John 6:44-59

Hey friends. Welcome back.

Thanks for joining us.

As we end the week together in the Gospel of John.

We're in the sixth chapter.

And we are in the 44th verse.

And it's been a couple days since we've been together.

This is a discourse that Jesus,

has instigated following the feeding of the 5000.

And then that brought him to this moment where he said, I am the bread of life.

And then there's been some complain about what he said.

This phrase, I'm the bread that came down from heaven,

and John has a misunderstanding, and all of that has

been covered in previous session.

So if you've not seen those, may want to circle back and pick those up.

But today we pick up in verse 44 and we're beginning to draw this.

This is one of those extended dialogs that John gives us.

But we're beginning to to move in on a close.

So I'll let me read for a few verses and then we'll come back and unpack

some of it.

No one can come to me unless drawn by the father who sent me,

and I will raise that person up on the last day.

It's written in the prophets, and they shall be taught by God.

Everyone who has heard and learned from the father comes to me.

Not that anyone has seen the father, except the one who is from God.

He has seen the father.

I tell you the truth, whoever believes has eternal life.

I am the bread of life, your ancestors

a manna in the wilderness, and they died.

This is the bread that comes down from heaven,

so that 1st May eat and not die.

I am the living bread that came down from heaven.

Whoever eats of this bread will live forever.

And the bread that I give for the life of the world is my flesh.

So, one of the striking

things I think about this passage is, again, how

how upfront John is being

or Jesus here is being with things

that seem to be implied in other gospels.

And keep in mind that a lot of this conversation, in fact,

the next passage that we'll move to after this one is remarkable

for its commune and imagery, and especially given the fact

that it helps to remember that John doesn't give us

the communion story, that belongs to the other three gospels.

And yet here is this very deep theological section about the bread of life.

And I give my flesh for the life of the world, and,

that is, I think,

interesting, given the lack of a communion story.

Clearly John is aware of those conversations.

Have you've said a couple of times, Michael, perhaps the fact that this gospel

tends to be dated later gives John a little bit more,

insight into some of those issues.

But Jesus being remarkably upfront with these things, you know,

I am the bread of life.

I'm the bread that comes down from heaven.

You may eat it and not die.

I'm the living bread that came down from heaven.

These are these are remarkably,

blunt statements, theological statements in John.

I think, as compared to some of the other gospels.

And I think that provides a certain flavor here.

It provides a flavor.

I would even argue it provides the kind of complexity, maybe even a struggle.

And we've said this before in the study, but just to get us all on the same page,

I have heard some people say, you know, if you don't know

the story of Jesus, the gospel you should read is John.

And this is one of those sections of John.

There's going to be some more coming later where this is more even in spades.

But this is a section in John.

I would argue Clint would be very, very difficult to read.

As someone who didn't

have a lot of experience with Jesus's story and Jesus's teaching,

I think if you do have some awareness, some history with the Gospels

and some of the miracle stories that you have in Matthew, Mark and Luke,

then, then maybe that touches this story in a particular way.

But yeah, don't don't miss how challenging these words are, how really advanced

these concepts are, how I think theology pickle is the right word.

Jesus's teaching here is I mean literally verse 56,

those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me.

And I in them.

If you don't understand what happens, I'm even going to say if you haven't

had some experience of what happens at the communion table,

this is going to be really difficult words.

You're going to be thinking, are we talking cannibalism here?

Is this some kind of pagan thing?

And the early church did indeed get accused

of that kind of behavior by people who looked in from the outside

and heard phrases like this, and they were struck by it.

They were repulsed by it is probably a better way of saying that.

And I just want to note that what Jesus is saying here is in direct

contrast between the Old Testament story and the reality of the

of the perfect and eternal revelation that we have in him.

So look at that.

It's explicit here when he says that the people of Israel,

verse 58,

it's the ancestors who ate and they died.

If the manna did not sustain them forever, right, that they have gone.

But it's those who eat the the flesh and blood of Christ,

the one who has come to believe,

the one who has come to actually even take into their own life

the nourishment of who Jesus Christ is, that one will be given eternal life.

So there's a

there's a communion frame, which I think you led in with really strongly.

I think there's also a bit of an Old Testament Jew version versus

the believing Jew you're trying to frame here as well.

I'll realize

that there are going to be some who eat to death and some who eat to life.

And the question is, which one of those you're going to be,

what do you partake in in your life?

And I think John is framing that, but this is a

you're not going to summarize this in a quick sentence.

This is got a lot of rich connection within the Gospel of John broadly,

and then with the rest of the scriptures, because what Jesus is teaching here

is rich and nuanced,

and that makes it hard to encapsulate in a short little pithy phrase.

You know, we've we've said numerous times, Michael, that

John loves misunderstanding.

We're going to see it here in a moment.

And and one of the things that sets up is that in John, there's this,

there is often this interplay between the physical and spiritual.

And in a passage like this and in the misunderstanding that comes

next, or in the passage that we looked at in, chapter four

with Nicodemus, you have

you have these moments, these

these conversations that sound physical, but then they're clearly spiritual.

You just you're constantly kind of moving in and out

of those two realms, and you see it here.

You're your ancestors ate manna, but they died.

And that sounds like a reference to a physical thing.

And if you eat this bread, you'll live forever.

Well, that's clearly not a physical thing.

And I think that, one of the difficulties of reading John,

I don't know that I would suggest this as a person's first gospel, be tough

because you need to have enough background to know

when John is doing which thing.

And and

I think one of the distinctive of this gospel is you just constantly

he he'll sometimes use the same word, but he'll mean different contexts with it.

And I think that

that provides a challenge here.

If you try to read John, literally,

you're going to take a sentence like

the bread I give, he'll live forever.

Well, clearly, that's a spiritual thing.

Jesus is not saying there's a piece of bread.

We know that.

But you need to know that in order to read this,

you need to know that what he really means is that those who partake in me,

those who believe in me, need not fear death.

They have a life that is eternal, a kind of life

that is not only different in quality, but in longevity.

In in,

In time as well.

And so, yeah, I there's

that's one of the things I think that just makes John interesting.

I, I if I'm going to be honest, I think it makes John frustrating. But

it's here.

And if we continue we're going to see it.

So verse 52 here, the Jews then disputed among themselves.

And they said, how can this man give us his flesh to eat?

So Jesus said to them, I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh

of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life,

and I will raise them up on the last days.

For my flesh is true food. My blood is true.

Drink those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.

Just as the living father sent me.

And I live because of the father.

So whoever eats of me will live because of me.

This is the bread that came down from heaven,

not like that which our ancestors a and died,

but the one who eats this bread will live forever.

He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.

So again, here here's a wonderful example.

You mentioned at Michael that in the early church there were,

accusations made about cannibalism.

But imagine you overheard here this verse and you don't understand it, right?

You got to eat my my flesh.

You got to drink my blood. That's the only way to have life.

It didn't take long for Christianity's enemies

to to run with that and cast some very dark accusations their way.

And again, I think John is better

suited to people who have some language of the gospel.

I think it's probably good that this gospel comes forth.

Yeah, because you you need a little framework to be able

to know what to make, how to make sense of some of these passages.

I just want to really point out, and I think it's an important

framing device that we should not forget by any means.

Verse 59 here he said, these things while he was teaching

where, right where in the synagogue.

That is so important.

That is critical, Clint,

to understand and remember, be reminded who he's talking to.

He's talking to people who need no explanation about manna.

He doesn't have to have any conversation about God's miraculous

provision in the desert, the fact that he carries the people

through, that ultimately he restores, redeems them.

When Jesus is making this argument with, as we have in the Gospel of John

the Jews, that's the phrase that we get so often here.

We're reminded that he's doing this in the middle

of the center of Jewish religious life, the synagogue.

Right.

Jesus is making an argument

that the old things that the provision of God seen

in the past pales in the fulfillment

of God's revelation and provision in Jesus Christ

in the incarnation, that the making flesh of God,

that that is this incredible theological understanding that.

Clint, I don't know how the church would have come to such a robust

understanding of that without this gospel.

There's a way in which I think that this is theology.

501 and realistically, Matthew,

Mark and Luke, that they don't any way get sideways with John.

They don't make a case for Jesus's life or the revelation and incarnation

that that they're not doing that in a way which is somehow oppositional.

But they they never really peel back the curtain, so to speak,

to allow us to hear this teaching of Jesus with this kind

of richness and depth, because clearly he's hooking into a thing

that the people in the synagogue that day would have understood the impart.

And he opens a new door to invite them to step into

which which would have expanded their understanding of revelation

and providence and God's work in the world

in a way that they could have never possibly imagined.

And I think that what we discover in very, blunt, very difficult words

here, this idea of my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.

I think some of the meaning of this is learned in the practice of the faith.

It apprenticing yourself to the Lord's table

in good seasons and bad seasons, returning

to the provision to the prayer that invites God for daily bread.

We discover in the richness and the texture

and the nuances of the faith, that these words

have beautiful theological significance as to who Jesus is.

But if you just drop into this clan and you're looking for the simple,

you know, too long getting rid of this, I think that you're going to,

at minimum, be confused and potentially offended

if you are too far outside of the circle

to have had an opportunity to to apprentice your way into this.

I think that again,

in not to belabor this, Michael, but

this is you know, this is some of the strongest language.

In fact, I was trying to think help me here.

I was trying to think of any place else in the gospel.

There's a reference to drinking my blood, right?

There's a there's the idea that you get Paul,

the body and blood of Christ, and you get, you know, in the Gospels,

this is the cup of a new covenant sealed in my blood.

My blood is shed for people.

But the idea of ingesting flesh and blood,

I can't think of a place that that's as explicit as it is

here in a gospel that doesn't tell us the Last Supper story, right?

Right.

Not not the body, not the bread and wine part of that story. And

that's an

that's amazing that John here early in the gospel,

not late as the others, but here early has this conversation.

And so we back up from that.

And to your point we ask, well what is what is this mean?

What is Jesus trying to say?

Jesus trying to say that his life,

his flesh and blood are a path to life and those who don't participate

in that path don't find life that,

yes, God provided for those in the desert.

But even that fell short of the gift that now God has given in Christ.

And Jesus is remarkably confident, claiming that of himself in the Gospel

of John in a way that I don't think we see in the other Gospels.

This I've come down from heaven.

I'm. I'm the one you don't get unless you do it.

You don't have it with me that

that's remarkably bold.

John is clearly the most

outspoken advocate of the ideas like this.

And again, maybe because he writes a little later and has had time

to let those ideas be defined in the early part of the church,

or maybe that's just the language that he he chooses and prefers.

But this is the this is

is complex in its content,

but it is incredibly outspoken in its delivery.

And I think that's a combination that John does.

Well. I think we have to give him that.

We're not going to rush ahead here.

But but very briefly, I just want to make sure that you kind

of see that we're not venturing outside of the frame that John gives us here.

Look at just verse 60, which we'll get to when we join together again next week.

Certainly subscribe to get part of that conversation.

But when many of his disciples heard that they said, this

teaching is difficult, and who can accept it?

And that there's no better way to understand that

John is not a tipping off to us?

I get it, this is intense.

This is difficult.

This is, challenging teaching to understand.

And I would just submit to you that when we continue on with this study,

we're going to discover that there's some choice language coming down the road.

There's there's some,

choosing

which community, which understanding we're going to be part of.

Where does belief lead us in this journey?

And it is so important that as people of faith,

we recognize that difficult teaching does not exist to confuse us.

It doesn't exist to tie us up into mental pretzels.

Difficult teachings like this are ultimately always set

within this question of Will you believe?

Will you have eyes to see?

Will you have ears to hear?

Will you lean in, take the first step of faith, and will you?

In doing so, then discover for yourself the reality and the truth of the words

that are there?

And Clint, you know, I think John does the church US service in this way.

John makes it abundantly clear there's no beating around the bush in this book.

If you are unwilling to take the step, the choice of believing

this is all going to be ridiculous to you and John makes it abundantly clear

that there were multitudes of people who struggled

to believe in the actual encounter with the living Christ.

They saw God in front of them and they could not believe.

And so that plays out into history, as I think, kind of a both a warning

and an invitation is how will we respond

and what is our choice when it comes to the hard things.

And if we are willing to submit to that process, that discipleship,

that journey with Jesus, we might find ourselves at some point

able to see in a way that we had never been able to see before.

It's true in all of the Gospels

that there's a choice provided

to believe or not believe.

And I'm not sure what a John scholar would do, so keep that in mind.

They they may not let me get away with this statement, but I perhaps

because John is from possibly

a later period in the church's history,

it seems to me,

Michael, and push back on this,

John maybe of the four Gospels, the most comfortable with the idea

that there are some who aren't going to believe, I think

that's a given

in the book of John, that whenever Jesus speaks, they're just some

who are going to come to him and some that are going to go away from him.

And again, that that's that's in all the Gospels.

I wouldn't I wouldn't debate that.

But it is so prevalent in John,

you know, even the disciples in the next passage, we're going to ask a lot,

like we don't know about it, you know, just that

that's a constant feature of John and

not just the Jews,

even the crowds, you know, even those who sometimes follow Jesus

then kind of turn away and go a different direction.

And John seems

most aware of the divisiveness

of a decision for Jesus that some are going to decide.

They're going to see in Jesus the way, the truth and the life.

But some are going to miss it.

It it is it seems to be built into John's worldview.

One last thing, because I know we need to wrap this up, but,

I think it's funny, Clint, because we are unlikely to be offended

at the idea that Jesus is claiming to be God's manna in human flesh.

As Christians and as people who live thousands of years later, we're.

We're just to that language.

We're not going to get worked up over that.

But he's in a synagogue where the people celebrate

God's provision in the wilderness, and he's saying a heretical thing.

This is an unbelievably offensive statement in the context it's delivered.

If you hear it like they would have heard it.

And so the gospel that John portrays is an offensive gospel.

It is offensive to our sensibilities.

And and so often we have people who tell us, well, the gospel is offensive.

And then they say a thing that's foreign to the gospel.

It has nothing to do with the gospel itself is just an offensive thing.

When Jesus says something offensive, it's because it reveals the truth

of who he is, and that offends our sensibilities.

That God would take on flesh is a mind bending reality,

and we will always have to come back to the cross to look again

so that we could have our imaginations expanded further.

And what Jesus is saying here, it riles the crowd.

It offends those who are able to understand what he's saying.

And yet, while he's saying it, there's truth that they do not see.

And will we be among the number who enter

into the process that we might have eyes to see it at a in some way?

Yeah.

John started by telling us that Jesus is the word,

and John seems comfortable with the idea that that is a divisive word.

Yeah, it just is. Thanks for being with us.

Hopefully there's been something challenging, interesting.

You've learned something new today as we go on this journey together.

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Thanks for being with us. Have a great weekend, everybody.