Food

Our text for today has been a difficult one for many scholars and teachers. As you will see soon enough, it just sounds so wrong. Jesus says some things here that are hard to understand or even to hear. But even though that is the case, there are some things here that are clear enough for us to understand and to benefit from. So, with that in mind let me read our text and then launch into the sermon. Today's text is John 6.47-59.

I think we all pause when we hear Jesus say,

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...

So, what is Jesus getting at when he says something as striking - and, shall we say, unappealing - as this? We would never use this kind of imagery, but he did. What's he saying? What are we to embrace here?

Let's establish what is clear, first. This whole chapter is about food. It started back when Jesus fed the five thousand. Later, it continued with a conversation about Moses and the manna. That's where Jesus talked about himself as the true bread in contrast with the manna. And then, in today's text, Jesus explicitly - maybe too explicitly - presents his body and blood as food. The chapter is all about food.

So, let's talk about food. When God created humans he made us in such a way that we need to eat. We need food. Why did he do that? It's helpful to see that there was no rule that he was supposed to follow in creating us in this way. He could have created us very differently. There were a multitude of options for him to choose from. He could have created us to do fine with just some sunlight providing nourishment. Or he could have skipped all of that and made us without any need for anything to keep us going. The point is that he created us in this way by choice. We are created to need food because God thought it was a good idea to do it that way.

That's one piece of the puzzle. Here's the next. All of creation is designed by God to reveal something. It is designed to reveal truth about him, about his creation and the relationship between the two. I'm guessing that you're all acquainted with the Psalm that starts out,

The heavens declare the glory of God, ​​​​​​​and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. ​​​

The psalmist is telling us that looking up into the sky will reveal some truth to us. Creation is built to reveal truth. Well, it's not just the heavens that are making a statement about reality. Humans, all of us, also declare some truth. How we function, including things like being created to eat, reveals truth, truth about who God is, who we are and how we relate to each other.

Now, we're ready for the next step. What truth is being declared by this aspect of our creation? What is being revealed by this fact that we need to eat? There are, I suspect, many lessons. Here's one. We are not independent beings. We cannot continue to exist with just what we have in us right now. We need some things from outside ourselves, things like food. Bad things happen when there is no food to eat. You starve. A person who does not eat will slowly, painfully and most assuredly die. We have been created as very dependent creatures. Deprive us of something as simple as food and we will die.

Now, listen again to Jesus' words.

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...

I hope that that's making a little more sense. I think the matter is clinched with what Jesus says next.

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

We're back, again, to the language of 'true'. As I've told you before, this isn't about the false versus the true. It's about the partial and the complete, or better, the picture and the reality. The food you eat each day is a picture. It is a picture that reveals a much greater reality. Just as every created person absolutely needs food, every created person absolutely needs Jesus. Food gives life. Anyone not convinced of that should try going without it. Eating food is a picture. It's a picture of gaining true life. Jesus gives the reality of that picture. Jesus gives true life, and he does that because he is true food.

So, let's pull this together. What is Jesus saying? Jesus is trying to drive home this thought: 'Without me you will starve. Without me you will die. Just as you need food to live, you need me to live, to live in terms of the deepest reality of what your favorite meal can only faintly picture.' Do you see that?

Let's go a little further. Let's talk about eating. Eating isn't just looking at some food. Neither is it about poking at that food with your fork. It's not even about merely nibbling at some crumbs on the edge of the plate. Eating is really going at it. It's taking the meat and vegetables and putting them into your mouth and chewing until you swallow it all. Eating is about making that food a part of what you are. And that's a picture. Likewise, following Jesus isn't about looking at the Gospel, poking at the Gospel or even nibbling at little crumbs of the Gospel. Following Jesus is about eating Jesus' flesh and drinking his blood. It's about making him a part of what you are.

On top of that, eating isn't something you do once or twice. It isn't even something that you do every once in a while. Anyone who adopts that habit will suffer for it. He will be, at best, a sickly person, greatly limited in what he can do. We need to eat. Each day we need to eat. And once again, the Lord's Prayer fits. 'Give us, this day, our daily bread.' Daily bread. Daily manna. Daily Jesus.

Seeing things in this way explains different bits of life. It explains those people who are not disciples of Jesus, your non-Christian neighbors. They may be eating, but whatever it is, it isn't true food. And so, they are starving. Or to say that more clearly, they are dying - slowly and painfully and assuredly dying. They still get up every morning, and do whatever it is that they do. They still eat their worthless food, something other than Jesus. But they are dying. And if you have eyes to see, you can see the signs of death. And, in a way, their counterfeit food only delays the inevitable. It's kind of like only eating junk food. That will keep you going, for a while, but over time the foolishness of doing that will become obvious. The signs of death become more and more difficult to ignore. And the question is asked, 'Where did that come from?' It came from a lifetime of eating junk instead of true food. But the solution is right at hand. ‘Come to Jesus. Eat true food. Become healthy.’ It has been said that evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where to find food. That fits so well here. But what is so sad is that even when offered true food, so many starving people continue to consume garbage. They are dying and yet refuse to be healed. And that is sad.

This also explains too many Christians. They have eaten the true food, but there are still the old habits of eating counterfeit food. Just as running a marathon is not possible if your main staple of your diet is Twinkies, robust discipleship (which is a marathon) is not possible without eating more and more of Jesus. We are seeing the results of a poor diet in so many saints these days: illnesses of the soul that show as enslavement to sins and the inability to quickly respond to the Spirit when he calls. A lively disciple is someone who eats more and more and more of the true food, more and more of Jesus. There are too many sickly disciples.

Now, we’re ready for a question. How do you get more of Jesus? How do you eat? This is where means and end are too often confused. True food is a gift that the Spirit gives. There are no tricks or secret methods that you need to perform to guarantee good nourishment, more of Jesus, for your soul. And that's where so many of the problems are.

I learned about daily Bible reading and prayer in college. InterVarsity taught me about that. So, that's when that habit began for me. But over the years, as I read my Bible and said my prayers, I continually had this nagging question. 'Why am I doing this? What do I hope to accomplish by this habit?' For the longest time I had no good answer for that kind of question. And, as a result, the means for getting more of Jesus, Bible reading and prayer, became an end in itself. I was getting to know my Bible better, no doubt. But was I getting to know Jesus better? Was I getting more of him?

There is a list of spiritual disciplines that Christians have practiced down through the ages. You know what's on that list: Bible reading, prayer, memorization, meditation, Sunday worship, celebrating the sacraments, reading good theology, and more. And there are plenty of folk who do those things. But when they are done doing any of these, do they say something like, 'I have made progress in receiving more of Jesus', or do they say something like, 'Well, that's done. What's next on my list?' I could tell you that you need to read your Bible every day and you might establish that as a habit - every day so many verses. Mission accomplished? No. What is that but counterfeit food? There are way too many who know the Bible really well but who are, nonetheless, starving. What we need isn't information about the Bible. What we need is Jesus.

So, should you stop reading your Bible and all the rest on that list? Maybe, if doing any of those things is just a matter of checking off something on your to-do list. Or you could redeem those habits by aiming them at this goal: getting more of Jesus. The difference between someone satisfying a to-do list and someone aiming at much more is not something that you can see just by watching them do one of those spiritual disciplines. The difference is all about what is going on in the soul. What's your goal? What are you aiming at? What are you desiring as you do read your Bible, say your prayers or whatever?

And this is where you need to remember that getting more of Jesus is a matter of the gift of the Spirit. There are no hoops to jump through to gain more of Jesus. But the Spirit will give you more Jesus - if he is what you desire. If he is your goal, then meditating on some Scripture or spending time in prayer or any of the other things on that list will result in your desire being satisfied. The Spirit will give you more of Jesus. You won't be able to sense the change in that moment. Getting more of Jesus is like exercise. You don't notice a trimmer waistline or bigger biceps after one or two workout sessions. But over time the change shows. If you desire more of Jesus the Spirit will use those spiritual disciplines to bless you with more of Jesus. And over time you will see the change.

And what you will see are signs of life. Starving people show signs of death. People who feed on Jesus show signs of life. Remember what he said.

Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life...

So, instead of slowly dying, the person who gives himself to getting more of Jesus slowly but surely thrives. He gains life; the waistline gets trim and the biceps grow. That's fine for a metaphor, but what are we really talking about? What are the signs of life? Jesus explained what life is.

And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

Life is about knowing God. And if you think that's about information to fill your head you haven't been listening. It's about understanding God and his ways, understanding yourself and why you do what you do, understanding this life and the difference between flourishing and just getting by, or worse. Gaining this life is getting to the place that you were created for, a place that we are all so far from. Getting more of Jesus will result in growing in this kind of life and that will show, especially these days, in ways that will distinguish you from so many others. Being alive like this lies at the heart of pursuing our mission of changing the world.

So, what do you do now? I could say that you need to pray. But what good would that do if it's just something on your to-do list, something to do so you can say that you've done it. No, before you pray you need to come to a decision. Do you desire more of Jesus? Do you desire what he has to offer: life, the kind of life that is all about knowing the Father? If that is what you do desire then prayer makes sense. And it also tells you what to ask for. 'Please, give me true food. Give me more of Jesus.'