John 6:1-15

The sixth chapter of John is about Passover. Or more specifically it is about connecting Jesus’ life and mission with the greatest event of salvation in the Jewish story.

John’s story directly evokes the Passover, the gathering of Manna, and the beginning of the covenant. In the gospel Jesus is re-actualising, evolving and redefining these events.

Before seriously reading John 6 we must first embed ourselves in the Passover and Exodus, so get reading Exodus! It’s the story of how the Hebrew slaves were freed by God.

At the centre of this freedom event is the founding of a sacred meal, a meal which would be repeated thereafter down through the generations, not as a memory but as a re-actualisation of the salvation event.

This sacred meal in Exodus 12-13, is followed by another meal in Exodus 16. This time the danger is not slavery but the harshness of the desert. Bread and meat are sent by God.

John 6 presents a very immediate human problem. There is a lack of food.

Whenever we face a problem of this kind all other concerns go out of the window, everything collapses into thinking about how to get enough food.

There is a need to look in two directions with a story like this. This is a story about real human hunger, a problem experienced by far too many people, those of us who’ve never been close to experiencing real hunger might scoff at supposed supernatural solutions, but surely that’s one point to remember, we have no experiences to draw on and so should not be too quick to ignore the material events of this narrative.

And yet, for this story to make sense to us at a gut level we need to engage with our own hungers, whatever it is that we lack and crave for deeply, those things we long for but have no means of attaining. (whatever it is for you, keep it in mind).

Philip notes that there isn’t enough money to feed everyone. Andrew brings forward a boy with a packed lunch, but he dismisses this as any kind of solution. For both of these men the problem feels insurmountable, and they’re absolutely right to feel so, in human terms there is no viable solution.

Then Jesus acts…..

1. Jesus makes everyone sits down on the grass. Already this is a place of more life than the desert, despite the immediate lack of food, John gives us a reminder that this place is a fertile land capable of providing food. Much like the Hebrews in Egypt, the problem is not production but distribution.
2. Jesus takes the bread and fish, and gives thanks.
3. The food is distributed.Leftovers are gathered, so that nothing is lost.
4. Twelve baskets are gathered, one for each tribe of Israel.

Jesus acts, and there is enough, more than enough, an abundance.

This meal was one event, a few thousand people benefited directly, that was obviously great for them. The bigger question (as always) is why it matters to us 2000 years later.

The first lesson seems to be that God has the power to act in ways we do not. Jesus, while fully human, (particularly in John’s gospel) seems to be more outwardly divine. Thinking back to our own deep hungers which I asked you to ponder above, it is important to focus on God’s ability to provide for our needs. Maybe not our wants, but our needs. A key part of our human relationship with the divine is that of dependency on a provide, we are called time and again to throw ourselves onto the benevolence of God in faith. In this sense there is a part of our divine-human encounter which is akin to that of a baby with its parent, total dependence and vulnerability.

A second lesson here is that of distribution. As noted above this story is set in a fertile land, not a desert. We must ask the question as to why these people don’t have any food. Why does the boy only have a small loaf and two small fish. Why when he’s stood on fertile land next to a lake full of fish? So we must ask these difficult questions. Remember Philip’s comment, he doesn’t tell us that there is no food, rather that there is no money; this is perhaps an economic problem not an agricultural one. In this context we must ask whether Jesus miraculously creates more food, or whether he simply redistributes the food already provided by the abundance of creation.

And a third lesson is that of thankfulness. Jesus gives thanks for the bread and fish, and perhaps much more, the implication is clear that an attitude of thankfulness is called for, from a place of hunger. This thankfulness feels easy when our bellies are full and our thirst sated, not so easy when we’re groaning with hunger and all that there seems to be is not enough.

As John 6 progresses more will be discussed, more will be revealed. At root this narrative is about the divine-human relationship, about human needs.