Gathering Fragments
Having witnessed the miracle of the Bread from Heaven (Article 8) we continue in Day 3 of John’s Creation by considering the curious actions that follow it.
When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.” So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten (John 6:12-13).
Why does Jesus command the apostles to collect together the fragments that are left over? Presumably not to demonstrate the magnitude of the miracle: the fact that a multitude has eaten their fill is evidence enough! We approach the answer by reminding ourselves of a relevant scriptural metaphor: bread is used to represent the word of God. The idea of a man being “fed” or “sustained” by the word of God is a scriptural picture with which we are familiar, and it underlines the fact that God’s Word should be seen as something nourishing (e.g. Matt. 4:4). The text of John’s gospel follows that trend precisely. Having entered Day 3 of John’s Creation, we find not only physical bread, but also spiritual bread in the form of God’s words in the extended teaching to the multitude that follows the feeding (John 6:26-65).
Consider the picture. Jesus is distributing physical bread on the mountainside to the multitude. Simultaneously, he is also distributing spiritual bread (i.e. the words of God which he is speaking) to the same multitude. As they are eating the physical bread, some crumbs fall to the ground and are not digested. Similarly, on the spiritual plane, while they are “eating” (i.e. listening to) the words that Jesus is speaking, some sentences will not be digested, either because the people were distracted at that moment, or because Jesus said something that was beyond the ability of the individual to comprehend. Here then comes the powerful part: at the end of the “meal,” Jesus instructs his disciples to walk around the area and pick up every fragment that has not been eaten!
What the disciples act out on the physical plane, gathering the crumbs together into baskets, should also be heeded on the spiritual plane: none of the words of God that Jesus had spoken to them (and us!) should be allowed to “fall to the ground” and not be fully digested with the rest of the message! How well this fits with the declaration of God: His words, which are best represented with the metaphor of sustaining bread, should never be allowed to fall to the ground and be wasted:
As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it (Isa. 55:10-11, see also I Sam. 3:19).
Thus Jesus gives the graphic demonstration that the provision of “bread” from God should be fully digested by instructing his disciples to gather the fragments, “that nothing be wasted” of those things that had not been heard.
We have proposed the reason that some of Jesus’ teaching was not digested was because it may not have been heard, but there is a more important problem. Parts of the spiritual bread were not attractive to the listener’s palate: which the multitude did not want to digest (John 6:60). Thus the people then (as now) merely consumed the portions that were attractive to them to obtain their fill, and discarded the fragments that were not attractive on the ground. How telling then that Jesus should instruct his disciples to walk all around the grounds and collect every crumb that had been eschewed! This is not fastidious litter collection — rather it is the demonstration of an important spiritual principle. The bread of God is not a meal at which we may pick and choose; and the point of “eating” at this table is not simply so one might be filled. Rather the whole meal must be digested: every truth appreciated, internalized and implemented.
With physical food we have a plateful before us and we eat the bits that we like and discard the rest, or perhaps merely eat until we are filled, and leave the rest. This is not appropriate behaviour with God’s word: those who begin the meal must eat it all, both the digestible and palatable, and the parts that are not, for the glory of the spiritual bread must lie with the Provider, and not the partaker.
The spiritual physique
This teaching impacts the way we consider Bible study. Too often Bible study is considered a “worthy” act or worse still, a necessary duty. By the pattern of John’s Creation we conclude rather that Bible reading is best understood as a hearty meal, and this utterly transforms our attitude towards the practice.
If Bible study is a duty, then some level of righteousness is earned from performing it, and some level of praise is due to the student for his application. Similarly, if Bible study is a worthy act then it becomes somewhat of an optional thing, to be followed only by those blessed with the “gift of study.” These viewpoints are well wide of the mark; Day 3 has shown us that the Bible, the Word of God, is food. By understanding Bible study as sitting down to a spiritual meal, our resulting attitude is guided in the most appropriate direction. No longer can the student be rewarded with praise for studying the Bible any more than he can be praised for sitting down to dinner. That does not suggest Bible study takes on the mendacity of a physical meal, but it does correctly show to whom thanks are to be given. We give thanks to God for His provision of physical food, and that is well (Ephesians 5:20), and now we learn that the same thanks should be offered for the spiritual food.
Similarly, no longer can Bible study be considered an optional extra any more than can eating physical food. If we desist from physical food, we become weak and sick, our physique eventually wastes away toward the point of extinction. In that weakness, we are reliant on the help of others, and are quite unable to help them; we are one in need of being carried, and certainly not one who could ever carry another. Be assured that our spiritual physique is no different. Without constant feeding on God’s word we become spiritually weak, directionless of mind and listless of spirit. Once again we become one who needs to be carried, rather than one who can support his brother. Thus we give thanks to God for the wonderful, strengthening meals that He provides in His word/bread from heaven.
Spiritual over natural
Having physically provided bread from heaven, Jesus now repeats the miracle on the spiritual plane, where he is himself the bread from heaven.
I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die (John 6:48-50).
In a pattern we see so frequently, the spiritual part, coming latterly, excels the former natural part. Within this chapter the physical feeding of the 5000 chronologically precedes the superlative revelation of Jesus as the bread of life. This principle is also true on the broader scale in the context of the history of God’s people. God provided physical bread (manna) from heaven through the hand of Moses, and excelled His provision with the revelation of Jesus Christ as the bread of life. The natural bread (manna) provided temporary sustenance in a mortal condition; the spiritual bread offers eternal life in an immortal condition. This spiritual bread is the body of Jesus Christ destroyed on the cross, and Christ himself establishes this symbol in this chapter.
I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world (John 6:51 also Matt. 26:26).
The concept of “home”: the apostles
At this declaration, the faith of some withers and they follow Jesus no more (John 6:66). Jesus then asks his disciples:
You do not want to leave too, do you? (John 6:67).
At first glance, the question seems to bear the familiar hallmarks of human self-sympathy: an over-exaggerated pathos derived from the disappointment of some walking away from him. Yet this is the Lord Jesus Christ we consider, so this cannot be the explanation. Rather, Jesus is putting forward a test, as he did to Philip at the beginning of the chapter where he tests whether or not the apostles realise that they are to assume the role of “those who feed” rather than “those who are fed” (John 6:6, see Article 8).
Yet why does Jesus now ask whether his disciples will leave him, when they have shown no sign of doing so? Clearly because leaving Jesus is precisely what they did do just the previous day! The previous day ended with his disciples attempting to row across the lake, going away from Jesus (John 6:16-17). They rowed away from him for the simple reason that they were going home — their idea of home was a geographical place (Galilee) where their domestic lodgings were located.
This idea is of paramount importance within the gospel, and is difficult to over-emphasize: the concept of “home”. The sixth chapter has a premier place in John’s Gospel because it contains (very subtly) a fundamental transition in the minds of the disciples, about how they view the concept of “home”. Simon Peter answers:
Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God (John 6:68-69).
Success! Peter leads the way in this fundamental transition of the disciples’ recognition of home. Up to this point of Jesus’ ministry, the apostles considered that “home” was Galilee. But Peter’s answer brokers the transition: his “home” is no longer a geographical location — it is by the side of his Lord and Master! For the remainder of the ministry of the Lord Jesus, we will see that “home” for the apostles is identified in this way.
The concept of “home”: us
Yet all this is little more than interesting speculation unless we apply it in our own lives, that most sensitive of domains to regard! We who have come beyond the water partake in the miracle of bread from heaven each Sunday morning, and truly there is a multitude of brothers and sisters that this spiritual bread feeds each Sunday. Now we must also address the most fundamental challenge of this chapter: once the miracle is passed, where will we go? Where, truly, is home? Will we silently thank our Master kindly for his wonderful company in which we were so privileged to share, and then row back across the very waters whose crossing brought us to him? Is the trip to this particular mountainside still just a “day out”: some novel experience atypical to our lifestyle? Or does the company of the people in our local ecclesia, with whom we can best hope to share the Master’s company, truly feel like “home?”
Perhaps, if truth were told, we would say of our time in the ecclesia: “I don’t really feel like I belong there.” Worse still, we might even offload our own shortcoming to others, saying: “Other people don’t make me feel like I belong there,” — though we should have no time for such evil-spirited self-sympathy. We must clearly allow this chapter, the sixth of John, to rebuke us, educate us, and most of all to encourage us, into being able to make that remarkable transition which the apostles, led by the declaration of Peter, did those many years ago. And this declaration does not merely bloom in that most inadequate of flowers — increased attendance at meetings — it strives for much more! It drives towards true spiritual growth: the cultivation for ourselves of a true “home” within the family of God, to the end that, were we to be questioned by Jesus at the end of each memorial service: “Will you also go away now?” we could honestly and innocently reply: “No Lord, for here is family. Here is home. Where else would I go?”
Conclusions from Day 3
This portion of John’s Gospel clearly mirrors the third day of creation. We find elements of the natural creation in the provision of physical bread in the feeding of the 5000, which draws our attention to the creation pattern. Once again, we find that the Gospel of John is not merely repeating the natural creation, but presenting a sequence in super cession above it. Thus we meet the spiritual bread from heaven: Jesus Christ himself speaking the nourishing words of the Father. From this we also learn to regard our Bible study as the opportunity to build up our spiritual physique on fine and healthful food, and to give thanks before eating for the provision we have received.
John also chooses to bring our attention to the fact that the miracle of the feeding of the 5000 occurs at the time of Passover (John 6:4). This reminds us of his earlier introduction of Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29), and thus reinforces the representation of Jesus in this part of the gospel as one upon whom the world feeds in order to find salvation.
Our findings in this Day match the findings of Days 1 and 2 in the evidence of the excellence of the spiritual creation above the natural creation. Spiritual bread excels natural bread because natural bread provides only temporary (mortal) life, whereas spiritual bread provides everlasting life (John 6:49-50,58). Spiritual bread is also superior because of the constancy of its availability: natural bread is only available at certain times and seasons, whereas the bread from heaven (Christ) assures us that whenever he is approached (e.g. in prayer) he will never turn us away (John 6:37).
Finally, we learn from the example of the collection of the fragments that none of God’s words is to be ignored. The bread from heaven is not to be eaten merely until one is filled and has consumed all the parts that are found to be agreeable to one’s palate; rather it is to be ingested, and digested, in its totality. There is no fragment of God’s instruction that should ever be allowed to fall to the ground and be wasted.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One