Will you eat His Flesh?
Notes
Transcript
Today we are still in chapter 6 of John. The beginning of the chapter we saw Jesus produce food from nothing pointing to His creative power. Because we know from Colossians 1 that everything was created by Jesus.
13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son,
14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.
And if you remember from last week, Jesus had a stern warning for all of us. Look at verses 25-27 with me.
25 When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?”
26 Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.
27 Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.”
Remember if you do nothing, your flesh will pursue food that perishes. Look at the world around us. By default the flesh can only pursue food that perishes.
but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.
“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life? And why are you anxious about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Do you remember the crowds reaction?
28 Then they said to him, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?”
29 Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”
The crowd wants to know what they need to do to be saved. But the Gospel is simple isn’t it?
I was talking to Jared yesterday about the Gospel and how simple it is but if the Father doesn’t draw you you can’t see it.
4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
How did the crowd respond to Jesus’ simple Gospel?
30 So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform?
31 Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ ”
32 Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.
Let’s pause a minute and examine this concept of bread from heaven. What is the crowd is talking about when they say our fathers ate manna in the wilderness?
So Jesus is obviously speaking spiritually but the crowd could only hear materially.
The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
So what was Jesus point? Let’s look at what pastor Andrew Wommack says about this passage:
There is no eternal life apart from Jesus. We have to personally partake of Him the same way we eat food to sustain our physical life. In John 6:52, these Jews clearly thought Jesus was speaking of cannibalism. Jesus knew what they were thinking but made no attempt to explain. Instead, He repeated His previous statement and even strengthened it by speaking about drinking His blood.
Remember 1 Corinthians 2:14 this wasn’t just a misunderstanding. Without the Spirit of God, the people could not understand. So Jesus didn’t try to explain and He didn’t try to soften it. He actually goes further. And adds to the eating of His flesh that is eating His word but also drinking His blood. When I hear the phrase drink Jesus’ blood. I think of
In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
The Old Covenant is gone and Jesus is introducing the New Covenant in His blood.
But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God.
So the question before you this morning is if your intake of Word of God was food would you starve to death or would you be malnourished or would you be well feed?