The same mob who are convinced of His Prophethood after a miraculous meal are also the ones who find His teachings too hard to adhere to and abandon their coup d'etat. Abandon their discipleship.
This little ditty, this chapter, sums it up though doesn't it? This teaching tells us all we need to know about engaging Jesus on His terms. Good stuff.
Since you can find commentary on this passage anywhere these days I want to work through this passage a little differently. I want to roll through it in reverse (like that Seinfeld episode in Season 9). It seems to me that Jesus' sums up this passage at the beginning but by the time most of us reach the end we've already begun to interpret it in an entirely different context.
So let's work these 9 Interactions between Jesus and the disciples in reverse and see what we find at the beginning.
NINE / 68-71
'You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know you're the Holy One of God.'
That's it. After all that talk of eating and blood and flesh and bread and manna and works and hometowns and divine origins and decision and Spirit...Belief. (Read 8:23-24 - Jesus is wildly clear on this)
The 12 (minus Judas I.) get it. They cut through the symbolism, they cut through the figurative language, they go past the fringe prophetical concepts and get to the heart.
Belief in Jesus as the Christ for eternal salvation.
'I chose you, the 12'
Jesus has been reiterating the sovereignty of God in drawing people to Himself (5:19-21, 6:39, 44). Here Jesus has the last word - He (and the Father) are in control of it all.
EIGHT / 66-67
Disciples (crowds) stop following Jesus. What pushes them over the edge beyond belief?
Jesus responds in the negative to the 12. 'Are you also going to leave?' But they get it. They have the flavor of actual faith in them.
SEVEN / 60-65
'This is a hard teaching, who could accept it?'
In 1:11 John preempts this. He tells us that many won't receive or accept Jesus.
Jesus goes on to clarify His point. In fact, He builds on :29, the very foundation of this entire interaction.
'Spirit gives life...the words I have spoken are spirit and life. Yet some of you don't believe.'
Sound familiar? In 4:21-26 Jesus tells the woman that worshipping God is a truth filled-spiritual interaction that happens beyond any tangible attachments. This happens though Himself, the Christ.
Now Jesus is following up with His key point of 'belief' only in the negative. He knows this crowd won't believe and so He pushes them to their breaking point.
'flesh counts for nothing.'
Not His own flesh. Obviously His flesh is important, He gives it for the life of the world! (3:16-17, Philippians 2:5-11, Hebrews 10)
Our flesh, our bodies, actions, works can never achieve salvation. Read 1:13 again. Read 3:13-21, outside of belief we're condemned and a condemned person can do nothing on his own, no word or work, to earn freedom. Belief is stressed in this simple phrase.
'Does this offend you? What if I ascend to my home?'
Oh yeah, Jesus also calls out their unwarranted offense. He knows what they're really hung up on and so He nails it. It's not cannibalism - against the Law. It's not drinking His blood - against the Law. The crowd wouldn't have taken these ideas literally. So then, what was it?
They understood He was speaking of total unity with Him. They understood that total consumption of Jesus meant total unity, faith and adherence to Him and His teachings. What's worse, they knew this meant that He truly was claiming to come to from Heaven and they absolutely couldn't accept this idea that He was God's actual Son (:41-42). What's even worse is that Jesus went on to say that they never really knew the Father anyhow (:45-46, 65). They were spiritually blind and dead and groping the dark for tangible fulfillment, not spiritual (:27).
As for the 'ascension' point, some theologians who claim this passage is about the literal body and blood of Jesus use this as a proof text. How? Well, the idea is that if Jesus were talking figuratively the whole time about his body as flesh then why would He begin talking literally about His ascension. He wouldn't bounce between figurative and literal to prove His point. So if the ascension is literal, so must the talk of eating Him.
Well, I'm not sure that's what's happening here.
The ascension is literal, yes (Acts 1:10). So was His descension (:33). The crowds missed the point. They were still hung up on His claim of divinity (:41-42) and couldn't even fathom total unity and faith in Him. So Jesus calls it out and simply says, 'look, I came from heaven and you don't believe Me. Will you believe if I return from where I came? Probably not.'
On a technical note, bouncing between figurative and literal language isn't strange or out of place. Read 7:37-38, yes we literally must believe in Jesus for salvation, no we don't literally drink Him.
CHALLENGE /
Yeah, that's enough for now. We'll unpack a few more pieces of the conversation in another post. A couple thoughts:
- How important is engaging Jesus in Spirit and belief? Why is He stressing this reality to this Jewish audience?
- Why don't the 12 sum up Jesus' point with a tangible action, such as eating and drinking bread and wine? Did they miss the point? Again, how important is belief, faith, trust and spiritual-intangible-unity with Jesus for salvation?
- In the previous chapters and in the following Jesus stresses simple belief (3:36, 5:24, 9:35-38, 14:6) - is there more to coming to a point of salvation? If so, what and why doesn't Jesus address it? If not then have put your faith / trust in Christ alone for your eternal rescue from sin and death?
Brant Pitre, Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist
Elmer Towns, John (commentary)
Jewish NT Commentary