The Greatest of Miracles

John 6:29-30

Jesus replied, “This is the work of God-that you believe in the One he has sent.” “What sign are you going to do so we may see and believe You?” they asked. “What are you going to perform?

                  In the two verses above we see a group of people asking Jesus for a sign to prove that he really is the Son of God. But let’s put this in context of what all is happening in chapter 6. Jesus has just taken 5 loaves of bread and two fish and feed 5,000 men and in response to this miracle the people wanted to make him king, but he knew their intentions and left them and headed for Capernaum. This is where the people who just saw him turn 5 loaves and 2 fish into a meal big enough for thousands of people want to see him do more.

                  Jesus is trying his best here in John 6 to get the people to see and believe that He really is the Son of God and He has come to save them. He keeps repeating that He is the bread of life, He is the manna that came from heaven, but the people won’t believe it. They want more. They need more evidence, as if feeding 5,000 wasn’t enough, they want another miracle the next day like that will make them believe for sure.

But a lot of the time we can be just like these people we read about in John 6. How many of us has begged God to give us this promotion, take away this physical pain or ailment, or make these test results come back clear and then we will live our lives for Him? I know that I have tried to bargain with God like that before, telling Him if he could just answer this one little prayer that I would devote my whole life to do whatever he wanted. But what we are missing here is that God has already performed a miracle for us. Just like Jesus had already multiplied the loaves and fish, he has already taken care of us in the most miraculous way. God sent His One and Only Son to live a perfect life for us, die on a cross for our sins, and raise again on the third day so that we can have hope of resurrection after death.

When we forget how big a deal it is for God to take something dead and bring it to life, (meaning us spiritually dead before salvation and alive once we are saved. Ephesians 2) then we cheapen God into some sort of magician who should answer our every request simply to prove he is still there. What more of a sign do we need than God making the old things pass away and new things to come (2 Corinthians 5:17) for us to believe that God performs miracles every day?

So what happens when we make those types of bargains with God that if he just makes this disease go away, or this harsh boss to get transferred, or for our kids to get their lives straight doesn’t get answered the way we want it to? Well usually we get angry and upset with God. We think that he doesn’t care about our lives. That he has just forgotten about us down here. But that is not true, God is a part of every part of your life. He feels your pain. Remember that death on the cross. That didn’t feel good on any level. It hurt God physically, emotion, psychologically, and spiritually. We serve a God that has suffered in every way that we have.