Reading: Genesis 16-17, John 6
Jesus - "The bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."
The Crowd - "Sir, give us this bread always."
Jesus - "I am this bread...but I said to you that you have seen me, and yet you don't believe."
I wonder if there is such a thing as spiritual intoxication, maybe even spiritual gluttony. It would be this fix, this satisfaction of being filled with things or emotions or ideas that you perceive to be good and pure and godly, but truly they are not so. It's the idea that you have to get a high, an instant gratification, of some sort of spirituality, of some emotion, of a few good tears, of a motivational sermon, and before you know it, all you're looking for is the high and you don't even realize you've missed out on the real good stuff - Jesus himself.
Let me give a few examples and maybe it will be clear.
- The fresh-off-of-church-camp teen who heard some good songs and met some zealous people that went back to the same old habits when he got back to school
- The girl who can't stop singing every song so loud in worship but doesn't even know how to engage with her coworkers in a good and loving discussion
- The couple that keeps praying for a raise or a financial miracle but hasn't prayed for each other's spiritual health or found their wants and needs met in the giving up of their everything in service to the Lord
- Abraham, who moved his family in response to the Lord's promise that he would father generations, but then decided to bear a child with another woman outside of God's plan
- The crowd following Jesus that wanted to see signs and wonders and have bread to the full but did not actually see that Jesus, right in front of them, was there to engage with, to know, to love; the same Jesus who created them, saved them, who had come to bring them out of need
I am preaching to myself here. Leave no doubt. We have all been in those places where we're wanting signs and wonders and desiring the radical and intoxicating presence of God. But if it stops at that, if all we want are the perks of being a Jesus-follower and we never actually want Jesus - a wholly good and full knowledge of our Creator and his intentions for us - then we are simply addicts. We are not God's children. We are not his people. We are not what he designed us to be.
We will all make these mistakes at times. We will all, from time to time, get drunk on good feelings and good music and forget that God spoke to us in the small things. So let's find ways to remember that he is always satisfying, whether spectacularly or under the radar. Let's start our days in prayer and scripture so our hearts are immediately gazing at his truth. Let's write goals to make the small things fruitful. Let's speak words of only pure and lovely things throughout our day. And when we mess up, before we ever seek to fall back into our drunkenness, let us choose to make the small steps toward growing in our Creator and our Savior. Let us choose to know our first bread and our last bread as Jesus.
The Crowd - "Sir, give us this bread always."
Jesus - "I am this bread...but I said to you that you have seen me, and yet you don't believe."
I wonder if there is such a thing as spiritual intoxication, maybe even spiritual gluttony. It would be this fix, this satisfaction of being filled with things or emotions or ideas that you perceive to be good and pure and godly, but truly they are not so. It's the idea that you have to get a high, an instant gratification, of some sort of spirituality, of some emotion, of a few good tears, of a motivational sermon, and before you know it, all you're looking for is the high and you don't even realize you've missed out on the real good stuff - Jesus himself.
Let me give a few examples and maybe it will be clear.
- The fresh-off-of-church-camp teen who heard some good songs and met some zealous people that went back to the same old habits when he got back to school
- The girl who can't stop singing every song so loud in worship but doesn't even know how to engage with her coworkers in a good and loving discussion
- The couple that keeps praying for a raise or a financial miracle but hasn't prayed for each other's spiritual health or found their wants and needs met in the giving up of their everything in service to the Lord
- Abraham, who moved his family in response to the Lord's promise that he would father generations, but then decided to bear a child with another woman outside of God's plan
- The crowd following Jesus that wanted to see signs and wonders and have bread to the full but did not actually see that Jesus, right in front of them, was there to engage with, to know, to love; the same Jesus who created them, saved them, who had come to bring them out of need
I am preaching to myself here. Leave no doubt. We have all been in those places where we're wanting signs and wonders and desiring the radical and intoxicating presence of God. But if it stops at that, if all we want are the perks of being a Jesus-follower and we never actually want Jesus - a wholly good and full knowledge of our Creator and his intentions for us - then we are simply addicts. We are not God's children. We are not his people. We are not what he designed us to be.
We will all make these mistakes at times. We will all, from time to time, get drunk on good feelings and good music and forget that God spoke to us in the small things. So let's find ways to remember that he is always satisfying, whether spectacularly or under the radar. Let's start our days in prayer and scripture so our hearts are immediately gazing at his truth. Let's write goals to make the small things fruitful. Let's speak words of only pure and lovely things throughout our day. And when we mess up, before we ever seek to fall back into our drunkenness, let us choose to make the small steps toward growing in our Creator and our Savior. Let us choose to know our first bread and our last bread as Jesus.