INTRO:
This event happened just after Jesus fed the 5,000 with the five loaves & two fish.
• That evening, Jesus sent His disciples across the Sea of Galilee while He dismissed the people. Later in the night, He comes to them walking on the water.
• Now many in the crowd have come to Capernaum looking for Jesus.
• Remember: the Sea of Galilee is only around 7 miles wide and 12 miles long.
• Here Jesus shares with them four images of relationship.
WORK (vv. 25-28)
1). Why had they come seeking Jesus?
A). (vv. 25-26) Notice that Jesus didn’t answer their question!
• They asked “when” Jesus got there, but Jesus told them “why” they had come.
• Jesus knows not only what we do, but why we do it as well.
B). Jesus said, “It’s good that you looked for me…but you didn’t do it for the best of reasons.”
• You did it because of your bellies!
• You looked for Me, not because of who I am, but because of what I did for you.
• They didn’t come because He taught them, but because He fed them!
• Too often people come to Jesus, not because of who He is, but because of what He has done (or can do) for them.
II). So Jesus uses then, this image of WORK to attempt to bring them into relationship with Him.
A). (v. 27a) “Don’t work for the food that perishes…”
o In other words, “Don’t make the things of this life, this world, your number one concern”.
• Those worldly things that we work so hard for: wealth, honor, power, pleasure – all those things, Jesus says, are “meat” which do nothing but satisfy our lusts and fill our bellies.
• But they don’t satisfy us and soon they perish!
B). Instead, Jesus says to work “… for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you.”
III). Jesus here, in this one statement, tells us some great things about eternal life:
A). First, it is unspeakably desirable:
• Since sin first entered the world in the Garden of Eden, and mankind began to taste death, there has been a quest to find everlasting life.
• The problem is that people are looking in all the wrong places.
o Ponce De’ Leon looked for the Fountain of Youth.
o Science today is looking at everything from cloning to cell manipulation to replicating our DNA in order to make “back-up” copies of our brains or even our entire bodies in the future.
• But Jesus said the food that He gives will endure for eternal life!
• It’s a life and a happiness that will last forever!
o John 10:10 Jesus said, “I came that they (whoever comes to Him) may have life, and have it abundantly.”
o John 15:11, “I have said these things to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”
B). Second, it is absolutely attainable:
o Why? Jesus, the Son of God and the Son of Man, says so!
o Look at the last part of verse 27: “For it is on Him that God the Father has set His seal.”
o This is quite possibly the most important statement in the entire passage.
o What is a seal? A seal is used as evidence of authority.
o In saying that God the Father has set His seal on Jesus, Jesus is saying that God has given Him full and complete authority to deal (covenant) between God and mankind.
o Jesus is God ambassador to us, and our intercessor to God!
o God has given Him the authority to do it, and He has given us the assurance that it is done!
o Eternal life is absolutely attainable through Christ Jesus.
What are you working for today? Food that perishes: wealth, honor power, pleasure?
o Or are you looking for food that leads to eternal life?
o Looking for someone –anyone -with the authority to take you out of the life that you’re struggling in, and offer you eternal hope, peace, and joy?
o Jesus has that authority…He’s telling you, “Work for the food that I have for you; bread, where you’ll never hunger again; water, where you’ll never thirst again. It’s here, and it’s free.”
In v. 28 the people ask Jesus, “What must we do to perform the works of God?” and in v. 29 Jesus answers them and says, “Believe.”
