Jesus led by making the crisis explicit

John 6 reveals the pivotal events through which Jesus made explicit a building crisis. He took the initiative, launching the last phase of his earth career, and giving an advanced addition to his many-sided saving message of truth.

Watch the 14:17 video or listen to the podcast episode.

Power exercised and political authority refused

Two dramatic events led up to the big clash, the major turning point in Jesus’ public ministry. After laboring in teaching and healing, Jesus and the twelve sought rest from the crowds and went off to a deserted place by themselves. The crowds pursued them insistently; but after they had been with Jesus and the twelve for three days, their food supply had run out. When it was late in the day, the twelve urged Jesus to send the people away to the villages to buy food for themselves. But Jesus was filled with compassion for these hungry ones, who were “like sheep without a shepherd.” Sheep rely on the shepherd to bring them to places where they can eat. With no shepherd, sheep are lost and vulnerable. For reasons that he did not explain, on this occasion Jesus, the good shepherd, chose to use his divine power. He took two fish and five barley loaves, multiplied them miraculously, and fed five thousand or more people.

Since the beginning of his ministry, this was the most stunning act in which Jesus’ compassion and power seemed to encourage the popular hope for a wonder-working, material Messiah. 

The people who had been fed responded with tremendous and united enthusiasm, and moved to make him their king. But he refused the offer of political power and withdrew. 

This first of these two events would raise expectations about Jesus as Messiah. The second would alarm the political authorities as well as the religious ones. More than ever, the question intensified. What would Jesus do next? 

The Master went into the hills to pray. 

Jesus’ initiates a higher level of conflict

The stage was set for the clash at Capernaum, much of it in the synagogue. Jesus was speaking to a gathering that included three groups: the apostles; other followers including some who had been fed with the five thousand; and a group of enemies. 

Jesus first challenged the material-minded motivation of those who had followed him to the synagogue because they had gotten free food. In contrast, he spoke of spiritual food, which “the Son of Man will give you.” Then one of his assembled enemies interrupted with an insincere question to put Jesus to the test. “What sign are you going to give us then, so that we may see it and believe you? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, “[Moses] gave them bread from heaven to eat.” 

Thus far, we have an interruption that is like previous skirmishes. But in Jesus’ reply we see his choice to take the initiative and make the building crisis explicit. 

“Very truly I tell you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is that which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. . . . I am the bread of life.” 

Now Jesus was calling into question the Biblical record or at least how it had been generally interpreted. He now proclaimed himself as having come down from heaven. And he not only offered to give to all the bread of life. He also revealed that he is the bread of life. This symbol called hearers to find ways of nourishing themselves on the bread of life. The standard answer is to take communion, using the elements of bread and wine. But Jesus was making a present-tense offer to everyone right then and there and to the whole world.

In the discussion and debate that followed, Jesus made clear that the life that he brought from heaven is eternal life; those who believe in him will live forever. In other words, Jesus, whose parents were known to some of his listeners, was not only human, but also divine. He had come down from heaven.

Now we are in new territory. Living truth is unfolding in new fullness. 

Some of the things that made this clash different were Jesus’ aggressive challenge to material-mindedness, the extent of the debate, Jesus’ challenge to scriptural tradition or its interpretation, his clear statements of fact that he had come down from heaven and that those who believe in him will live forever, plus his symbolic teaching of living truth, the bread of life. 

Some of these enemies knew Jesus, his teachings, and his actions well enough to have glimpsed his divinity. Just reading text on the page hardly conveys what it would have been like to see and hear him when he was functioning in high gear. 

His acts of power revealed the power of God. His words of truth revealed eternal truth to those who were spiritually hungry. In the life that he offered one could glimpse the quality of eternity. And Jesus was all that in himself. 

But his enemies were self-deceived; they did not allow themselves to face their intuition honestly and allow its implications to change them. Some of them were conspiring to kill him. Their hatred and plotting amounted to sin, deliberate rebellion against God. Therefore, if they were to be saved, they needed to accept Jesus himself—one with God—as the bread of life. 

Jesus chose to respond to his enemies by clarifying the stakes: he was offering them eternal life, which they could accept or refuse. He revealed what they needed, but not in the form of literal doctrine that spiritually blind minds would use against him. Instead, he communicated in a symbol, the bread of life, that could touch the heart and save the soul. 

He gave his enemies another chance to wake up, turn around, and nourish themselves on the bread of life. He thereby also strengthened and protected his true followers by giving them the empowering revelation of his divinity of the one they had chosen to trust. 

Open hostilities had broken out at a new level. It is plausible that, soon after this, the Temple rulers began the practice of throwing believers in Jesus out of the synagogue. Temple agents were looking for an opportunity to arrest him, put him on trial, and bring about his death. Jesus would continue to combine attacks on his enemies with beautifully symbolic expressions of the truth of who he was. 

Reacting to the higher level of conflict, many of Jesus’ disciples turned back and stopped following him. They were willing to be fed, but not to go against their leaders and traditions to any significant degree. The parable of the sower told of the gospel seed falling on rocky soil and springing up enthusiastically until the scorching sun would expose how shallow their roots were. The lukewarm would fall away; the wholehearted would endure. Regardless of how unpopular it might be, Jesus was totally dedicated to the Father’s will in proclaiming the truth whose time had come. 

Note: the Capernaum Synagogue pictured here does not date all the way back to the first century. Image credit: Author unknown. Public domain. 1950. Heritage Conservation Outside The City via Heritage Conservation Outside The City via the PikiWiki – Israel free image collection project  

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/22/PikiWiki_Israel_64863_capernaum_partially_restored_synagogue.jpg?20201022084023