Chapter 6:1. There are two parts quite distinct in chapter 6. In the first we have the Lord shadowed forth in His glories, in connection with the earthly people, as Prophet, Priest, and King. Psalm 132 is often referred to in connection with this: “I will abundantly bless her provision, I will satisfy her poor with bread” (vss. 26, 27). Here we have the people in their unbelief. Jesus answered them, and said, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek Me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life.” So in John 5:39-40: “Ye search the scriptures,”; yet “ye will not come unto me that ye might have life.” Then He goes on in the fullness of His grace. As in Matthew 11, where the rejected One speaks out of the depths of His personal and moral glories, (“No one knows the Son but the Father.” “I am meek, and lowly in heart.”) “Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” Here (John 5:40) He says, “I have eternal life for you, and a fourfold testimony to the truth, and you will not come!” What comes out next? Having refused Him as the Light and Life, they add to it their rejection of Him as the Jehovah of Israel. Do not you feel the need of the Holy Ghost to lead our souls to the full appreciation of a grace that yields to no rejection, until all has been tried in vain? They saw this great sign, and said that He was a prophet. Then they wanted to make Him a king. All these things are in connection with Israel, though His priestly place extends beyond Israel (as His atoning death), And not for that nation only, etc.
Verses 15-21. “When Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take Him by force to make him a king, he departed again into, a mountain Himself alone.” While He is praying on the mount, a figure of His heavenly place of intercession (a reality, of course), they are on the sea — it is a figure of the remnant. It is a beautiful picture of intercession in heaven. In Matthew 14 you get this scene developed. Why not here? I believe the reason is, because John’s object is always to bring out the personal glory and greatness of Christ. “It is I”; that was enough to still every fear, for God Himself was in that. They see Him walking on the sea. Who but God could do that? That is the thought of the Spirit here. It is a divine Person. The act reveals the Person. “Who is able to remit sins except God alone?” they say, in Mark 2: “But that ye may know that the Son of Man has power on the earth to remit sins,” he says to the paralytic, “To thee I say, Arise, take up thy couch, and go to thine house. And he was raised up straightway, and, having taken up his couch, went out before them all; so that all were amazed, and glorified God, saying, “We never saw it thus.” His words, we may add, equally revealed the Person who was there — He was morally that which He uttered (John 8:25). With Him thoughts, words, and acts had their common source in the infinite depths of the divine nature. John is always bringing in a divine Person. The Holy Ghost, as far as we have gone, knows no other object than His Person. As Jehovah He fed the multitude. He does not say, “I am Jehovah”; but who else could feed five thousand men out of a few loaves and fishes? Who but God could walk upon the waters? Jehovah is a name of relationship. You do not say it is Jehovah that walked on the water — you say it is God.
There is a wonderful fullness in that scripture, Matthew 14:23-33: “When the evening was come he was there alone, but the ship was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with waves; for the wind was contrary,” and so forth. Those that were toiling in rowing represent the remnant, but Peter walking on the water represents Christians coming out of Judaism. It is a question of faith. Just like the one leper that came back to give glory to God, though there were ten cleansed, and the Lord had told them to show themselves to the priests, according to the prescribed order in Leviticus. One only saw beyond this, or had spiritual instinct to lead him to the feet of Jesus, giving God thanks. And he was a Samaritan stranger. He goes to Jesus, and the Lord sends him on his way in the liberty of salvation. He is, as to the spirit of that passage, in Christian position. The poor Samaritan stranger had found God in One poorer than Himself. What are priests and temples for such an one? This, too, is what Paul did, and the Jews that came out of Judaism — like Peter, they left the boat, as it were, to go to Jesus; their path was over troubled waters, but they never sank. He who drew them to Himself sustained them. Faith alone can travel by such a path; and there is none other, if one would follow Jesus. The Holy Ghost is bringing in a living Person — Christ — to supersede all these old things that were passing away. You get this in the history of the leper.
“Lord, if it be Thou” — (compare John 6:68 — “Thou hast the words of eternal life” ). You cannot get on at all unless you have Christ before your soul. That is the greatest proof to me that we are on divine ground, the confusion we get into when the eye is off Christ. We have left the boat. We have Christ, and the Spirit, and the word, but no boat, the port in view, if not gone to sleep. We have nothing but Christ. If our eye is off Christ, we cannot walk at all. When the Lord went into the ship, that is a figure of what it will be when the Lord joins the earthly people — all their troubles will be over. They worship Him as Son of God. But in the meantime what a perfect picture it is of our present position! We cannot get on unless our eyes are fixed on Christ, an evident proof that the place we are in is a divinely ordered one. It is the right place to get your feet upon the water, but you cannot get on if your eye is off Christ. Without Me, He teaches us, you can do nothing; yet, when we think of the activities of the Christian world, how few of all the things that are done in Jesus name are really done with Him. “Lord, if it be Thou,” said Peter, bid me come unto Thee” — his only Hope and Object. “Lord, to whom shall we go?” said the same disciple, upon another occasion; “Thou hast the words of eternal life” — “There is none beside Thee.”
Verses 26, 27. “Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek Me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled. Labor not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of Man shall give unto you, for Him hath God the Father sealed.”
Now we come to the second part, to the great foundation, Jesus presenting Himself in incarnation, in death, and pointing on to ascension. What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where He was before?
(vs. 62). He has become actual Man. It is not Christ occupying or filling an official relationship, but taking the place of Man to meet the need of man — not of Jews alone, or of Gentiles, but of the fallen creation, that had no resources in itself. It is the Son of Man giving meat that endures unto ever-lasting life, and sealed by God the Father. Remark this word “sealed.” God never sealed the first man, it is the second Man who is before us now. Him hath God not only sealed, but sanctified, sent, justified, accepted, and “glorified.” That is the Mighty One on whom help has been laid. There is Isaiah 42 also, “My servant whom I have chosen.” All these expressions (seven in number) refer to Him in His place of Manhood.
But this sealing by the Father, even God, when the Holy Ghost descended upon Him, is a very deep and precious truth, and has important bearings, besides its intrinsic sweetness and blessedness, as revealing at that moment the mutual relations of the divine Persons. It was when Jesus was praying (Luke 3) that the heavens opened to Him, the Spirit of God came upon Him, and in the voice out of the heavens the Father was heard proclaiming, “Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I have found My delight.” It was not sufficient to announce Him to others, the voice must reach Himself personally also. It is thus the Father calls attention to Him on the ground of His delight in Him in His personal relationship — His blessed ways before Him giving immediate occasion (so to speak) for this voice from the heavens which accompanied the sealing. The next time this voice was heard, it proceeded from the glory in the cloud, with the added word, “Hear Him.” It seems as though the Lord desired to invest His present testimony to them with all the authority of God — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — (the Son sealed of the Father by the Spirit), knowing its unspeakable importance to man, whose state for time and eternity depended upon the way in which he treated it, — “Unless ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in. you.” It was man’s side here — would he eat of the Bread out of heaven?
This solemn truth would have authority in their consciences as spoken by Him whom the Father had sealed. God — Father, Son, and Spirit — was revealed in that blessed and solemn scene. In John 5 the mighty sanction of this testimony was not the sealing, but that the Father had given to the Son, in His position amongst men, to have life in Himself, and so He quickened whom He would — (the dead heard the voice of the Son of God, and they that heard lived) — authority also to execute judgment (which was eternal in its results), because He was Son of Man. The conscience is exercised according to the manner in which Christ is presented to it. To Nicodemus He was a man come from God, and as such had authority in his conscience — he must “hear him,” even though he came by night for that purpose. The woman of Samaria thinks of Messiah, who, in His day, would tell them all things. The wonderful Stranger before her had already made His voice to be heard in her conscience; this brought forth fruit presently in, “Come, see a man who told me all things that I had ever done: is not this the Christ?” Her conscience had first been reached, then mind and heart, when the Father, seeking worshipers, is proclaimed. “I know that Messias is coming,” and “He will tell us all things.” She learns that Jesus is Messiah, and bears testimony to Him, according to the power of His word in her conscience, a powerful testimony, as the word shows us.
In John 5, He was giving divine life — He gave it as Son of God, but still in the place of Man; but here, as Son of Man, He is giving His flesh through death, to be fed on for the life of the world. The Father sealed, marked Him off. These are His great credentials. He is a divine Person, Bread of God out of heaven, giving life to the world, presenting Himself as the only Hope and only Object for man. It is thus, too, the Father ever presents Him: “Behold My servant, whom I have chosen,” etc., is heard again in, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I have found My delight; hear Him!” This is the voice from the glory-cloud. Moses and Elias must retire (see Luke 9) when Jesus, the Son, is there. The law and the prophets were until John, but not, even the greatest of those born of women can be heard when Jesus fills the scene. They depart, and Jesus is left alone; they see no one but Jesus only with themselves. He had just been manifested in the heavenly glory of the kingdom His face shone as the sun, and His garments were white as the light; but deeper truths than this are disclosed in this great scene — He receives honor and glory from the Father in that which the voice brought to Him from the excellent glory: This is My beloved Son, in whom I have found My delight.” Jesus was the Son of the Father, Object of His delight, and He was now alone — alone for them, they saw no one save Jesus with them — they saw no one else. May the Holy Spirit apply the bearing of all this to our souls!
In Matthew 12 how different was the scene! His face did not shine like the sun, nor did He stand in garments white as the light; no glorified men were His companions there, but poor sinners in their misery; and when they told it out to God, He was with them — alone for them also. Grace was poured into His lips, the fragrance of His garments was what came out here — it reached the courts above, even within the veil (so to speak), and brought the Father out. His voice from the opened heavens reveals the lowly One, the Friend of publicans and sinners, as His beloved Son, in whom He found His delight. The heavenly glory of the kingdom adds nothing to, nor does the lowliness of His place on earth take from or affect the glory and blessedness of His relationship to the Father — He is His beloved Son, the infinite All to Him. It is well to remember that His grace has given us, even now, to belong to that place where Christ is All and in all.