Diet For Life

Grace to you and peace, from God our Father and from our Risen Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. Our text this morning is from our Gospel reading and specifically the following: (John 6:54, 61, 66-69).

54 [Jesus said] Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day . . . 61 But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this? . . . 66 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. 67 So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” 68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

Let us pray: These are Thy words O Lord; help us and sanctify us in the truth. Thy Word is truth. Amen.

To whom might we go to have our dryer fixed? It has been giving us trouble lately. Do you know someone who could repair it?

To whom might I go to have this spot on my skin looked at? It has been changing color lately, and I’m worried about it. Do you know a doctor I could trust to give me a competent analysis?

To whom might we go for help with our daughter? She has been acting strangely lately. We are worried about her. Do you know someone who could help us?

To whom shall we go? It’s a question we often ask—and ask in a multitude of situations. Where is a source of help? Who is able to assist us with this or that need?

The question is most serious when we ask it with regard to life’s meaning and purpose. To whom shall we go to find out what life is all about? To whom shall we go to get the clue to life’s puzzles?

To whom shall we go to discover a center for our lives? Sometimes some of us have asked that question in frantic depression. Then it’s a matter of life and death. Sometimes some of us have spent years looking for the answer to the question. To whom shall we go to find the key to a meaningful life?

Our society seems especially preoccupied with trying to make life exciting. Think of all the sports and other forms of entertainment designed to provide excitement. I marvel at the number of people who seek escape from boredom through drugs and alcohol. But I also understand them. I understand the quest to make life interesting through adventure—through excitement.

However, excitement by itself cannot make life totally meaningful. It can transform a few minutes of life; but when the buzz of excitement is over, we are right back where we started. And this is true of other easy, quick-fix answers work.

And so our Lord Jesus asks a couple questions that individually, we need to answer. The first is:

“Does my teaching offend you?” (v. 61)

Why were the hearers offended? Three Thoughts...

They were more interested in having a “Bread King” than anything else.

They were offended that Jesus suggested that he is greater than Moses.

They were unprepared to relinquish control, and unwilling to completely live by faith.

The Greek word for “Offend” is the word “Skandalon”, where we get the word, scandal.

Today we live in a “cancel culture,” an age when people in society are offended by many things, things that never bothered anyone for generations; now, however, it is a problem.

The people were offended, scandalized, over what Jesus had said: Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day . . . (John 6:54).

On the surface it looks like this is about the Lord’s Supper — and Holy Communion could apply — but what is really going on here is Jesus teaching about FAITH.

“Whoever feeds on my flesh” — a different word than “Eat” in the previous verse. This is a present tense verb, which means it is a continual action. To feed on Jesus is to gnaw or gobble like an animal consumes food.

All this, dear people, is about a relationship. Feeding on Jesus is much more than saying, “I believe,” this is about a relationship with God that is intimate! This is about the radical necessity of believers’ taking Christ into themselves and making him part of their very essence. In a word, to devour!

The radicalness of this is why the hearers were so offended and scandalized.

Some years ago the movie City Slickers was popular. It was the movie that hooked us on Billy Crystal and what a fine actor he is. Some of you will remember the story. A group of urban businessmen seek some new meaning for their lives. These city slickers fly out west and become cowhands for a few weeks. They think that in doing this tough, manly work they will find a new depth and significance for their lives.

On one occasion, the old, tough trail boss gives the confused city slickers some sound advice. They ask him what he thinks the meaning of life is. In response, he simply holds up one finger. It is one thing. But what one thing, the crew wants to know? The trail boss claims, however, that everyone of them must find out for themselves. It takes the city slickers the rest of the movie and a series of difficulties for them each to discover the one thing in their lives to which they must commit themselves. The one thing that makes their lives meaningful, provided they are committed to it. For me at least, the message of the movie is that the meaning of life is found in one single commitment.

In some ways our Gospel lesson agrees with that message. Peter’s response to Jesus is similar to the advice of the trail boss. There is one person to whom we must be committed. But in another important way our Gospel lesson disagrees with the movie’s message. The movie suggests that we must discover a single commitment for ourselves. We must mold something around which we can center our whole lives. Peter also claims that meaningful life is found in a single commitment. But that commitment is not discovered by us humans. We do not create it out of the hodgepodge of our lives. God give us that single commitment in what God has done in Christ.

Christ is the bread sent down from God to feed us confused and starving humans. In Christ, God gives us the glue that holds our lives together. God provides us a direction for our lives—a map that leads us out of our confused, excitement-seeking search.

Oh, it is not that simple. Because a gift is no good to us unless it is received and unwrapped. This bread of life is not nourishing unless it is gnawed upon, consumed like an animal eats food. The promise of eternal life requires our trust. It demands that it becomes part of our essence; who we are.

They couldn’t handle Jesus’ directive. It disrupted their idea of what it means to be religious. They were comfortable with their idea of what it means to believe or have faith.

Jesus is selling this relationship thing that is far too radical, and many are not interested.

A total acceptance of Jesus as the only way to eternal life was the issue.

Reactions to Christ’s testimony are the same today. Many of those who want to follow him as “great teacher” are offended by the claims that Christ clearly makes concerning himself in his Word. Others find in these claims the only real assurance of eternal life.

And all of this begs the question:

“You do not want to leave too, do you?” (v. 67)

“Do you still want to be followers? Even after my comments on the Bread of Life? Even after many have left? Will you go along with the crowd?”

Jesus was not forcing them to say; they were free to leave. But to leave also meant walking away from the promise of eternal life.

With this question Jesus was pushing them to evaluate their reasons for following him. He was giving them a chance to assess their relationship with him and the basis for it. He was calling on them to verbalize what they believed.

Peter’s answer — “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” — acknowledges man’s need to go somewhere for spiritual answers to life’s spiritual needs.

He admits man can’t stand spiritually by himself or on his own. But he sees nobody besides Jesus who can satisfy man’s spiritual needs.

No one had been able to provide what Jesus had been supplying for them as they had followed him.

From Jesus’ words to them they had experienced new life with the Lord, the eternal life for that God had originally created man, interaction with the Lord, and enjoyment of his unending blessings. How could they abandon this source of life to which Jesus had referred (v. 63)?

Jesus is calling you to FEED on Him; He is calling you into a radical relationship with Him, and with it is a promise: “I will raise you up on the last day.”

It is a relationship of intimacy

It is a relationship of hope

It is a relationship of promise.

“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 objective of today’s gospel reading is for you to understand the necessity of taking Christ into yourselves as your very essence.

Do You Still want to Follow Jesus?

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.