Turn your attention now to John chapter six, beginning at verse 22. I'm gonna go ahead and read this passage, and then we're gonna look at it section by section. So it's in your worship guide. Please follow along as I read. On the next day, I remember in the early part of the chapter, which we looked at last week, Jesus had fed the 5,000 on the mountainside. with their families, with a few loaves of bread and fish. On the next day, the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea saw that there had only been one boat there, and that Jesus had not entered the boat with his disciples, for that his disciples had gone away alone. Other boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum seeking Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the lake, they said to him, Rabbi, when did you come here? Jesus answered them, truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal. And they said to him, What must we do to be doing the works of God? Jesus answered him, This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent. So they said to him, Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness. As it is written, he gave them bread from heaven to eat. Jesus then said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Then they said to him, sir, give us this bread always. Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger. Whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me. And whoever comes to me, I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. And this is the will of Him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that He has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise Him up on the last day. Let's pray. Gracious God, we thank you for your word today. Lord, there's great truths in this passage of scripture, and we pray that you'd enable the preacher here to bring it out, that you would bless your word by your spirit. So we look to you for your blessing upon the reading and the preaching of your holy word today. Through Christ our Lord, we pray. Amen. Here's the main idea of this passage today. Jesus is the true bread from heaven who gives eternal life to those who believe in him. Again, Jesus is the true bread from heaven who gives eternal life to those who believe in him. Let's go back in history for a few minutes, some 2,000 years ago. On the eastern side of the Lake of Galilee, up on the side of a mountain, Jesus of Nazareth fed 5,000 men along with their families with only five loaves of bread and two fish. Everyone was well fed. There were even 12 baskets of leftovers. We read about this last Sunday, the first 15 verses of John chapter 6. This was indeed a great miracle. It was an unheard of miracle. How do you explain something like this happening? Well, let's remember what Wayne taught us a few weeks ago, that you have to go back to the prologue of John, because that sets the tone and the content of everything that follows. In verse 18 of John chapter one, we see that Jesus, the son of God, became flesh and he dwelt among men. And when He came among us, many signs and miracles were revealed through His ministry that confirm clearly that He is the very Son of God whom the Father sent from heaven. In the prologue, chapter 1, verse 3, the scripture says regarding the Word, Jesus, all things were made through Him. Without Him, nothing that was made has been made. So Jesus Christ, to put it plainly another way, he's the creator of all things. He's the agent of God's creative work. He created the universe, the earth, all the plants, including the wheat that grows on the hillsides from which bread was made in ancient Palestine. He did all this by the word of his power, by his command. If we remember this, It should not be too surprising to us that he was able to feed 5,000 men and their families because he was God incarnate. God in the flesh had no less power than when he spoke the universe into existence. Now, not everyone believes that Jesus did a miracle that day. Some liberal so-called scholars say that What really happened is that that boy set an example for everybody else there. He shared his lunch and everybody else shared their lunch, and so everybody got to eat. Well, that's not what happened. There was a great miracle that happened. It was a great testimony to who Jesus was. He was a man, yes, but more than a man, he was also God. He became man without losing one ounce of his deity. What makes God to be God was not in any way lost when Jesus became a man. The feeding of the 5,000 with their families was a clear sign of who he was. Who else has ever done this in the history of the world? The people there, the pious Jews who knew the texts of scripture, recognize this and they said in John 6 14. This is indeed the prophet who was or who is to come into the world. They recognized what had happened. He had to be the prophet that Moses was talking about. Well we think that probably these barley loaves, well these loaves were made out of barley. Now the word bread is a key word in this passage. If you look through here, these 18 or so verses, you see the word bread or its synonyms, such as food or manna, mentioned 10 different times. So it's a very significant theme of this passage. Well, bread has been called the staple of life. In many cultures, such as the Jewish culture of Jesus' day, It was what most people use for basic survival, especially poor people. You remember the Lord's Prayer, give us this day our daily bread. Daily bread was the sustenance of most of the people. Now this bread was most likely whole grain bread. It was much healthier than some types of bread that we use today, the refined white flour sandwich bread like Ms. Baird's sandwich bread. No, it was whole wheat bread, healthy. So this kind of nutritious bread, such as these barley loaves, the poor people used barley because it was cheaper than wheat, was healthy food. So the people that ate that day were fed a healthy meal. It was not junk food. And so they're able to continue their destination. Remember, it was the Passover season of the year, so probably many of them were on their way to Jerusalem to celebrate the great feast. So we'll take up our text today, verse 22, and let me read that three or four verses again to refresh our memory. On the next day, this is the day after the feeding, the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea This is on the eastern side. Saw there's only one boat there. Jesus had not entered the boat. His disciples had gone away alone. So, there were other boats around there. And so, when they saw that Jesus and the disciples had left, they got into the boats and they went to the other side, to Carparnia. Now, what were these boats? Probably some kind of taxis, you know? I'll take you across for so much money. So, okay, hop in, you know, and they would go across. Now, it was eight miles across. 13 miles length, eight miles across the Lake of Galilee. So, Jesus went back to the western side to the Capernaum. Capernaum was on the northwest shore of the Lake of Galilee. Well, When they found Jesus, it says in verse 25, they said to him, Rabbi, when did you come here? Jesus didn't answer their question, but he says this, truly, truly, I say to you, you're seeking me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life. First thing I want us to see about this passage today is to look at what I'm calling the bread chasers. The bread chasers. They were chasing after Jesus, not because they'd seen a great miraculous sign, not because they recognized it was a testimony that Jesus had to be the prophet who Moses predicted. They were not following him because they recognized him as the promised Messiah, but because he had fed them a great feast on the mountainside and they wanted a repeat performance. Jesus recognized their motivation. They were bread chasers, not Messiah worshipers. You know, today we have so-called ambulance chasers. Those are lawyers who hang around seeing somebody that gets in a wreck or hearing about it and they'll go and talk to them and say, come on, let's go to court, let's sue that person who hit you so he can make some money. So he's chasing people, these lawyers, to try to make money. Well, they have selfish motivation like these people on that day. These bread chasers were looking for a free meal. Another feast like they'd had on the mountainside, on the other side of the lake. Their lives were focused on material things. They wanted their bellies full of food, not their hearts and minds filled with spiritual truth, with communion and fellowship with God. How many are like that today? But here's Jesus' advice to them. More than advice, it's a command since he's the son of God. He says, do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life. So many people today are working for the food that perishes. Their lives are consumed with perishable things, with money and possessions and food and drink and pleasures. Even yesterday I read of a prominent executive, lady executive of a corporation, a big international corporation, and she said this, I spend my money on wine, food, and travel. So many people in our world, if they could afford it, if they could do it, they would do the same thing. They would like to have enough money to spend it on wine and food and travel. But what does Jesus say? He says, those are things that perish. Don't let the perishable things consume your lives. Paul had something to say about this. He said in Ephesians chapter 2, among whom we also once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind. Well, these people were concerned only about their bodies, about eating another big meal. Jesus says to them, don't do that. That is a dead-end street. It may get you somewhere in this life, but it won't get you anywhere in the life to come. Instead, work for something else. He says, work for the food that endures to eternal life. which the Son of Man will give to you. So let's consider another theme that Jesus brings in here, not bread chasers, but bread receivers. And we're talking about a different kind of bread here. He says, work for the food that endures to eternal life that the Son of Man will give to you. Jesus was saying, You're pursuing the wrong things. You're pursuing bread for your stomachs. But you need to pursue something of a totally different nature. You need to pursue food that endures to eternal life, not perishable food. Even bread will perish. If you leave it out, even in the refrigerator, it will develop a green mold. It will begin to have a pungent odor. It will rot. It will perish. So why spend your life and energy on something like that that is perishable? There's a better food, a better bread. It's the food that endures to eternal life. Don't you want to have eternal life? He would say to those people and to all of us today, when you die, you're going to be just like that moldy bread and even worse. So why not live forever? Well, the people were saying, that sounds good, Jesus. How can we do that? Jesus says, the Son of Man will Give it to you. What? Give it to me? You mean I don't have to work for it? The Son of Man will give me eternal life? Would He look on a sinner like me, who has pursued the satisfaction of the flesh and mind all my life, and give me imperishable eternal life? Yes, Jesus is saying that's exactly what I will do. How do we know Jesus will do this? How do we know He has the power to do this? Well, look at the rest of verse 27. It says, for on Him, God the Father has set His seal. That's an interesting statement for Jesus to bring into this conversation. So what is the seal? It may be a seal of the Holy Spirit. that was poured out on Jesus at his baptism and the Father spoke from heaven and said, this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. Likewise, it could be a reference to the Mount of Transfiguration when the Father spoke from heaven and said, this is my beloved Son with whom I'm well pleased, listen to Him. Or the Supreme Seal that the Father set upon Him is most likely, I believe, the fact that he raised him from the dead. This certified that his death on the cross was sufficient and acceptable as the payment for the sins of his people. So a man who's speaking here would, in a couple of years, be raised up on the cross, be buried, and rise from the dead on the third day. But the resurrection confirms and certifies who he was And all that he spoke was true. Jesus is saying in verse 27, work for the food that endures to eternal life. So those who are listening carefully, he said work for the food. So they ask him, verse 28, what must we be doing to do the works of God? Jesus, you're telling us to work for the food that endures through eternal life. So what is the work that we need to do? Do we need to give our money to the poor? Do we need to volunteer to clean the synagogue every Friday? Do we need to memorize more of the Law of Moses in the first five books of the Holy Scriptures? Tell us, Jesus, what we have to do to do the work of God. We're willing to work our fingers to the bone if we can have this eternal life. Jesus gives them a very surprising answer in verse 29. He says, this is the work of God that you believe in Him whom He has sent. Jesus is saying this. to have eternal life. You don't have to work your fingers to the bone doing good deeds. You just have to believe in the one whom the Father sent. Jesus is saying you need to put everything else aside and believe in me. You don't have to work. You don't have to labor. You don't have to agonize and crawl on your knees for your sins. You only have to believe in me. Your only responsibility to find eternal salvation is to believe in me. Trust me to save you and give you as a gift eternal life. If you believe in me, you will not perish. You will have eternal life. Jesus is trying to help these people become bread receivers. Those who receive Jesus as the bread of life. He wants them to become bread believers. Those who believe in him, they receive him, they believe in him. Look at their response in verse 30 and 31. So Jesus says to them, this is the work of God that you believe in me, believe in him whom he has sent. And so look at their response. Verse 30, then what sign do you do that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform, Jesus? Show us something. Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness. As it's written, he gave them bread from heaven to eat. So what are they saying? They're saying, Jesus, show us a sign. Then we'll believe in you. Can't you do what Moses did when he prayed for the people and manna came down from heaven every morning and covered the grass and they had food to eat for the day? Jesus, do something like that. What Moses did and we'll believe you. Can you believe that they're saying this after he fed 5,000 people with only a few loaves and fish? What more sign could you want? They want another sign. Jesus' response in verse 32 is, truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven. It wasn't really Moses that did it, right? But my father gives you the true bread from heaven. He's the one who calls the manna to come down, and he's giving you something much more valuable and permanent than daily manna. The Father gives you the true bread, the true bread from heaven. Not the temporary bread of manna in the wilderness. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Verse 33. So Jesus had to correct them there. To give credit to God, not to Moses. But God the Father does much more. Instead of sending perishable food, perishable bread, like manna, that would rot the next day, the Father sends you true bread. It is imperishable. It's not something you put in your mouth and chew it and it gives you strength for the day. But this bread is a person. He comes down from heaven because he was in heaven. As the prologue again to John's gospel states it, in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God. The Word was God. And verse 14, And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. This is the true bread that comes down from heaven. He's the Word who became flesh. And as verse 33 in John 6 says, He gives life to the world. John 1, 4, the prologue says, In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. Jesus is saying to these people, I am the true bread of God, who came down from heaven, and I give life to the world. I've come down from heaven to give you life. Well, this sounded good to them. So they say, sir, give us this bread always. Reminds us, doesn't it, of the woman at the well in Samaria in John chapter four. Jesus talked about giving her living water that she would never thirst from again. And she said to him, Sir, give me this water so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water. Well, at this point, it doesn't look like either one of these people or groups or people is catching Jesus' deeper meaning yet. They're still thinking about physical water and physical bread. So Jesus states it again here in verse 35. He says, I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. Jesus is speaking here of spiritual realities, not physical realities. Even as bread made from wheat that grew on the hillsides of Palestine, was a staple of life for these people, so Jesus Christ himself is a staple of life, of spiritual life, of eternal life for those who believe in him. What does this term bread of life mean? Someone has written this that the bread of life means bread which gives life. Coming to Christ and believing in him are seen to be synonymous as the only means of securing spiritual satisfaction. What is Jesus saying here? He's saying that if you come to him, you'll no longer hunger. What kind of hunger is he talking about? You'll no longer hunger and struggle to find God. You'll no longer be groping in the dark. that man that we prayed for earlier today is. You'll no longer be ignorant of the way of salvation. You'll no longer have to hunger to have your sins and guilt and shame removed. Christ will take all these from you, put it on himself, and bear the burden in your place. It means you'll no longer be thirsty. What kind of thirst is he talking about? Well, the thirst to know is there really a God or not? To know if God cares about me or not? To know what will happen to me when I die? I think it's these kind of crucial spiritual realities that Jesus is talking about. He will fulfill the hunger and thirst that we have to know about God, to know God, to be in relationship with Him. He's saying here that the bread of life, Jesus, meets the deepest longings we have to know God, to be in fellowship with Him, to have assurance that we'll be with Him when life is over. All of these kinds of longings Hopefully, we have these longings. Hopefully, they're growing within us. We're becoming more aware of them. All these longings are met by Jesus Christ, our Lord, because He's the bread who's come from heaven, the true bread to give us eternal life. Now, Jesus is not alone in this great work of salvation. Look what verse 37 says. It says, all that the Father gives me will come to me. So we do not come to Jesus just because one day we think, well, this might be a nice thing for us to do. Something is going on behind the scenes. There's a work of the Father working to bring us to faith in Christ. The Father actually gives to the Son all those who come to Him in faith. We come to faith in Christ because God the Father gives his people to his Son. Every believer is a gift of the Father to his Son. Isn't that wonderful? What a tremendous truth. You and I are gifts of the Father to his Son. What a special privilege to have. The Father has given me and you to His Son. He's given us faith to believe in His Son. We don't work for our salvation. We receive His salvation. His salvation is a gift. It's not a work. We ourselves are gifts of the Father to the Son. The bread, the barley loaves that these people were pursuing only had temporary power and effectiveness to relieve hunger and give physical strength. Once it was eaten and digested, people would get hungry again. There was a never-ending cycle, hunger, eating, satisfaction, hunger again. Maybe not enough food. and then hunger again, never permanent satisfaction and contentment. But in Jesus, the true bread from heaven, who gives life to the world, he says in verse 39, I should lose nothing of all that he has given me. He's saying, if you come to me as the true bread of heaven, who gives life to the world, I'll give you eternal life. You'll never be lost. You'll always be secure in me. You will not lose your salvation. Your Father has given you to me as a gift. You're now mine, mine forever. And I will not lose any of those whom the Father has given me. All hell and Satan and all his demons and the whole world of evil could rage against a believer. But he or she will never be lost. As Paul says in his first letter, chapter 1, verse 5, talking of believers, we, by God's power, are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. We're being guarded by God's power, not our power. But this is not the end of the story that's being presented here. Look what the final destiny of the believer is. These people who have been chasing Jesus around the lake only for daily bread, the next meal on their minds, but something happens. They meet the very Son of God and he begins to reveal new realities to them and change their thinking. He casts their minds towards the future. toward the end of human history. And look what he says in verse 40. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. Here we see again, the Father and the Son are at work in the salvation of the believer. It's the Father's will. That everyone who looks on His Son, believes in Him, should have eternal life. That means that my spirit, my soul will live forever, right? Yes, that's true, but that's only part of the truth. My body and your body will live also. Listen to 1 Corinthians 6.14. God raised the Lord, that is Jesus, and will raise us up by his power. Amen. Jesus is the firstfruits of all that will follow. In John 11, Jesus said to his friend, he said to her, I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live. 1 Thessalonians 4, verse 16, for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a cry of command, with the voice of an archangel, and the sound of the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. that He will raise us up, those of us who believe in Him. Paul goes on to write in 1 Corinthians 15, verse 51, he says, Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, that is, not all die, but we shall all be changed. In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable. And we shall be changed, for this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. So these people were on their way to the great feast at Jerusalem. They heard that there was the prophet from Nazareth in the area. So they went to see him, and they found him. And they went up on the mountainside, and they spent the day listening to him teaching. He was feeding their minds and hearts with teachings they'd never heard of. Then to top it all off, he looked up to heaven, he prayed a prayer, and began to distribute a small amount of food until everyone was fed and full. And the day ended, and the disciples and Jesus left. The next day, they got in their boats and they went. to the other side, and they thought, let's get in on another feast, and they found Jesus. They did get in on a feast, but it wasn't a feast of physical food to fill their stomachs. They were taught divine truths about salvation from the lips of the Son of Man, the prophet Moses spoke of, the long-awaited Messiah. They got a lot more than they bargained for. So what have we seen today? We've seen that Jesus Christ is the true bread from heaven who gives eternal life to all who believe in him. We've looked at the bread chasers and we considered the bread receivers, those who received Christ, and the bread believers, those who believe in Christ. You see, pursuits for the things of this world only give temporary satisfaction, even if they give that. The food of this world perishes, but the food that Jesus gives endures forever. That is, he gives himself as the true and lasting bread from heaven. Salvation comes by faith in him alone. He's the Father's gift to those who come to Him. Christ will never turn away those who come to Him in sincere faith. And all who come to Him will never be lost. Belief in Christ leads not just to the satisfaction of a single meal for the body, but belief in Him brings eternal life to the whole man. body, soul, and spirit, Christ will raise up every believer on the last day. Let's pray. Dear Father, we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, the true bread from heaven. If a man or woman believes in him, we receive eternal life. We thank you, our God, that he's the mighty son of God. To feed upon him, to believe in him is to receive life to the full, permanent, eternal life, life that will never be lost. And we should be raised up on the last day when Christ returns. We give you thanks. In Jesus' name we pray.