The Bread of Life Jn. 6:35-63 CLICK TITLE FOR AUDIO
There are many who are confused about eating the bread of life. They believe that eating the Eucharist is receiving Jesus Christ. This confusion arises from a misunderstanding of Jn 6:35-63. So, we will study this passage to clear up the misunderstanding. Hopefully, some who have been misled will know what Jesus said and place their faith in him and his words rather than in the false doctrine of a church.
The bread of life is Jesus – Jn 6:35 – the bread of life is a literal man. It is not bread and never was bread. Notice, the bread of life is “living,” [Jn 6:51] and had flesh and blood [Jn 6:53-54], which bread doesn’t have.
By contrast, regular bread is “meat which perisheth” – Jn 6:27 – when the multitude came to Jesus in John 6 they were returning to get more bread [Jn 6:26]. He had miraculously fed 5,000 men the day before and they wanted more of this bread. But bread perishes, no matter whether it is baked by a baker, baked by a church or miraculously blessed by our Savior. Bread is bread and it goes in your system and then it goes out. It is meat which perishes. It only temporarily satisfies your hunger.
The bread of life eternally satisfies hunger and thirst – Jn 6:35 – when a person comes to Jesus he never hungers and when he believes on him he never thirsts. This is an interesting statement. Every true believer I know still eats and drinks because he gets hungry and thirsty. Even Paul got hungry and thirsty [2 Cor 11:27]. Better yet, Jesus got hungry and thirsty [Jn 19:28; Matt 4:2]. So, obviously Jesus was not talking about physical hunger and thirst. He was talking about spiritual hunger and thirst.
Spiritual hunger and thirst are quenched by believing the words of God. The word of God is milk [1 Pet 2:2] and it is meat [Heb 5:12-14; 1 Cor 3:2]. Yet people don’t nourish themselves in the milk and meat of the words of God by ripping pages out of their Bibles in the morning and chewing and swallowing them. They nourish themselves in the words of God by reading them, studying them and believing them [1 Thes 2:13].
Likewise, Jesus satisfies the spiritual hunger and thirst of lost souls when they believe on him. Look again at Jn 6:35 and also at Jn 6:47-48. Everlasting life comes from believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. The people that came to Jesus that day were still hungry because they didn’t believe on the Lord Jesus Christ [Jn 6:36]
The woman at the well in John 4 got into a similar discussion with the Lord. Jesus compared drinking from Jacob’s well and thirsting again to drinking of his water and never thirsting again [Jn 4:13-14]. When the Samaritan woman heard of his water she said, “Sir, give me this water.” Now read the rest of that passage and tell me where she ever drank a drop of water. She didn’t physically drink; she believed!! And so did a bunch of other Samaritans.
The reason that we never thirst again after we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ is found in Jn 7:37-39. You come unto him and drink by believing on him and when you believe on him out of your belly flows rivers of living waters. Now, I have known a good many Christians and I have never seen a literal river of water flowing out of any of them. Jesus, again, wasn’t talking about literal water. He was talking about the Holy Spirit. You see, these conversations are all about spiritual things, not literal flesh, blood and water!!
It is the spirit that quickeneth – Jn 6:63 – in this verse of scripture Jesus clears up the whole misunderstanding by showing us that “the flesh profiteth nothing.” He said, “the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” Eternal life comes from believing what Jesus said, not by eating his literal body and blood.
Do you not realize that Jesus would have been violating the word of God to teach them that they had to drink his literal blood? He would have been violating the command of his Father in Gen 9:4; Lev 17:11-14 and Acts 15:20. There is no way on this earth that Jesus Christ would ever do anything contrary to the words of God. The Word of God never violates the word of God, ever!
It is impossible to eat Christ’s flesh – Jn 6:52, 62 – no one the day that Jesus taught them this passage bothered to carve off a piece of Jesus’ flesh and eat it. You can tell by their question and by Jesus’ question that eating his flesh was impossible. Just like Nicodemus knew that it was physically impossible for a man to enter his mother’s womb a second time to be born again [Jn 3:4]. These are spiritual matters. Yet men try to understand them as physical matters. A Church is fooling you into believing that its priests have some mystical power to convert man-made bread into the Lord’s literal flesh. And then they are further fooling you into believing that this bread they call flesh can give you eternal life. Don’t be fooled into believing that. They don’t understand Jn 6:53-56. You know why? They don’t understand Jn 6:57.
Peter understood the passage – Jn 6:66-69 – Peter knew that Jesus is the Son of the living God and he knew that Jesus had “the words of eternal life.” He believed Jesus. You are saved by believing Jesus; not by eating a piece of bread that some man wants you to believe has been turned into Jesus. Quit calling that piece of man-made bread which perishes, “my Lord and my God.” That’s blasphemous.
Conclusion: believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved [Acts 16:31]. Receive Jesus Christ by faith [Jn 1:12] not by mouth. No one ever received him by mouth, not the day that Jesus taught them and not any day since then. You can only receive him by faith by believing what he said, “He that believeth on me hath everlasting life,” [Jn 6:47].