Is Jesus Testing You Right Now?

A Verse, A Comment, A Prayer, A Blessing

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Is Jesus Testing You Right Now?

A Verse, A Comment, A Prayer, A Blessing (12/6/2023)

Casey B. Hough

Dec 06, 2023

Transcript

A Verse

John 6:5-7

When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do.

Philip answered him, “It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!”

A Comment

Today’s passage appears in the well-known story of Jesus feeding the five thousand. As the crowd grew, Jesus showed regard for their well-being. But He was interested in more than simply filling their stomachs. He also wanted to grow their faith, especially the faith of His disciples.

So, Jesus poses a question to Philip about where one might find enough bread to feed the great crowd. NT scholar D. A. Carson noted that Philip was the natural choice to be asked this question because he “came from the nearby town of Bethsaida” (John 1:44). Philip’s response reveals that he could “think only at the level of the marketplace, the natural world.” Philip’s solution did not take into consideration the greatness of the One who asked him the question. Philip sought natural solutions to supernatural needs.

I love the fact that Jesus tests Philip with a question. Admittedly, though, I rarely think of how Jesus might be testing me with questions. Sometimes, the questions we face in life are posed not to see how intelligent we are but how much we believe Jesus is who He says He is. We think that the answers to the questions require great solutions from us when, in reality, the solutions are actually beyond us.

This can be difficult for us to realize, especially in our solution-oriented, problem-solving society. We hesitate to answer these kinds of questions with “Jesus, I don’t really know, but you know” because we fear it makes us look incompetent or unprepared. But the reality is that we are far less competent or prepared than we like to think. The answers to many of the questions we face are beyond us, but that is not a bad thing when we know that Jesus is with us.