Tonight we enter chapter 6 of the Gospel of John. This chapter reveals Jesus to be the provision for every human and material need. Note again Jesus’ pattern. He first demonstrated the truth, then He began to preach and teach it. In this chapter, Jesus will feed the 5,000 and calm the stormy sea.
No matter how small the need or how stormy the problem, Jesus is the Provision. In verses 1-15, we focus on Jesus providing for human and material needs. Keep in the back of your mind as we study this passage that trying to meet human needs by any other source than Christ is doomed to failure and will not satisfy.
Note also that believing and trusting are essential for God to meet human need. But there are several levels of faith and trust and that’s a lesson that man must learn in order to see that Christ is the Bread of Life. READ verses 1-6.
Jesus had just healed the paralytic man and then gave a good lecturing to the religionists about His authority and power. Some time after this (we don’t know for sure how much time), Jesus crossed over the sea or lake of Galilee.
For a side note, the “some time” is the time during Jesus’ Galilean ministry. Covered in Mat. 4:12-14:12. These events are not covered by John. John concentrated on Jesus’ Judean ministry. Read thru Jn. 5, skip to Matt. 4:12-14:12 then to John 6.
(Explain Galilee vs. Tiberias as compared to Lake Corpus Christi and Mathis Lake.)
The Sea of Galilee is about 13 miles long and 8 miles wide. The crowds watched where Jesus was heading and rushed around the lake by foot. Their journey would have been about 9 miles.
The Greek words in the original manuscript for the words “following and “saw” are in the imperfect tense meaning they had been following Jesus for a long time and kept on following Him, seeing the ministry of His miracles.
Jesus was tired from the pressure of facing the crowd day after day. He tried to find some privacy to get away. When that didn’t work, He took His disciples and went on top of some unknown mountain. He needed time to be alone with God and His disciples. It was the Passover season, a time when thousands flooded Jerusalem and surrounding areas.
The picture we are given is that of Jesus sitting on the mountainside, lifting up His eyes from resting upon His knees and seeing a great crowd of thousands streaming across the fields and up the mountain toward Him. This great crowd included those who had followed Him around the lake and pilgrims who were caught up in the excitement of hearing about Jesus.
So Jesus uses this occasion to demonstrate two concerns.
1. His concern for meeting the needs of man, even the most minute need of a meal, telling us that there is no need that Jesus doesn’t want to meet. This crowd had been following Jesus for days and now had just journeyed 9 miles. They were not only hungry but they were out of food. Here they are in the middle of nowhere and there was no place to buy food. Jesus was filled with compassion for them and in His attempt to provide He asks His disciple, “Where can be buy some bread for these people?”
2. His 2nd concern was to strengthen the disciples. Jesus already knew what He was going to do, but He used this occasion to test and strengthen the disciples, teaching them a tremendous lesson on faith. They were just like we are as Jesus’ disciples—we are in need to grow in faith.
READ v. 7. Here we see the pessimistic faith of Philip. Either the disciples had 8 months’ wages (200 denarii) in their treasury or else Philip was just pulling a figure out of the air. Let’s talk a minute about pessimistic faith.
1. A pessimistic faith sees money and human resources and that is all. A pessimistic faith sees only the available resources. It stresses the hopelessness the impossibility of the situation.
2. A pessimistic faith doesn’t see God or His power. A pessimistic faith professes God and Christ to be the Son of God. It professes the belief that Christ has the power to meet the needs of man. It even witnesses the miraculous working of Christ in other instances.
But when a problem arises, the immediate response is to see the problem, not the power of God—that seems to be forgotten.
a. A pessimistic faith forgets God’s glorious power in the past.
b. It fails to think of God’s power. Its mind is on earthly things, not on spiritual things. It’s carnal, not spiritual.
c. A pessimistic faith feels that the problem is too big for God’s power or too little for God to be interested in.
d. It fears that God’s power will fail and the person’s faith will be weakened. The person with pessimistic faith is the one who feels it’s safer to pray weakly, “Lord, if it be Your will, handle this problem. What does James 1: 6-8 says about this? READ.
e. A pessimistic faith will not see God’s care and love, His interest and concern over every little thing that happens to a person.
f. A pessimistic faith gives thanks and praise to God for what one has (health, money, things) but fails to trust God for the miraculous (healing and multiplication of resources so that one can better serve and help others.)
g. A pessimistic faith looks to others for help instead of looking to God and depending upon Him alone.
READ vv. 8-9. Here we see an optimistic, but still questioning, faith exhibited by Andrew. Let’s say something about this optimistic, but questioning, faith.
1. An optimistic, but questioning, faith loves the Lord and is committed to Him. Andrew saw Jesus’ concern so he went among the crowd to search for food and he found and gathered all he could.
2. An optimistic, but questioning, faith lays what it can before the Lord. No matter how little the resources or how poor the quality, it is all laid before the Lord. Barley bread was the bread of the poor. It was the cheapest bread that could be made or bought. Not only were there only two fish, it was two small fish. But no matter how small or how poor the quality, Andrew offered what he had found—the boy and his food—to the Lord.
3. An optimistic, but questioning, faith does question: “How far will they go among so many?” This optimistic, questioning faith many times will deteriorate into complaining about the problem, grumbling over the small provision, or griping over the poor quality.
A questioning faith looks at the need, then looks at the meager resources, both how little and how poor the quality, and it questions God. It questions instead of believing God to take care of the problem. Our lesson in this is that whatever the need is, the fundamental need is to learn to trust Christ and not to question and doubt His love and care, wisdom and power.
We have many in this church with this optimistic, but questioning faith. When we were planning this sanctuary. Many wanted to be optimistic and support it. But they questioned the little resources we had.
READ vv. 10-13. Now we see an example of a positive, unswerving faith. It’s seen in Christ. Jesus demonstrated for His disciples the kind of faith they were to have in God. Let’s look at Jesus’ faith as our example.
1. Jesus took what He had and gave thanks to God. He only had a small amount. He could hold all of it in one hand. But notice, He didn’t look at it in despair, wondering if it would be enough. He looked up and gave thanks to God. The small amount and poor quality didn’t matter. What mattered was that He had something. So He took it in appreciation, lifted it up to God, gave thanks for it, and trusted God to meet the need of the hour. He knew without a doubt it would be taken care of.
2. Then He gave what He had. All He could do was distribute what was in His hands and trust God. This He did. He simply gave what He had and God did the rest. That is all that God asks us to do—give what we can and trust Him to multiply it.
3. Jesus used others to help Him in meeting the need. He gave to the disciples and they gave to the people. His disciples were essential to the task. They were the ones made responsible for feeding the people.
God met the need because of the positive, unswerving faith of Jesus. He met the people’s need and filled them. In fact, He more than met their need. How much more? 12 baskets full. Why twelve baskets? One explanation is there were 12 disciples—12 servants who had so obediently and trustingly helped Christ. Each servant had a supply that would last him for days. God always provides abundantly for His true servants. Notice, too, that not a morsel was wasted. Every ounce of provision was to be used at some future date.
READ vv. 14-15. What we are seeing here is a materialistic profession of Jesus. The people professed Jesus to be the Messiah, but they were thinking of an earthly, materialistic king, a Messiah who could meet both their personal and community or national needs.
Jesus had fed and healed them. He had done what every man wanted, met their need for health and food. So they wanted to set Him up as the King of their lives. They didn’t want to ever hunger or be sick again, not as long as they lived. They saw in Jesus the possibility of an earthly, human Messiah.
They saw Him as One who could provide not only food and healing, but also deliverance from their trials, comfort for their sorrows, peace through their disturbances, and victory over their enemies.
Of course we know that Jesus can help any person through anything. But the problem with the crowd was their desire for earthly and worldly satisfaction. They thought in terms of physical and material needs, but these are only temporary.
The Lord’s concern is primarily spiritual—spiritual strength and spiritual blessings, the strength and blessings that last forever.
And when you get down to it, that is the reason most people forsake Christ. Because He demands denial of self and separation from the world. We will hear more about this when we get to vv. 26-27 in this chapter. So for now we will close with this reminder from 1 John 2: 15-16.
“Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does—comes not from the Father but from the world.”
