John 6 is one of the most
important passages in all of the scriptures...and I really mean it
this time! It's in this chapter that Jesus really gets serious with
His disciples about Who and why He is; and about who and why they
are, as well (vss. 35, 51 and 64,66).
There are several points
that John brings out in relation to this miracle of the feeding of
the 5000, that none of the other gospels writers do, although they
all describe the same event. First of all we read in vs. 1 that the
Sea of Galilee is also referred-to as the Sea of Tiberias, which is
the only use of that name in the entire New Testament. Then vs. 2
contains the only reference in the Gospel of John to there being
great crowds that followed Jesus. Of course, those followers only
came because of the miracles He had done, so they probably fall into
the same category as the Galileans, back in ch. 4.48; that can be
verified in 6.66, where we see their reaction to Jesus' teachings.
Thirdly, it's only John
who speaks of this event as happening on a mountain; and only John
who describes the five loaves as being barley loaves; and of there
being "much grass there". This is real attention to
detail! John was a a remarkable man, and what he is doing, is
painting a portrait of Jesus as, not the Man of the hour, as the
people took Him to be, but the Man of eternity that He declared
Himself to be (vss. 33-35).
This is an important
chapter, and you don't want to miss a single line of it. You might
even go so far as to say that only one other miracle of Jesus equals
this one...His last one...rising from the dead! The one, reminding
us of His body, broken for the masses, and the other, His body
restored for the masses! There is powerful symbolism going on here;
Jesus is sufficient to meet your needs, as He makes perfectly clear
in vs. 48. And again as beautiful a story as this may be, just like
in ch. 5, it only serves to set the foundation for the truth that is
to follow.
So let's begin by reading
6.1-3...
Things began to happen
following all that we read-of in ch. 5...the healing of the lame man;
the persecution of Jesus by the Jews, for healing on the Sabbath; and
their determination to kill Him because He had taught Himself to be
"equal with God". So "after these things", the
Lord left Jordan and crossed over the Sea of Galilee. Almost exactly
as had taken place back in ch. 4.1-3, Jesus had no intention of
"casting (His) pearls before swine" (Matthew 7.6), so He
left those who so obviously despised and rejected Him. You know,
that should be a warning to every unbeliever who reads these verses!
But on the other hand, there was a multitude who followed Him, as we
read in vs. two, because they were hoping to take advantage of His
power to perform!
All those people, more
that 5000 men (+) as we read later on, lacking in spiritual
discernment and in appreciation of the Person of Christ. They saw a
magician...Jesus the Great! A clever physician who could heal the
sick; they really did fail to recognize Him as the Saviour of sinners
and the Messiah of Israel...and is it any different with the
multitude today? Just ask the man on the street what he thinks of
Jesus. These days He could be a movie star...a box office hit!
That second verse really
does describe people. More often than not it's idle curiosity, or
the need to be entertained, or the love of excitement that draws the
crowd. And it's exactly what we read-of here in the Word of God that
is often repeated even in the world today. Jesus' miracles sent many
after Him, but drew only a few to Him! That's the reason Jesus
withdrew from Judea...to shake the mob so to speak, and spend time
with His true disciples. Are you a true disciple of Jesus? Because
if you are, you're exactly the kind of person He wants to have
around!
Well let's get to the
story that is starting to unfold...
The first thing we want to
consider here, and the most obvious, is the fact that...
(a) Jesus has a plan,
vss. 4-6
The most important feast
on the Jewish calendar, the feast of the Passover, was about to take
place. They were about to kill the paschal lamb, and here was the
Lamb of God, right in their midst! And not only was He unrecognized
by the religious elite, but He was unwanted as well (5.18); the
Passover had truly become "a feast of the Jews". The
Baptists must have directly descended from them, because we surely
love our feasts! But their emptiness was spiritual as well as
physical. They flocked to Jereusalem to celebrate the holidays, and
they flocked after Jesus to celebrate the healing of the flesh. And
so, He put them to the test, including His own disciples! But that
doesn't mean He was indifferent to them or their needs. In Matthew
14.14 we read in a parallel passage that..."He was moved with
compassaion toward them". And then, there was Philip (vs. 5)!
You know, when we study
the scriptures, we usually pay closer attention to the passages that
relate more closely to our own individual situation; those that
strike a chord in our hearts and lives. We need to remember that the
Bible is a living book, and the Book of Life! If we take a look at
the minutest details of the passages we study, we can see that the
fingerprints of Holy Spirit are all over them! The problems and the
people and the possibilities are exactly the same today as they were
yesterday. The world is the same and the devil is the same and human
nature is the same. So we can very easily put ourselves in the
position that Philip was in. The funny thing is, it was Jesus Who
set him up, to "prove" or to test him, when He asked the
question of Him that He did.
Now this is difficult meat
to swallow, but it's true that sometimes when we are confronted with
a difficult decision, it's been put there by the very hand of the
Lord! "Let's just see how Ed...handles this one, he thinks he's
so smart!" No, it's not like that, but maybe..."How much
can he be relied-on in a crisis? Is he the man for the job?"
What do you do? Do you take inventory like Philip and Andrew did?
Do you rack your brain looking for a solution? Or do you center your
thoughts on Jesus? That's the real test of faith! Just think how
often you have tried to change, or to help a situation and have
failed. You might just as well as given it to God to begin with,
because Jesus has a plan! When people are hungry and thirsty, He has
a plan. The Lord knows that people are physically starving because
we have wasted our natural resources; and they are emotionally
starving because we have wasted our time; and they are spiiritually
starving because we have wasted opportunities to minister Jesus to
them! People are hungry, and when Jesus lifts up His eyes, He sees a
whole multitude of us!
Next time, we will see
that there is a POWER!
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