What must we do to satisfy God?

Once the crowd realized that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum in search of Jesus. When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, "Rabbi, when did you get here?" 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.  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."

Then they asked him, "What must we do to do the works God requires?" Jesus answered, "The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent."

So they asked him, "What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do?  Our forefathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written: `He gave them bread from heaven to eat.' "

Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven.  For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."

"Sir," they said, "from now on give us this bread." Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty".

In today’s Gospel lesson, the people ask Jesus a question as old as time itself: What must we do, to do the works God requires?  When God created Adam and Eve, He made them perfect—perfect in body, perfect in mind.  They knew what God expected of them.  Yet despite this knowledge, they disobeyed the God who had given them life, given them love, given them paradise.  They knew what God wanted them to do, but they made a different choice.  As a result, they were cursed.  Because they had chosen sin over God, the Almighty Lord took away their immortality.  Life would be hard, and eventually come to an end in death. 

But worst of all was the separation from God.  Sin had made it impossible for man or woman to come close to God physically or mentally.  Sin makes it unsafe for us to look at God or try to approach Him; His holiness is like a fire that reduces to ash anything tainted by impurity.  Sin also distorts our thinking; we find it impossible to understand God’s words or trust in His wisdom.  Sin has made God a stranger to us, and so people ask what must we do, to do the works God requires? 

As the years went by, as one generation gave way to the next, people drifted further and further away from the Lord.  Yet as ignorant as they were, they still knew that a higher power was in charge of the universe.  Life is filled with problems—crop failure and still birth, war and plague, earthquakes and severe weather.  In every age, men and women have understood their need for divine help in times of crisis.  But since God is unknown to them, they ask the question what must we do, to do the works God requires?  What must we do to make God happy so He will help us?  What must we do to earn God’s love and approval so that when we die He will take us to heaven?  What must we do?

Men and women have been asking this question for thousands of years.  Sadly, most of them have gone looking for answers in the wrong places.  There have always been people of God who could answer the question, people like Enoch and Noah, Abraham and Joseph, Moses and Samuel, David and Isaiah.  But most people have looked elsewhere when seeking an answer to the question what must we do to do the works God requires?  They turned to gods made up by human storytellers, gods like Osiris and Baal, Ishtar and Moloch, Zeus and Odin.  Many turn to people they regard as holy men, men like Mohammed and Joseph Smith.  Some turn to philosophy, like Scientologists and atheists.  Some seek the divine in nature, like witches and psychics.  Some even turn to Satan as they look for their answers. 

Such misguided behavior comes naturally to us; sin blinds us to God and the truth that He reveals.  Sin twists our thinking so that evil looks good and good looks evil.  Sin makes lies look reasonable and the truth seem foolish.  Paul spoke of this in 1st Corinthians chapter one: the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing…but…the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God's sight.  God’s people have been blessed with prophets who preserved God’s truth on paper, yet most dismiss these holy writings as unworthy of their time.

Which is not to say that God’s people fully understood His writings either.  We see that ignorance reflected in the question, what must we do to do the works God requires?  Think about that question.  It comes from an underlying assumption, and that assumption is this: ‘if God would just point us in the right direction, we can please Him with our lives.’  Sadly, nothing could be further from the truth.

Sin is more than just making the occasional bad choice.  Sin is an infection that sickens every fiber of your being.  Sin is a cancer that is rotting you away from the inside out.  Sin is a mental illness that distorts how you see the world.  When God calls you a sinner He’s not speaking of what you do, He’s speaking of what you are. 

St. Paul wrote nearly ½ of the New Testament, yet he was constantly troubled by his sinful desires. In Romans chapter seven he writes I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature…I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway.  In Psalm 14 King David wrote, The Lord looks down from heaven on the entire human race; he looks to see if anyone is truly wise, if anyone seeks God. But no, all have turned away; all have become corrupt. No one does good, not a single one!  Even the good deeds of Christians are tainted by sin; Isaiah writes (chapter 64), We are all infected and impure with sin. When we show off our righteous deeds, they are nothing but filthy rags.  The tragic fact is this: even if we know what God wants, we are incapable of doing it.

Which makes Jesus’ answer to the question so wonderful to hear: The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.  Believe in Jesus, the Savior sent from God.  That’s it.  That’s the one thing necessary to please God.  That’s the one thing necessary to secure His help with your problems and guarantee you a place with Him in heaven. 

But it seems too simple.  After all, we were taught that there’s no such thing as a free lunch.  If someone helps you, you owe them a favor.  If someone gives you a gift, they expect something of equal value in return.  Everything comes at a price or with strings attached; that’s the way of the world.  So when Jesus offers a relationship with God that demands nothing in return except our loyalty, it seems much too good to be true. 

So the Jews demanded proof from Jesus to back up His claim.  For hundreds of years, they had worked hard to obey the Laws given by Moses.  Now Jesus was offering to simplify their lives in a way that seemed almost scary—stop relying on your own efforts to be good and trust in Jesus to make everything right.  But if they were going to trade loyalty to Moses for loyalty to Jesus, they wanted some kind of proof that Jesus was just as great as Moses—if not more so. They asked him, What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do?  Our forefathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written: `He gave them bread from heaven to eat.'  As they looked at things, Moses’ ability to provide bread in the desert over a 40 year span of time was proof that he was a holy man who should be listened to, who had the power needed to care for the people of God.

Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven.  For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.  With these words, Jesus corrects their false ideas about Moses.  Moses was not a leader of Israel because he was a holy man; Moses was not a miracle worker because he was a holy man.  Moses was a sinner like everyone else.  Moses committed murder. Moses told God that he didn’t want to lead the people of Israel.  Moses let anger take control of him several times during his years as God’s representative.  Moses was not a man who pleased God with a holy, blameless life.

The reason that Moses led the Israelites was because God told him to.  God gave Moses the words to say as His earthly representative.  When God performed miracles to bless His people, He used Moses as His agent.  Moses did not deserve any credit for doing miracles or speaking words of wisdom; those gifts came from God.  Moses was not special because he led a holy life; Moses was special because he trusted God. 

Which brings us back to Jesus’ words: The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.  Moses had faith in the Lord, and God used that man of faith to do great things for the Israelites.  Through Moses, God freed them from slavery in Egypt.  Through Moses, God told them what God expects and how to be forgiven when they failed to measure up. Through Moses, God fed the Israelites in the wilderness and protected from their enemies. Through Moses, God led His people to the Promised Land. 

But at the end of his life, Moses made this prediction: The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him (Deuteronomy 18:15). The prophet Moses was speaking of would be Jesus, the Son of God born in this world as a man to save us from our sins.  Like Moses, God would work through Jesus to free us, to forgive us, to feed us, and finally lead us to paradise.  Jesus lived the life of perfect obedience that God expects from each of us.  Jesus broke Satan’s hold on us so we are no longer slaves to his desires.  Jesus suffered for our sins so we can be forgiven and spared God’s awful punishment for being sinners.  Jesus gives us strength to withstand adversity by feeding our souls through Word and Sacrament.  Jesus rose alive from the grave, guaranteeing our resurrection to a new life of eternal happiness.  What God did through Moses is only a pale shadow of what God has done for us through Christ.

Jesus did everything necessary to purge us of our sins and bring us into God’s beloved family.  The work is completely done; nothing is required from us except to believe.  After all He went through on our behalf, you would think that Jesus might demand some compensation from us.  But Jesus is the Son of God; His love is not flawed by sin like our love is.  Even with friends and lovers, we deal in the trade of favors; relationships break down when one person feels that he is getting the short end of the stick.  But the love of Christ is free of selfishness; our Lord demands no payback for His suffering on the cross.  As Paul writes in Ephesians 2:8-9, it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. 

From the time when sin clouded the human mind in darkness, people have asked what must we do to do the works God requires?  This question shows how sin has made us ignorant of God.  This question reveals the wrong assumption that if we just knew what to do, we could please God with our words and earn His favor by our actions.  Thankfully, Jesus has answered the question: The work of God is this—to believe in the one he has sent.  We need God’s help to face the tragedies of life and not be crushed by them; we need God's help in order to escape the grave and live joyfully forever.  Thankfully, we don’t need to bribe Him with our time or money; we don’t have to climb a mountain and live in a cave, spending the rest of our days as hermits alone in prayer.  Jesus provides everything we need; all He demands in return is our love and our trust.