The Bread of Life – Trinity 7

The Bread of Life

Trinity 7 T Mark 8:1-9

INI

There’s nothing more important than hearing the preaching and teaching of God’s Word. Everything else pales in comparison. There’s no amount of money in the world that can give what the Word gives. There’s no amount of entertainment that one engages in that can grant them satisfaction like the Word of God. No sports leagues can dominate a Christian’s Sunday through Saturday quite like the word of God. The Word of God is something that orients our entire lives.

That’s the example that these 4,000 hungry souls demonstrate to us in the Gospel lesson. They valued God’s teaching. They had been listening to Jesus preach for three days straight. They went without food, entertainments, and even their jobs just so that they could be filled and satisfied with that which truly grants life.

That’s the sort of serious dedication they had to receiving God’s Word. But what about us? What excuses do we make to miss church on Sundays? Or not coming to Sunday School? What excuses do we make to not have the word of God dwell in our lives richly for our entire week, not just Sundays? Our lives are filled with so many entertainments and distractions that reading the bible and praying together as families gets pushed to the side. Because, maybe we don’t see it as being all that important? That family devotions and prayer are just an optional part of life?

Satan’s temptation for the Christian is to compartmentalize where and when your faith is lived. That we can confess our faith on Sunday and go to church, but then not apply any lessons received from God’s Word in daily life. That we can be good Christians in our works of mercy seen by the community, but then go home and ignore our spouses and treat our children with disdain. Or even allow our children to not grow up in any real fear and admonition of the Lord by having Sunday’s be the only time we spiritually feed them. Or children, that we can say we believe in God on Sunday, but then go out and live in rebellion against our parents and God’s Law revealed in the 10 commandments. If Christian love and mercy isn’t lived in the home, it’s not really going to be lived outside of it.

Living in such a way is not the way of life at all. That’s the way of death. That’s the way of sin. That’s what Adam did in the Garden of Eden. He didn’t hear the Word and promise of God attached to the tree of life. He didn’t really pay attention to God when He said that he could have fruit from any tree, except for the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Well, maybe he heard it. But he quickly forgot. Or he didn’t apply that word of God in his life. Or even worse, he deliberately disobeyed and thought God didn’t know what was best for him.

Paul says in Romans that the wages of sin is death. And that sin is something that we’re enslaved to. Sin isn’t something that we just get over, or that we conquer by our own efforts. As we learned from last week’s epistle reading, sin is something that must die in us. Because sin produces nothing good. It only destroys lives, families, relationships, and bodies. Sin produces no God-pleasing fruit. What sort of fruit does it produce? Paul says “the wages of sin is death.”

We might look at the 4,000 people who gathered to hear Jesus’ sermon and think, “those fools had a death wish. Who goes without food for three days, without any thought about where they might get their next meal?” But even though their stomachs were empty, their souls were filled. That was of supreme importance to them. They were filled with the right fruit. They’ve had enough from picking the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil like Adam and Eve. They wanted something real, something substantial. That’s why they were with Jesus for three days straight, hanging their faith on every word He said.

Eventually they needed something to eat. Jesus isn’t ignorant or inconsiderate of that fact. Yet, Jesus had compassion on these hungry crowds and miraculously fed them with bread and fish that they might travel home with full bellies and souls. But above all, Jesus recognized their faith, that they wanted more than just physical bread. For when you eat physical food, that satisfaction is only temporary. You will hunger again. But they wanted the bread of life. The kind of bread that fulfills every human need and satisfies for all eternity. That bread is Jesus. In a separate account in the Gospels, Jesus makes that clear when He says, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall never hunger. And whoever believes in me shall never thirst. […] Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats this bread, he will live forever (John 6:35, 47-51).” In Jesus, we find true, eternal satisfaction to the problem of sin. To believe and spiritually feast on Jesus’ words is to take from the tree of life in garden, just like God wanted Adam and Eve to do all along. The fruit from this tree reverses the death caused from the tree of death. This is the fruit that the Christian rightly desires.

The crowds craved this fruit, the bread the Jesus gives. Just as the crowd’s desire for the bread of life lead to them being without food for three days, so should we desire for the bread of life over and above all other things in this life. All other things that we think might fill us in this life fall submission to Jesus, the spiritual bread giver. And even when we might think we’re missing out on something in this life, we aren’t!

And even when we’re without physically, the Lord knows our needs. He knows we’re humans. He knows that we need food to eat, water to drink, a house to live in, families to love and provide support, and jobs through which money is made to take care of things in this life. But all these other things in life, what we eat, what we drink, what we wear, falls underneath God’s providential care for His children. He says, “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you (Matthew 6:31-34).”

Our Lord here doesn’t encourage laziness or sloth. Rather, He’s saying that we need to seek Him first. Trust in Him for all things. Entrust our daily lives unto His care. Don’t worry about the things of this world. He is your creator and provider for all things. Even the birds of the air are taken care of. How much more does our Lord care for you?

This is the faith our Lord calls us to. It shapes our daily Christian lives. For there are only two paths for God’s children to go down: the path of sin, or the path of faith. And Paul tells us where these two paths will lead, “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Romans 6:23).”

This free gift of God comes from the tree of the cross – the place where all sin is put to death. It’s the place where Jesus sets us free from the curse of death with which Adam was cursed when He sinned in Eden.

Christians receive this gift in faith, and it’s tangibly received in the Lord’s Supper. However, when the Lord’s Supper is received in merely a physical way, that is, in unbelief, rebellion, and a compartmentalized heart, the spiritual gifts of forgiveness, life, and salvation aren’t conferred in the eating and drinking. But in faith for the spiritual bread Christ brings, with a desire to partake of the tree of life that bears fruit through the gift of the cross, we are strengthened in this free gift given by our Savior.

INI

Pastor Joshua Ralston