On Sunday, May 10, Pastor Rob Pacienza preached Part 2 in “The Gospel of John” sermon series. His text for the sermon was John 6:22-40. In this encouraging Mother's Day sermon about Jesus being our Bread of Life, Rob opened by sharing about the 1971 movie, Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory. Just like the children with the Golden Tickets who are given the opportunity to eat anything in Wonka's Chocolate Room, the 5,000 men (plus women and children) were not only fed by Jesus, but overwhelmed with more food than they could eat. But the next day, all of the food was gone and they were hungry again. So they looked for Jesus because their stomachs were empty and they just wanted something to eat.

The people wanted bread to fill their stomachs, but Jesus wanted to give them the Bread of Life. Jesus said to them, “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.” (v. 27) Of course they did not understand this, so they asked, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” (v. 28) Does this sound familiar? We are always looking for what we must do in order to gain eternal life. But Jesus answers all of us by saying, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” (v. 29) And this is the hardest work. Do we believe in ourselves or do we believe in God? Our work for God or God's work for us?

Why are we never satisfied? Why are we always exhausted? Why are we discontent? Why are we always searching? Why are we always running to the next best thing? Because our lives are hungry! Jesus gives us the answer, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” (v. 35) Jesus is the only thing that can ever truly satisfy the hunger and thirst of our lives. Our problem is that we are looking to be filled by 100 different people and 100 different things other than Jesus, and we wonder why we are always left empty! But the good news for us today is that Jesus has fully satisfied God on our behalf, so that our lives can be fully satisfied in Jesus.

And just like Charlie Bucket, we not only win a lifetime supply of chocolate, we also get the entire Chocolate Factory!

 

Other sermons in this series:

The Gospel of John | Series
The Gospel of John | Audio
The Gospel of John | Video