So Jesus, What Have You Done For Me Lately?

That Bible, eh. It is a good book isn’t it?

OK it is a volume that is a collection of books. Still good though.

This morning’s post on Jesus as the Bread of Life was, as with the others, something that came out of hours of meditation, deliberation and contemplation. I’m not so swiftly inspired to just churn out pieces at the drop of the hat … all the time.

In my research I read again John 6 and was arrested by the brief exchange before Jesus says He is the bread of life. In verses 22-33 the scene makes me chuckle. Jesus has just performed what those in attendance regarded as a sign in miraculously providing for at least 5000 people with some fish and loaves of bread. While they slept off their fish sandwiches he manages to nip across the lake without the aid of a boat. When they wake up and notice that a boat is missing, but Jesus wouldn’t have been in it, but Jesus isn’t around they track him down to the other side of the lake. They enquire as to how He got there, He just says that rather than follow and work for the temporal bread, they should pursue food that leads to eternal life. They understandably wonder what do you have to do to get this bread, Jesus says believe in me. They say, so what proof have you got – back in the day we got our bread direct from heaven, you got something to prove you’re worth believing in?

It was at that point that I burst out laughing. Follow me carefully. You’ve heard about this man who does these miracles, you hear him talk with authority and to top it off he performs an amazing sign of taking a few and feeding thousands, he then mysteriously manages to make it across a lake without a boat and when you see him next and he says believe in him, your question is, why? What have you got to prove yourself? What have you done lately? After all he’s already done, you want him to prove himself!

Hilarious. Ridiculous. And just typical of the human condition.

It’s like the child (usually in those wonderful adolescent years) despite being so well nurtured by his parents still turning around and demanding stuff as though the parents have something to prove to them, as if they owe it to him. (Yeah, my parents will be able to relate to that!)

It would be bad enough if it was just an issue for those tricky teen years and yet experience of faith and the community of those seeking to follow Jesus shows that this attitude is not just left to the ‘youngsters’. Jesus dies to save us and restore us to God. He forgives our sins and heals our diseases. He fills us with His precious Holy Spirit. He commissions us and gives us purpose that fulfils us in following in His footsteps. All of this and more He does and the response to the call to believe can sometimes be that similar ‘What Have You Done For Me Lately’ attitude. As if He still needs to prove Himself. As if the current life situation is so pressing and is a priority to us that needs resolving by Him first, then we’ll consider what He has to offer.

Still don’t know what I mean? Take the attitude to a financial crisis. The bills are piling up and you don’t have a clue where the money is coming from because you’ve just been made redundant and other sources of income resemble a desert in its dryness. The panic and anxiety sets in and rather than first going to Jesus, first believing Jesus and following His call in this dilemma, the attitude is to question Him and wonder why He hasn’t sorted this already. That attitude of unbelief in the light of the incredible things He has already done is either expressed openly in sullen unwillingness to obey and give due worship. Worse still, however, it can be done subtly through an attitude that says if I don’t get things sorted they will never be sorted, i.e. Jesus won’t sort it, so I’ll have to take matters into my own hands.

We can sit in the middle of a church gathering and be so amazingly blessed by the words and acts of those who enjoy God and still leave that environment face the day to day challenges with that quizzical approach to Jesus wondering what has He done for you lately. Bizarre and yet endemic to the challenge of discipleship to get over ourselves, take up the cross and choose to follow Jesus in those tough times and believe Him. Our daily challenge is to believe that He remains not just the convenient provider for my immediate struggles, but actually the access to eternal life that lives in contentment of who He is and knowing that He cares and in Himself has provided all we ever need.

So I remind myself in the Word to come to Him for He is the Bread of Life and when I consume Him and He is a part of my being, I never lack, I never hunger, I never go without, for He is my life, He is my food, He is my being, doing, beginning and ending. I remind myself that He is the Bread that I consume when I believe Him.

For His Name’s Sake

Shalom

dmcd