death!
So God came to earth in the form of Jesus to live a perfect sinless life, then give His life as a sacrifice for you and I, so we could get to heaven based on His sacrifice.
In verse 30-31 they say, Okay if you’re the man, what sign will you give us. Our fathers got manna from heaven as a sign.
So their logic seems to be that Jesus feeding 5000 people was a small miracle compared to the manna from Heaven.
READ 32-35
Your Biggest Need is Not Physical – It’s Spiritual
We all need physical bread. God knows that. It is included in the Lord’s Model Prayer, “Give us this day our daily bread.”
We are made up of Body, Mind and Spirit.
We seem to work a lot on the first two. We try and take care of our bodies by proper nourishment and exercise. When our bodies don’t feel right, we go to the doctor or start popping over the counter Meds.
We take care of our mind by going to school, reading, and learning. Some people spend years in college, trying to learn more and more. We are driven to DO – to do the right things to nourish our body and mind.
When it comes to the Spirit, there are three types of people.
Type number one, had no thought of nourishing the spirit. Eat, Drink and be Merry – that’s it…As long as I’m well fed, got a roof over my head that’s enough for me. I’m just a blob of mutated cells anyway. I came from a monkey, that came from a fish, that came from plasma, that came from…. Well that’s where evolution really breaks down.
Type number two, feels the need to nourish the spirit, and lives their life trying to. Books, CDs, Spiritual Gurus, you walk into any major book store and there are whole sections on “spirituality.” It really depends on whom you read as to what you believe.
This person feels the need, but searches for what the world has to offer to fill that need. AND, they keep on searching. You see they are trying to DO something to fill their spiritual need. Read the right book, find the right guru, listen to the right recording.
When Jesus met up with the young rich ruler (Luke 6) the guy asks Jesus, “What do I have to DO to have eternal life.” He was caught up in it to. Give me the right formula, the right incantations, the right prayers, a list of things I can do to get it.
Jesus says ---- you must be born again!
The guy (I think sarcastically) says, How can I crawl back into my mother’s belly and be born again?”
Jesus says, no, your spirit has to be born again.
The Third Type of Person feels the void, realizes the need, and realizes that nothing of this earth can fill it.
Jesus says, you can eat all the butter top bread you want, but the real bread you need is ME.
Jesus is the Living Bread
Paul said,
Philippians 3:18-20 (NIV1984)
18 …many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly things.20 But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ,
In your notes, underline “Their mind is on earthly things.” What are these earthly things. Not all earthly things are bad. My house, my car, my family, my career – those are all earthly things.
BUT --- earthly things will not get me to heaven. If my mind is all tied up --- if my hope is dependant on these earthly things, I am lost. I have to depend and put my hope in Christ, the Living Bread.
When I feast on the Living Bread I will not die but have eternal life.
Conclusion:
So, what is God to you?
This God that seems so impersonal and even scary to some people came to this earth to give you life.
Life is found in Him through Jesus the Living Bread.
Eat this bread, and you will never be hungry again.
SONG Mystery to prepare us for Communion
