Truth in Tension: Seeing Jesus ClearlyНамуна

He is a God of more than enough, but He is not a vending machine.

The greatest truths are often held in tension in the text. People usually want to resolve this tension, but I believe that this tension holds the truth exactly where God wants it. In today's devotional, we will examine two of these tension points in John 6, and together, they will help us see Jesus more clearly.

There is a striking moment in John 6:66 NLT that states, “At this point, many of his disciples turned away and deserted him.” It may be difficult to imagine Jesus saying something so shocking that many of his followers abandon Him, but we see it happen here. What’s even more astonishing is to realize that this entire episode began when Jesus miraculously fed the 5,000.

Earlier in John 6, Jesus saw the crowd coming to look for Him, and He felt compassion for them. A boy offered his lunch, two small fish and five loaves of bread, and Jesus broke up the food and passed it out amongst the people. The Bible tells us that everyone ate until they were satisfied, and afterward, the disciples went out and picked up 12 basketfuls of leftovers.

Later that night, Jesus leaves that place, crossing the water to the other side. Fun fact: This is when Jesus walks on the water. The next day, the crowd wakes up and realizes Jesus has left. They determine He must have crossed to the other side, so they chase Him down again. This sounds noble, but when they finally find Jesus, the story unfolds in an unexpected way.

They want to understand Jesus and even ask Him what they must do to perform God’s work like they had seen Jesus do. His instructions are simple: Believe in the one he has sent. And this is when it goes awry. “Show us a miraculous sign if you want us to believe… give us more bread” (v.30-34). In Verse 14, they exclaim that Jesus surely must be the prophet we were expecting,” but by verse 42, they are saying, “Isn’t this just the son of Joseph.”

We must see and understand two lenses of truth through this text.

Lens 1: He is a God of more than enough.

When Jesus fed the 5,000, I am sure everyone thought to themselves that there was no way this small amount of food would be enough to feed everyone. Yet, in the end, not only did it feed everyone, but there were leftovers. This has always been the nature of God. In 2 Kings 4, we see a similar story where the prophet Elisha feeds 100 men with 20 barley loaves. When Elisha tells his servant to pass out the food, the servant responds that he can’t expect this to feed 100 men, almost as if he is embarrassed about it. But Elisha tells him to do it, and there will be leftovers, and there were. You need to know that in your life, God is and will always be a God of more than enough.

Lens 2: God is not a vending machine.

When they come back to Jesus and demand more food for them to believe, he tells them no. They had missed the point of why he fed them in the first place. He tells us that He is the bread of life. They have missed the point. How often do we miss the point? He didn’t perform a miracle just to feed them in a moment, but he performed a miracle to show them who he truly is. Do you ever treat God like a vending machine? “…God, I will put in just enough, but you better be spitting out the treats. Press A3 because I love M&Ms… you know, Miracles & Money.”

If we look at Him through only one of these lenses, He will either be our personal genie who must give us everything we want OR someone who has the ability to do for us but is either unable or unwilling to provide. But looking at Jesus through both of these lenses, we know that as long as we don’t view Jesus as our personal vending machine, He will always be a God of more than enough.