Jesus had "urges" too...

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"But he said to them, 'I have food to eat that you know nothing about...My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.'" John 7:32, 34 New International Version


I think of hunger pangs and stomach grumblings.  I do not know the true pain of actual hunger because I have rarely been in a place where food was not readily available.  Nevertheless, I know that when time passes without eating I can become irritable, quick to frustration and insensitive.  I am not much fun to be around during those times.  Like the popular Snickers commercials, so many of us are discontent until we have met our physical urges with physical sustenance.

While I do not think that Jesus meant that obedience to the Father necessarily made His stomach grumblings vanish, I do believe that Jesus was making a very strong point to His disciples about what fuels His lifestyle.   Jesus' nourishment did not come from the physical world.  Though He was fully human, Jesus' concern was not that His physical body was fed but that His Spirit was in total submission to the will of the Father.

When we are hungry, we often look forward to eating and oftentimes "eating well," which typically indicates consuming delicious foods in abundance.  Dare I go to a restaurant with a grumbling stomach and I will end up ordering an appetizer, an entree and even a dessert.  I look forward to meeting my urge.  I cannot wait to sit down and eat a delicious meal.  I can imagine the disciples saying the same thing.  "We should eat, we've been doing a lot of work.  Four more months and then it's harvest time.  Man, food is really plentiful and delicious then."  Our Savior is not ignorant of this human tendency to look forward to our fleshly satisfaction because He was human too.  He goes on to say to His disciples, "Do you not say, 'Four more months and then the harvest?  I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields!  They are ripe for harvest!" (John 7:35).


I believe Jesus' question (and His immediate answer) is twofold.  The first is physical.  I do not think that Jesus means that we cannot enjoy a good meal or that we cannot look forward to responsibly (without gluttony and excess) meeting our need for food.  Yet not in even in food are we to find more pleasure than we do in obedience to God.  The second applies spiritual meaning to a physical example.  There is no justification in delaying our obedience because the fields are "ripe unto harvest" - the world is ready to hear about Jesus and His call to repentance and submission to His Lordship.

We cannot postpone our obedience to Jesus because we have an urge that has not yet been met.  Jesus makes His point clearly after His disciples urge Him to eat.  I can imagine the scene, the disciples telling Jesus that He has been working too much and that He should eat something or He'll pass out or something like that.  And Jesus is quick to say, "Listen, I know you're concerned but I have an entirely different type of nourishment that keeps me going.  I receive so much more satisfaction from obeying my Dad, from listening to Him and following the promptings of His Spirit.  All of you are so concerned about yourselves.  You think that once you have a desire met, an urge, then things will be okay.  Sometimes it's trivial like we'll share about Me once we've had a meal.  Other times it's more significant, like we'll wait until debts are paid or marriages are arranged or education has been accomplished.  Don't you see though?  Those things don't matter - cannot matter - more than obedience.  The work has been done, the stage has been set, you don't even really have to do anything crazy; all you have to do is obey Me and the One who sent Me and you'll experience satisfaction that blows away any peace you can get from putting yourself first."

Jesus' teaching scares me.  He says that His food is obedience.  I need food to be obedient.  Do you see the difference?  I am so far from where I want to be from living out this teaching.  If I have to choose between meeting my urges (even the most natural and acceptable ones like hunger) and obedience to Jesus, He tells me to choose Him.  Christ followers will find more joy in following Jesus than anything else in the entire world.  Following Jesus is not on the top of the priorities list because following Jesus is not something that can be managed or prioritized.  Following Jesus and obeying Him is the foundation of the list and from where all of our pleasure is derived.

I am learning a lot about Jesus and one of the things I see is that He is obsessed with obedience.  Obedience is more important to Him than passion and excitement.  He even says in another part of the Gospel that if we love Him, we obey Him.  I don't think we talk about that enough in church or at Bible studies.  I think we try to present our version of the seeker friendly Jesus who is a liberal hipster who drinks lattes and talks about radical love.  All this obedience talk seems orthodox and is probably a turn off to "free spirits" and so on.  I think it's important to be honest about Jesus.  He wants us to obey Him.  And He wants obedience to be more important to us than our own physical hunger.

Talk about paradigm shift.  Crazy, right?  I'm not there yet.  Truthfully, I don't think there is a "there."  I think this is a journey, a process, of sanctification (becoming more saintly or Jesus-like).   My prayer is that I will be less focused on me and more focused on Jesus.  Taking my thoughts away from me and placing them on Jesus will help me with not being so self absorbed.  Maybe I can end up like those dogs in the above picture who listen to their master and fight their own natural urges.  That's a true story I want to tell one day.