Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is figurative and spiritual rather than literal, for flesh alone profits nothing while the Spirit gives life through His words which are spirit and life. It means believing in Him and personally receiving Christ Himself by faith into the heart, so that the believer dwells in Him and He dwells in the believer and lives within. It means receiving, digesting and assimilating His Word and teachings until they become part of the being, and personally receiving the virtue of His atoning death given for the life of the world. Whoever so partakes has eternal life now through His life within, and He will raise that person at the last day to immortal life free from pain and sorrow. This partaking must be personal and daily by faith rather than by proxy or occasional observance, and it changes the receiver into His likeness as a partaker of the divine nature.
Figurative Spiritual Meaning
Eating the flesh of the Son of God and drinking His blood is figurative and spiritual, not a literal eating of human flesh. The flesh by itself profits nothing, the Spirit gives life, and the words spoken are spirit and life. Christ presents Himself under the similitude of heavenly bread, His flesh true food and His blood true drink, to be discerned only by faith and spiritual perception. Those who stumble at it as a hard saying turn back for lack of depth, while those who truly receive His word never hunger and never thirst for higher or more satisfying food. The promise belongs to those who so eat and drink, for they have eternal life now and will be raised up at the last day to live forever, unlike those who ate manna and died.
It means believing in Him and personally receiving Christ Himself by faith as Saviour. It means trusting that He forgives sin and that the believer is complete in Him, taking Him into the heart so that His life, love and grace become part of one's own life. As food nourishes the body when eaten, Christ nourishes the soul when His love is received and dwelt upon, bringing truth working by love into the heart to purify the soul. This is entering living fellowship and union with Him, becoming a partaker of the divine nature, making His principles one's own and revealing Him to the world. It requires more than theoretical knowledge, for eternal life depends on receiving the dying Saviour, looking to the cross and to His expiatory death, and obeying His teachings, which gives spiritual strength, joins the believer to Christ and Christ to the believer, and brings resurrection at the last day.
It means receiving, digesting and assimilating His Word, teachings and commands until they become part of the being and shape action and character. This is done by hearing, searching, studying, meditating, believing, obeying, practicing and living by them, keeping the Word and truth continually before the mind, looking to Jesus and living by faith in God's promises. It is taking His words into practical life as spiritual food, not merely tasting them occasionally or giving mere assent, but receiving His truth and counsel with wholehearted unhesitating faith so that Christ abides in the heart by faith and the believer dwells in Christ. So received, His words give light and assurance, pardon, sanctification and a transformed character, with daily feeding giving spiritual strength and eternal life and the promise of resurrection at the last day. He is the center of the believer's life, and this feeding is necessary for eternal life and for seeing God's kingdom.
It means personally receiving the virtue and saving merits of His atoning sacrifice and death for the life of the world. Christ gave Himself and died for sin, and His blood shed on Calvary cleanses from sin and is applied individually through repentance and faith in His atonement. Taking His sacrifice as the basis of salvation, believers appropriate His words so they give spiritual life and strength, receive His nature and righteousness, have Him abiding in the heart, and are nourished by His saving blood. Belief in Christ for forgiveness alone is not enough unless His word is received and assimilated until it becomes the motive power of life and action. Preaching that leaves Him and His saving power out gives no spiritual nourishment, like an offering of fruit without the blood of the slain lamb, while those who appropriate the living bread for themselves are able to break it to others and give the food essential for spiritual growth and eternal life.
It is vital saving union and mutual indwelling in which the believer dwells in Christ and Christ dwells in the believer and lives within. The believer lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, like a branch joined to the vine, depending on Christ for life and receiving Him as the source of spiritual life. Giving the mind and heart the nourishment of the Son of God, the believer is formed in a Christlike spirit and character with Him as the center of life. Those who so receive His spiritual life have eternal life and will be raised by Him at the last day.
His flesh and blood are Bible truth, the living oracles including Old and New Testaments, received as bread from heaven and leaves of the tree of life that give solid experience and spiritual strength. The words spoken have special reference to the spirituality of the Word, and the living oracles are called His flesh and blood even before the crucifixion because His work as substitute for sin was the only hope of ancient Israel. The directions given in the Old Testament Scriptures are full of nourishment for practical holiness and obedience, and no soul who takes those words and eats them will remain in spiritual hunger. The New Testament does not displace the Old or cast it aside, but sheds added light back upon earlier ages and gives significance to the whole Jewish economy, and both belong together. It is the privilege of all to feed on the Word by planting the feet upon it, studying it, and making it constant meditation with mind and heart, receiving it not with understanding alone as formulas for the intellect alone but with heart, moral nature and will. So received in fellowship of the Spirit, laying hold upon truth itself and appropriating it, the Word takes possession of the will, brings every thought into captivity to obedience, renders the Bible immortal truth and spirit and life, and brings life and immortality to light through the gospel with spiritual sinew and muscle to the prayerful searcher, eaten even now without waiting until translation.
Setting and Hearers Divided
The saying belongs to the sermon on the bread of life spoken in the synagogue at Capernaum after the feeding of the multitude and the walking on the water, when He had refused to be made king. It was given to explain the spiritual meaning of that miracle, to define His kingdom as spiritual and not temporal, and to set out in clear lines the conditions of eternal life and the truths of His work. By the miracle He had fed five thousand men besides women and children by creative power and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing was wasted, yet He taught that spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food and that chief labor must be for the meat enduring to everlasting life given by the Son sealed by the Father. It brought a closer test for His followers, shedding precious light on all who heard while trying professed disciples.
The Jews heard with the ears only and took the words literally, caviling with scornful unbelief, How can this man give us his flesh to eat, and were horrified because the law strictly forbade tasting blood. Even disciples with limited comprehension called it a hard saying, murmured, and failed to discern that His words are spirit and life. Many were offended by the plain testimony because it reproved lives out of harmony with truth and righteousness and offered spiritual rather than worldly good.
Many turned back to walk no more with Him, and their departure revealed unbelief and distinguished true believers from half-hearted followers. The crisis exposed hopes of an earthly kingdom and was spoken beforehand so that those not wholly with Him would show their position and reveal true sentiments rather than later dishonor Him in trial. For Judas it was the turning point in his history, when seeing that expectations of a worldly kingdom would not be realized he made shipwreck of faith and afterward permitted doubt, envy, hatred and disaffection to develop until it broke out openly. Those who stumbled at the saying as hard left Him because they could not grasp its spiritual meaning of dwelling in Him and living by Him.
The twelve did not show themselves unfaithful at that time, but stayed rather than go back to lifeless formalism and the commandments of men. Peter speaking for his brethren recognized that He has the words of eternal life and bore public witness by remaining with Him. The saying is received only by those meek and lowly in heart and by a humble, teachable spirit that lets heaven's light remove obscurity, while proud, self-righteous, unbelieving and selfish minds though convicted refuse to yield and cannot grasp its meaning. Its full meaning was to be understood after the crucifixion, resurrection and ascension, when the Holy Spirit would bring His words to remembrance and those who truly heard and believed would remain and prepare their hearts to receive Him.
Christ the True Bread
Christ gave His flesh for the life of the world and shed His blood in sacrifice, becoming the bread of life by perfect obedience and as the Sin-bearer who stepped down from glory to combine humanity and divinity. To eat that flesh and drink that blood is to receive His atoning death on the cross for the salvation of the world, to be spiritually nourished and joined to Him, and to show that union by seeking to do His will and becoming like Him in conduct and speech. His life becomes the believer's life and the spirit becomes one with His, as the branch of the vine is one with the parent stock and nourished by sap flowing from stock to every branch, producing consistency in life and character. This feeding supplies the necessities of the soul just as physical food supplies the necessities of the body, for Christ Himself supplies the nourishment through His Spirit and life-giving words, not through flesh as such. Whoever so receives has eternal life now and will be raised at the last day to live forever by Christ as He lives by the Father.
He is the true bread from heaven given by God Himself through the gift of Christ, and Moses did not give that true bread nor can it be obtained from any human agent. Manna sustained earthly life but could not prevent death or give immortality, and those who ate manna in the wilderness are dead, while Christ gives life that lasts forever. As the Passover lamb whose flesh was eaten recalled the Lamb of God, and as the blood on the Hebrews' doorposts marked their safety when Egypt's firstborn were slain, so His blood was shed for the sins of the world. That sacrifice received by faith is spiritual food giving a well-founded hope of resurrection to immortal life in God's kingdom, for He has power to raise believers at the last day. He still provides for bodily necessities as when by creative power He fed five thousand men besides women and children and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing was wasted, yet spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food.
He is the tree of life restoring what Adam and Eve lost in Eden, and the vine to which believers are joined as branches drawing life to bear fruit, freely available to all who cling to Him. Coming to Him and believing on Him whom God has sent means never hungering nor thirsting, for He declares Himself the Bread of Life and the bread of God coming down from heaven giving life to the world. This feeding on the divine Word is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience. His words are spirit and life, to be discerned only by faith and spiritual perception.
As the resurrection and the life He has life in Himself, with right and power to make alive whom He will and to give immortality and healing from sin to those who behold Him. He laid down life in humanity and took it up again, and the life He laid down in humanity He takes up again and gives to humanity. Those united to Him through faith and the agency of the Holy Spirit have eternal life because His life becomes their life, and because He became one with humanity His life in raising believers from the dead becomes their life. The promise is assurance of deliverance from death and the grave, so believers who die faithful have only fallen asleep and rest until He awakens them to share eternal glory. His claim as the Sent of God and Redeemer of the fallen race, the living bread come down from heaven whose flesh is given for the life of the world, is proved by His resurrection from the grave.
Eternal Life and Resurrection
Whoever eats Christ's flesh and drinks His blood has eternal life now because His life is within, and He will raise such a one at the last day to immortal life. This eating and drinking means receiving Him Himself and receiving His Word in faith and obedience, taking Him as the bread of life given through His death so that there is a living connection with God. It is not a benefit of the flesh, for the flesh profits nothing; the Spirit gives life, and His words are spirit and life and become the source of spiritual life to those who receive them. To live thus on the flesh and blood of the Son of God, which is His Word, is to be strengthened and rooted and grounded in the faith, to see increased evidence for prizing and obeying the Word, to arise to defend the faith when others count believers as dross, and to stand in trial when seekers of convenience, pleasure and enjoyment fall. Those who so receive become one with Him in mutual indwelling, dwelling in Him while He dwells in them, and this union also produces unity of purpose and harmony of action. The Word nourishes the mind as food nourishes the body, and the life it forms makes its hearers observers of the Word.
Those who receive have an earnest of the immortality that will be theirs through His death and resurrection. They may die, as Christ died, and the earthly body may decay and faithful believers may fall asleep in death, but the Saviour's life remains in them, hidden with Christ in God, sustaining them by the principles of faith. This life is the divine remedy for sin, making believers one with Himself in this life and throughout eternity, partakers of the divine nature changed by God through the Holy Spirit into the likeness of Christ with a character like His. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood describes that union: through faith and the agency of the Holy Spirit He dwells in them and they live by Him through obedience to His word, breathing a holy atmosphere, carrying assurance of holy principles, with lives worked by the power of the Holy Spirit. Because Christ laid down His life in humanity and took it up again, giving His life for the life of the world, He gives life and immortality to humanity and has engaged to raise the righteous dead, so believers grasp the pledge of their own resurrection in His resurrection. At the last day, when the last trumpet sounds, the dead who sleep in Christ will come forth to new life, clothed with the garments of salvation, and enter through the gates into the city of God to the happiness and joy of their Lord, with eternal life as their reward, which is His assurance of deliverance from death and the grave.
Eternal life is in Christ and is obtained only through this participation in the Son of God, not by an independent immortality inherent in people. The chapter sets out the conditions of eternal life, and thoroughly understanding and living by its teaching leads to a life that measures with the life of God, unlike earthly life free from pain and sorrow. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood means feeding upon the bread of life that came down from heaven by believing in Christ as a personal Saviour, personally knowing and receiving the living Son of God, and receiving His life-giving words which are spirit and life. Those who do this become partakers of the divine nature, have a living connection with God, bring eternity into their reckoning, and live as in the presence of the whole heavenly host under the watching care of angels. It means daily receiving, believing and living by His words and living by every word of God, depending on Him for spiritual life and supply since He gave His life for the life of the world, and as disciples receive from Him they can pass spiritual nourishment on to others. The believer who thus sees the Son by faith and believes in Him obeys God's commandments and finds everlasting life, and this life leads to believing Christ will return and preparing for His appearing.
The promise is explained alongside hearing His word and believing the Father who sent Him, by which a person passes from death to life and removes condemnation, as stated in John 5:24. Refusing His words is refusing this eternal life, for His words are eternal life to those who believe. Repeated, uncorrected wrongdoing can blind people until they reject the truth even in the face of clear light, and those who refuse the words of life and the correct principles He has sent are not partaking of Christ. Their rejection lets deception strip truth of its importance, while their character reveals the outcome of their choices.
Receiving Christ Personally Daily
Partaking is personal and individual, requiring inward union with Christ by faith in Him as a personal Saviour that no one can have by proxy, for each must come himself with his own hunger, convictions and sense of need, practically applying the Word to his own soul. Mere outward connection with any church, name, profession, activity, or claim to follow Him without living faith will not save, for only receiving Him by faith, taking His spirit and mind, obeying His words, and entering living union in which He dwells within gives eternal life now and resurrection at the last day. As the body is built from food eaten, so believers become partakers of His divine nature and one with Him in spiritual life, and no one can be nourished by what another eats. His words are spirit and life, while the flesh profits nothing, and this must be received with wholehearted, strong, unhesitating faith that educates the soul to believe.
It must be daily, continual and constant, not merely occasional, weekly, on one special day, or only at the sacramental service. Weekly seasons of prayer and one day of special service are not enough for the soul's need and do not qualify for solemn responsibility, and occasional prayer or merely hearing or reading leaves duty undone like looking into the moral looking-glass and forgetting. As daily food sustains the body, so continual dependence on Christ, surrendering the will to God, holding fast to Him as personal Saviour and chief good, making Him guide, living by every word He speaks, drawing from Him through earnest prayer and receiving His word, renews mental and physical powers and changes the believer into His likeness.
It is maintained by continual contact with truth of heavenly origin through eating His words, breathing His Spirit, studying the Word, earnest prayer, sitting at His feet to learn meekness and lowliness, doing missionary work, and treasuring every ray of light. This means encouraging appetite for the soul, praying for enlightenment, constantly meditating, digesting and by practice assimilating the Word so it is taken into the life current, searching it, comparing Scripture with Scripture, and putting divine wisdom into practice. Books and human authors cannot meet the need Christ alone supplies, and an overload of other reading, including improper reading, must not hinder the mind from receiving and inwardly assimilating Him as the word of life. Such communion surrounds the soul with heaven's atmosphere, gives health and vitality, tone and vitality to religious experience, nourishes faith, makes the Word effective, brings mutual indwelling in which the believer lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and teaches by example to think less of gratifying fleshly appetite and feel greater anxiety for soul food.
It means laying aside all malice, guile, hypocrisy, envy, evil speaking, rivalry, jealousy, covetousness and self as products of the carnal mind and unsanctified heart, and growing thereby as newborn babes by the sincere milk of the word. Those who open the Word to others must first feed on it themselves, watch over themselves, weed out deformity and weakness, practice the truth they teach, for where self is mingled the eater has not truly eaten and labor for others is of little effect. Keeping the mind pure and free to do God's will requires closely guarding the appetites, since self-indulgence, intemperance in eating and drinking and any unhealthful habit cloud spiritual judgment, harm the stomach, weaken the system, strengthen disposition to temptation and sin, and hinder obedience, while simple food and submission to Christ's words support purity and service.
It means surrendering the will, crucifying and denying self, taking up the cross daily, accepting enmity against the serpent, refusing careless indifference, overcoming every evil propensity, keeping His commandments and doing His works in faith working by love. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is eating God's Word as bread of life and heeding His laws, opposite eating the serpent's meat of selfishness, hypocrisy, evil-surmising, envy and covetousness and opposite eating of the forbidden tree through disobedience, and is eating from the tree of life. Those who so receive escape control by hereditary and cultivated tendencies, pride, vanity, self-esteem, worldliness and every sin, reveal Christ, work out salvation with fear while God works in them, and have right to say in Christ's strength they will conquer Satan's devices. Profession continuing in sin and neglecting great salvation shows one has not truly partaken and has no part with Him.
It calls for firm steady faith in God's Word and promises rather than reliance on feelings, excitement, fanaticism, or human wisdom and human help, with every action guided by what the Lord has said. Believing on Jesus whom God sent comes first and obedient working of God's works follows, for the bread from heaven gives life as the Word studied, believed, taught and lived. Promises are to be received personally as an invited guest at a spread banquet, gathering its truths and promises as a wellspring of wisdom and comfort, feeding on the banquet of God's Word and trusting its large, full, grand promises, which give strong consolation and highest-value experience. Compared with God's Word, man's word is chaff to wheat, and the Word is sanctification and righteousness, spiritual food satisfying hunger, even leaves of the tree of life.
Coming to Him and believing includes never hungering nor thirsting, for He who comes shall never hunger and he who believes shall never thirst. Chief labor and anxiety must be given not to meat which perishes but to meat enduring to everlasting life which the Son sealed by the Father gives, though the same compassionate Saviour who fed five thousand besides women and children and ordered fragments gathered still provides for bodily necessities. The true bread from heaven was not given by Moses nor obtained from any human agent, but God gives it through Christ, and asking for daily bread means asking for this spiritual food as well as temporal food. Believing and receiving His word brings everlasting life to the receiver.
Eating and drinking Christ belongs to every truly converted soul as the free gift of grace, not deserved by merit nor bought with money, to be freely received and freely given. Those claiming discipleship who receive, believe and practice His word have eternal life, will be raised at the last day, dwell in Christ with Christ dwelling in them, and live by Christ as Christ lives by the Father. The eating and drinking must be done in this life by making the truths He taught a part of daily experience. It is spiritual, not physical, gives eternal life, shows by the life that citizenship is in heaven while in the world but not of it, and prepares for advancement to the higher school.
Transformed Into Christlikeness
Partaking makes a person a partaker of the divine nature, changed into His likeness and reflecting His attributes in holy character, steady disposition, and newly illuminated life. Receiving Christ as spiritual food gives the mind and heart the nourishment of the Son of God, bringing dependence on Him for life and formation in a Christlike spirit and character. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is believing in Him as God's gift, entering living union with Him, making His principles one's own principles, receiving His character and sharing His life, and revealing Him to the world. It supplies spiritual strength and the necessities of the soul just as physical food supplies the body, because Christ Himself supplies the nourishment and His words are spirit and life, while the flesh by itself profits nothing. Those who so believe and receive Him as personal Saviour, looking constantly to Him in daily, hourly faith, have eternal life now, dwell in Christ with Christ dwelling in them, live by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, live forever, and will be raised up at the last day, unlike those who ate manna and died.
Feeding upon the divine Word as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word gives healthy development of all spiritual powers, with sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity and moral power when brought into experience, and their lives show the union as they seek to do His will and become like Him in conduct and speech. It brings forgiveness of sins, sanctification unto eternal life, and daily faith working by love purifying the soul, with growth up into the full stature of men and women in Christ and progressive lifetime conformity to the divine will. This means living by God's revealed word and not departing from its precepts, bringing the truths of Scripture into daily life and daily experience, and making continual growth in grace through daily learning in the school of Christ with prayer ascending to God. Christ was made flesh so that the character believers may possess by this eating and drinking can be understood, and the eating and drinking is spiritual, not literal flesh. It requires studying the spiritual truths of God's Word comprehensively and receiving them into life to produce a practical, holy experience and godly example, personally accepting Christ's truth and clinging to His Word through experienced knowledge rather than mere theory. Partaking brings His Spirit and life, satisfies the soul's hunger, leaves no appetite for the world's corruption, and hides the life with Christ in God.
Those who live by Him become like Him in dealings, bound in fellowship with tender love, unity, patience and peacemaking, cured of accusing, judging, envying, faultfinding, gossip and strife. Feeding on Christ means making Him rather than other people's faults the focus, for He is the only Sin-bearer who can take away sin. It makes a person one with Him in unity of purpose and harmony of action, with mutual love and confidence that constitutes a moral force and convincing power, paying absolute homage to the Word of God and taking the Bible and the Bible alone as rule of faith and practice, with no easy fellowship with the world and no slipshod religion. Studying and practicing the Word cures faultfinding and makes Christlike peacemakers who restore rather than bruise character, loving one another as He loved them, bearing witness to Him, and relying on Him as the source of power for useful service. Christ is blended with their existence, living and acting in them, supplying holiness and unselfish motives, cutting away the spirit of drawing apart so that tender love, respect, kindness, patience and unity are manifested.
It gives spiritual strength, wisdom, efficiency and power to grow up into Christ the living head, with Christ formed within supplying every part of spiritual life like blood forming from food. Receiving the word of infinite power brings God's power present among them and gives special power to the voice, builds spiritual life, and brings spiritual, mental and physical health as the whole being is brought into harmony with God. This union shapes memory, actions, motives, judgment, and love for God and others, giving the wisdom, sufficiency and power needed to live faithfully, and it must not merely be contemplated but taken in and lived by to heal the soul and bring spiritual strength into active use. Conduct and speech show whether the union exists, for sanctified truth changes words and actions into blessing, while claims without obedience are empty. Those who truly feed become one with Him and partakers of the divine nature, molded and fashioned by His Spirit to constantly act out His words in service so plainly that many souls are won, and what enters the spiritual life is expressed in the words.
Christ is the only Sin-bearer and divine remedy for sin, and humanity alienated from God is reconciled to Him only by spiritually partaking of the flesh and blood of His dear Son, which reveals the great love at the foundation of all God's dealings. Looking to Him heals the serpent's sting, and beholding Him changes people into His image with vitalizing power for body, mind and spirit. His words taken in become wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption so that the life meets His requirements, and just as the body is strengthened or weakened by food eaten, spiritual life takes the character of the food given to the mind, producing spiritual health and power to do good. Receiving changes the natural person formed by heredity, nationality, education and circumstances into a new creature with new heart, new purposes and new impulses. Those who eat and drink bear fruit in the heart, fruit in the lips, and fruit in the character, some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundredfold. It means partaking daily of Christ as heavenly manna and drinking of the Spiritual Rock that followed Israel, drinking deep draughts from the fountain of His sympathy, tenderness and love, and having Christ formed within as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life, without which there is no life.
This union leads a person to resist transgression and every approach to sin, to grow more like a shining light, and to gain victory advancing from strength to strength rather than growing weaker. Daily receiving Him and becoming a partaker of the divine nature keeps wicked thoughts from strengthening and prevailing within the heart. Receiving Him fully brings full assurance of faith and a deep grasp of God's truth, which requires being emptied of self and centered wholly in Christ. Eating God's Word as the bread of life and heeding His requirements by obedience to His laws is the opposite of eating of the forbidden tree through disobedience and is eating from the tree of life, escaping control by hereditary and cultivated tendencies, pride, vanity, self-esteem, worldliness and every sin, and receiving power to become sons and daughters of God. It brings into life sunshine and the sweetness and fervency of God's life, refusing to be cast down, trusting His love and His holding of the right hand, and serving as laborers together with God. It fills every heart with wisdom and sanctified judgment, creates a real and enjoyable atmosphere of grace, produces love in response to beholding the love and tenderness of God in Jesus, fills lives with love for God and others, Christ's Spirit and holy aspirations, and springs up in desire for active service, molding life after the divine likeness for effective work.
Communion Ministry and Mission
In a special sense eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of God takes place in holy communion, where bread and wine symbolize His broken body and shed blood. By faith in His sacrifice poured out in death at Calvary believers receive His spiritual life, contemplate that sacrifice, assimilate His life, and are purified and strengthened. The service forms a living connection binding the believer to Christ and thus to the Father, joining dependent human beings to God. As faith contemplates the great sacrifice the soul receives spiritual strength from every communion. The ordinance keeps the crucifixion before the mind and embodies the figures of flesh and blood, so that celebrating it in spirit and in truth the representations are clearly understood through the Holy Spirit preparing the mind and quickening perception to grasp the truths conveyed. Eating His words and obeying them makes believers partakers of His divine nature and one in spiritual life with Him, just as the body is composed of the food eaten, and no one can be nourished by what another eats but each must eat for himself to have eternal life and be raised at the last day.
Looking upon the crucified Redeemer in communion gives fuller comprehension of the magnitude and meaning of the sacrifice made by the Majesty of heaven, glorifies the plan of salvation, awakens living sacred emotions, and puts praise to God and the Lamb in heart and lips. Fresh memory of Calvary keeps pride and self-worship from flourishing, elevates thought, purifies heart, transforms character, sends the believer forth as a light reflecting that love, and leads to glorying only in the cross. In doing so believers join the communion in the upper chamber, pass through the garden of His agony, witness the struggle by which reconciliation with God was obtained, and see Christ set forth crucified among them. Taking the bread and wine does not itself bring the heart into harmony with God, but Christ must be continually received as spiritual food through meditation, prayer, and doing His will, so that His nature is incorporated and He lives within.
Understanding this truth gives gospel ministry the life-giving elements of eternal life and brings a fresh, clear, powerful presentation of the gospel. Those open to the Holy Spirit are energized with new life and awakened to see the beauty and majesty of truth. Ministers must first partake themselves to have bread to break to others, uplift Christ, and nourish hearers to growth instead of preaching Christless arguments that leave them starving. Thoroughly understanding and living by the teaching of this chapter, which sets out the conditions of eternal life, leads to a life that measures with the life of God. Feeding upon the divine Word as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience.
The instruction in John 6 is the mystery of godliness, to be studied and made part of life by bringing its teachings into daily experience. So received it gives oneness with Christ and the knowledge that enables distinguishing the true from the false in days of peril when Satan works miracles and apparent healings that test those who have had great light. Receiving His words, which are spirit and life, gives eternal life and establishes the soul in the truth of God's Word so that it will not be deceived by sophistries, for miraculous healings are not reliable evidence of God's people. Plainly stated, the way to obtain eternal life is receiving the principles of God's Word into daily life and practicing the truth contained in it, thereby coming into connection with Christ and having His Word as stronghold and defense against deception and spiritual darkness in the last days. Those ministering in word and doctrine must not be dull of understanding but must read the sixth chapter of John and ask God for clearness to comprehend its important statements, feeding the mind on Scripture for spiritual growth rather than spending time on books and magazines that flood the world, lead the mind astray, and hinder growth.
The chapter calls each person to realize dependence on Christ alone by creation and by redemption, to look to Jesus instead of making man a trust or following human devising, and to be guided by the Word of the living God. Those who receive Him by faith have Him as sanctification, righteousness, and exceeding great reward, and walk and work as accountable to God, while without this dependence there is spiritual weakness and bondage to human beings. It means paying absolute homage to the Word of God in doctrine and principle, taking the Bible and the Bible alone as rule of faith and practice, having no easy fellowship with the world and no slipshod religion, so that unity of purpose and harmony of action with mutual love and confidence constitutes a moral force and convincing power to the world. It means making the living oracles the study, searching the Scriptures to understand counsel given from the beginning, taking the place of a learner depending on God for guidance, following His principles in dealing with believers or unbelievers, cherishing eternal principles of justice and righteousness in word, spirit, and action, instead of substituting human devising and making God's will secondary. The Word of God is to be one's counsellor rather than relying on a minister or physician to create one's experience, for no other food can build up the spiritual life.
Its teaching is to be made the essence of education in all schools, rather than words of worldly wisdom, maxims of men, or human theories. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of God is tasting that the Lord is gracious as actual personal experience, meaning true conversion and new birth, discerning the requirements of the spiritual kingdom and having part in it. As newborn babes those who eat and drink learn to desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby, opening the mind to the entrance of God's word with determination to practice it, by which light comes and the word gives understanding to the simple. When obtained the frivolous life is changed, the feet are placed on the first round of the ladder which is Christ Jesus, the character is transformed under the gaze of heaven, step-by-step heavenward mounting follows, and Christ is revealed in spirit, words, and actions. This feeding upon Christ's words as His very flesh and blood is the education children, youth, men and women need to become workers together with God, given at the school at Cooranbong by the most complete faculty yet provided, where teachers should give students the bread of life, not instruction that cannot sustain spiritual life and leads toward death. Feasting on the word as Christ's flesh and blood strengthens spiritual life, helps grow in grace and knowledge of truth, forms habits of self-control, causes childish faults to give way to Christian character, and produces healthy religious characters, though continued watchfulness and nurture are required because the soul's health decays when neglected.
Receiving His words which are spirit and life makes sound in faith and belongs with care for the body in health reform and sanitariums to restore sin-sick souls. In that work people are to be taught this meaning together with how to care for their own bodies, so as to receive peace and hope and faith and be restored to spiritual life and led to receive and obey present truth.
Feeding on Christ as heavenly nourishment creates hunger for Him and brings spiritual strength and comfort. Turning instead to worldly entertainments leaves no room for that hunger and risks losing assurance, peace, joy, hope, and love for Bible religion. Spiritually men and women are built up from the food they give the mind, and the bread sent down from heaven to be eaten is contained in the Bible, so eternal life and resurrection come by giving the soul right food and properly feeding the mind by living on the words from His lips, wholly depending on the Lord, having faculties controlled by the Spirit, bringing the soul into subjection to God's will, staying thoughts upon God, and obeying His law, with no condemnation to the obedient. What people choose to feed mind and soul affects desire for this heavenly nourishment, for as eating and drinking nourish the body so spiritual life depends on what the mind takes in and assimilates; dwelling continually on others' faults is unhealthy nourishment, while feeding on what is good promotes vitality and growth, in contrast to the world's desires, pleasures, amusements, cheap reading, and novels which cannot satisfy or heal and waste precious powers.
Failure to eat and drink by abiding in Christ and eating the heavenly bread is the reason for lack of the Holy Spirit, though God has given every facility, every grace, and the riches of heaven's treasure as the privilege to draw continually from this provision. Vanity, evil-thinking, evil-speaking, and cherished, petted, exalted self keep believers from availing themselves of it, leaving them powerless, inefficient, and unable to work out salvation in harmony with God's will. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood means receiving intelligent knowledge of His Word, being fed with the bread of life as hungry souls are fed with truth, and that life-giving knowledge is to be unfurled and imparted widely to those perishing in error, keeping many at work in other fields and all countries instead of gathering means for one place. Feeding on Christ is distinct from merely knowing the truth, for those who know it can still fail to feed, remaining unresponsive even when precious saving truth is repeated over and over, so labor spent so repeating would be better spent carrying truth to unworked cities and to those ready to perish in ignorance and sin who would repent if reached.
The sign to be expected now and always of true teaching is the working of the Holy Spirit on the teacher's mind to make the Word as impressive as possible, not an excitement of feeling or something outside the Word to make people feel. The living bread is His Word which He has given, not dead dry theory but Spirit and life, and attention must not be called to dreams and visions. Feeding on Him stands opposite being absorbed in investigation of unrevealed mysteries, for Jesus deliberately withheld mysteries and disclosures that would have absorbed attention for generations, because curiosity and conjecture eclipse the grand momentous truth He wished ever prominent and cause loss of sight of what He had already taught. Instead it calls for keeping Christ and His revealed instruction the subject of most earnest thought and desire, marking His words, studying the Scriptures, and treasuring every ray of light given, rather than seeking many inventions and knowledge God has not revealed.
No pressure of commercial work, business, cares, or pursuit of material gain excuses neglect of this feeding, for receiving and practicing the Word of life forms a character fit for heaven and gives eternal life. Devotion to business that leaves no time for prayer and the words of life deprives the soul of nourishment and inspiration and prevents representing Christ and preserving spirituality. Those who receive His words share in the love He gives His followers, yield themselves to God, follow the way He trod, and obey His commandments from the heart, depending through the Holy Spirit on God's power and revealing His love and holiness. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is being doers of His Word, manifesting His self-denial, self-sacrifice, patience, mercy, long-suffering and love to bring the erring back to repentance and fellowship with God, working reformation in individual souls, families, and the church under the transforming grace of the Holy Spirit, thereby overcoming selfishness and covetousness.
All who bear His name must so eat and drink or have no part with Him, taking the truth He gave and the words He spoke for guidance into the heart and making them part of life, taking the Scriptures into the individual heart. So feeding as newborn babes on the divine Word gives eternal life and resurrection at the last day, mutual indwelling in which the believer dwells in Christ and Christ in him, living by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and healthful development of all spiritual powers. It means believing in Christ as personal Saviour and appropriating God's Word as daily bread purchased at infinite cost, becoming a partaker of the divine nature, a branch of the living vine receiving life by vital current from the parent stalk, with character able to receive heaven's blessings and work successfully for others. This daily receiving of grace sufficient for duties and trials, accepted and improved by remaining a student in Christ's school to learn what pleases God, is how to conquer invisible foes instead of living to amuse and please self.
What looks barren to the unrenewed becomes to the converted mind like the garden of God, giving fitness for immortal life and equipping believers to stand through the coming conflict. Those who live on His flesh and blood, which is His Word, are strengthened, rooted, and grounded in faith, see increased evidence for prizing and obeying the Word, arise to defend the faith when others count them as dross, and stand in trial when those who seek convenience, pleasure, and enjoyment fall. Without partaking of Him who gave His flesh for the life of the world there is no life, and receiving this life requires understanding His words by experience and doing them, a teaching repeated over and over even when hearers were offended because spiritual life depends on it, far more essential than perplexity over temporal food or prosperity. Those who receive and obey His word as partakers of the divine nature are taught by the Holy Spirit and made wise to discern spiritual things and understand the things of God in order to fulfill His purpose, while those without the Spirit's teaching remain ignorant no matter what other advantages they have.
Connections to Other Scripture
Eating and drinking is coming to Him and believing on the One whom God has sent, so that whoever comes will never hunger and whoever believes will never thirst. He who spoke this remains the same compassionate Saviour who does not overlook bodily hunger, who by creative power fed five thousand men besides women and children and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing would be wasted, and who still provides food for bodily necessities. By that miracle He taught that spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food, so chief labor and anxiety must be given not to food that perishes but to food enduring to everlasting life, which the Son of man gives as One sealed by God the Father. The true bread from heaven was not given by Moses and cannot be obtained from any human agent, but God Himself gives it through the gift of Christ, for the bread of God comes down from heaven and gives life to the world, and He declares Himself the Bread of Life.
It means feeding upon the divine Word of God as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby. Whoever so feeds has eternal life, will be raised at the last day, dwells in Christ and Christ in him, lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and will live forever, unlike those who ate manna in the wilderness and are dead. The words are spirit and life, not literal flesh, for the flesh profits nothing, and they can only be discerned by faith and spiritual perception; those without depth stumble at the hard saying and turn back. This feeding is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience. Made the real essence of education in all schools, it nourishes rather than words of worldly wisdom, maxims of men, theories of human beings, or human theories, as seen when hearers in the synagogue at Capernaum with limited comprehension murmured, called it a hard saying, and went back to walk no more with Him.
It means living by every word that comes from the mouth of God and proceeds from God’s mouth. Such eating and drinking keeps a person joined to Christ so as not to be separated from Him and lose the eternal reward of everlasting life. It means accepting the enmity placed between man and the serpent and refusing to be careless and indifferent in neglecting the great salvation. It stands opposite becoming earthly by eating the serpent’s meat of selfishness, hypocrisy, evil-surmising or evil suspicion, envy, and covetousness, choosing instead to live by His teaching. It gives the right to say in the strength of Jesus Christ, depending on Christ’s strength, I will be a conqueror and will not be overcome by Satan’s devices and Satan.
It means partaking daily of Christ as heavenly manna and drinking of the Spiritual Rock that followed Israel in the wilderness, because what food is to physical needs Christ is to spiritual necessities. It means drinking deep draughts from the fountain of His sympathy and tenderness and love as the Bread of life, and having Christ formed within the soul so His presence is a well of water springing up unto everlasting life. Without this partaking there is no life in a person, and those who lack a right comprehension of true religion and have a low estimate of the Christian life are changed by it and need to be converted anew and rebaptized. Receiving life and nourishment from Him must be done with contrition for sin, pictured by eating the Passover lamb with bitter herbs, and with sin put away, pictured by eating unleavened bread.
Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is figurative and spiritual rather than literal, for flesh alone profits nothing while the Spirit gives life through His words which are spirit and life.
It means believing in Him and personally receiving Christ Himself by faith into the heart, so that the believer dwells in Him and He dwells in the believer and lives within.
It means receiving, digesting and assimilating His Word and teachings until they become part of the being, and personally receiving the virtue of His atoning death given for the life of the world.
Whoever so partakes has eternal life now through His life within, and He will raise that person at the last day to immortal life free from pain and sorrow.
This partaking must be personal and daily by faith rather than by proxy or occasional observance, and it changes the receiver into His likeness as a partaker of the divine nature.
Figurative Spiritual Meaning
Eating the flesh of the Son of God and drinking His blood is figurative and spiritual, not a literal eating of human flesh. The flesh by itself profits nothing, the Spirit gives life, and the words spoken are spirit and life. Christ presents Himself under the similitude of heavenly bread, His flesh true food and His blood true drink, to be discerned only by faith and spiritual perception. Those who stumble at it as a hard saying turn back for lack of depth, while those who truly receive His word never hunger and never thirst for higher or more satisfying food. The promise belongs to those who so eat and drink, for they have eternal life now and will be raised up at the last day to live forever, unlike those who ate manna and died.
It means believing in Him and personally receiving Christ Himself by faith as Saviour. It means trusting that He forgives sin and that the believer is complete in Him, taking Him into the heart so that His life, love and grace become part of one's own life. As food nourishes the body when eaten, Christ nourishes the soul when His love is received and dwelt upon, bringing truth working by love into the heart to purify the soul. This is entering living fellowship and union with Him, becoming a partaker of the divine nature, making His principles one's own and revealing Him to the world. It requires more than theoretical knowledge, for eternal life depends on receiving the dying Saviour, looking to the cross and to His expiatory death, and obeying His teachings, which gives spiritual strength, joins the believer to Christ and Christ to the believer, and brings resurrection at the last day.
It means receiving, digesting and assimilating His Word, teachings and commands until they become part of the being and shape action and character. This is done by hearing, searching, studying, meditating, believing, obeying, practicing and living by them, keeping the Word and truth continually before the mind, looking to Jesus and living by faith in God's promises. It is taking His words into practical life as spiritual food, not merely tasting them occasionally or giving mere assent, but receiving His truth and counsel with wholehearted unhesitating faith so that Christ abides in the heart by faith and the believer dwells in Christ. So received, His words give light and assurance, pardon, sanctification and a transformed character, with daily feeding giving spiritual strength and eternal life and the promise of resurrection at the last day. He is the center of the believer's life, and this feeding is necessary for eternal life and for seeing God's kingdom.
It means personally receiving the virtue and saving merits of His atoning sacrifice and death for the life of the world. Christ gave Himself and died for sin, and His blood shed on Calvary cleanses from sin and is applied individually through repentance and faith in His atonement. Taking His sacrifice as the basis of salvation, believers appropriate His words so they give spiritual life and strength, receive His nature and righteousness, have Him abiding in the heart, and are nourished by His saving blood. Belief in Christ for forgiveness alone is not enough unless His word is received and assimilated until it becomes the motive power of life and action. Preaching that leaves Him and His saving power out gives no spiritual nourishment, like an offering of fruit without the blood of the slain lamb, while those who appropriate the living bread for themselves are able to break it to others and give the food essential for spiritual growth and eternal life.
It is vital saving union and mutual indwelling in which the believer dwells in Christ and Christ dwells in the believer and lives within. The believer lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, like a branch joined to the vine, depending on Christ for life and receiving Him as the source of spiritual life. Giving the mind and heart the nourishment of the Son of God, the believer is formed in a Christlike spirit and character with Him as the center of life. Those who so receive His spiritual life have eternal life and will be raised by Him at the last day.
His flesh and blood are Bible truth, the living oracles including Old and New Testaments, received as bread from heaven and leaves of the tree of life that give solid experience and spiritual strength. The words spoken have special reference to the spirituality of the Word, and the living oracles are called His flesh and blood even before the crucifixion because His work as substitute for sin was the only hope of ancient Israel. The directions given in the Old Testament Scriptures are full of nourishment for practical holiness and obedience, and no soul who takes those words and eats them will remain in spiritual hunger. The New Testament does not displace the Old or cast it aside, but sheds added light back upon earlier ages and gives significance to the whole Jewish economy, and both belong together. It is the privilege of all to feed on the Word by planting the feet upon it, studying it, and making it constant meditation with mind and heart, receiving it not with understanding alone as formulas for the intellect alone but with heart, moral nature and will. So received in fellowship of the Spirit, laying hold upon truth itself and appropriating it, the Word takes possession of the will, brings every thought into captivity to obedience, renders the Bible immortal truth and spirit and life, and brings life and immortality to light through the gospel with spiritual sinew and muscle to the prayerful searcher, eaten even now without waiting until translation.
Setting and Hearers Divided
The saying belongs to the sermon on the bread of life spoken in the synagogue at Capernaum after the feeding of the multitude and the walking on the water, when He had refused to be made king. It was given to explain the spiritual meaning of that miracle, to define His kingdom as spiritual and not temporal, and to set out in clear lines the conditions of eternal life and the truths of His work. By the miracle He had fed five thousand men besides women and children by creative power and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing was wasted, yet He taught that spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food and that chief labor must be for the meat enduring to everlasting life given by the Son sealed by the Father. It brought a closer test for His followers, shedding precious light on all who heard while trying professed disciples.
The Jews heard with the ears only and took the words literally, caviling with scornful unbelief, How can this man give us his flesh to eat, and were horrified because the law strictly forbade tasting blood. Even disciples with limited comprehension called it a hard saying, murmured, and failed to discern that His words are spirit and life. Many were offended by the plain testimony because it reproved lives out of harmony with truth and righteousness and offered spiritual rather than worldly good.
Many turned back to walk no more with Him, and their departure revealed unbelief and distinguished true believers from half-hearted followers. The crisis exposed hopes of an earthly kingdom and was spoken beforehand so that those not wholly with Him would show their position and reveal true sentiments rather than later dishonor Him in trial. For Judas it was the turning point in his history, when seeing that expectations of a worldly kingdom would not be realized he made shipwreck of faith and afterward permitted doubt, envy, hatred and disaffection to develop until it broke out openly. Those who stumbled at the saying as hard left Him because they could not grasp its spiritual meaning of dwelling in Him and living by Him.
The twelve did not show themselves unfaithful at that time, but stayed rather than go back to lifeless formalism and the commandments of men. Peter speaking for his brethren recognized that He has the words of eternal life and bore public witness by remaining with Him. The saying is received only by those meek and lowly in heart and by a humble, teachable spirit that lets heaven's light remove obscurity, while proud, self-righteous, unbelieving and selfish minds though convicted refuse to yield and cannot grasp its meaning. Its full meaning was to be understood after the crucifixion, resurrection and ascension, when the Holy Spirit would bring His words to remembrance and those who truly heard and believed would remain and prepare their hearts to receive Him.
Christ the True Bread
Christ gave His flesh for the life of the world and shed His blood in sacrifice, becoming the bread of life by perfect obedience and as the Sin-bearer who stepped down from glory to combine humanity and divinity. To eat that flesh and drink that blood is to receive His atoning death on the cross for the salvation of the world, to be spiritually nourished and joined to Him, and to show that union by seeking to do His will and becoming like Him in conduct and speech. His life becomes the believer's life and the spirit becomes one with His, as the branch of the vine is one with the parent stock and nourished by sap flowing from stock to every branch, producing consistency in life and character. This feeding supplies the necessities of the soul just as physical food supplies the necessities of the body, for Christ Himself supplies the nourishment through His Spirit and life-giving words, not through flesh as such. Whoever so receives has eternal life now and will be raised at the last day to live forever by Christ as He lives by the Father.
He is the true bread from heaven given by God Himself through the gift of Christ, and Moses did not give that true bread nor can it be obtained from any human agent. Manna sustained earthly life but could not prevent death or give immortality, and those who ate manna in the wilderness are dead, while Christ gives life that lasts forever. As the Passover lamb whose flesh was eaten recalled the Lamb of God, and as the blood on the Hebrews' doorposts marked their safety when Egypt's firstborn were slain, so His blood was shed for the sins of the world. That sacrifice received by faith is spiritual food giving a well-founded hope of resurrection to immortal life in God's kingdom, for He has power to raise believers at the last day. He still provides for bodily necessities as when by creative power He fed five thousand men besides women and children and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing was wasted, yet spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food.
He is the tree of life restoring what Adam and Eve lost in Eden, and the vine to which believers are joined as branches drawing life to bear fruit, freely available to all who cling to Him. Coming to Him and believing on Him whom God has sent means never hungering nor thirsting, for He declares Himself the Bread of Life and the bread of God coming down from heaven giving life to the world. This feeding on the divine Word is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience. His words are spirit and life, to be discerned only by faith and spiritual perception.
As the resurrection and the life He has life in Himself, with right and power to make alive whom He will and to give immortality and healing from sin to those who behold Him. He laid down life in humanity and took it up again, and the life He laid down in humanity He takes up again and gives to humanity. Those united to Him through faith and the agency of the Holy Spirit have eternal life because His life becomes their life, and because He became one with humanity His life in raising believers from the dead becomes their life. The promise is assurance of deliverance from death and the grave, so believers who die faithful have only fallen asleep and rest until He awakens them to share eternal glory. His claim as the Sent of God and Redeemer of the fallen race, the living bread come down from heaven whose flesh is given for the life of the world, is proved by His resurrection from the grave.
Eternal Life and Resurrection
Whoever eats Christ's flesh and drinks His blood has eternal life now because His life is within, and He will raise such a one at the last day to immortal life. This eating and drinking means receiving Him Himself and receiving His Word in faith and obedience, taking Him as the bread of life given through His death so that there is a living connection with God. It is not a benefit of the flesh, for the flesh profits nothing; the Spirit gives life, and His words are spirit and life and become the source of spiritual life to those who receive them. To live thus on the flesh and blood of the Son of God, which is His Word, is to be strengthened and rooted and grounded in the faith, to see increased evidence for prizing and obeying the Word, to arise to defend the faith when others count believers as dross, and to stand in trial when seekers of convenience, pleasure and enjoyment fall. Those who so receive become one with Him in mutual indwelling, dwelling in Him while He dwells in them, and this union also produces unity of purpose and harmony of action. The Word nourishes the mind as food nourishes the body, and the life it forms makes its hearers observers of the Word.
Those who receive have an earnest of the immortality that will be theirs through His death and resurrection. They may die, as Christ died, and the earthly body may decay and faithful believers may fall asleep in death, but the Saviour's life remains in them, hidden with Christ in God, sustaining them by the principles of faith. This life is the divine remedy for sin, making believers one with Himself in this life and throughout eternity, partakers of the divine nature changed by God through the Holy Spirit into the likeness of Christ with a character like His. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood describes that union: through faith and the agency of the Holy Spirit He dwells in them and they live by Him through obedience to His word, breathing a holy atmosphere, carrying assurance of holy principles, with lives worked by the power of the Holy Spirit. Because Christ laid down His life in humanity and took it up again, giving His life for the life of the world, He gives life and immortality to humanity and has engaged to raise the righteous dead, so believers grasp the pledge of their own resurrection in His resurrection. At the last day, when the last trumpet sounds, the dead who sleep in Christ will come forth to new life, clothed with the garments of salvation, and enter through the gates into the city of God to the happiness and joy of their Lord, with eternal life as their reward, which is His assurance of deliverance from death and the grave.
Eternal life is in Christ and is obtained only through this participation in the Son of God, not by an independent immortality inherent in people. The chapter sets out the conditions of eternal life, and thoroughly understanding and living by its teaching leads to a life that measures with the life of God, unlike earthly life free from pain and sorrow. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood means feeding upon the bread of life that came down from heaven by believing in Christ as a personal Saviour, personally knowing and receiving the living Son of God, and receiving His life-giving words which are spirit and life. Those who do this become partakers of the divine nature, have a living connection with God, bring eternity into their reckoning, and live as in the presence of the whole heavenly host under the watching care of angels. It means daily receiving, believing and living by His words and living by every word of God, depending on Him for spiritual life and supply since He gave His life for the life of the world, and as disciples receive from Him they can pass spiritual nourishment on to others. The believer who thus sees the Son by faith and believes in Him obeys God's commandments and finds everlasting life, and this life leads to believing Christ will return and preparing for His appearing.
The promise is explained alongside hearing His word and believing the Father who sent Him, by which a person passes from death to life and removes condemnation, as stated in John 5:24. Refusing His words is refusing this eternal life, for His words are eternal life to those who believe. Repeated, uncorrected wrongdoing can blind people until they reject the truth even in the face of clear light, and those who refuse the words of life and the correct principles He has sent are not partaking of Christ. Their rejection lets deception strip truth of its importance, while their character reveals the outcome of their choices.
Receiving Christ Personally Daily
Partaking is personal and individual, requiring inward union with Christ by faith in Him as a personal Saviour that no one can have by proxy, for each must come himself with his own hunger, convictions and sense of need, practically applying the Word to his own soul. Mere outward connection with any church, name, profession, activity, or claim to follow Him without living faith will not save, for only receiving Him by faith, taking His spirit and mind, obeying His words, and entering living union in which He dwells within gives eternal life now and resurrection at the last day. As the body is built from food eaten, so believers become partakers of His divine nature and one with Him in spiritual life, and no one can be nourished by what another eats. His words are spirit and life, while the flesh profits nothing, and this must be received with wholehearted, strong, unhesitating faith that educates the soul to believe.
It must be daily, continual and constant, not merely occasional, weekly, on one special day, or only at the sacramental service. Weekly seasons of prayer and one day of special service are not enough for the soul's need and do not qualify for solemn responsibility, and occasional prayer or merely hearing or reading leaves duty undone like looking into the moral looking-glass and forgetting. As daily food sustains the body, so continual dependence on Christ, surrendering the will to God, holding fast to Him as personal Saviour and chief good, making Him guide, living by every word He speaks, drawing from Him through earnest prayer and receiving His word, renews mental and physical powers and changes the believer into His likeness.
It is maintained by continual contact with truth of heavenly origin through eating His words, breathing His Spirit, studying the Word, earnest prayer, sitting at His feet to learn meekness and lowliness, doing missionary work, and treasuring every ray of light. This means encouraging appetite for the soul, praying for enlightenment, constantly meditating, digesting and by practice assimilating the Word so it is taken into the life current, searching it, comparing Scripture with Scripture, and putting divine wisdom into practice. Books and human authors cannot meet the need Christ alone supplies, and an overload of other reading, including improper reading, must not hinder the mind from receiving and inwardly assimilating Him as the word of life. Such communion surrounds the soul with heaven's atmosphere, gives health and vitality, tone and vitality to religious experience, nourishes faith, makes the Word effective, brings mutual indwelling in which the believer lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and teaches by example to think less of gratifying fleshly appetite and feel greater anxiety for soul food.
It means laying aside all malice, guile, hypocrisy, envy, evil speaking, rivalry, jealousy, covetousness and self as products of the carnal mind and unsanctified heart, and growing thereby as newborn babes by the sincere milk of the word. Those who open the Word to others must first feed on it themselves, watch over themselves, weed out deformity and weakness, practice the truth they teach, for where self is mingled the eater has not truly eaten and labor for others is of little effect. Keeping the mind pure and free to do God's will requires closely guarding the appetites, since self-indulgence, intemperance in eating and drinking and any unhealthful habit cloud spiritual judgment, harm the stomach, weaken the system, strengthen disposition to temptation and sin, and hinder obedience, while simple food and submission to Christ's words support purity and service.
It means surrendering the will, crucifying and denying self, taking up the cross daily, accepting enmity against the serpent, refusing careless indifference, overcoming every evil propensity, keeping His commandments and doing His works in faith working by love. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is eating God's Word as bread of life and heeding His laws, opposite eating the serpent's meat of selfishness, hypocrisy, evil-surmising, envy and covetousness and opposite eating of the forbidden tree through disobedience, and is eating from the tree of life. Those who so receive escape control by hereditary and cultivated tendencies, pride, vanity, self-esteem, worldliness and every sin, reveal Christ, work out salvation with fear while God works in them, and have right to say in Christ's strength they will conquer Satan's devices. Profession continuing in sin and neglecting great salvation shows one has not truly partaken and has no part with Him.
It calls for firm steady faith in God's Word and promises rather than reliance on feelings, excitement, fanaticism, or human wisdom and human help, with every action guided by what the Lord has said. Believing on Jesus whom God sent comes first and obedient working of God's works follows, for the bread from heaven gives life as the Word studied, believed, taught and lived. Promises are to be received personally as an invited guest at a spread banquet, gathering its truths and promises as a wellspring of wisdom and comfort, feeding on the banquet of God's Word and trusting its large, full, grand promises, which give strong consolation and highest-value experience. Compared with God's Word, man's word is chaff to wheat, and the Word is sanctification and righteousness, spiritual food satisfying hunger, even leaves of the tree of life.
Coming to Him and believing includes never hungering nor thirsting, for He who comes shall never hunger and he who believes shall never thirst. Chief labor and anxiety must be given not to meat which perishes but to meat enduring to everlasting life which the Son sealed by the Father gives, though the same compassionate Saviour who fed five thousand besides women and children and ordered fragments gathered still provides for bodily necessities. The true bread from heaven was not given by Moses nor obtained from any human agent, but God gives it through Christ, and asking for daily bread means asking for this spiritual food as well as temporal food. Believing and receiving His word brings everlasting life to the receiver.
Eating and drinking Christ belongs to every truly converted soul as the free gift of grace, not deserved by merit nor bought with money, to be freely received and freely given. Those claiming discipleship who receive, believe and practice His word have eternal life, will be raised at the last day, dwell in Christ with Christ dwelling in them, and live by Christ as Christ lives by the Father. The eating and drinking must be done in this life by making the truths He taught a part of daily experience. It is spiritual, not physical, gives eternal life, shows by the life that citizenship is in heaven while in the world but not of it, and prepares for advancement to the higher school.
Transformed Into Christlikeness
Partaking makes a person a partaker of the divine nature, changed into His likeness and reflecting His attributes in holy character, steady disposition, and newly illuminated life. Receiving Christ as spiritual food gives the mind and heart the nourishment of the Son of God, bringing dependence on Him for life and formation in a Christlike spirit and character. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is believing in Him as God's gift, entering living union with Him, making His principles one's own principles, receiving His character and sharing His life, and revealing Him to the world. It supplies spiritual strength and the necessities of the soul just as physical food supplies the body, because Christ Himself supplies the nourishment and His words are spirit and life, while the flesh by itself profits nothing. Those who so believe and receive Him as personal Saviour, looking constantly to Him in daily, hourly faith, have eternal life now, dwell in Christ with Christ dwelling in them, live by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, live forever, and will be raised up at the last day, unlike those who ate manna and died.
Feeding upon the divine Word as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word gives healthy development of all spiritual powers, with sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity and moral power when brought into experience, and their lives show the union as they seek to do His will and become like Him in conduct and speech. It brings forgiveness of sins, sanctification unto eternal life, and daily faith working by love purifying the soul, with growth up into the full stature of men and women in Christ and progressive lifetime conformity to the divine will. This means living by God's revealed word and not departing from its precepts, bringing the truths of Scripture into daily life and daily experience, and making continual growth in grace through daily learning in the school of Christ with prayer ascending to God. Christ was made flesh so that the character believers may possess by this eating and drinking can be understood, and the eating and drinking is spiritual, not literal flesh. It requires studying the spiritual truths of God's Word comprehensively and receiving them into life to produce a practical, holy experience and godly example, personally accepting Christ's truth and clinging to His Word through experienced knowledge rather than mere theory. Partaking brings His Spirit and life, satisfies the soul's hunger, leaves no appetite for the world's corruption, and hides the life with Christ in God.
Those who live by Him become like Him in dealings, bound in fellowship with tender love, unity, patience and peacemaking, cured of accusing, judging, envying, faultfinding, gossip and strife. Feeding on Christ means making Him rather than other people's faults the focus, for He is the only Sin-bearer who can take away sin. It makes a person one with Him in unity of purpose and harmony of action, with mutual love and confidence that constitutes a moral force and convincing power, paying absolute homage to the Word of God and taking the Bible and the Bible alone as rule of faith and practice, with no easy fellowship with the world and no slipshod religion. Studying and practicing the Word cures faultfinding and makes Christlike peacemakers who restore rather than bruise character, loving one another as He loved them, bearing witness to Him, and relying on Him as the source of power for useful service. Christ is blended with their existence, living and acting in them, supplying holiness and unselfish motives, cutting away the spirit of drawing apart so that tender love, respect, kindness, patience and unity are manifested.
It gives spiritual strength, wisdom, efficiency and power to grow up into Christ the living head, with Christ formed within supplying every part of spiritual life like blood forming from food. Receiving the word of infinite power brings God's power present among them and gives special power to the voice, builds spiritual life, and brings spiritual, mental and physical health as the whole being is brought into harmony with God. This union shapes memory, actions, motives, judgment, and love for God and others, giving the wisdom, sufficiency and power needed to live faithfully, and it must not merely be contemplated but taken in and lived by to heal the soul and bring spiritual strength into active use. Conduct and speech show whether the union exists, for sanctified truth changes words and actions into blessing, while claims without obedience are empty. Those who truly feed become one with Him and partakers of the divine nature, molded and fashioned by His Spirit to constantly act out His words in service so plainly that many souls are won, and what enters the spiritual life is expressed in the words.
Christ is the only Sin-bearer and divine remedy for sin, and humanity alienated from God is reconciled to Him only by spiritually partaking of the flesh and blood of His dear Son, which reveals the great love at the foundation of all God's dealings. Looking to Him heals the serpent's sting, and beholding Him changes people into His image with vitalizing power for body, mind and spirit. His words taken in become wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption so that the life meets His requirements, and just as the body is strengthened or weakened by food eaten, spiritual life takes the character of the food given to the mind, producing spiritual health and power to do good. Receiving changes the natural person formed by heredity, nationality, education and circumstances into a new creature with new heart, new purposes and new impulses. Those who eat and drink bear fruit in the heart, fruit in the lips, and fruit in the character, some thirty, some sixty, and some a hundredfold. It means partaking daily of Christ as heavenly manna and drinking of the Spiritual Rock that followed Israel, drinking deep draughts from the fountain of His sympathy, tenderness and love, and having Christ formed within as a well of water springing up unto everlasting life, without which there is no life.
This union leads a person to resist transgression and every approach to sin, to grow more like a shining light, and to gain victory advancing from strength to strength rather than growing weaker. Daily receiving Him and becoming a partaker of the divine nature keeps wicked thoughts from strengthening and prevailing within the heart. Receiving Him fully brings full assurance of faith and a deep grasp of God's truth, which requires being emptied of self and centered wholly in Christ. Eating God's Word as the bread of life and heeding His requirements by obedience to His laws is the opposite of eating of the forbidden tree through disobedience and is eating from the tree of life, escaping control by hereditary and cultivated tendencies, pride, vanity, self-esteem, worldliness and every sin, and receiving power to become sons and daughters of God. It brings into life sunshine and the sweetness and fervency of God's life, refusing to be cast down, trusting His love and His holding of the right hand, and serving as laborers together with God. It fills every heart with wisdom and sanctified judgment, creates a real and enjoyable atmosphere of grace, produces love in response to beholding the love and tenderness of God in Jesus, fills lives with love for God and others, Christ's Spirit and holy aspirations, and springs up in desire for active service, molding life after the divine likeness for effective work.
Communion Ministry and Mission
In a special sense eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of God takes place in holy communion, where bread and wine symbolize His broken body and shed blood. By faith in His sacrifice poured out in death at Calvary believers receive His spiritual life, contemplate that sacrifice, assimilate His life, and are purified and strengthened. The service forms a living connection binding the believer to Christ and thus to the Father, joining dependent human beings to God. As faith contemplates the great sacrifice the soul receives spiritual strength from every communion. The ordinance keeps the crucifixion before the mind and embodies the figures of flesh and blood, so that celebrating it in spirit and in truth the representations are clearly understood through the Holy Spirit preparing the mind and quickening perception to grasp the truths conveyed. Eating His words and obeying them makes believers partakers of His divine nature and one in spiritual life with Him, just as the body is composed of the food eaten, and no one can be nourished by what another eats but each must eat for himself to have eternal life and be raised at the last day.
Looking upon the crucified Redeemer in communion gives fuller comprehension of the magnitude and meaning of the sacrifice made by the Majesty of heaven, glorifies the plan of salvation, awakens living sacred emotions, and puts praise to God and the Lamb in heart and lips. Fresh memory of Calvary keeps pride and self-worship from flourishing, elevates thought, purifies heart, transforms character, sends the believer forth as a light reflecting that love, and leads to glorying only in the cross. In doing so believers join the communion in the upper chamber, pass through the garden of His agony, witness the struggle by which reconciliation with God was obtained, and see Christ set forth crucified among them. Taking the bread and wine does not itself bring the heart into harmony with God, but Christ must be continually received as spiritual food through meditation, prayer, and doing His will, so that His nature is incorporated and He lives within.
Understanding this truth gives gospel ministry the life-giving elements of eternal life and brings a fresh, clear, powerful presentation of the gospel. Those open to the Holy Spirit are energized with new life and awakened to see the beauty and majesty of truth. Ministers must first partake themselves to have bread to break to others, uplift Christ, and nourish hearers to growth instead of preaching Christless arguments that leave them starving. Thoroughly understanding and living by the teaching of this chapter, which sets out the conditions of eternal life, leads to a life that measures with the life of God. Feeding upon the divine Word as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience.
The instruction in John 6 is the mystery of godliness, to be studied and made part of life by bringing its teachings into daily experience. So received it gives oneness with Christ and the knowledge that enables distinguishing the true from the false in days of peril when Satan works miracles and apparent healings that test those who have had great light. Receiving His words, which are spirit and life, gives eternal life and establishes the soul in the truth of God's Word so that it will not be deceived by sophistries, for miraculous healings are not reliable evidence of God's people. Plainly stated, the way to obtain eternal life is receiving the principles of God's Word into daily life and practicing the truth contained in it, thereby coming into connection with Christ and having His Word as stronghold and defense against deception and spiritual darkness in the last days. Those ministering in word and doctrine must not be dull of understanding but must read the sixth chapter of John and ask God for clearness to comprehend its important statements, feeding the mind on Scripture for spiritual growth rather than spending time on books and magazines that flood the world, lead the mind astray, and hinder growth.
The chapter calls each person to realize dependence on Christ alone by creation and by redemption, to look to Jesus instead of making man a trust or following human devising, and to be guided by the Word of the living God. Those who receive Him by faith have Him as sanctification, righteousness, and exceeding great reward, and walk and work as accountable to God, while without this dependence there is spiritual weakness and bondage to human beings. It means paying absolute homage to the Word of God in doctrine and principle, taking the Bible and the Bible alone as rule of faith and practice, having no easy fellowship with the world and no slipshod religion, so that unity of purpose and harmony of action with mutual love and confidence constitutes a moral force and convincing power to the world. It means making the living oracles the study, searching the Scriptures to understand counsel given from the beginning, taking the place of a learner depending on God for guidance, following His principles in dealing with believers or unbelievers, cherishing eternal principles of justice and righteousness in word, spirit, and action, instead of substituting human devising and making God's will secondary. The Word of God is to be one's counsellor rather than relying on a minister or physician to create one's experience, for no other food can build up the spiritual life.
Its teaching is to be made the essence of education in all schools, rather than words of worldly wisdom, maxims of men, or human theories. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of God is tasting that the Lord is gracious as actual personal experience, meaning true conversion and new birth, discerning the requirements of the spiritual kingdom and having part in it. As newborn babes those who eat and drink learn to desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby, opening the mind to the entrance of God's word with determination to practice it, by which light comes and the word gives understanding to the simple. When obtained the frivolous life is changed, the feet are placed on the first round of the ladder which is Christ Jesus, the character is transformed under the gaze of heaven, step-by-step heavenward mounting follows, and Christ is revealed in spirit, words, and actions. This feeding upon Christ's words as His very flesh and blood is the education children, youth, men and women need to become workers together with God, given at the school at Cooranbong by the most complete faculty yet provided, where teachers should give students the bread of life, not instruction that cannot sustain spiritual life and leads toward death. Feasting on the word as Christ's flesh and blood strengthens spiritual life, helps grow in grace and knowledge of truth, forms habits of self-control, causes childish faults to give way to Christian character, and produces healthy religious characters, though continued watchfulness and nurture are required because the soul's health decays when neglected.
Receiving His words which are spirit and life makes sound in faith and belongs with care for the body in health reform and sanitariums to restore sin-sick souls. In that work people are to be taught this meaning together with how to care for their own bodies, so as to receive peace and hope and faith and be restored to spiritual life and led to receive and obey present truth.
Feeding on Christ as heavenly nourishment creates hunger for Him and brings spiritual strength and comfort. Turning instead to worldly entertainments leaves no room for that hunger and risks losing assurance, peace, joy, hope, and love for Bible religion. Spiritually men and women are built up from the food they give the mind, and the bread sent down from heaven to be eaten is contained in the Bible, so eternal life and resurrection come by giving the soul right food and properly feeding the mind by living on the words from His lips, wholly depending on the Lord, having faculties controlled by the Spirit, bringing the soul into subjection to God's will, staying thoughts upon God, and obeying His law, with no condemnation to the obedient. What people choose to feed mind and soul affects desire for this heavenly nourishment, for as eating and drinking nourish the body so spiritual life depends on what the mind takes in and assimilates; dwelling continually on others' faults is unhealthy nourishment, while feeding on what is good promotes vitality and growth, in contrast to the world's desires, pleasures, amusements, cheap reading, and novels which cannot satisfy or heal and waste precious powers.
Failure to eat and drink by abiding in Christ and eating the heavenly bread is the reason for lack of the Holy Spirit, though God has given every facility, every grace, and the riches of heaven's treasure as the privilege to draw continually from this provision. Vanity, evil-thinking, evil-speaking, and cherished, petted, exalted self keep believers from availing themselves of it, leaving them powerless, inefficient, and unable to work out salvation in harmony with God's will. Eating the flesh and drinking the blood means receiving intelligent knowledge of His Word, being fed with the bread of life as hungry souls are fed with truth, and that life-giving knowledge is to be unfurled and imparted widely to those perishing in error, keeping many at work in other fields and all countries instead of gathering means for one place. Feeding on Christ is distinct from merely knowing the truth, for those who know it can still fail to feed, remaining unresponsive even when precious saving truth is repeated over and over, so labor spent so repeating would be better spent carrying truth to unworked cities and to those ready to perish in ignorance and sin who would repent if reached.
The sign to be expected now and always of true teaching is the working of the Holy Spirit on the teacher's mind to make the Word as impressive as possible, not an excitement of feeling or something outside the Word to make people feel. The living bread is His Word which He has given, not dead dry theory but Spirit and life, and attention must not be called to dreams and visions. Feeding on Him stands opposite being absorbed in investigation of unrevealed mysteries, for Jesus deliberately withheld mysteries and disclosures that would have absorbed attention for generations, because curiosity and conjecture eclipse the grand momentous truth He wished ever prominent and cause loss of sight of what He had already taught. Instead it calls for keeping Christ and His revealed instruction the subject of most earnest thought and desire, marking His words, studying the Scriptures, and treasuring every ray of light given, rather than seeking many inventions and knowledge God has not revealed.
No pressure of commercial work, business, cares, or pursuit of material gain excuses neglect of this feeding, for receiving and practicing the Word of life forms a character fit for heaven and gives eternal life. Devotion to business that leaves no time for prayer and the words of life deprives the soul of nourishment and inspiration and prevents representing Christ and preserving spirituality. Those who receive His words share in the love He gives His followers, yield themselves to God, follow the way He trod, and obey His commandments from the heart, depending through the Holy Spirit on God's power and revealing His love and holiness. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood is being doers of His Word, manifesting His self-denial, self-sacrifice, patience, mercy, long-suffering and love to bring the erring back to repentance and fellowship with God, working reformation in individual souls, families, and the church under the transforming grace of the Holy Spirit, thereby overcoming selfishness and covetousness.
All who bear His name must so eat and drink or have no part with Him, taking the truth He gave and the words He spoke for guidance into the heart and making them part of life, taking the Scriptures into the individual heart. So feeding as newborn babes on the divine Word gives eternal life and resurrection at the last day, mutual indwelling in which the believer dwells in Christ and Christ in him, living by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and healthful development of all spiritual powers. It means believing in Christ as personal Saviour and appropriating God's Word as daily bread purchased at infinite cost, becoming a partaker of the divine nature, a branch of the living vine receiving life by vital current from the parent stalk, with character able to receive heaven's blessings and work successfully for others. This daily receiving of grace sufficient for duties and trials, accepted and improved by remaining a student in Christ's school to learn what pleases God, is how to conquer invisible foes instead of living to amuse and please self.
What looks barren to the unrenewed becomes to the converted mind like the garden of God, giving fitness for immortal life and equipping believers to stand through the coming conflict. Those who live on His flesh and blood, which is His Word, are strengthened, rooted, and grounded in faith, see increased evidence for prizing and obeying the Word, arise to defend the faith when others count them as dross, and stand in trial when those who seek convenience, pleasure, and enjoyment fall. Without partaking of Him who gave His flesh for the life of the world there is no life, and receiving this life requires understanding His words by experience and doing them, a teaching repeated over and over even when hearers were offended because spiritual life depends on it, far more essential than perplexity over temporal food or prosperity. Those who receive and obey His word as partakers of the divine nature are taught by the Holy Spirit and made wise to discern spiritual things and understand the things of God in order to fulfill His purpose, while those without the Spirit's teaching remain ignorant no matter what other advantages they have.
Connections to Other Scripture
Eating and drinking is coming to Him and believing on the One whom God has sent, so that whoever comes will never hunger and whoever believes will never thirst. He who spoke this remains the same compassionate Saviour who does not overlook bodily hunger, who by creative power fed five thousand men besides women and children and ordered the fragments gathered so nothing would be wasted, and who still provides food for bodily necessities. By that miracle He taught that spiritual food is of far more consequence than temporal food, so chief labor and anxiety must be given not to food that perishes but to food enduring to everlasting life, which the Son of man gives as One sealed by God the Father. The true bread from heaven was not given by Moses and cannot be obtained from any human agent, but God Himself gives it through the gift of Christ, for the bread of God comes down from heaven and gives life to the world, and He declares Himself the Bread of Life.
It means feeding upon the divine Word of God as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that they may grow thereby. Whoever so feeds has eternal life, will be raised at the last day, dwells in Christ and Christ in him, lives by Christ as Christ lives by the Father, and will live forever, unlike those who ate manna in the wilderness and are dead. The words are spirit and life, not literal flesh, for the flesh profits nothing, and they can only be discerned by faith and spiritual perception; those without depth stumble at the hard saying and turn back. This feeding is the divine element the soul needs for healthy development of all spiritual powers, giving sanctified strength, wisdom, integrity, and moral power when brought into experience. Made the real essence of education in all schools, it nourishes rather than words of worldly wisdom, maxims of men, theories of human beings, or human theories, as seen when hearers in the synagogue at Capernaum with limited comprehension murmured, called it a hard saying, and went back to walk no more with Him.
It means living by every word that comes from the mouth of God and proceeds from God’s mouth. Such eating and drinking keeps a person joined to Christ so as not to be separated from Him and lose the eternal reward of everlasting life. It means accepting the enmity placed between man and the serpent and refusing to be careless and indifferent in neglecting the great salvation. It stands opposite becoming earthly by eating the serpent’s meat of selfishness, hypocrisy, evil-surmising or evil suspicion, envy, and covetousness, choosing instead to live by His teaching. It gives the right to say in the strength of Jesus Christ, depending on Christ’s strength, I will be a conqueror and will not be overcome by Satan’s devices and Satan.
It means partaking daily of Christ as heavenly manna and drinking of the Spiritual Rock that followed Israel in the wilderness, because what food is to physical needs Christ is to spiritual necessities. It means drinking deep draughts from the fountain of His sympathy and tenderness and love as the Bread of life, and having Christ formed within the soul so His presence is a well of water springing up unto everlasting life. Without this partaking there is no life in a person, and those who lack a right comprehension of true religion and have a low estimate of the Christian life are changed by it and need to be converted anew and rebaptized. Receiving life and nourishment from Him must be done with contrition for sin, pictured by eating the Passover lamb with bitter herbs, and with sin put away, pictured by eating unleavened bread.