Where else can we go....

Truly truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His Blood, you can have no life in you.---Jesus

 

When Jesus said this to His followers as recorded in John 6, they were astonished and appalled. These were his disciples, not some obscure crowd just hanging out in the synagogue at Capernaum. His 12 apostles were there too. After He spoke these strange words, the disciples, not the 12, murmured. This should remind us of another story where Israel murmured. They murmured when Moses fed them with manna in the wilderness. But this was different, it wasn't Moses telling them about bread come down from heaven, this was Jesus, this was God Himself. And it wasn't manna He was going to give, it was His flesh, which He told them was "real food and real drink.". Jesus didn't mince words , and these words were something different. He had called Himself a gate and none had murmured. He had called Himself the Light of the World and none had murmured. Why did this cause such upheaval? After they murmured He made it even harder for them. He said, " Unless you "gnaw" the flesh of the son of man and drink His blood you have no life within you." Gnaw was the original Greek for the word "eat" that He used the second time He said it. He made it clear that He was not being symbolic, and they knew it. Now turn to your bible, John 6:66, and we see one of the most pivotal points in His ministry. This was the only place in scripture where His followers left Him over a teaching. It was too much for them then, and it is still too much for many today. But He said it, and He did not stop them from leaving Him. He did not run after them and say, " I was only using this as a metaphor, it is only meant as a symbol." No, He did not say this. And today, He calls all of us to the same mysterious Meal, for apart from His Body and Blood, we "do not have eternal life." He said, "If you do not eat my body and drink my blood, you have no life within you." The 12 apostles stayed, and Peter, who always speaks for the Church in scripture, gave their very childlike faith reason, "Where else can we go, You hold the words of eternal life."

 

wkm