Reflections on John 6:16-21
In the verses prior to our reading, John tells us that the crowd had started following Jesus because of the signs he was doing for the sick. Then, following Jesus’ feeding of the five thousand, they become convinced that he was a prophet in the tradition of Moses – a prophet/leader who was able to communicate directly with God and, therefore, whose commands need only to be obeyed and they would be restored to the land of promise. A land of peace. A land of plenty.
John tells us that this hope, framed within the crowds existing worldview, grew quickly into a vison of Jesus as a saviour king who would free them from the Roman invaders and restore them to the land. God’s kingdom on earth…, or so the common understanding of the day would have it.
This faith-view framed Jesus as a certain kind of teacher and a certain type of leader – giving rise to a particular hope and particular expectations. But when these failed to materialize, Jesus, it was concluded, wasn’t worth following after all and many of the crowd, we find out later, simply turned round and left.
For the twelve disciples, however, their experience on the lake framed Jesus altogether differently. The disciples experienced Jesus not as one like Moses, but as the ‘I Am’ whom Moses encountered in the burning bush – The One who is immanent in all and transcendent over all. A point John doubles down on by narrating Jesus’ dominion over the elements and his power to drive out fear.
This embodied encounter frames Jesus in such a way that when the twelve are later asked, ‘why do you not leave me’. They replied, ‘Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life’. The disciples experience had framed Jesus as ‘life eternal’. Life in all its potential. Life in all its actuality. Life in all its fullness. There was, therefore, nowhere else for the disciples to go.
That the disciples in their day, and we in ours, encounter The One who is immanent in all and transcendent over all as The One who simultaneously breathes words of comfort – I Am: do not be afraid – is the source of all peace and all joy. Now and for evermore. Amen.