Doing the Work of God

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN

DOING THE WORK OF GOD

John 6:25-29

25 When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, "Rabbi, when did you get here?" 26 Jesus answered, "I tell you the truth, you are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. 27 Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. On him God the Father has placed his seal of approval." 28 Then they asked him, "What must we do to do the works God requires?" 29 Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent." 

NIV

It always seems that Jesus does not directly answer a question, but rather speaks to the heart of the issue. That is what he did with Nicodemus and he is doing the same thing here. They asked him when he got here, but he did not tell them but spoke to their reason for searching him out. Who had ever seen such a miracle? One man takes a few little fish and a couple loaves of bread and feeds thousands of people and then has leftovers. Who wouldn't want to stick around, maybe he will give them something else or feed them again? Jesus speaks right to the issue. All they were concerned with was their temporal stomach, or the things of the world, working for food that spoils. Jesus just gave them food for their stomach and now he is telling them to work for food that will endure to eternal life, which he will give them. He just proved he could give them food that spoils, so why would they not believe he could give them food that leads to eternal life? Wow, just think, we can have food for our stomach and food that gives us eternal life! This is the best of both worlds. But Jesus is referring to only one world, his kingdom. Don’t spend your efforts on the temporal, spend them on the eternal. Ok then, what do we have to do in order to do the work God requires in order to have this food that leads to eternal life? Believe in Jesus. That seems way too simple. Don’t we have to do anything else? No, that is it, just believe in Jesus and we have eternal life. Wait, just a second, God requires all sorts of good deeds from us. God wants us to witness, he wants us to love each other, he wants us to give, he wants us to stop sinning, he wants us to give up all sorts of things and start doing all sorts of things. He wants us to go to church every Sunday, well maybe not so much, because we invented Sunday, God only invented the Sabbath. Well, maybe there are many things as believers we should do and some things we should not do, just out of our love for God, but all of that is not the work of God. Sometimes some believers get confused about the work God has prepared in advance for us to do. How can he make it any simpler? The work he prepared in advance for us to do is believe in the one he sent, Jesus. That was and is the plan of God from before the foundation of the earth. There is more to this conversation between Jesus and the crowd, but this is enough for now. Just to think about the fact all we need to have eternal life is to believe in Jesus. Now that does not just mean to believe Jesus existed once, but it means to put our faith in Him, to trust Him, to accept Him as our Lord and Savior, that believing in Him is the one and only way we are going to get to heaven for all eternity. This is not about Jesus plus something else. It is just about believing in Jesus. It is about doing the work of God.