They said therefore to him, Lord, ever give to us this bread.
Jesus has just spoken of the bread of God that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. The crowd answers with what sounds like the perfect request. One question decides everything: did they want Christ, or only what He might hand out?
Their words are respectful and eager. But they reach no higher than the appetite that brought them to Him. The writers below quote an older translation, which reads "Lord" where the ESV reads "Sir."
Thinking only of the natural life, the people say, "Lord, always give us this bread." They had no sense of their spiritual needs. So they saw nothing of His glory and missed the meaning of His words.
They ask for a supply, not for a Person. You can enjoy a supply and still keep the Giver at a distance.
Yet these striking, life-giving words produce no real faith in these people, even though they ask, "Lord, give us this bread always" (v. 34). It was not Himself they wanted, but what He might give them. Could He not keep multiplying the loaves and fishes to satisfy them? They only confirm what He said in verse 26: they cannot hide their earthly mindedness at all.
Earlier a woman at a well asked Jesus for the water He was offering. This crowd asks for bread in almost the same way. So the difference between them cannot lie in the words.
At first their answer seems all you could wish for. Like the woman of Samaria they ask for the gift He had spoken of, and unlike her they do not expose their ignorance. "Lord," they say, "always give us this bread." Two cases can look so alike and still be completely different! And He who "knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man" could not be deceived.
They want bread handed over so that they need not depend on the Giver again. His reply, "I am the bread of life," refuses that arrangement.
This is their last effort to get what they were after — bread for this world, bread always. But unbelief is wrong in every way. It is life that God is giving, and nothing less meets the true need of man. And this life is in Christ, not from Him. It does not exist apart from Him, handed out from Him, so that anyone could have it independently of Him. In Him was life; in Him only is life found. He is the Bread of life.
The conversation has been about Israel in the desert, where God gave bread from heaven. The Lord's reply picks that up and closes it.
This awakened at least their natural desires, and they said, "Lord, always give us this bread." He answered with the words of our scripture. Turn to Exodus 16 and you will see that God gave the manna to satisfy the hunger of the people. In Exodus 17 water comes out of the rock to quench their thirst… So He declares that the manna and the rock that was struck were pictures of Himself, standing there in front of them, and that in Him they find their answer and fulfilment. That means anyone who receives Him has every craving and desire of the soul fully satisfied, and for ever. But, as the context shows, He can only be received as the manna after He is known in death.
The warmth in this verse does not last. The crowd learns that the bread is Christ Himself, given in death. Then their eagerness collapses.
The Bread that endures to eternal life was standing among them, and how eagerly they ran after the bread that perishes! They say: "Lord, always give us this bread." But they could only see it as bread to keep human life going here in this world. When they saw it was not this, it lost its interest for them… The disciples heard words of eternal life; the worldly-minded crowd heard "a hard saying" they would not listen to.
Writers differ over the request itself. Some see a real stirring of desire that soon cooled. Others see earthly-mindedness that could not stay hidden. All agree it stopped short of faith.
- Asked — They asked for bread; they did not ask for Christ. The request was for a supply He might keep handing out, not for the Person standing in front of them.
- Mistaken — Their words almost matched the Samaritan woman's. Yet the two cases were completely different. Right words are no proof of faith, and the Lord was not deceived.
- Corrected — Life is in Christ, not from Him. He does not hand it out apart from Himself, so no one can keep the gift and drop the Giver.
- Fulfilled — The manna fed hunger. The struck rock met thirst. He is the reality of both, and He satisfies every craving of the soul for ever.
- Refused — When they learned the bread was Himself, given in death, it lost its interest for them. The same words the disciples called words of eternal life, the crowd called a hard saying.
[And] Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life he that comes to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst at any time.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
But I have said to you, that ye have also seen me and do not believe.
They had watched Him feed thousands and followed Him across the lake. They had even asked Him to give them this bread always. The Lord answers by naming what was missing in them. His charge is not that they lacked evidence, but that they had it and remained unmoved.
The sight the Lord speaks of was not a glance. It took in everything He had done and everything He was, and still left them cold.
He Himself is the Bread of life, able to fully satisfy the need of every hungry and thirsty heart. Yet He sadly tells the Jews that they too had seen Him. That seeing of course takes in His works of power and grace, and every outward quality that proved His great glory. Still they did not believe. They saw no beauty in Him personally. Dense indeed is the darkness of mere materialism!
The crowd wanted another sign. The Lord refuses. A sign was never the road to the faith that saves. So He talks with them instead.
A miracle is not the proper or direct ground of divine or gospel faith — the faith the Spirit works, the faith that saves the soul. No. The faith that saves the soul takes hold of the Son of God in the way that only sinners convinced of their guilt and need do. It is knowledge that the conscience itself makes. All of John's Gospel has been showing us this. So in this very chapter the Lord does not work the miracle the crowd wanted. Instead He talks with them in a way that uncovers whether their conscience had been reached. Were they following Him as sinners who needed life, or only as an admiring and interested crowd?
These are not the words of a cold judge. They are the words of love that was offered and pushed away.
No language is as cutting as the language of rejected mercy, of love repulsed and slighted! Here was this blessed One. His errand to this world was nothing less than this: to be the expression of His Father's love and the Saviour of lost men! He carried His credentials in every gracious word from His lips and every action of His perfect, spotless life. The miracle of the loaves had drawn a crowd who followed Him across the lake from selfish motives. They admitted that they had "seen" Him. But sadly they "did not believe." When they understood that He was the bread of life, they showed plainly that this was not the food they had come for.
Being closest to Him made their unbelief worse, not better. And the point does not stop with that crowd.
Sadly, the crowd that saw Him had no faith in Him. Their privilege in seeing Him only added to their guilty unbelief. And there is more to add. The atoning work is now done. He is dead, risen and glorified, and preached among the nations. So it is a greater sin still where He is not believed on in the world.
This verse is the first of three refusals in John 6. Each time the Lord presents Himself in a new way, man turns from Him again.
Sadly, man left to himself rejects Christ when He comes as a man, just as later he rejects Him in death (verse 52) and as ascended (verse 66). The Lord has to say, "You have seen Me and yet do not believe."
He does not stop at the failure. The next words turn from what man would not do to what the Father will do.
Here we see the contrast between the breakdown of man and the steadfast, unchangeable will of the Father. In verse 36 Jesus said to those around Him, "You have seen Me and yet do not believe." At once He went on to add, "All that the Father gives Me will come to Me." Man, the responsible man, may fail, as he always has. But God's purposes will surely be accomplished. Hold this in the soul by the power of the Holy Spirit, and it will bring continual joy to our hearts. Through grace it gives us both strength and stability. It sets our feet upon a rock — the rock of God's power and love.
- Seen — their sight of Him took in His works of power and grace, everything that proved His glory. The problem was never a shortage of evidence.
- Unmoved — a miracle is not the ground of saving faith. Saving faith is the knowledge a conscience makes, and the Lord's words test whether anything had reached theirs.
- Wounded — the sentence carries the tone of mercy pushed away; they wanted another meal, not the One who gave it.
- Exposed — nearness makes guilt greater; it does not excuse it. The refusal repeats through the chapter: they reject Christ come as a man, then in death, then ascended.
- Answered — the Father's unchanging will meets man's breakdown at once, so the crowd's failure opens the way to a rock that does not move.