A General Question that Becomes Personal

   Following up on the verses that I have read and written about the past few days, Jesus speaks with those who continue to stay close to Him to hear His words. Jesus knows the hearts of all those people, and knows the reasons each is still there. He also knows which do not actually believe what He is talking about, but are looking for something else. He hears their grumbling over not being able to understand, and so He gives them another thing to add to their questions as He talks about ascending back to heaven where He came from. Then He tells them that some of them do not believe and the reason is that they have not heard the call of God, but they follow for selfish reasons. After this many shook their heads and went home.

   When I see that crowd around Jesus, I see people who have been physically fed, I see people who have seen healing and perhaps been healed themselves, and I see people who have heard someone speak words that moved them in some way. In short, I guess I see people today, and I see them all sitting in church on a Sunday morning, knowing that perhaps this Jesus is someone special, but not truly understanding all that He has to tell them.

   The personal reasons why anyone chooses to identify with the Christian Church are many and varied, and all of us fall in that spectrum somewhere.

   Then Jesus looked up at the crowd as they grumbled their way down the hill, heading for home, and spoke to the few remaining with Him, "Do you all want to get out of here also?"

   Most had not found what they expected, and they had heard but not understood. It was too confusing and too hard to keep up their enthusiasm without seeing any result. So they hit the road, perhaps to wait for the next miracle worker to come along.

   All of us are in that crowd of people, and we have to hear those words that ask, "Why do you remain with Me, when so many do not choose to do so?"

   Are the reasons cultural, are they social, or are they because we have realized that the words of Jesus are the only ones that will bring us to God, and that is where we want to be?

   The questions are not for the church in general, they are for me.