Partaking of Christ

John 6:51–59 ESV

51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” 53 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. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 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. 58 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.” 59 Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.

Partaking of Christ

1. The physical nourishment received by the Israelites in the wilderness was a shadow of the spiritual nourishment through Jesus. (vs. 51-52)

John 6:51–52 ESV

51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” 52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

Deuteronomy 8:3 ESV

3 And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

Jesus continues his confrontation with the Jewish leaders after they question what he means by giving his flesh to eat. They simply ask, “How?” This is the same reaction we find when Jesus is teaching Nicodemus in John 3. He also asks, “How?” “How can I go back into my mother’s womb to be born again?” Now the Jewish leaders ask, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” On first reading, it sounds like cannibalism. Eating flesh and drinking blood was completely forbidden by Jewish law. Even the early church was often accused of being cannibals because they would speak of eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Jesus. However, we know that this was not something that was to be taken literally.

Jesus has already spoken about the manna that was given to the Israelites while they were in the wilderness. Earlier, when he said that he was the living bread, he is no longer concealing who he is and what he has come to do in front of the Jewish leaders. He makes the direct connection between the manna from heaven and the bread that comes down from heaven found in him. It is a shadow or image of what is fully realized in Jesus. He has come not to nourish our physical bodies but to bring us spiritual nourishment. He has come to feed our souls. Moses tells the Israelites that they are not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God in Deuteronomy 8:3. Those who partake of his flesh will live forever. Jesus says to Martha, the sister of Lazarus, in John 12:25-26, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” To which Martha replies, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”

The spiritual nourishment that is given to us in Jesus give us eternal life. Eternal life is not something that we earn or can attain for ourselves. It is something that has been done for us. This is the message of the gospel. Eternal life is not something that is based on what we do in this life. It is all based in what God has done for us. That is why we can trust and believe in what Jesus says. He has already done that work on our behalf. It is provided for us through him alone. Just as God gave the manna from heaven in the wilderness, so God has given us Christ to be nourished in our souls.

2. Jesus will lose his life that we might gain life. (vs. 53)

John 6:53 ESV

53 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.

1 Timothy 2:5–6 ESV

5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.

Verse 53 is the image of Jesus giving his life as a sacrifice for our sin. The Jewish leaders are in disbelief about what Jesus has said to this point. We have already established throughout our journey through John 6 that belief in Jesus is paramount to understanding what he is saying. Without faith and belief in Jesus as the Son of God, there is no foundation to what is being said.

When Jesus speaks of us eating his flesh and drinking his blood, there must be sacrifice and death involved. Just as the manna from heaven was a shadow of the bread of life coming from heaven, so the sacrificial rituals of the temple were shadows of the Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. By him giving his life, we gain life. Paul reminds us in 1 Timothy 2:5-6 that Jesus has given himself as a ransom for all. He replaced us. He took the death that was to be ours upon himself. Just as the animals that were sacrificed in the temple took the place of those who brought the sacrifice to the altar, Jesus is our sacrifice. But his sacrifice is a once and for all sacrifice. We don’t have to keep going back. He gave himself for all time and for all who believe. In Hebrews 9:12, it says, “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 securing an eternal redemption.”

When we partake of Jesus’ sacrifice through our belief and trust of him, we secure our eternal redemption. We are set free from the power of sin and death. We have life. If one does not partake of the sacrifice of Christ, then one does not have life. One is still dead in his or her sins and is not truly free in Christ. The only way that we have true life is in Jesus. There is no other way. He is the way, the truth, and the life. He is true life. When we trust in Christ, then we have true life. This is the fallacy of the world. In our humanness and sin, we believe that we have freedom to do what we want and live how we please according to our desires. But we are actually slaves to our desires. We are slaves to ourselves. We deny ourselves the true life that is found in Christ by trusting in the false life that is given to us by the world. The world has nothing to offer us except death. It has nothing to give. It only takes and uses. But in Christ there is newness of life. There is freedom. He has paid the ransom. Therefore, he has set us free. He has given himself fully on our behalf.

3. Through the Eucharist, we partake of Christ’s body and blood through faith. (vs. 54-59)

John 6:54–59 ESV

54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 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. 58 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.” 59 Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.

1 Corinthians 11:27–29 ESV

27 Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. 29 For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself.

It would be wrong for us to completely spiritualize the language here. We can try to make it into something that is not physical but a kind of inner celebration. That we can abide in Christ and feed on him so that we can have some kind of metaphysical experience. But that is not the case here. The word that is used by Jesus for “eat” is a physical munching or chewing. It is not something that is simply spiritual but something physical. It is an action. Therefore, we can surmise that the language that is being used here points directly to the Eucharist, the Lord’s Supper, the sacrament in which Jesus’ body and blood are offered to those who believe in a mysterious way to be eaten and drunk.

So here, after the feeding in the wilderness, where (as in the other gospels) Jesus’ action with the bread is described in words very like those used at the Supper itself (verse 11), we find a long discourse in which, here at its climax, Jesus declares that in order for him to be truly united with his believing followers, it is necessary for them to ‘munch’ his flesh and drink his blood. Paul goes further in 1 Corinthians 11:27-29 by telling us that if we come to the table in an unworthy manner, meaning that we come without faith in the One who has offered this meal to us, then we eat to our judgment. We cannot be united with Christ and abide in him without having the faith necessary. If we do not have faith in the sacrifice that is made on our behalf, then the sacrament means nothing.

As Methodists, we believe that when we come to the table Christ is really present. He is the host. We say in the liturgy, “Christ invites to his table…” It is not our table. It is not my table as the one who presides. It is Christ’s table. He invites all who love him and earnestly repent of their sin. In other words, if we love and believe in the sacrifice of Christ on the cross and that he was raised on the third day and we come with a repentant heart, we will be accepted at his table to receive a full measure of his grace. So, when we partake of Christ in the bread and the cup, we are truly partaking of his body and blood. We are eating his flesh and drinking his blood so that we may have eternal life. We are feeding on him so that we may live. We say in the liturgy, “Bless these gifts of bread and wine. Make them be the body and blood of Christ that we may be the body of Christ redeemed by his blood.”

Our understanding of the Lord’s Supper is that Christ is spiritually present in the elements of bread and wine and through them we receive his abundant grace that leads to life. It is only by his grace that we are saved. That is why John Wesley called the Eucharist a “converting” sacrament. In it, we see with our eyes and experience in our bodies the fullness of God’s love for us that Christ died for us while we were yet sinners.

When we partake of Christ in faith, we are given mercy. He has placed upon himself all of our sin and failures. He has put upon himself all of the times that we have turned our backs on God and denied him with our lips and our lives. He has placed upon himself all of the times that we have failed to be good neighbors to those around us. He has placed upon himself all of the times what we have rebelled against God and followed our own path. Yet, he still bids us to come to him all who are weak and heavy laden so that he can give us rest. Christ has done the work of salvation for us. We partake of him in faith at the table as a constant reminder of the sacrifice of Christ on our behalf.

In his sermon, “The Duty of Constant Communion,” John Wesley says the following: “It is no wonder that men who have no fear of God should never think of doing this. But it is strange that it should be neglected by any that do fear God, and desire to save their souls.” He goes on, “It has been shown, first, that if we consider the Lord’s Supper as a command of Christ, no man can have any pretense to Christian piety who does not receive it (not once a month, but) as often as he can…” It was Wesley’s intent that all Methodists would partake of Christ every Sunday.

We are called and commanded by Christ to come to the table often. May we not neglect to come to Christ and receive the fullness of his grace.