The Men's Bible Study considered the Gospel text for this coming Sunday (John 6:24-35). The text is a follow up from last week's feeding of the 5,000. The question that framed our discussion asked, "What are we looking for when we look for Jesus?"
Some responses included: being loved unconditionally, humble access to God, and instruction on how to love unconditionally. These responses are those of mature disciples. It is clear that we are all on a different stages on our journey to find Jesus. The crowd in the passage for Sunday is just starting to figure out what it means to follow Jesus. As a member of our study said, Jesus is trying to teach the crowd that his ministry is more than just offering a free lunch.
When Jesus met the crowd that was looking for him, he said, "Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you at your fill of the loves." Again, the crowds are having a hard time understanding what Jesus is really trying to accomplish in his ministry. In a way, everything boils down to the tension between a heavenly reality and an earthly reality.
Still over 2,000 years later we live in that tension between heaven and earth but we know that through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, heaven and earth are being made one. In the fullness of time at the second coming, the oneness of heaven and earth will be fulfilled in all creation. As for now, we live in the in-between-time, the-already-and-not-yet of God's new reality in Jesus.
This in-between-time sparks a lot of questions that help us in our journey to become better disciples. Questions that ask, "how do we love like Christ loves?", "what is my part in the work of God?" "how do we know that God's hope for salvation is true?", "how do we do better to live in Christ's new reality of hope and abundance instead of darkness and scarcity?", "what does Jesus mean when he says that our work is to believe in him? what does our response to this faith statement look like?"
Perhaps the most pressing question for today asks, "How is God in Jesus reconciling what we think we need with what Jesus knows we need?" Jesus says, "I AM the bread of life." Jesus knows what we need bread that lasts forever but we are used to only needing the bread that lasts for a small time. Jesus is giving us more than a band-aid, more than a free lunch, Jesus is giving us a truth that covers all of our wildest dreams. In order to access this truth, he simply asks that we trust him. Trust in the I AM, in the one who is drawing the past, present, and future into one moment where all people can celebrate in the fullness and richness of God, where all people are drawn together by perfect love.
"What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you?" Jesus is saying, "I AM the sign." I AM the bread of life that feeds you forever. Jesus is saying, live in me, live in my ways, live by my teachings, take of my flesh, and I will live in you forever. I AM the new reality that you are hoping for, and I AM here now revealing this new reality of heaven on earth.
Keep on asking questions about your faith in God and see how Jesus is revealing the signs of the hope to come through his life, his death, and his resurrection.
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