Christ participated in four Passover celebrations during His short, three and a half year ministry on earth. Early in His ministry, He cleansed the Temple in Jerusalem by overthrowing the tables of the money-changers proclaiming, "My Father’s House is a house of prayer for all people, but you have made it a den of thieves." This first Passover seemed to be a critical event at read more...
Jesus was going about doing good. He authenticated His claim to be Israel's Messiah through the many signs and wonders He performed... in fulfilment of Bible prophecy. People wondered if He was the coming great Prophet about whom Moses spoke. Like Moses, He fed the people in the wilderness and promised to save them from their sins... and so great multitudes followed Him... wondering if He could be the promised Son of David.
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Whenever we think of the word 'work' it brings to the mind some activity that we have to DO. As good Christians we want to work for the Lord and indeed, we are called to do His work. We desire to be good and faithful servants, workmen who will not be ashamed when we stand before Him. And the Bible tells us that we are His workmanship who have been created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God has already prepared for us.
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Too often today, men and women are seeking to gratify their short-term physical desires at the expense of their eternal, spiritual needs.
Too many believers today are seeking to gratify their carnal lusts and excite their flesh, their feelings, and their emotions with sights and signs, miracles, wonders, and worldly 'hip' and 'hype' at the expense of true, spiritual satisfaction, which alone comes from knowing the Lord Jesus read more...
During His earthly ministry, Christ taught the multitudes that He was the promised Messiah. He authenticated His claims through many signs and wonders, such as the feeding of the 5000. The supply of bread and fish satisfied the crowd's physical hunger and excited their carnal cravings, but they neglected to understand the deeper meaning of this miracle of Jesus.
Knowing that the Lord had crossed to the other side of the Galilee read more...
Physical hunger requires food for the body, but spiritual hunger requires spiritual food for the soul and Christ had just announced that He is the Bread of Life, the spiritual food that came down from heaven. Jesus had just made the first of many earth-shattering 'I AM' statements that announced His Messianic authority and proclaimed His eternal deity. He expands this truth by announcing: "All those that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who read more...
Jesus gave a detailed discourse about the Bread of Life to the same multitude who had just partaken of the five barley loaves and two small fishes. Throughout His ministry, Jesus was teaching the people that He had been sent from God to carry out the will of the Father. He taught that He alone is able to satisfy the hungry soul and provide for our bodily needs. He was proclaiming to be the promised Messiah, Who had come in fulfilment of Scripture.
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Throughout the Gospel of John, we find that both the unsaved crowds and Christ's own believing disciples misunderstood His teaching, and substituted a physical interpretation on important spiritual truths. Christ was the promised Messiah and his signs and wonders authenticated His claims, and yet His word was not believed. Five times the Lord told the crowds that He had: "Come down from heaven," but they would not hear and believe.
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It is our Christian duty to proclaim the gospel of grace to a world that is dead in sin and without hope of salvation. However, it is not our responsibility, to save people - to get a person 'saved'. That role is reserved for the Holy Spirit, Who is in the world to convict the unsaved sinner of sin, of righteousness, and of judgement. Every man has the choice to come into the light of the gospel or remain in spiritual darkness.
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Jesus set the stage for His important teaching on the Bread of Life by feeding a multitude of 5000 men, besides women and children, with 5 barley loaves and 2 small fishes. Although God is our great Provider Who supplies all our bodily needs and the daily necessities of life according to His great goodness, His greater provision is the gracious offer of the salvation of our soul, the redemption of our body, the forgiveness of our sin, and life everlasting.
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The Lord Jesus used the feeding of the 5000, in John chapter 6, to teach the powerful truth about God's plan of salvation for mankind, to clarify His heavenly origin and Messianic claim, to correct some flawed beliefs that had developed in Israel, and to announce some very precious promises for all who would believe in Him.
Jesus graciously fed a great multitude of hungry people with 5 small barley loaves and 2 tiny fishes, read more...
The apostle John had written his Gospel in order that we may know and believe that: "Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that by believing we may have life in His name." And although the written Scriptures, the Messiah, and God's plan of redemption was to come through the Jewish nation, God in His grace knew that for a time Israel would have to be set aside for a time, due to unbelief. The Church, which is the Body of Christ, would have to be formed read more...
Jesus is the Living Bread Who not only has Life in Himself, but is the giver of Life and Who gave His Life as a ransom for many. Jesus is the Bread of Life, in Whom is life-everlasting. He is the eternal God of all gods, Light of all lights, and Life of all life.
Jesus is the divine Bread from heaven Who came to earth in the likeness of sinful man in order to give His sinless life as the ransom price for the sin of the world. The read more...
When Adam, the progenitor of the human race, sinned against the living God, fellowship with his Creator was broken forever, and fallen man was eternally separated from God by sin. But in His omniscience, God already knew of man's ruinous choice, and so before the foundation of the world He planned to give His dearly beloved Son to be the only acceptable ransom for the sin of the world. And when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a read more...
On a number of occasions, the disciples were challenged to give an answer for what they thought about Jesus Christ. Early in His ministry, it was revealed to Peter by the Spirit of God, that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of the living God. But as time passed, Christ's teachings became increasingly challenging to the Jewish mindset. In His earthly ministry, Christ was only sent to Israel, but His true mission was to include the whole world.
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The Gospel of John is the only New Testament book that is specifically written to unbelievers. Indeed, in chapter 20, we discover the reason that John wrote his gospel: "These things are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God," he wrote, "and that by believing, ye might have life through His name."
Faith must be in the read more...