The World's Best Bread - John 6:22-35

Chad Richard Bresson

The Table of Los Fresnos

Sermons • Sermon • Submitted 11 days ago • Presented 11 days ago

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Introduction

Have you ever heard of Butter Garlic Naan? Butter Garlic Naan is an Indian bread that is loaded with butter and cheese and garlic. It is served with chicken curry in many places. Butter Garlic Naan was named by TasteAtals, the online food encyclopedia, the world’s best bread for 2025. The world’s best bread. If you’re wondering what the best American bread is… further down the list was California Sourdough Bread… and somewhere in the rankings was Texas Toast. But Butter Garlic Naan from India is the world’s best bread.

While I don’t remember ever having Butter Garlic Naan, I do think it is safe to say that I know a bread that is even better than Butter Garlic Naan and that bread has everything to do with why we are here this morning. What is it that makes the Table, the table? Why does the Table exist? Why do we bother getting together like this? Why the Table Church? What is it that we are doing here? The answer is Bread. The Bread.

John 6: the entire Bible story

We get our answer from John 6. If there is a Bible passage we should all memorize and take to heart, it's John 6. John 6 for me is the magna carta for The Table. Over the past few years, we’ve spent quite a bit of time in John 6. In fact, John 6 is on the back of 100s of t-shirts we’ve given away.

John 6 has the entire story of the Bible wrapped up in one chapter. This chapter is a grand summary of the story of Jesus. If this chapter is the entire story of the Bible and a summary of the story of Jesus, then it is a summary of what it means for the Table to be the Table. And it gives us purpose and meaning for why we are here this morning opening a new chapter in the life of The Table.

At the beginning of John 6 we find huge crowds following Jesus wherever he went… to the point of interrupting a personal moment with his 12 disciples on a mountain. On this particular occasion, the crowd following Jesus stays late in the day and Jesus brings up food. Before anyone says anything about food, Jesus goes there. Where will we buy bread so that these people can eat?

And those of us who grew up in Sunday school know the rest of the story. One of the most spectacular of Jesus' miracles… he feeds the 5000… and there are many baskets left over. Truly spectacular. 5 loaves and two fishes… feeds a crowd of probably around 15-thousand… twice the size of Bert Ogden Arena just down the road here.

And the way it was taught in Sunday School was…. that was it. Yay. 12 baskets left over for the disciples to eat. End of story. Let’s go walk on the water. But it's not the end of the story. Next thing you know, Jesus is walking on the water… which is pretty cool… we're not going to get into that….and…. then… the crowd is back the next day… on the other side of the lake.

Jesus feeds; Jesus explains

We will pick up with verse 26…

Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled. 27 Don’t work for the food that perishes but for the food that lasts for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set his seal of approval on him.”

So that wasn't all there was. The story doesn't really end with the 12 baskets. This, and the rest of chapter 6 is an explanation of the meaning of the miracle of feeding the 5000. they come looking for more bread. And Jesus points out that they are looking for the wrong kind of bread. They are looking for bread that comes from good ole Kansas wheat. They are looking for Wonder Bread that “builds strong bodies 12 ways”. They want bread that satisfies immediate hunger. Food that perishes. They are not satisfied with what Christ has done… they are not satisfied with Jesus. They want more of the same.. and Jesus says… you missed it. You missed the point. What you should have seen on the mountain is the True Bread from heaven… the Real Bread that gives life that is not of this world.

The crowd wants bread that they can produce. They want to be self-sufficient. Their salvation is bound up with what they can do for themselves. It’s all about getting what they can, from their own intuition, their own smarts, their own wit. And the reality is that we do this all of the time and we find that it cannot satisfy our hunger.

I want it all, I want it now!

A couple of British philosophers writing in the 80s captured the sentiment of this crowd that came to see Jesus in their famous line: "I want it all and I want it now." They speak for the rest of us. We want it all and we want it now. And when we don’t get what we want, we want what we aren’t getting even more. The relentless pursuit of ALL. The relentless pursuit of winning. The relentless pursuit of being self-sufficient.

Jesus confronts this relentless pursuit of MORE in this chapter and presents himself as the only one who is MORE. Bread, throughout the Bible, represents sustenance, and provision, and satisfaction. In the Bible bread gives life. Bread is God’s provision for life itself. These are the same themes that present themselves in the Old Testament stories regarding the Manna sent from heaven to feed the Israelites who were wandering in the desert, a story that is referenced here. That manna, that physical bread… this crowd equates with Moses and the law. They’d rather have Moses than Jesus.

But Jesus turns the table on them and us. The manna given to the Israelites in the wilderness… is just like the 5 loaves that were used to feed 15,000 people. That manna and that bread points to a greater reality that we are always dependent on Jesus to sustain us and provide for us what we cannot do for ourselves.

Jesus: The Bread of Life

Jesus says this in verse 35:

I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again.”

This is the story of Jesus, the one who was anticipated in the Manna in the wilderness, the one who was pre-figured in the law-giver Moses… the one who provided the bread in the wilderness, the one who was promised who would come and feed the hungry… this very same One is the Bread who comes from heaven to give life to those who are dead in sin. While we were totally self-sufficient and full of ourselves, Christ died for us.

We either try to produce the bread ourselves and always pursue having it ALL, or we must have bread from heaven… we must get our satisfaction from Jesus who does for us what we cannot do for ourselves. And only then will we ever truly be satisfied.

If Jesus is only one who can satisfy us, only one who can give us life.. if Jesus is the main point of all that is happening in this story and the next story, if His story is how we understand ourselves, then week in and week out, year after year we will be telling the story of Jesus here at the Table. And it is the story we will be telling San Benito. The story of Jesus as the Bread of Life, as the best Bread ever is the story that we will be telling over and over and over again. It is a story of life, and grace, and forgiveness. And it isn’t meant for us to keep it here. It’s for our neighbors. It’s for our community.

Why San Benito?

That does raise a question for today, a question that has been asked more than once over the past few weeks: Why San Benito? We should always be cautious about asking the why question because God doesn’t tell us the why and doesn’t promise to tell the why. But I do think there is this to think about: we’re here to do the same thing for San Benito that we did for Los Fresnos… feeding people the Best Bread in the World. I don’t know why we spent 5 and a half years enjoying Jesus’ blessing and reaching so many people in Los Fresnos only to be moved to San Benito. But what we can say from John 6 is that the same Best Bread for Los Fresnos is the same Best Bread for San Benito. And the very same needs of forgiveness and grace and salvation are here as it is in Los Fresnos. The mission doesn’t change. The need doesn’t change.

What about the building?

And that’s not just true of our mission, but of this gift, our building. And what a gift. Tim Cool, a guy who has written much about the use of church buildings, says this:

Church buildings tell a story. Churches are not buildings. But buildings are important pieces in God’s mission of building his kingdom. - Tim Cool

We’ve said often that the building is not the church. And having a building now, we’re going to have to double down on that. We have not had a building. And now we do. But the building is not the end goal. The building is a tool, a fantastic tool for gospel ministry. The building will tell the story that we have the Best Bread in the World. And the building will further the story as a means by which we will connect people to Jesus and His story. Not just here… the building is a staging area and a launch pad for telling the story of Jesus in all sorts of other places.

Curtis and I met a gentleman in the neighborhood yesterday who has been here 44 of the building’s 72 years. And he has stories about this place. About the people he knew here. Good stories. This building will not only tell the story, but will further the story of Jesus in the lives of our neighbors and beyond.

We have the best bread in the world, Jesus himself. The building isn’t a place to settle into , but a place where we will optimize telling the story of the Best Bread in the world, the Jesus who loves us so much he became one of us… to forgive us and give us life. Life for us. Life for San Benito.

Let’s Pray

The Table

Of the four books in the Bible we call the gospels, John does not have an Upper Room story… he does not have the story of the Passover with the disciples…the Last Supper, and the bread and the wine. Or does he?

In verse 51 of this same chapter 6 Jesus says this:

I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 52 At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat??” 53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, 55 because my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.

Eating of the flesh and drinking of the blood… straight out of the Passover story and the Last Supper. Only it's here in John… the conclusion to the story of the feeding of the 5000. We participate in the real meaning of this miracle every time we receive the Lord's Table. The only one who can satisfy everything we ever wanted feeds us of himself in the bread and the wine. There at the Table he tells us that He is our satisfaction.

And He offers himself in the Sacrament at the Table. He promises forgiveness at the Table. "I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

Here at the Table, Jesus says, You can't. I can. I am the bread of life. You want life. Find your satisfaction in me. Receive all that I can and will provide for you in faith. That work, that food, that relationship… cannot satisfy… but I can. I died and rose.. I satisfied the demands that you could not. Be satisfied with me and in me. Receive what I have done for you and receive my promises in faith. This Table is bread from heaven.

Benediction

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