(REFLECTIONS ON John 6:60-71)

“I am the bread of life,” Jesus said. This caused many to stumble, meaning to be offended, shocked, and even disgusted. To eat His flesh and to drink His blood, for a people that do not eat blood, for the life is in the blood, how could this be what Jesus is saying?

But it is because the life is in the blood, that through the blood shed by Jesus on the cross that we have life in Him. However, what Jesus is referring to isn’t just His physical flesh and blood, which He offered on the cross, but also His word, the spiritual bread, that is what we are to spiritually eat and drink, for spiritual life.

63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.

Although we now know we aren’t physically feasting on the flesh and blood of Jesus, belief isn’t just acknowledging, but rather it is in entrusting ourselves and giving our lives to Him as our Lord.

If we truly understood what we have to give up to the Lord, what authority we have to turn over to Him, and what the cost of discipleship is, would we follow after Him?

Does this cause you to stumble? That we have to give up our life to Him? Does that leave us offended, shocked, and even disgusted to think that just as Jesus picked up the cross and died on the cross for humanity, that He also expects us to pick up our cross daily as well?

Does this cause you to stumble? That it isn’t just an issue of physical and spiritual understanding, but rather obedience and Lordship? Faith isn’t what we desire it to be, or what we mold it into, but it is what the Lord has ordained it to be, called it to be, and created it to be.

Does this cause you to stumble? And will we also withdraw and not walk with Him anymore because Jesus’ way is different than what we expected, or will our respond as Peter did, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life.”

Pastor Michael Lu
Enduring Word Bible Commentary: John 6