The Forever Food

John 6:24-35

Did you get a chance to watch the Olympics these past couple of weeks? It can be fun to watch the best of the best compete in a variety of sports, right? I didn’t really get a chance to watch a whole lot of it. I just saw a couple of judo matches on YouTube. But anyway, today is the closing ceremony. And so in just a few hours, it will all be over. And when it’s all over, how many of the athletes will be remembered? And for how long? To be sure the athletes who win medals, they get more recognition than the ones who don’t. But how many of you can name all of the gold medal winners from four years ago? Or how about eight years ago? How about 12 years ago? The glory and honor that these athletes pursue, it’s not wrong. But it doesn’t last forever. Even their medals, if they don’t properly take care of their medals, they will lose their glossy sheen over time. And so the things that they pursue, ultimately, they perish. But there is one thing that lasts forever. And in John chapter six, Jesus tells us what that one thing is. You see, Jesus had just fed the 5,000. And then he left that place and crossed to the other side of the Sea of Galilee. And some of the people that he fed, they followed him. They got into boats and went after Jesus. They were hoping that they could get another free meal out of Jesus. Their focus was on the earthly temporal things. And so when they do catch up with Jesus, they act like it was all a coincidence. Like they just so happened to be in the same town of Capernaum. But Jesus knew what they were up to. They weren’t slick. This is why he says, “Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs are performed, but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for the food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.” So Jesus, again, showing his divinity, reads their minds. And he gets to the heart of the matter. Don’t put your focus, don’t put your efforts on the food that spoils. Rather focus on the food that doesn’t spoil. And in a certain sense, we all work for the food that spoils, right? We all have to go to work so that we can earn money, so that we can go and buy food. But we have to keep going to work and we have to keep earning money, so that we can buy food. It’s this endless cycle that we have to keep doing until we die. And so Jesus says, don’t put your focus on that, on the things that perish. Rather put your focus on the forever food, on the food that doesn’t spoil. And Jesus says, I am that food. I am the bread of life. And if you eat of me, you will never go hungry. But sadly, the people weren’t really interested in this. Their focus was on the earthly temporal stuff. What about us, brothers and sisters? Do we more often put our focus on the earthly temporal things of this world rather than on the bread of life? I know I’m guilty of it. Do we work hard so that we can fill our homes with stuff, stuff that we don’t need? And even if we buy that TV that we want or that car that we want, or that house that we want, how long will it take before we want something else? And how long will it take before that TV becomes outdated or the car breaks down? These things, this stuff that we sometimes value more than the bread of life, ultimately, they become useless. They become trash. They perish. And you know what else perishes, brothers and sisters? It’s us. All of us will break down. All of us will grow old and all of us will die. And we will never go hungry. And so how do we want to spend the limited time that we have here on earth? Because time’s running out. And when time finally does run out, we will either spend all of eternity in hell or all of eternity in heaven. So where do we want to spend eternity? Well, if we maintain the same attitude that the people had here in John chapter 6, we’ll spend it in hell. Even though Jesus had the seal and approval of God the Father, that wasn’t enough for the people. That wasn’t enough for the people. They saw Jesus perform the miracle of feeding the 5,000 with just a few pieces of bread and fish. How dull they were, how stubborn they were to believe that he was the Christ, the promised savior of God. And so they tell Jesus, “Yeah, you may have fed the 5,000, but Moses, he fed the whole nation of Israel with manna from heaven.” So if you want us to believe in you, then you got to do a miracle on par with him. And so Jesus has to set them straight. It wasn’t Moses who gave you bread from heaven. It was God. And now God is giving you something way better and way greater. He’s giving you himself the bread of life. And this bread gives life to the world. And the same is true today. Jesus is still giving himself, graciously giving himself to us right now. This bread of life nourishes us when we dive into his word and are reminded that our sins are forgiven in him. This bread nourishes us when we daily rejoice in our baptisms. This bread nourishes us when we partake of the Lord’s supper. This bread of life is what makes us feel or what makes us spiritually full. It’s what makes our hearts and our stomachs spiritually full so that we no longer hunger nor thirst. You see, people will try to fill that spiritual hunger in all sorts of ways. You see, we all have that God-shaped hole in our hearts, but only God can fill that hole. But people will try to fill it with all sorts of things. Some will try to fill that spiritual void with their spiritual strength. Their career or their accomplishments or their accolades. Others would try to fill it with drugs or alcohol or any number of addictions that exist. Some will try to fill it with people, but only Jesus can fill that spiritual void that we all have. Some people will try to find peace in all sorts of ways, peace in their lives in all sorts of ways. But only Jesus can give that true and lasting peace. Some will try to perform the works of God as it says here in John 6, but only God can do the work of God. And the work of God is salvation. The work of God is freeing us from the tyranny of Satan and the fear of death. The work of God is giving us faith to believe in his one and only son who willingly went to the cross to die for our sins. And so, brothers and sisters, instead of focusing on the perishable things of this world, let’s eat the bread of life and let’s cherish the bread of life. You see, Jesus, he went to the cross and with his precious blood, he won the medal of life. And he has given that medal to you so that you can live gloriously, not just for a while, but forever in paradise. And he won the crown of victory and he gave that crown to you. And that crown will shine bright forever and ever and ever. Amen.