Believing God is our work

“What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”
John 6 28-30 ESV

Here is the background to this scripture. Jesus fed 5000 people by the Sea of Galilee. The next day, these people looked for Jesus and his disciples. Jesus recognized that these people were looking for Him, not because of the miracle He performed, but because He gave them food. Jesus told them that it was important to work for food that will give them eternal life. These people were the ones who asked the question "What must we do, to be doing the works of God?"

Jesus answer is so simple. To do the work of God, we must believe God. We must believe that God performs miracles, not because we have been doing the right things or praying the right prayers, but because we believe that God can. God CAN easily perform miracles such as feeding 5000 with five loaves of bread and two fish. It certainly was a spectacular miracle. However, it seemed to be very short lived. Instead of praising God and trusting Him for their future needs, these people wanted to know what they needed to do so that Jesus would perform the miracle again.

Believing that God will get us through a tough time in spite of great obstacles always brings the greater miracle. It may not be the spectacular miracle, but trust always brings the greater, lasting miracle--the miracle of a heart focused on God.