The True Bread of Life

Introduction

Have you ever felt that you couldn't understand the Bible? Sometimes Jesus said things that made little sense to our finite minds. We read it and read it and read it again. Suddenly, with a flash of insight, it all comes clear! It almost leaps out of the page, alive and surprisingly applicable to our lives.

Such is the case with today's passage for many. Even in his own day, most people didn't understand from the beginning. But eternal life hung in the balance. Unless God, the Father, by the Holy Spirit, enlightened their hearts and minds, there was no way the gospel could be understood. And death ensued for those who didn't understand. The same is true today. Unless God, the Father, by the Holy Spirit, enlightens your heart and mind, there is no way to understand, much less receive the gospel.

Everyone - believer and unbeliever - may struggle with this. But if you are one of those who don't believe, this is urgent for you. Pray the Lord show you clearly what this portion of Scripture is all about.

The problem is, the gospel is not a boxed gift to receive. It's not a story to acknowledge as a historical fact. The gospel is a person, and it is spiritual. When Jesus speaks of the bread of life, the water of life, eating His body and drinking His blood - all of these expressions are about Him and our receiving Him as Lord of our life. We are to let Him nourish our souls like food does our cells.

Today, I want to walk you through Jesus' discussion with the Jews after they caught up with Him in Capernaum, across the Sea of Galilee.

1. Jesus is the True Bread from Heaven (v. 32)

2. Jesus is the True Bread of Life (vs. 35-40)

3. Jesus is the True Bread of Eternal Life (vs. 43-518)

4. Jesus is the True Bread of Spiritual Life (vs. 60-65)

Conclusion

Today, we are confronted with Jesus - the Bread of Life, sent from Heaven, to ensure we are given spiritual, eternal life. Unless we learn to understand the spiritual - which we cannot do without help from the Father above who draws us, and the Spirit who enlightens us - there is no hope. Belief in Jesus is far more than intellectual belief where we believe the history books are right, we believe the stated purpose for why Jesus came to die and rise again are right. No, belief in Jesus is to live by Jesus. Let Him instruct us, fuel and empower us, and give us His perspective, learn to communicate with Him and the Father by the Holy Spirit. He gives us a life on a higher plane that the world knows nothing about. He gives us spiritual purposes in life, not mortal ones. Those may be given to enable us to live, just as Paul was a tent-maker to fund his ministry, but Paul's ministry was to tell the world of Jesus, establish local bodies of believers to carry on that work in their communities, and to cause the gospel to be heard and where God used that, to be believed around the known world.

That is what OUR purpose is as well. Let us not take it as a hobby, but as a focus of our lives. Let us commune with Jesus daily, that He guide us in this endeavor. Let us read His Word, study it to understand it, and pray that it be lived out in our lives, no matter the cost to ourselves. Reckless abandon is not the goal - it's the standard. We must be recklessly abandoned to Christ and forsake this world. Be like the 12, who seek to do that, or will you be like the many who can't allow this in your life? And what is the gift for those who stay? Go?