Words of Life

Intro

This morning I get to share with you from Scripture what I believe to be one of the most urgent messages a person could possibly hear. This morning is going to finish a three week stretch of looking at Jesus teaching about how he is the bread of life, and this morning he is going to shed light on this ultra-important reality that most people will never really consider:

That human beings are not made of flesh alone, but that God made us to be both body and soul; and just as your body is in constant need of eating food, so also our souls are in desperate need of nourishment.

Jesus here is showing us the reality that we live in a spiritual wasteland, and this world has no spiritual food for us. In fact, we as a people are spiritually starved to death. But in this spiritually desolate wasteland, God has provided a spiritual feast for us through his Son Jesus Christ. This is what I get the privilege of preaching to you this morning, and I’m going to break our text up into three main points:

God had prepared a Spiritual feast for us in Jesus

Prideful hearts refuse the feast and starve to death

Humble faith feasts on Jesus and lives forever.

God Has Prepared A Spiritual Feast For Us In Jesus

John 6:52–58 ESV

The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Jesus is the only true spiritual food

State: We have already discussed this a bit over the the course of the last several weeks, but this is an incredibly important point that Jesus has been making, and it can be a difficult one for our minds to grab on to. The point is that human beings are not merely physical creatures, but we are also spiritual beings; we are made of both flesh and spirit. And just as our bodies need to be fed in order to live, so also our spirit must be fed or it will die. And just as our bodies must eat nutritious food and not merely plastic that looks like food, so our souls must feast on Jesus and nothing else. Jesus here is showing us the reality that our spirit was designed to feast on Jesus and nothing else.

John 6:53 ESV

So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

John 6:55 ESV

For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.

It is clear in this passage that most of the followers of Jesus were not accustomed to thinking about “spiritual food.” They have been following Jesus for quite some time now, and they have been amazed by his miracles and signs. For most of them, the main reason they were following Jesus was because he proved that he could feed 5,000 men with 5 loaves and two fish, but this is a mortally flawed reason to be following Jesus. The people showed that they cared very much for physical food, and they saw Jesus as the one who could provide it to them. They saw him as the “new Moses” who was going to make manna come down from heaven all over again

In this passage, Jesus is confronting their materialistic worldview by showing them that their needs are so much deeper. He wanted to show the people that they were spiritually starved to death, and that he was the only spiritual food that could bring them back to life. He corrects their understanding by saying to them

John 6:48–50 ESV

I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die.

Jesus is making a massive claim here: without feasting on him, nobody can have any spiritual life in them. Far more than claiming to be a teacher, prophet, or mere example to us, Jesus is claiming to be the one and only spiritual food for the people, and unless they feasted on him, they would never live.

connection to Wilderness period

desolate, no food, provision, grumbling, death

Illustrate:

Apply: For us modern, western Americans, we have to learn the same lesson as the people who were following Jesus. We have to learn that as humans, we are not merely flesh and bone. We are not merely chemical reactions accidentally taking place. Beyond that, we are a spiritual people; and our spirit must eat nutritious food just like our bodies must do.

We must also come to realize that Jesus is the only food that can nourish our souls. Unless we feast on Jesus, our souls cannot possibly live. To refuse the feast of Jesus is to refuse spiritual life, and unless we come to feast on him regularly, our souls will starve to death.

This means that all of the other “spiritual advice” people offer, all of the moralistic teaching, all of the wisdom of the world is false spiritual food and cannot nourish your soul. There is only one food that can make you alive, and it is Jesus Christ himself.

but how quickly can we be the grumbling people that reject the feast? How quickly can we become annoyed or concerned with church life, and miss the reality that this is the body of Christ? How quickly can we neglect the feast, desiring other things in life that have become our higher priorities?

Make no mistake: Jesus is the feast, and unless we partake, we have no life in us. But how do we eat?

God has made our spiritual food readily available

State: Jesus is a feast for our souls, and this is a feast that is readily available. We do not feast on Jesus literally with our mouths, for Jesus is in heaven at the right hand of the Father, but we feast on Jesus as we behold him in faith. More specifically, God has given us what we call the means of grace so that we might feast on Jesus regularly. These means are the Word of God (especially the word preached), prayer, and the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

As we read the Bible, but especially as we sit under the Word of God preached, we are feasting on Jesus as we believe what it says. We lay hold of the truth of the gospel, we behold Jesus as he really is, and as we believe it, our souls are fed and nourished.

As we pray to God in the name of Jesus, we walk with him. We give him praise for who he is and what he has done. We ask for the things we need from him as we remember that he is our perfect and powerful provider. Our souls are shaped by God as we spend time communing with him in prayer, and as we do this, we feast on Jesus.

In baptism, we see the sign and seal of our union with Christ in physical form. We see how we have been buried with him, how we have resurrected with him, and how we live in the power of his Holy Spirit.

In the Lord’s Supper, we get a most profound and beautiful representation of what Jesus is talking about in this passage. In it, Jesus has given us bread and wine as the symbols for his body and blood; but he has done more than that. As we partake by faith, we truly believe that we are feasting on Jesus Christ and our souls are being nourished by him. This is a spiritual feasting, and it is meant to nourish our souls, not our bodies.

Illustrate:

Apply: These means of grace are the ways God has promised to make Jesus readily available to us to feast on, and this is why we as a church are so committed to the means of grace. It is all too common that churches try to invent new ways to feast on Jesus, and in doing so they end up neglecting the means God has actually given to us. Rather than cave in to the desires of our hearts, we remain committed to preaching the Word of God, praying in the name of Christ, and administering the sacraments regularly, because this is how the people of God feast on Jesus Christ; this is how our souls are nourished and vitalized.

This is why preaching will always be gospel-centered.

This is why our singing will always be gospel-centered

This is why our Study groups will always be gospel-centered.

God has given us a wonderful feast, and we get to partake regularly! Not just once in a while, and not even just once a week, but throughout our weeks we are intentionally building out time where we come together to feast on Jesus

God has provided a readily available spiritual feast for us in Jesus Christ; but if this is the case, why are so many people spiritually starved to death?

It is because nobody who is holding on to any kind of pride will ever choose to feast on Jesus. For the rest of our time together, I want to look at how the text highlights two different kinds of people and what they do with Jesus. First: the prideful people who reject the feast of Christ.

apply - you need this often! Why starve yourself? Church is no more an add-on than food is.

Prideful Hearts Refuse The Feast

John 6:60–66 ESV

When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.

Prideful Hearts can’t acknowledge true spiritual food

State: Most of the disciples heard Jesus describing how he has been given as the one and only spiritual feast that can bring life to the world, and how do they respond? By grumbling. And why do they grumble? Because they take offense at the teachings and language of Jesus, and they do not believe him.

John 6:60–61 ESV

When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this?

These people have followed Jesus, they have listened to his teachings, they ate the bread at the feeding of the 5,000, they’ve left a lot behind to follow him, but they have refused to feast on him because they have not truly believed in him. Rather than behold him, love him, and glory in him, they have chosen to study him and use him.

To these people, Jesus is simply something to do and a topic to debate. He is doing interesting things, and so they’re willing to follow him and be entertained by his miracles. His teaching is regarded as controversial by the people, and so they will listen and debate.

But never once did these disciples simply just feast on Jesus. Never once did they take him at his word. Never once did they bow down and worship. Never once did they experience new and true life in him. They know Jesus as the teacher and miracle worker, but they have not come to know him as the Holy One of God. And so Jesus continues,

John 6:61–64 ESV

But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Here Jesus sets the record straight: he is no philisophical concept to be debated, nor some tradition to be kept intact: but he is God himself. He asks, “would you still be offended by my words if you could see me as I used to be, before I took on flesh?” Jesus says that he has offered them life, but they are too busy scrutinizing his words to see that life. Their pride has blinded them, and when God set a spiritual feast before them, they grumbled about it like little kids grumble about any food that isn’t chicken nuggets or buttered noodles.

Illustrate:

Apply: I believe that this blinding pride is more prevalent today than it was when Jesus walked the Earth. I believe this kind of pride has invaded our churches, and I believe that we have to be actively killing this kind of attitude in ourselves every day.

It’s all too common that we begin to think about Jesus as a concept to study and debate, to pick the parts we like about him and to leave the ones we don’t.

It’s all too common that we begin to see following Jesus as an extra-curricular activity that can be neglected when things get busy.

It’s all too common that we allow biblical truths to offend us, and we start to see Christianity as something to be consumed and critiqued and not as a spiritual feast that God has prepared for us.

So be honest with yourself: are you truly feasting on Jesus? Do you take him at his word? Do you adore him? Do you bow down and worship him? Is he truly your all in all? Or have you adopted a prideful attitude that simply conceptualizes Jesus rather than feasts on him?

And if you have, then what now?

Note the drastic difference between he prideful disciples who walk away spiritually empty, and the twelve disciples who display a humble faith that feasts on Jesus.

Humble Faith Feasts on Jesus

John 6:67–69 ESV

So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

The Twelve (Eleven) display true faith

State: Imagine the scene with me here for a moment. You’re in the synagogue at Capernaum listening to Jesus teach about how God has given him to be the spiritual provision for the world to a group consisting of thousands and thousands of people. He has been the talk of every town and has garnered a massive following. But as his teaching begins to confront the pride, it challenges the belief of the crowd, and all of a sudden the entire crowd disperses while they mutter under their breath that Jesus must be a madman.

Almost all of them, anyway. At this point, when the crowds are gone, and Jesus is left almost all alone, he turns to the twelve closest to him, and he says, “do you want to leave now too?”

Consider the response Peter gives, and consider what it is not: He doesn’t respond with some theological answer. He doesn’t claim to fully understand the words of Jesus here. He doesn’t connect it to the feast of unleavened bread, and he doesn’t even try to defend the teachings themselves. But what does he do? What does he say?

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” Peter here, speaking on behalf of the group, simply acknowledges that leaving Jesus would be like giving up food and water for the rest of their lives. Where else would they go? They have come to know, and have experienced, that Jesus is life itself. They haven’t been following Jesus because he is entertaining, or because he makes for good debate; they have been following because they have found life in him.

Illustrate:

Apply: And I want you to think with me about the implications of this for a moment. What this means is that it is possible to feast on Jesus without being a theology buff. What this means is that feasting on Jesus is not the same thing as debating his words. What this means is that feasting on Jesus is not something for the academic, but it is for those who humbly believe his word.

What this means is that someone can feast on Jesus, but not be able to articulate the doctrine of penal substitutionary atonement. What this means is that someone can feast on Jesus without being able to perfectly explain the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Please don’t misunderstand me: I speak as someone who has committed a lot of my time and energy to studying theology — but it is entirely possible, and in fact it is a reality, that someone can study Jesus every day of their life and never feast on him, and so they never find life in him. Some of the most famous biblical scholars are no Christians. Even the demons believe! — and shudder.

So ask yourself this: Have you approached Jesus as a topic to study, or as the bread of life, a feast for your soul?

Maybe you remember what it was like to feast on him and find your soul overflowing, but that was a long time ago. Let me encourage you: God has prepared that same feast for you today if you would approach in humble faith.

Maybe you just realized for the first time that you are spiritually starving to death. Brother, Jesus is a feast that can satisfy that hunger like you can’t imagine until you taste and see.

Maybe you’ve been feasting, but its been a tough week and you’re just exhausted. My friend, Jesus bids you come and recline at table with him.

Approach him with that humble faith, and you will find yourself as the guest of honor at a banquet for your soul that can only be described as eternal and pure life.

FCF: hard hearts are blind to the beauty of Jesus

CFC: by grace through faith, God has provided a spiritual feast for us in Christ

Christianity is a feast