Lord, to Whom Shall We Go?by Jeff Robb

Reflection

This conversation happens in the synagogue at Capernaum. The day before, Jesus had fed five thousand people with five barley loaves and two small fishes. The crowd followed Him across the lake, hoping for more bread. Instead He told them, I am the bread of life. And He said things that were hard to hear.

Many of His own disciples said, This is an hard saying; who can hear it? And then comes one of the saddest lines in the Gospels. From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.

These weren't strangers. They were disciples. They had walked with Him. And they turned around.

Then Jesus turns to the twelve. Will ye also go away? Notice that He doesn't plead with them. He doesn't soften what He said to win them back. He asks a plain question, and He lets them answer it.

Peter answers, as Peter usually does. Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.

What stands out in Peter's answer is what it doesn't say. He doesn't say, Lord, we understood every word. He doesn't say, This is easy for us. The twelve may well have been as puzzled as anybody. But Peter has thought it through. Where else would we go? Who else has words like these? He has looked at the other roads, and he knows they don't lead to life.

That's an honest kind of faith. It isn't the faith of someone with no questions. It's the faith of someone who has questions and stays anyway, because he knows where the life is.

Most of us find parts of the Bible hard. Reading through it chapter by chapter, we come to passages we don't fully understand. There are seasons in life too, when following the Lord costs something, or when prayers seem to go unanswered. In those times it would be easy to drift back, quietly, the way those disciples did. No big announcement. Just walking no more with Him.

Maybe you know that pull. A hard passage you couldn't make sense of. A prayer that seemed to go unanswered. A stretch when faith felt more like a duty than a joy. It's in seasons like those that Peter's question matters most.

Peter's question is a good one to ask ourselves on the hard days. To whom shall we go? Money can't give us eternal life. Our own cleverness can't. A busy schedule can fill our time, but it can't fill our souls. Only Jesus has the words of eternal life.

So if today is one of those days when faith feels like work, you don't have to have it all figured out. You can do what Peter did. You can stay close, keep listening, and keep walking with Him. Sometimes the most faithful thing we can say is simply this. Lord, I'm not going anywhere. You're the one with the words of life.

Cross-references

John 6:35; Psalm 73:25-26; Joshua 24:15