We want the bread to be the bread and not some kind of metaphor for God. When I am in debt, I want money. If I’m facing a hard circumstance, I want a solution. If I’m in a hard battle, I want victory. If I’m hungry, I want bread. I want God to provide all these things. All the while, God simply wills to provide himself. Jesus is the answer. And the answer might not involve a windfall of money to get out of debt or a solution to the problem or a victory in the battle. That’s a problem. I really don’t so much want Jesus as I want help.

Jesus can spot that from a mile away.

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.”

We want Jesus to help us more than we want Jesus to have us. In our shortsighted desperation, what we don’t realize is help in this situation or that one is only a Band-Aid, a temporary fix. Jesus is himself the eternal solution. Watch this:

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. (v. 35)

We look for solutions when we need a Savior. Jesus is not God’s solution to all of our problems. Jesus is God’s gift of himself to us. It sounds cliché to say, but the old adage comes to mind: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you have fed him for a lifetime.”

Give a person the answer to their prayer, and you help them for a time. Teach a person to abide in Jesus, and you have changed his life forever.

Jesus can solve our problems and, at times, he will. This is not his primary concern. Jesus cares most about becoming our life, our hope, our love, our joy, our all-in-all.

It sounds simple, but it will be the hardest thing we ever do—to entrust ourselves completely, unreservedly, and continuously to Jesus. This is the path of discipleship. True maturity does not come from pleading for answers to our prayers but from desperately seeking the one who answers.

And isn’t it a little bit more than amazing (and ironic) when on the night he would give himself up for us he took bread from the table, gave thanks to God, broke the bread and said, “Take, eat. This is my body which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 

Just wow! It’s why I call it, “Wonder Bread!” 

PRAY

Abba Father, we thank you for your Son, Jesus, who is himself the answer to our prayers. Grow us up to want Jesus more than we want our problems solved, to love him for who he is beyond what he can do for us. Come, Holy Spirit, and give us this bread. We pray in Jesus’s name, amen.

JOURNAL

How do you relate to this point of desiring Jesus more than you want him to solve your problems? What will it take to grow in this kind of maturity? How might we get to the place where we can say, “Jesus, I will love you and cling to you even if you don’t solve my problems”? What, if anything, holds you back from this kind of faith?

SING

Today, we will sing “My Faith Looks Up to Thee” (hymn 351) from our Seedbed hymnal, Our Great Redeemer’s Praise.

For the Awakening,

J. D. Walt

John David (J. D.) Walt Jr. is the Sower-in-Chief for Seedbed and the pastor of the Gillett Methodist Church in Gillett, Arkansas. 

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