I am that bread from heaven! Everyone who eats it will live forever. My flesh is the life-giving bread that I give to the people of this world.”
They started arguing with each other and asked, “How can he give us his flesh to eat?”
“Jesus answered: I tell you for certain that you won’t live unless you eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man. But if you do eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will have eternal life, and I will raise you to life on the last day. My flesh is the true food, and my blood is the true drink. If you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you are one with me, and I am one with you. The living Father sent me, and I have life because of him. Now everyone who eats my flesh will live because of me. The bread that comes down from heaven isn’t like what your ancestors ate. They died, but whoever eats this bread will live forever.”
John 6:51-58 (CEV)
If ever there was a time when Scripture should be interpreted figuratively, this is it! I would not be keen on recreating the imagery of flesh-eating Jesus followers. The Robby Williams “Rock DJ” music video showed us how revolting this is.
Bread, meat, wine – these are all the basics of a Mediterranean/Galillean lunch. And Jesus places himself right in the middle of the lunch. “I am the true food and my blood is the true drink”. Obviously we make connections with the communion meal – the celebration of Jesus’ life and death and resurrection. But the people who heard this public address wouldn’t have had the benefit of that insight. It’s not much wonder so many people dropped out. Far too radical, too weird.
So if Jesus is speaking figuratively here, how do we eat his flesh and drink his blood? Is he just talking about the eucharist? Or is there a deeper sense of identifying with him? I’m wondering if we’re being reminded that this is no disembodied spirit we’re connecting with. It’s a flesh and blood human being presenting us with “God with skin on”. A truly human expression of God with all six senses working, vulnerable and fragile like us.
I asked a group of colleagues what they thought of this challenge from Jesus. Chris, the Catholic in the group gave us the phrase “Corpus Christi” as a way of connecting with this focus on the “Body of Christ” in all its fullness. David, one of the Baptists, reminded us that after the crowd had taken off, Jesus asked the remaining disciples if they were going to leave as well after his ‘disastrous sermon’. These guys probably didn’t really get what Jesus said. But Peter says “To whom else would we go. Only you have the words of eternal life”. There’s a sense of mystery here. Uncertainty. Ambiguity. We can live with that.
Hello Duncan,
The words of Jesus that you have quoted raise a very intriguing topic. It’s one I believe the Christian church would do well to fully investigate. Here Jesus describes the kingdom gospel (the real good news) and in spite of all the New Testament studies that have been done over the centuries, as far as I can ascertain, the truth behind it has never been seen.
Jesus is claiming that if we feed on him we will live on forever. Thats the correct literal translation. In other words, if we obey, we don’t have to physically die! He is not talking about the life after death issue. He is explaining about having life, or continuous living, now. You see the contrast that he makes at the end of your quote, where he says that under Moses, in spite of the so-called manna from heaven, they all physically died.
Jesus reinforces this gospel very clearly in John chapter 8. Here he is talking to some Pharisees. (verse 13). The group also includes Jews who had believed in him and were arguing about whose father God was. (verse 31). Then in verse 51 Jesus makes what appears to be an outlandish statement. Truly, truly I tell you, if anyone keeps my word he won’t physically die unto the age. That is what he said. Notice how the Jews answer him by saying Abraham physically died, and so did the Prophets, so who did he think he was? They obviously saw it like he said too. Can you see the context?
Remember also that the Pharisees had no problems about a belief in life after death. In fact their beliefs were very similar to the basic Christian understandings of today. That included an end time conflict between good and evil, a coming messiah and a physical resurrection of the dead unto judgement.
I believe the apostle Paul saw this kingdom gospel and it is confirmed by his writing in 1 Corinthians, chapter 15 where he outlines the two-stage evolvement of humankind, and that if the dead aren’t being raised then Christ obviously hasn’t been raised! He also states that Jesus was raised as a life giving spirit. JC really did give his life for us and during this process he demonstrated that physical death has been dealt with but this has confused us. Unfortunately we have spent too much time focusing on a raised up Jesus whom we imagine lives up in the sky when the life giving one has really been entombed in our hearts! Believers touch that real one when they open their hearts with their conversion experiences etc. But apart from that we are not encouraged to continue to follow these feelings (the spirit). We are taught to follow laws (Moses in the wilderness) and consequently we all miss out on the potential of the life giving spirit of Jesus. Is it to be the so-called living Jesus up in the sky, or the sacrificed one in our hearts? We cant have it both ways. He either died for us or he didnt.
When we respond to our deep heart feelings (our hearts cleansed by faith) we are, trusting that he has died for us and symbolically speaking, we are drinking his blood and eating his flesh. That spirit is the eternal life, which translates continuous vitality. Jesus got it and willed it over to us on his death. Eternal life is not just something we inherit after we die. If we, as a community, turn towards our hearts, we will see a coming together, with a beautiful oneness, as the living Jesus manifests through our interaction with each other. We are his body. Then well see some amazing things happen!
That, in a nutshell, is the return of Jesus. First as a thief in the night, and then as Lord of glory! Thats the true gospel.
And this is continuous living, that they may fully understand thee, and JC whom thou has sent. John 17-3