John 6:1-15

After Jesus got the Jews angry enough to kill Him for claiming to be God (the text only says "these things" – I think it is worth remembering what these things are), He went to the opposite side of the Sea of Galilee. No sense tempting these men to kill Him any longer, I suppose. But a large crowd followed Him because of the miracles He was doing among the sick.

 

I'm not sure why the text mentions that the Passover was approaching at this point. Because I'm not sure, I'm probably missing out on one of the biggest points in the text. Many commentators only note that it serves to tell us the time of the event. A couple of others mention that the Jews would have already been preparing for the Passover. Would this have made it hard for the disciples to get bread? Probably not. I don't think the main point of this statement has been uncovered in the commentaries I've seen so far.

 

Jesus initiated the conflict here. I don't think anyone expected Jesus to provide food for all these people, but He turned to Philip and asked, "Where are we to buy bread so that the people may eat?" John writes that Jesus was testing Philip's faith and understanding.

 

I think Philip failed the test. He responded that they didn't have the resources to buy enough bread for this crowd.

 

But Andrew did a bit better. He noted that one kid in the crowd had some food with Him. But he then expressed His doubt that this food could do much good in such a large crowd.

 

The text says that Jesus already knew what He was going to do. So He must have known about this child and the food before Andrew said anything. He must have known that one of His disciples – maybe even that it would be Andrew specifically – was going to point out the meager resources the child had.

 

Of course, I have heard the story many times. Jesus had the disciples get the men to sit down on the grass. Jesus took the bread and fish, gave thanks for them, and distributed them to the people until they were satisfied. When the disciples gathered the leftovers, there were 12 baskets of food!

 

The response of the people? "This is the Prophet we've been expecting!" Their decision? To make Jesus king by force. What's that mean? It probably does not mean that they intended to force Jesus to be king. They probably assumed that He intended to be king. Rather, they intended to forcefully and violently overthrow the Romans and set Jesus up as king over Israel!

 

But Jesus withdrew by Himself on the mountain.

 

This must have confused the people. Did they understand the truth correctly? Was Jesus the expected Prophet? Yes! But was He seeking to violently overthrow the Romans to become king? No!

 

Jesus intends to be king of much more than Israel, and He still has important work to do so that this can happen.