24 HOURS - A DAY IN THE EARTHLY LIFE OF JESUS CHRIST

 

I have a question for you …Have you ever met a superstar? I met one or two in my life, Canadian actor John Candy in the 1990s, also a national media reporter I admired, Joe Schlesinger. And I have to say, I was awed by each encounter. ‘Celebrity’ is a big thing these days! It seems to be everything! We live in an age of stardom, perhaps unlike any era in human history! We even invented the term ‘superstar’! There was a controversial movie when I was growing up, proclaiming Jesus Christ as a super star! It’s still popular with certain movie buffs.

This summer, the media exploded with news about the untimely death of a pop superstar, Michael Jackson. A music icon and phenomenon worldwide, his fans seem determined to make him live on forever. They developed a video series on the internet of a continuous loop of people doing ‘the moon walk’ imitating Jackson’s famous dance move! Some say this amazing electronic moon walk video will continue for eternity!   

Michael Jackson epitomized stardom to many, but we know his life was actually marred by dark allegations and a desperate attempt to create happiness on earth which all his money never seemed to buy him in the end. No matter how legendary we make people, the truth is once they die, they become another ripple in the vast ocean of time, space and eternity.

It seems to be human nature to want to make the earthly last forever, doesn’t it? We often hear of people wanting to leave a legacy! I suppose this is a good thing! Take world famous billionaire Bill Gates. He announced just over a year ago he and his wife Melissa are using their many millions to launch a foundation to help the poorest nations around the world. That’s a truly positive legacy! Wonderful!

Another moon walk was remembered recently. NASA celebrated the 35th anniversary this summer of the Apollo moon mission. Remember that? Wow! That was something to see! Yet some believe this earth-shaking event was just a gigantic contrived hoax, part of a huge post-war and Cold War space race, a show of global superiority between rival superpowers and nations!  There are all kinds of questions about famous people and events, aren’t there? Who can unravel it all?

Truth versus fiction! Who has the truth? How can we know one from the other?

The same questions came up in Jesus’ time.

However, with advanced knowledge in our 21st century we often like to think we’re more in touch. We know more. Yet do we really? Just this summer for instance, scientists noted that the sun, that amazing star that lights our planet, isn’t releasing solar flares! As a result, parts of the earth are experiencing what feels like global cooling not global warming. Mysterious! Is the earth facing global warming or isn’t it?

What I love most about God’s Word is that it holds endless mysteries.

For example, Jesus said heaven and earth would pass away but His Word wouldn’t! That’s kind of a DARING declaration, wouldn’t you say?  How could Jesus say such things!? Was He some kind of sensationalist? Was Jesus into making shocking and bold statements that had no substance?

In studying John 6 we encounter the beginning of a series of big, bold statements by Jesus that left His listeners flabbergasted. This is an incredible passage of Scripture. 70 verses long…I just focus on the first half of it here, but this is where God’s Word reveals the first of one of Jesus’ powerful I AM statements. Bible scholars call this Jesus’ self-revelation statements, which is just a fancy way of saying that Jesus started telling everyone WHO HE WAS!

Something shocking happens when Jesus does this! When He speaks up about who He is, it rocks a few people out of their comfort zones. Up until this point, some following Jesus looked at him as a kind of ‘superstar’ of His day. Any wonder! Miracles no one had ever seen or imagined accompanied Jesus. John 6 actually started out with an awesome miracle…a few small loaves and fish that fed thousands!

But I pick up here in John 6 at a point just 24 hours later. (Do you ever watch the TV series called ‘24’? It’s a continuous series of high action events dramatized in the life of a detective or secret agent. Intense! John 6 is even more dramatic in my view. The ‘24’ character is just a character, not a real person. But in John 6 we are walking through a riveting 24 hours called: A Day in the Earthly Life of Jesus Christ!

We find Jesus in verses 24-35 of John 6 busy meeting with crowds who have tracked Him down in Capernaum. Jesus is talking with them about bread. 24 hours ago He fed them bread…miraculously! Today people are kind of expecting more of that amazing stuff, but they don’t GET what He is saying to them at all! People are looking to Jesus for an encore on the loaves and fish miracle…Yippee! More FREE bread! They even expect He could do that for them the way Moses did for 40 years with the people of Israel in the wilderness.

But Jesus shocks them with His response to their eager quest for bread. He even disappoints many people because He isn’t handing out bread today.

He says something that rocks them off their feet: I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE…

Later on in John 6, Jesus adds to this by saying MY WORD IS SPIRIT AND IT IS LIFE… Wait! What is Jesus talking about? What’s going on here?

Just 24 hours earlier, people had a great day with Jesus on the Galilean hillsides. Now they are looking for real bread and He’s talking about something totally different! Something that seems ‘way out there’…

Has Jesus suddenly gone off the deep end?!

People had thought as much about many of the Old Testament prophets long before Jesus came along…that some of them went off the deep end. People still say such things about others who seem to be ‘too spiritually minded to be any earthly good’.

But what about Jesus?...He wouldn’t be that way! Jesus took such great care of peoples needs. He sincerely and powerfully reached out and healed people! What was happening now? He seemed to be getting way too spiritual all of a sudden, talking about being I AM – talking about being the BREAD OF LIFE!

Here’s what happens next…CNN has nothing, no ‘reality TV’ program can touch this story from real life Bible history!...

After Jesus made His first I AM declaration in John 6, something shocking happened. The apostle John reports very clearly that many followers and disciples, former ‘fans’ of Jesus began walking out on Him.

Odd, isn’t it? I mean, just 24 hours earlier, you couldn’t have found a MORE enthusiastic crowd if you tried! People had chased after Jesus on the hills of Galilee with such enthusiasm no one had ever seen the likes of it! There was a reason for this. People knew Government and religious systems had never helped them out like Jesus did!

People knew no one had done such astounding, mind boggling things as Jesus…healing the blind, lepers, lame, even the deaf and dumb! Jesus was also unafraid to approach a mad man, a demon-possessed guy who lived in a cemetery and terrified people for miles around! Jesus had rescued a woman caught in adultery from being stoned! Jesus calmed raging seas! Jesus RAISED THE DEAD!! You have GOT to be enthusiastic about a person like Jesus, don’t you?

So, what went WRONG?

When Jesus miraculously fed thousands out of a few loaves and fish 24 hours earlier, people were murmuring amongst themselves, eager to make Him King!

Jesus knew this…He knew their thoughts! Jesus knew the people. The people thought they knew Jesus! They certainly knew His miracles. Yet no one realized WHO JESUS REALLY WAS, He was telling them, but they didn’t get it at all…

THE BREAD OF LIFE!

Instead, people were fixated. People are good at fixating, aren’t they, aren’t you and I?

This crowd got focused on Jesus’ signs and wonders! We can’t really blame them, can we, but the problem is that they stopped dead in their tracks right there. They didn’t go further with Jesus or deeper with Him! They didn’t get beyond their immediate physical needs.

But people sure tracked down Jesus fast! Many realized after Jesus fed them miraculous bread and fish on the hillsides that He had walked off into the mountains alone and didn’t return by dark. They knew His disciples had taken off in a boat across the sea without Him. This crowd was on the story like a group of international media hounds!

They noticed that even his disciples seemed let down!

What’s with this Jesus, anyway? He gave everybody an awesome day and suddenly He is a NO SHOW!

Let’s follow and see what’s going on here!

In case you don’t know it, but I am sure you do…the disciples left the loaves and fish miracle day and headed out to sea without Jesus, smack into a storm that would have taken them down if Jesus hadn’t shown up walking towards them on the stormy waves! Getting into the boat with them, suddenly the sea is calm and they reach shore! ANOTHER MIRACLE…in less than 24 hours!

This kind of thing happened around Jesus all the time! Miracles made His disciples and others following Jesus think how amazing He was. But they didn’t realize WHO He was.

Aren’t we the same sometimes? I know I am. You get tired of waiting for Jesus. You know He has done miracles in your life, but you need Him around and He doesn’t seem to show so you take off…headed in your own direction…with your own agenda driving the boat! You run into a worse, a more desperate situation than the one you left behind. Panic! Your earthly limitations show up. Jesus comes to you…walking on the stormy seas…You are in awe…You get to shore…and you have got to ask yourself…WHO IS THIS JESUS?

That’s how it was in John 6. The crowds waited for Jesus. Couldn’t figure Him out and knew some miracle had happened to get Him over the sea to Capernaum without the disciples. They wanted in on it! This was over the top Facebook or Twitter news! This was HUGE STUFF!! But Jesus doesn’t answer the hyped up crowd in a way they expect. He doesn’t tell them how He got across the sea from Point A to Point B…in a howling storm in the dark of night!

Jesus gets down to the real story!

 “You want to be with me because of the miracle of free bread, NOT because you believe in WHO I AM. DON’T GO AFTER PERISHING FOOD! SPEND YOUR ENERGY SEEKING AFTER THE ETERNAL LIFE I CAN GIVE YOU!  I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE…

It’s interesting to note here that the followers listening to Jesus, sharing the bread and fish, and hearing Him say I AM…actually were NOT as clued out as we might think they were. I AM happened to be a familiar statement to Jewish followers of Jesus. They knew it referred to a famous meeting in the history of their ancestors. A meeting between Moses and God in front of a fiery burning tree…a kind of miracle tree! (the tree appeared to be on fire, yet didn’t burn up!).  Moses had asked God His Name, and God spoke back to him from the fiery tree – (by the way…did you know that fire is symbol of the Holy Spirit throughout the Scriptures – a symbol of the powerful presence of God? I’m sure you know that…) And God said: “Tell Israel that I AM has sent you…”

In John 6, Jesus repeats those same two small and infinitely powerful words…

I AM

Can’t you just hear Jesus saying it?

Hey…that’s ME, people!!!  I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE!

A Jew himself, Jesus knew his hearers should be able to get this incredible clue to His identity.

Now, if Jesus was merely out to be a hero in His day, a ‘superstar’…do you really think He would say words like He did…. I AM!

Think about it. Would anyone risk making such a bold spiritually-loaded statement if it wasn’t true!

I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE!

WHO on earth would say such a thing? No one! In Jesus day, if He was saying I AM and wasn’t telling the truth, He was really putting Him self out there…at huge risk, wasn’t He?

But that is the crux, the very heart of truth in this amazing 24 Hours in the Earthly Life of Jesus.

You see, you’re right! The people didn’t know Him at all, not really… But Jesus KNEW WHO HE WAS!

Here’s one more thing you may want to think about…It is very interesting to note that the apostle John also mentions that Jesus gave the loaves and fish miracle to His followers at a uniquely strategic moment and time…right around the Jewish season of Passover. Do you think this was by accident? No. There are no mistakes in the timing found in John 6. People following Jesus all over the hills of Galilee had no business doing so if they were Jews, which many of them were. They should have been preparing for the Passover observances! Instead they had been spending days following Jesus around looking for more miracles!

And now Jesus, unknown to those watching for miracles is showing them another one…He is illustrating an astounding truth…a reminder at the very time of Passover, that He is the Passover Lamb…their Deliverer…We know this because of course at Passover in the Old Testament, the angel of death passed over the doors of homes in Israel marked by the blood of a priestly sacrificial lamb.

JESUS KNEW WHO HE WAS!  He thought people would connect the dots...that they would see that He was the Lamb of God coming to take away their sins, the sins of the world! But people did not get it…

Isn’t it amazing how God does things in our lives and we miss what He’s showing us? A series of amazing things may take place in our personal walk with Him…We kind of think we get it…but many times…we focus on the miracle stuff…the free bread and fish….the earthly realities.

We miss the spiritual connection about WHO JESUS IS. He wants to connect with us, to build a relationship!

We’re out looking for bread and fish!

Isn’t it interesting how this 24 Hours, A Day in the Earthly Life of Jesus Christ takes us right into the present, the here and now?

We can be so much like those people following Him around Galilee and Capernaum, those who didn't GET it about who He was.

But here’s the great Good News! Jesus didn’t give up on that crowd and He never gives up on us either. I love that about Jesus!

Later in the Gospel of John, Jesus makes several more incredible I AM statements…He says WHO HE IS…He says I AM THE DOOR (not merely a sprinkling of priestly blood on a doorpost, not part of a Passover religious ritual!)

He is THE DOOR! The door to life everlasting!

Can you see now that Jesus’ miracle of bread and fish in John 6 isn’t simply an accident, an event that happened by chance? Can you see the strategic and divine timing and purpose of it all, every transition, every moment, one event leading into another? Amazing! God is orchestrating something and we have a remarkable picture of it laid out in His Word.

This is something way bigger than bread and fish! The bread and fish miracle was a platform for JESUS TO SHOW PEOPLE WHO HE IS!

We know many in Jesus’ day hoped for an earthly political figure who would rescue them from oppression. In many ways, things haven’t changed much in the 21st Century.

We still look for political leaders, great people who in the midst of today’s pressure cooker world and upheavals who might offer us a sort of ‘miracle’ earthly solutions to great troubles surrounding us.

Later on in John, Jesus also makes the ultimate I AM statement.

I AM THE WAY THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE.  

If His followers began deserting Him by the score when He told them His first I AM, you can imagine what a stir this next I AM THE WAY THE TRUTH AND THE LIFE words caused, can’t you!

We know what an uproar it caused…It left our beloved Lord hanging on a lonely tree at Golgotha…dying for the sins of the world.

These tremendous and profound I AM statements in John are one of the Bible’s richest and greatest treasures uncovered…in all of Scripture. These awesome I AM words of Jesus go way over the top beyond His wondrous miracles! (And by the way, I am not discounting His miracles…Jesus doesn’t discount miracles either…) but He desires to get us beyond that …way beyond…up close and personal with Him and WHO HE IS!

That’s the key to this whole incredible 6th Chapter of John.

Now notice the question the crowd finally throws at Jesus. Maybe they thought they could get Him back doing miracles, so they threw Him a challenge, a question.

Um…Okay, already Jesus…What should we do to satisfy God? Okay, we’re listening. We want to know.”

Again Jesus answers in an unexpected way. Not a new rule or religious directive of some sort...Just a few simple and powerful words.

“This is God’s will for you…BELIEVE IN THE ONE HE HAS SENT!”  

Talk about Spirit-empowered and heaven-sent words!  

By now if all Jesus was after was an earthly crown or hall of fame status, don’t you figure He would have walked away! This has been some 24 hours. He tells people who He is and they seem disappointed, looking for earthly bread.

Yet we marvel as Jesus patiently and persistently goes on to say in John 6 - All who believe in Me - the Bread of Life, will be raised to life everlasting on the Last Day!

WOW! This is no kind of statement about stale daily bread! Far, far from it!

This is heaven’s BIGGEST EVER, overflowing, miracle-to-top-all-miracles! This is all about life forever…RESURRECTION!

John 6 is about Jesus offering life forever! It just doesn’t get any better than that. But many walked away after that first I AM… They didn’t get anywhere close to the rest of Jesus’ I AM words…It reminds me, looking at this 24 hours in Jesus’ life of a story He told in the Gospel of Luke 16: 19-31.

You know this story….a rich man and a beggar live close together, the beggar living off scraps at the rich man’s door, dogs licking his wounds. Jesus tells how the poor man dies and goes to Abraham’s bosom…to paradise! The rich man also dies and finds himself living forever in eternal torment and flames…no way out!

Seeing the beggar a far way off clothed and well, resting in a pleasant place with Abraham, across an immense chasm he can’t cross, the rich man cries out…

Go back! Warn my brothers…go back to earth! Tell them NOT to live like I did…blind, unbelieving, stubborn, sinful, selfish!

Jesus words are compelling beyond belief. He says – “If they wouldn’t believe the Word of God, the testimony of the law and the prophets, they will NOT believe even if someone returns from the dead and tells them hell is real!” (para-phrased)

It is exactly what He is also saying in John 6.

THIS IS GOD’S WILL. BELIEVE IN THE ONE HE SENT!

What can you and I learn from the John 6 ‘reality TV report’ story, this dramatic 24 hours – A Day in the Earthly Life of Jesus Christ?

What’s in it for us? Many of us may find ourselves today in totally tough and challenging life situations. We might be saying…

Oh, if only Jesus would meet me in this need…physical, financial, healing,  work situation or relationship that’s gone sour…

There’s a huge temptation to give up when we’re in tough spots. To head out in the boat without Jesus! To seek our own earthly, feel-good solutions, chase our own philosophies, intellectual reasoning, direction…whatever! We may even start backing out spiritually on our faith life.  

I know. I’ve done it. Yet Jesus still says to us today - I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE.

I don’t know about you, but John 6 answers a lot of questions for me. I hope it stirs your faith as it did mine. I know that when I pray the prayer the Lord taught us to pray, The Lord’s Prayer, and when I come to those words…

Give us this day our daily bread…I won’t simply think of earthly bread, (although I know and believe the Lord cares about my basic needs being met – that’s His generous and loving nature!) But I have a feeling I will be praying and maybe some of you will also…

Give us this day our daily bread…Give us this day Your BREAD OF LIFE bread, TRUE BREAD…Give us MORE OF YOU, Lord Jesus!