We all know what we think we need—food, security, respect, a life that finally comes together—but Jesus in John 6 cuts straight to the question underneath: what do we really need, and why do we keep mistaking the temporary for the eternal?
The following study questions are AI generated and may contain errors.
The preacher says we often “think we know what we need” but act like we need something else entirely. What’s one thing you genuinely believed would make you happy or solve a problem—and what actually happened when you got it?
Jesus tells the crowd, “You are seeking me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.” How do you recognize the difference between following Jesus for who he is and following him for what you hope he’ll give you?
The sermon contrasts what Herod, the Pharisees, and the hungry crowd each thought they needed. What did each group actually need, and why couldn’t they see it themselves?
The preacher uses the image of anchoring an inflatable snowman—you have to let it inflate first to know where the stakes really go. How does that picture change the way you think about figuring out what your life actually needs?
What does it mean, practically, to “aim at heaven” and trust that “you will get the earth thrown in”? Can you think of a time when that actually proved true in your own life, or does it feel like a promise you struggle to believe?
This transcript has been automatically generated and may contain errors.
Well, here we are. We’ve been working the last few weeks over the passage John 6, and it’s not where we normally land in Advent, but in conversation it seemed like a place to go this year. And the more I spend time in John 6, the more it strikes me how much it speaks to the issues we bring to Christmas. And where it really lands to a great deal, I believe, is, what do we really need? If you made a list to Santa when you were growing up and you think back to that list, you put down what you needed, right? Need changes over the years, but we always have a sense, this is what I need, this is what I want, this is what’s going to bring me happiness. And as we go into this next section of John chapter 6, starting with verse 21, we’re going to find what the people coming to Jesus thought they needed. We’re going to think about that because what they thought they needed and what we think that we need is really, really quite similar.
Let’s ask our God to comfort us and direct us as we do that. Let’s pray.
Father, we come before you as those who think we know what we need. We make our list. We send you our wish list of things that we think are going to make us happy or successful. They’re going to bring our lives together. Even when those things come into our lives, so often we find that things still come apart. Even when we think we have everything down, everything’s arranged right. So often that we find out that it’s not that way at all. And Lord, as we contemplate what we truly need, would you help us to better understand that and to be guided by your Holy Spirit that we might have our hearts directed towards you, we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Well, I say all that and I have to let you know, I do now have everything I need. I have everything I need because I got an email this week. And this wasn’t just any old email. I want you to know that I really got this. I’m going to go ahead and show it to you there. And if you don’t have super great vision, I’ll just tell you what it is. But I want you to know I actually did get this email. I received my official invitation to join the Illuminati. Yes, I have been invited to join the Illuminati. All I need to do is email this random Gmail address and they will initiate me into the secret society.
And I just want to tell you some of the things that I now have. It says, “We are dedicated to bringing the underprivileged, the less fortunate, individuals with exceptional talents into the spotlight of wealth, influence, knowledge, business opportunities, and political connections. Now is the perfect moment for you to bid farewell to your worries, health concerns, and financial troubles by becoming part of the Illuminati’s elite family.” And then I’ll skip down a little. It says, “Are you prepared to become a member of the Illuminati’s New World Order? If you answer yes, please respond to our dedicated recruitment email address. Ensure that all your correspondence is directed exclusively to this email address mentioned above for further instructions on the membership process.” So I have it made now, right? The Illuminati runs the world. I have it made right here. I didn’t send an email to that email address. But I was thinking about it. And I have a feeling I know from the way those email addresses go what would happen if I emailed that email address. I’m pretty certain I’d be told I needed to send an untraceable account a modest sum of money so I could have power over the world. No big deal, right? I mean, what’s a little money if I can be a part of the Illuminati?
It’s kind of interesting when you think about an organization that is, there was an actual organization known as the Illuminati centuries ago. There’s a lot of questions on how long it lasted, what level of influence it ever had. But we continue to talk about it and people continue to theorize whether there is an Illuminati today. Why? Because of the very things that that email talked about. If only I respond to this, if only I could get in good with them, I won’t have to worry about business connections or political connections. I won’t have to worry about my health because I’ll have access to the greatest powers on earth. There’s nothing in this world that’s going to stop me. That appeals an awful lot to us, doesn’t it? Because all of us are here tonight with something wrong. I don’t have to know. I’ve talked more or less to all of you. Some of you that are new here tonight, I may not have talked to a lot, but I can say just by knowing people that every single person I’ve ever met has had something wrong. And sometimes we don’t think about it a lot. Things are going pretty well and we’re focused on what’s going well. But all of us have something wrong. All of us have something that’s hurting us. All of us have something that is paining us.
And you get something like that and there’s that glimmer of hope. Could this be the solution? Well, as we turn to John chapter 6 verse 21, the people there are looking for that solution too. And just to set the stage where we were last week, Jesus fed the 5,000. And you think about Jesus feeding the 5,000. Imagine you have just witnessed someone who could take a little bitty bit of food and feed the largest group of people, a larger group of people I’d imagine than any of us here have ever fed. Jim’s catered some meals, so maybe he’s fed 5,000 people. But I can say this, even if Jim had, he wouldn’t have fed 5,000 with one boy’s snack. You need a lot of food.
So they see Jesus and they see here’s someone who can do that and they think he can solve our problems. And that’s where we find ourselves in verse 21.
“So then they were glad to take him into the boat and immediately the boat was at the land to which they were going. On the next day, the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea saw that there had been only one boat there and that Jesus had not entered the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone away alone. Other boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum seeking Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, ‘Rabbi, when did you come here?’ Jesus answered them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.’”
Jesus gets right to the point here. And this is something that’s so wonderful about Jesus. We don’t do this. I certainly don’t do this. I like to beat around the bush a lot. But what did Jesus say? I know why you’re here. You’re not here because you understand who I am and you think I’m just, I’m the Messiah, I’m the Christ, I’m everything that people 2,000 years from now will be singing in Christmas carols. I know you’re here because yesterday you were hungry and you saw me produce a whole lot of food and you’re hoping I’ll do it again. And you’re hoping maybe if you can get in good with me, you’ll never have to worry about eating again because I’ll keep feeding you. I’ll solve that problem.
And maybe today our immediate concern isn’t food. We live in a society, thankfully, that most of us don’t worry day to day, am I going to eat something? But certainly in that time they did. A lot of people were living at a subsistence level where every day’s meal was a question mark. And in that context, someone who could do this answers the problem. They received, they thought, the Illuminati letter, but they’d seen it with their own eyes. It wasn’t some random email address. And they said, if we can just join, he’ll feed us.
Now, ironically, as we’re going to see, they were right, but not in the way they thought. They knew what they needed in this moment, and they thought, he can solve that. I need food. We need food.
We see other people in the Christmas story. A few chapters before, we just turn back, right? We go back and look at what’s happening at Christmas. When Jesus was born, what’s happening? There are people who also have needs, and there are different needs. There were people that didn’t like the Romans. There were people that did like the Romans. There were people like Herod who wanted to hold on to power. Herod wasn’t a popular king. He wasn’t a celebrity ruler. Herod was someone who the majority of the people whom he ruled viewed him as illegitimate. They didn’t think he actually had a claim to the throne.
Now, if you’re a leader and the people you rule don’t think you belong there, the only way you maintain that power is by threat. That’s exactly what he did. Herod was no moderate. Herod was no careful, “I want just peace and harmony in my kingdom” kind of guy. Herod was the sort of person, if I can kill some people, and that will make people fear me, I will kill some people, no problem. Herod wants power. That’s what he needs.
And what we see, there’s Herod. He’s not the picture of a religious person. But we also have the religious leaders. They’ve studied the scriptures. We saw the prophecies on Friday night when we had our journey through the Christmas story from Genesis to Revelation. And when you think about that, they understood that someone was coming, a Messiah was coming, and they assigned their needs to him. And their needs were to overthrow the Romans, to finally have their own ruler again. Not someone like Herod, who was a puppet client to the Roman Empire, but someone who actually would rule in their interests and to keep their own power in the process.
What are we told in Matthew chapter 2 verse 3? When they hear the prophecy that this is actually being fulfilled, it says, “When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.” Here’s a remarkable thing. They get their letter that the one who actually has power, that can actually solve everything, is coming into the world, and they’re troubled. And we might say, well, why would you be troubled at that? It seems like it’s because they were afraid what it would do to what they already had. Herod wanted power. If the Messiah came, if the legitimate heir to the throne, the real king, came into the world, that didn’t bode well for his power. But it didn’t necessarily bode well for those who had made sort of an uneasy alliance with him either.
We’re told all of Jerusalem was troubled. Why? Because they knew what their life was as it is, and most of them looked at that life and they said, well, you know, everything may not be the way I want it, but everything is at least the way I know it’s going to be. So they were troubled.
Sometimes when God’s calling us to act, we find ourselves troubled too. Sometimes when we actually confront who Jesus is, who the baby in the manger really was, and who the man he grew up into really was, and who the God eternal who was incarnate in the flesh that Jesus, the Son of God, was and is, we find ourselves troubled because it doesn’t fit with all the things that this email promised. Because Jesus doesn’t necessarily promise we’re going to have power. Actually, he doesn’t promise at all. Not now. Someday we will stand in God’s glory. I can’t think of anything better you could ever hope for than that. But in this moment, he doesn’t promise everything will go well for us. In fact, he talks about persecution and suffering. He doesn’t promise we’ll live physically in this life eternally, that everything in this life will go smoothly. He actually says it could be quite difficult. And we wonder if maybe we can find something else that will instead better answer where we are in this moment.
And it really comes down to what do we really need? And if you ask me, I know the right theological answer. What do I really need? I need God. But knowing the answer and actually living the answer are two different things because a lot of times I know that’s the answer. But how am I acting? Am I really acting as one who knows he needs God? Or am I acting as someone who needs all the things that email promised? What do I think I really need?
I remember in kindergarten there was a classmate named Nick. I don’t really remember much about Nick, but here’s something I do remember about Nick. Nick had snakeskin boots. And I thought these were just the most amazing thing ever. Well, probably one of the only times I ever remember really wanting any kind of footwear. It’s never been my thing, but I remember these snakeskin boots. I mean, he walked around with his snakeskin boots and, you know, it was just, wow, it’s kindergarten. So I remember, I think it was for my birthday, I got a pair of snakeskin boots. They weren’t very comfortable. I think I wore them once. I thought I needed those snakeskin boots. Life and happiness depended on snakeskin boots. Very clearly, very shortly thereafter, I learned that happiness actually depended on not wearing snakeskin boots. But I thought that’s what would bring me happiness.
We put on an awful lot of snakeskin boots in our lives. Sometimes it is the things that we see someone else, someone who’s close to us, or someone that we barely know. I never got very close to Nick. I have no idea what happened to him after kindergarten. I’m surprised the name even is still in my head. But he had the boots. He had the boots. What are our boots? What are our boots? That’s where the people had set their eyes. And it was something more important than boots. They wanted to eat, but they wanted to eat because they wanted a life that was easier, more comfortable, more successful, maybe less influenced by the Romans, because if we have enough food, then we’re not starving, then we can start focusing on things like overthrowing this oppressive government. I don’t know everything that was going in their heads. If they have enough food, then they wouldn’t have to work so hard, right? Because when it really comes down to it, why do we work? Well, we work hopefully a little bit for fulfillment, but we work because we want a roof over our heads, we want food to eat, we want those sorts of things. That’s often what motivates us. If I don’t go to work, I’m not going to eat, I’m not going to have a nice place to live, I’m not going to have a car to drive, then I won’t even be able to get to work because I don’t have the car to drive, and so on and so forth.
So what were they thinking? They were thinking, wow, we can solve this, we can put this into the proper place. Jesus will just give us food. And so they had set their eyes on these snakeskin boots that were going to somehow make things right. Jesus was going to redirect them and say, you know, when you put those on, when you have all the food you could ever want to eat, do you know what’s going to happen? You’re still going to be unhappy. That’s what you’re focused on. You’re going to be unhappy.
And here’s an interesting thing if you really think about it. Most of us, again, I mentioned this earlier, most of us, praise God, have food to eat every day. Does it mean that we’re always happy and everything’s great? No. If you’ve never been in that place, you might think it would, but you realize once you have it, well, now there’s other things that make me unhappy, other things that go wrong. And even they knew that. I mean, they were still dealing with death and brokenness and all this sort of stuff, but they thought they had found the snakeskin boots. But there’s something better, and that’s what Jesus is going to direct them to and direct us to, and we see that in verse 28. It says,
“So then they said to him, ‘What must we do to be doing the works of God?’ We thought we were doing that by following you, Jesus, to the eternal buffet.”
And Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”
So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate manna in the wilderness, as it is written, he gave them bread from heaven to eat.”
Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” We don’t realize what we truly need. And sometimes when God’s working in our lives, he smacks us over the head and we don’t even see it coming. And we think, wow, I didn’t know any of that.
I think about the passage that Kathy and Jeff shared with us during the candle lighting and these shepherds, these shepherds out there tending their flocks by night. We know that, right? We understand that. But we turn to Luke and we read about those shepherds and we think about them and you think, if you’d asked them, if you pulled them in that moment before the angels appeared, shepherds, what do you need? Well, new anti-wild animal technology to keep the animals away from our sheep so we can sleep well at night might have been up there. Food to eat might have been up there. A larger flock so we can be more successful, that might have been there. What they probably didn’t say was angels appearing from on high declaring that the Messiah is born. That probably wasn’t what they would have named off. And yet that’s exactly what they really did need.
Here’s the challenge and this is what Jesus is challenging them to and challenging us to. When the people come to him and say, “Well, we just want this bread that you’ve been sharing. We want this food. We want to sign up for the frequent diner card, Jesus. You have the best cafeteria ever.” Jesus says, “But every day you’re going to eat and every day after that you’re going to be hungry again. Let me give you something that will last. Let me give you something that’s more than just today’s food.” God does that and they bring up Moses. That’s who they’re referring to there in the manna while the people were out in the wilderness. Yes, God does provide for our daily needs. We have it right in the Lord’s prayer. “Give us this day our daily bread.” But he does so much more and that’s what he wants them to understand. They needed something more.
Herod thought he needed power. If I just have more power, if I just solidify my claim on the throne, all will be well. Well, guess what? Where’s Herod now? He’s dead. No matter how firm of grip he had on the throne, he’s still dead.
The Pharisees thought, if we can just avoid having the Messiah rise up and overthrowing our nice, clean, easygoing religious establishment we have right now. We have it worked out well. We have authority. We have comfort. People respect us. How often is that what we really want? We just want people to respect us. I guess where are all those Pharisees from that time are too? They’re dead. So the things that they thought they needed are things that are no longer relevant to them. Things that we think that we need will no longer be relevant someday too. But what do we truly need?
The shepherds responded with joy because they heard what God said and they realized, wait a second, he is talking about what we really need. That’s what we’re called to do too.
Think about the thief on the cross. We’ll fast forward to Easter for a moment. There you have Jesus on the cross. You have the thief next to him. And if I had been on that cross as a thief, I think what I would have been thinking I needed at that moment was, Jesus, get me off of this thing. Jesus, give me a good alibi so they can’t convict me any longer. Jesus, just, you know, you seem to have lots of miraculous power. Send me to some foreign country. Give me the ability to speak that language and everything will be good. That’s what I need. Make sure I don’t get caught next time.
What did he say? He gets it. He says, “Jesus, remember me in your kingdom.” And what does Jesus say to him? And he said to him, “Truly, I say to you today, you will be with me in paradise.” What he really needed, to be in God’s presence. He said, God, I need you. That thief had better clarity of what he really needed than I usually do. And God was faithful to respond to it.
What’s the treasure we’re going to seek? Too often we think we kind of know where things are going and we just don’t really know. And yet, we do know because we see in history what happens to all of us. We all die. We all suffer. It’s struggle. That’s why it’s often hard at Christmas time because we remember the struggles. We remember the lost loved ones. We go through this. It’s painful. We can see if we really want to.
So often we kind of, I kind of, this is me. I have this amnesia to that and I think, but God, I just need this and it’ll be okay. I was thinking about, I love inflatable snowmen. Anyone else here love those inflatables you can put up? And actually, you know, they have them not just at Christmas time now. You have all kinds of different inflatables. I have some different ones for different seasons, you know, ghosts and pumpkins and things and Easter bunnies. And I mean, they’re wonderful. They make, they’re so happy.
Here’s something I learned. First, when I try to set one up, I put it up on the ground. You lay it out there and you have these straps that you strap it down to the ground so it doesn’t blow away, right? Because it’s a big, it’s basically a giant air balloon and the wind comes along and you need to strap it down. So you put these straps down. So I’d lay it out on the ground and I’d think, well, this is how it’s going to be. So I put down the straps. And you know what? No matter how many times I’ve done it, if I do it that way, where I just kind of spread out on the ground and put down the straps, I never predict exactly how it’s going to fill and where the straps should be in relation to the inflatable. Here’s what I need to do. I need to turn the inflatable on, let it inflate, see where it’s going and then put down the straps. So I understand what it really needs.
Well, for us, the scriptures tell us where things are inflating to so we can put the straps down in the right place. For us, looking simply at history tells us a lot about what we truly need as well. We can see where our lives and every life is inflating to. And the question is, do I want to put the straps where I really need them? I’m going to put them into God.
We need to turn on the treasures we seek and see how they inflate. A lot of times we’re going to find out there’s giant holes in them and they don’t inflate at all. But what we’ll see is the outcome is obvious once it’s inflated. C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity said, “Aim at heaven and you will get the earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you will get neither.”
So often I aim at earth, but God calls us to aim towards him and in that we do just as these people did. Jesus told them, this is the work of God that you believe in him whom he has sent. And may we say what the people said in verse 34. They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” They came seeking earthly bread, just fill us up, don’t let us be hungry. Now they say, “Sir, give us the bread that will actually fill for life.”
Reminds me of the Samaritan woman in John chapter four. She encounters Jesus at the well. And here’s what she says at first, verse 15. The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, water from the well.” She’s been talking to Jesus. He says he has this eternal, she’ll never need more water. Give me this water so I will not be thirsty. You have to come here to draw water. She’s thinking what I need is not to have to come here every day and go through this, especially I’m an outcast in society. People don’t want to have anything to do with me. It’s embarrassing to even go there. Give me something so I don’t need that.
And Jesus says, well, how about something better? You don’t want physical water. You want eternal water. You want healing in your soul. And as she encounters Jesus truly, as she allows God to work, look what changes. Verse 39. Many Samaritans from that town believed in him. Why? Because of the woman’s testimony. “He told me all that I ever did.” That’s incredible. Here’s a woman who’s an outcast, a woman who’s rejected, a woman that goes to the well when everyone else has left so that people don’t even have to encounter her because she knows it’s just going to be unfortunate. It’s just going to be uncomfortable.
And she encounters Jesus and Jesus tells her he knows what her sins are. He tells her what she’s been through. He tells her about her brokenness and her hurts. And he says, I know who you are and I’m talking to you and I want to give you eternal water. I want to have relationship with you. And what does she do? She says, well, now I need to encounter these other people. I need to tell them because I realized I’ve been thinking about my earthly need. I don’t want to be embarrassed. I don’t want to be uncomfortable. I don’t want to have to do this work.
She says, I put these stakes in the ground. I see where my needs are inflating to and Jesus, I not only know that I need you, I want other people to know that too.
He redirects her aim. He redirects the crowd’s aim that comes to him seeking food. And when we see the best of the Christmas story, when we think about like the shepherds and their encounter with Jesus, what do we see? We see them having their needs redirected as well. Jesus offers us a better aim, friends, and that’s our calling every day. And certainly at Christmas time, as we think about this and we sing these carols and we see all the lights and the decorations, I mean, every one of them remind us of where things are really going and what Jesus offers us.
And we see those inflatables inflating up and say, God, I want my inflatable to be anchored to the ground of you in the exact places you say the stake should be, because I know that I need the better aim. I need you, Jesus.
That’s my prayer for myself, and it’s my prayer for all of you this Christmas time. Let’s come before God and ask that he would help us to have that aim.
Lord, so often I’ve struggled to have that aim. Jim led us in the time of confession earlier, and there’s always a boatload of things I could put there because I think I have the aims down, and oftentimes I make them sound very, very good, very necessary, very holy even. And yet, how often is it that I’m completely missing where you’ve called me to? Lord, would you remind me what I really need, what I really need today, what I really need tomorrow, what I really need every day is you. Would you help all of us to be reminded what we need every single day is you. Lord, would you give us the strength and the comfort that we need. It’s too hard on our own. We do thirst, and yet, Lord, would you give us that eternal water, and would you strengthen us for everything that’s ahead, that we might see where your kingdom is going, see where the directory of that inflatable is, and see that as we turn to you and as we anchor in you, something wonderful and beautiful.
We pray this in Jesus’ precious name. Amen.
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