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What Are You Following?[1]
Scripture Reading: John 6:56-69
Rev. Young Tae Choi
August 22, 2021
Prayer
Holy Spirit, pour out upon us wisdom and understanding,
That, being taught by you in Holy Scripture,
Our hearts and minds may be opened to receive
All that leads to life.
Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
Sermon
Imagine a hurricane was striking Greater Vancouver right now. This storm at sea was causing large waves, heavy rain, floods, and high winds, disrupting the international airport at the port of Vancouver, and causing shipwrecks as well. On land, its strong winds were also damaging vehicles, the UBC campus, and the Lions Gate, and nearly everything left outside as well. The storm surge was making landfall at Stanley Park. If this hurricane was a deadly Category five hurricane, like Hurricane Katrina, the most notorious storm of the 21st century, it would be really hard for anyone to survive.
However, there is an ironically calm spot in a hurricane, that is the eye of the hurricane. It is the calmest part at the center of strong hurricanes, typically 30–65 km in diameter. If we were there, in most cases, we would see clear sky without wind. How would you feel if you were standing there in the calm, not on the surface of the storm, where it was dangerous?
These two contrasting images of the hurricane seem to represent a pattern we face in churches today: Some people end up leaving the Christian faith as they are being swept along by strong, cultural storms affecting the Western world, such as materialism or skepticism; others stay with Christ faithfully as if looking up at the clear sky calmly in the midst of chaos.
We encounter these two groups of people in the text we just read, too. In John chapter six, well-known for the discourse on the bread of life, we find that there is another group of disciples following Jesus, besides the twelve disciples. This crowd is quite different from Jesus’ eleven disciples (I say eleven here because Judas was one of the Twelve with Jesus but did not truly believe in Him) in the sense that they are spiritually blind, so they cannot see Jesus as the promised true manna, the One that can feed them with spiritual food.
They follow Jesus and see His amazing miracles such as healing the sick and feeding a huge crowd with five barley loaves and two fish on the mountain. They also eat the miraculous food there. Being impressed by the sign, they think that Jesus is the prophet they have been expecting for many years. So, they are ready to force Him to be their king.
Yet, Jesus does not want to be their earthly king. He slips away into the hillside by Himself and the next day, Jesus and His twelve disciples move down to Capernaum. Once the multitude sees that neither Jesus nor the Twelve are there, they get into boats and go across to Capernaum to look for Jesus. In fact, Jesus Himself knows their wrong motivation for following him. Jesus points out that what they are really looking for is physical food and a king who can take care of their needs, not for what the miracles actually point to–Jesus His very self.
They even attempt to manipulate Jesus for their own purpose, asking, “Show us a miraculous sign if you want us to believe in you. What can you do? After all, our ancestors ate manna while they journeyed through the wilderness! (v. 30)” Jesus then replies, “Moses didn’t give you bread from heaven. My Father did. And now He offers you the true bread from heaven. The true bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world…I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever…Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him” (vv. 32-34, 51, 56).”
Although Jesus clearly discloses Himself as the true manna that can give them eternal life, even after feeding them with enough food, they neither get the point nor believe in Jesus. They say, “This is very hard to understand. How can anyone accept it?” (v. 60). Jesus sees unbelief in them and then says: “You haven’t believed in me even though you have seen me… This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled them” (vv. 36, 65).
In the end, they turn back and no longer follow Jesus. They might conclude that Jesus is not the one who can satisfy all their desires. They simply followed their own interests. In other words, they lose not only because of their own lack of faith but also because the father was against them from the start.
After the fickle disciples fell away, Jesus turns to the twelve and asks, “Are you also going to leave? (v. 67)” Simon Peter replies, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words that give eternal life. We believe, and we know you are the Holy One of God” (vv. 68-69). He is confessing what he has been given to see and believe although he might not have truly understood the preceding conversation. Peter’s reply serves as a confession of allegiance in contrast with those who abandoned Jesus.
Here, we should pay attention to the verb “believe” that Peter uses. Because this word, “believe,” is the key to understand Jesus’s metaphors in this discourse on the bread of life. Several metaphors Jesus employs and extends in chapter six, such as “true bread from heaven,” “the bread of life,” and “eat my flesh and drink my blood,” all actually point to the same response – believe in Me as the Savior, the Holy One whom the Father has set apart. I am the only One who can deal with the sin of the world. So, Peter’s confession – “we believe and know you are the Holy One of God” – is an appropriate response to Jesus’s repeated invitation to life.
Furthermore, the verb “believe” and discipleship are closely interrelated. The verb “believe (pisteuo)” or its noun “faith (pistis)” in Greek is not simply trust or intellectual assent but rather wholehearted allegiance to something or someone. Rightly understood, faith signifies that one commits oneself to Jesus in complete confidence. In this sense, the “believing in Jesus” must come with action by entrusting everything to Him, and the reality of the faith is revealed through obedience to His words. Accordingly, believing in Jesus stands for becoming His disciples. No one can faithfully follow Jesus without the living faith. None of us can be Jesus’ disciples without the faith that is loyal to the Holy One of God.
The eleven disciples stay with Jesus and follow Him when many no longer follow Him. Their faith is like looking up to God through the clear sky at the centre of a strong hurricane.
In Canada, several strong, cultural hurricanes, strike churches from the inside and from outside today. They are many, many in different forms, such as materialism, individualism, relativism, skepticism, pluralism, and so on. Religious pluralism, for example, is a widely accepted-belief system, that all religions are equally true as if all religions climb up the same mountain toward the same top of it in different ways. This idea is a tough storm that hits the exclusive nature of the gospel of Christ. It makes the message of the gospel that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life sounds arrogant. In our pluralistic society allowing other religious beliefs, we are forced to be silent on proclaiming the gospel unconsciously. This message, like Peter’s confession of allegiance, could be offensive and be rejected by anyone who is not in Christ. They may say “How can anyone accept it?”
Inside the church, another example, grace-ism weakens the life of the church. It oftentimes whispers in our ears that you don’t have to do a thing; you don’t have to “work out your salvation with fear and trembling; Since it’s all been done for you, just sit back and relax and abuse the unconditional grace of God. This understanding of the grace of God is partially true but not sufficient. Grace-ism is another expression of cheap grace, which means acceptance of God’s grace in salvation without the desire to repent of sin or live a joyful life of obedience in Christian discipleship. It fosters a Vampire lifestyle, the one that keeps sucking up Jesus’ blood without responding to the grace of God through real behavioral change – a life of gratitude, praise, and allegiance to Jesus as the Lord of one’s life. Cheap grace thus takes away the vitality of the church by gradually reducing the importance of discipleship.
Amid those storms, I am not surprised to witness that many churches are struggling to survive, either becoming empty castles or becoming like a local community centre that never speaks of the cost of grace.
One thing is clear: Some may turn away from Jesus if they are like the unfaithful followers looking for something other than Jesus. Others will continue staying with Jesus, just like the eleven disciples whom God the Father led to His Son (and with whom God will continue His redemptive mission).
So, where are we in the ongoing hurricanes that challenge our faithfulness these days? Are we being swept away by the strong winds of the hurricane? Do we also want to leave Jesus? Or, are we in the eye of the storm, looking to Christ with sustained attention, faith-fully? What or who are we following now?
Before closing my sermon, I would like to read for you part of the letter from leaders in the underground church in Afghanistan.[2] You will see clearly where their attention is in a horrific, deadly storm around their context.
What we are witnessing right now is the decimation of the country and people of Afghanistan. We are watching twenty years of work and the strengthening of a nation being destroyed in a single day. The Taliban has a hit list of known Christians they are targeting to pursue and kill. The US Embassy is defunct and there is no longer a safe place for believers to take refuge. All borders to neighboring countries are closed and all flights to and from have been halted, with the exception of private planes. People are fleeing into the mountains looking for asylum. They are fully reliant on God, who is the only One who can and will protect them
. The Taliban are going door-to-door taking women and children. The people must mark their house with an “X” if they have a girl over 12 years old, so that the Taliban can take them. If they find a young girl and the house was not marked they will execute the entire family. If a married woman 25 years or older has been found, the Taliban promptly kill her husband, do whatever they want to her, and then sell her as a sex slave.
Husbands and fathers have given their wives and daughters guns and told them that when the Taliban come, they can choose to kill them or kill themselves—it is their choice.
Global Catalytic Ministries (GCM)…is taking an active stance in prayer, support, and advocacy for our brothers and sisters—many of whom have been serving as leaders as the Afghanistan church grows at a historic rate (second only to Iran right now). Although people are heading for the hills, many want to stay in the country and continue to advance the Gospel; however, we will relocate those who need to be secured. GCM’s stance has always been and will be to do whatever is necessary to move the Gospel forward. Our brothers and sisters in Afghanistan continue to inspire us with their boldness and resolve in their darkest hour…
Please pray for the Afghan Church to have strength and endurance.
This should be our prayer today:
O Lord, to whom shall we go?
We believe you are the Holy One of God.
We give you our lives.
May our hearts, our minds, and our desires be yours.
May our hands and feet and voices
Move as you would choose.
May our moments and days
Flow in endless praise.Amen.
[1] This sermon is an updated version of the sermon, “In the Eye of the Hurricane,” I had preached to Kerrisdale Presbyterian Church, 2017.
[2] https://www.faimission.org/wire/afghanistan-official-statement-underground-church
Preached by the Rev. Young Tae Choi on August 22, 2021
at Richmond Presbyterian Church.