John 6:53-57 "So Jesus said to them 'Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son..."

"So Jesus said to them 'Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life, and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me" (John 6:53-57).

Comment:

Clearly Jesus was being deliberately shocking in his insistence to the pious Jews who were questioning him—and whose strict dietary laws forbade them from drinking the blood of the flesh—by phrasing his teaching as he did. Time and the gentling effects of translation often discourage us from realizing how powerful and assertive Jesus' teachings were, particularly when they came up against the religious consciousness of his time.   As with so much of the Gospel of John, we have to recognize in approaching this passage that Jesus is speaking here, not as Jesus of Nazareth, the carpenter's son and Jewish scholar, but as the Christ—the full expression of spiritual identity, power and purpose that he achieved and calls us to achieve as well. The Christ is the Presence of God expressing as us, and it is the very essence of life. We 'eat the flesh of the Son of Man' when we ingest and claim the truth of our Oneness with God. Metaphysically, flesh represents the substance of God in us, and blood is the energy of God. We metaphysically eat and drink the flesh and blood of the Christ when we claim it as the very sustenance and source of our own life. It is what Jesus refers to elsewhere (to the Samaritan woman in John 4) as “the water of life,” and when we fully claim it for ourselves we will never thirst again.   Blessings!

Rev. Ed