Many years ago I remember seeing a little booklet written by the Minister in the church I grew up in. It carried an intriguing title. It was called "How to be a successful backslider". I can't now remember just what points were made in the booklet but perhaps it included some of the matters we're going to look at this evening as we consider the questions that Jesus posed and which are recorded at the end of John chapter 6.

The first of these relates to "taking offence" at what Jesus says. The second is related but deals more with the whole idea of doubting or repudiating His authority. The third is much more about following the crowds and the fourth is all about integrity.

In order to understand the significance of these questions we must consider for a few moments what has taken place already earlier in the chapter.

The Background

The chapter opened with Jesus feeding a large crowd in a miraculous way. The crowds still flocked to Him but Jesus was not impressed at all by their motivation. Instead of thinking about what this miraculous sign might have to say about the One who had performed it they crowds were only really interested in having free meals!

Jesus knew that it was very important not to focus upon the wrong things - the people would perish were they to do that! And so he wanted the people to focus upon those things that really mattered. Yes, physical food was necessary but it should never be made the N°1 goal in life – eternal life too must be sought after. "Seek first the Kingdom of God…" How foolish to concentrate upon the temporal blessings that Jesus had given but fail to recognize that He had come to bring the far greater blessings of spiritual life and spiritual satisfaction.

This led on to discussion about "bread" and in particular bread from heaven.

Jesus' enemies and his detractors were quick to try to compare what He had done with what Moses had done many centuries before when he had provided manna for the people to eat in the wilderness. In making their comparison Jesus came off rather unfavourably!

After all, they asserted, Moses had given them bread from heaven while all Jesus had done was give them earthly food to eat.

(It is interesting to note that the ancestors of those who were arguing with Jesus about the wonderful provision of manna had not always maintained such a high view themselves and had indeed grumbled about the provision. It won't be long before their descendants will be grumbling in their turn about what Jesus has to say to them!)

In his response to their criticisms and challenges, Jesus shattered their entire argument by telling them that the true bread of God was not a thing at all but a person – and that He, Jesus, was that person – the manna was merely a shadow of the reality that He was!

In a beautiful and meaningful discourse on the bread of life he declared himself to be the real gift of the Father. He said that he, in turn, would give his flesh and blood for the life of the world, and that in order to be saved, one had to eat his flesh and drink his blood.

The Jews had not minded when Jesus spoke of himself in terms of bread. But what really got them man I had was when he described yourself as bread come down from heaven!

"eating is Coming" and "drinking is believing"

The key to understanding what this section is really all about is to realize that Jesus is speaking as He so often did in highly pictorial language. The last thing He expects is to be understood in a crassly literal way.

Look for example at v.35 where Jesus declared:

"I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst."

The language is not hard to understand. Jesus is basically saying that to eat and to come to Him are the same thing; to drink and to believe are also identical.

And such believing has the most wonderful consequences – two things in particular are mentioned in this context:

Jesus said:

v.40 "everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him (1) should have eternal life, and (2) I will raise him up on the last day."

And when we read to vvs. 44, 45 and 47 the verbs coming and believing are again used to describe those who have eternal life and who will be raised up on the last day.

vvs.44, 45, 47 "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. It is written in the Prophets, ‘And they will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me… Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life."

Thus from this section of the chapter it is very clear that for a person to have eternal life he/she must come to the Lord Jesus Christ and exercise believing faith in Him.

It is with this knowledge in mind that we must read the subsequent verses of the chapter where Jesus continues to speak about these same blessings of eternal life and of being raised up in terms of "eating his flesh" and "drinking his blood". We are still meant to understand Him to be saying that we must come to Him and exercise faith in him. Nobody in their right mind accuses Jesus of teaching cannibalism which is what he is teaching if we are to understand his words literally.

William Hendriksen helpfully paraphrases Jn.6:53-58 as follows:

"So Jesus said to them, I most solemnly assure you, unless by living faith you accept, appropriate, and assimilate the Christ, trusting in his sacrifice (broken body and shed blood) as the only ground of your salvation, you do not possess everlasting life. On the other hand, he who does accept my sacrifice with a believing heart, digesting it spiritually, has everlasting life for the soul, and I will raise up his body gloriously at the last day, the great day of judgement. For my sacrifice (broken body and shed blood) is the real spiritual food and drink. He who spiritually digests this food remains in the closest and most vital union with me. As the Father, the Ever-Living One, commissioned me, and is for me the fountain of life, so also he who spiritually digests me, he, indeed, will find in me the source of life for himself. (Pointing to himself?) This is the real bread, the genuine source of spiritual life and nurture, even the One who does not owe his origin to this earthly sphere but came down from heaven. And this bread is far better than that mere shadow and type-namely, the manna in the wilderness - which your fathers ate, but which could not keep them alive in any sense whatever, not even physically, for they died. He who spiritually digests me as the true bread of life will live forever (first, with respect of the soul, afterward also with respect to the body which on the last day will be raised gloriously).

But they took offence at Him

I wonder if you understand just why that was.

You see, Jesus has been making a succession of extraordinary claims:

1. He had been declaring that He was far more important than was Moses

2. He had been saying that He always did what his Father wanted him to do

3. He had been insisting that He was right in the very centre of the Father's plan and purpose

4. He had been affirming that a man's eternal destiny was entirely dependent upon Him

5. He had been saying that any spiritual life that a man might enjoy was uniquely because of Him

6. He had been stating that He had come into the world in order to offer his life as a sacrifice: see v.51 "And bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh."

7. In addition to all this He had been declaiming that before any man was able to come to Him it was absolutely essential that the Father intervene to draw him – without such a drawing no-one would ever come to Jesus!

Isn't this just an intolerable list! Isn't Jesus just as politically incorrect as it's possible to be? Are we really surprised that "many of His disciples" considered His teaching as just too hard to accept? They had tasted something of Him and they liked some of what they knew but He just went too far and, as far as they were concerned, blew it. They simply couldn't take such teaching any more. And so they backed up and stopped following.

That is always a real possibility when you begin to come to terms with what Jesus actually says rather than buying into the watered down, sugary version of gentle Jesus meek and mild fame. Jesus simply is not prepared to rubber stamp the prevailing prejudices of the day. He will not pander to our preferences nor will He caress our sensitive feelings. He will however remain true to character and say the truth!

Moses was one of the most important religious heroes of the Jews but Jesus will not allow Moses to share the stage with Him! In today's terms that means that Jesus won't swing with the dominant ideas of religious pluralism where everyone has something useful to say and no-one is wrong. I wonder who your religious heroes might be – the Dalai Lama, Mother Theresa – they're simply not to be compared with Jesus.

But isn't it human to err and to sin? No-one is perfect after all! Again Jesus doesn't agree but asserts His own complete wholesomeness and perfection. And we don't like people who blow their own trumpet do we? But what has Jesus been doing again and again through this section but speaking about how important He is! What are you going to do with Him?

Surely different people have different needs and have found different ways of making it through? Yes, but not to God says, Jesus! If you'd know anything at all about spiritual living and relationship with God I'm your man, He says! Insufferable arrogance or absolute truth? Many then found it a hard message and walked away – what about you today?

And what is all that stuff about drinking His blood? Isn't that disgusting and offensive? Yes, it was offensive to the Jew who had been told all his life not to drink blood but Jesus was speaking about the self-offering He was to make as He was to lay down His life as a sacrifice for sin. And today many don't like all that talk about bloody sacrifices and appeasing the wrath of an angry God. If they were honest they too would walk away but instead in their dishonesty they reinterpret, redefine and remodel Christianity to make it acceptable to themselves – it was a pity that Jesus hadn't heard of cosmic child abuse in His day because surely then He wouldn't have talked about giving His life for the life of the world!

Oh yes and don't we just love to see man as the measure of all things? Don't we love to see man as omni-competent able to do whatever he wants and to determine freely his own destiny. Let's rewrite the doctrine books and away with the sovereignty of God and in with the sovereignty of man! What right has God to act, to judge, to choose? Oh no, we don't like admitting our absolute need of His intervention in our lives to draw us to Christ – we don't mind a bit of help by let's not exaggerate. And yet Jesus stated it so clearly – none will come unless the Father draw him.

Do you want to be a successful backslider? Well here is one way. Take offence at what He says! Reject what He says! You can do that openly and walk away and you can do that clandestinely by subtly altering His words while pretending to follow.

There were both types amongst those who were called His disciples – many stopped following at that time, they simply found His words too hard to take, He was too authoritarian, He was too severe, He was too egocentric. Put simply He wouldn't do things their way! And so they turned and walked away.

But there was another way – to continue on hypocritically. Judas didn't leave at that time but continued on – but his heart wasn't in the matter. For the moment everything was kept under wraps but out it would come later on.

They hadn't seen it all

Those who followed were grumbling not liking His message – they grumbled because ultimately they had no faith in Him. They didn't believe that He had come from heaven – they would be confounded were they to see ascend there again! Confounded but not converted. Unbelief gives way to more and more unbelief refusing to be convinced. Unbelief is not neutrality it is sin and must be abandoned, it must be repented of. And for that they need divine intervention in their lives – is that what you need in your life?

For the crowds of disciples to see Jesus ascend to where He had been before it would mean that He had completely accomplished all for which He had descended from heaven in the first place. He would have given His flesh and His blood in substitutionary sacrifice just as He had been so recently declaring to them. He would have been completed vindicated by the Father – not left to rot in the tomb but raised to the newness of resurrection life. He would have received all authority in heaven and earth and He would have commissioned those disciples who did remain faithful to their task of world-wide mission!

But no they won't believe they will walk away – they are scandalised by the way He calls a spade a spade, they want soft, gentle, appeasing words that don't upset them, that are pleasing on the ear, that don't cause trouble and division – but those are not the words Jesus came to bring – He did not come to stroke us but to save us and He alone is able to do so!

What about you?

As the crowds turn away what about the apostles, what will they do? Isn't it easy to follow on to press on when all is on the up and up? Well Peter? What are you going to do now? Surely you don't want to run away do you?

That is the way Jesus puts the question to the Twelve in v.67 He expects a different answer from them! He expects better things of them!

And of course Peter responds with his answer – I believe it to be the answer that most of you would want to give were Jesus to ask you the same question. When the going gets tough and the numbers dwindle and the future looks bleak you know don't you deep down that there is nowhere to go – He has the words of eternal life. You have tasted and seen that the Lord is good and whatever others might be tempted to do you know what you want to do – you want to go on trusting Him and following Him.

Well do it my friends! Do it!

Don't be surprised at the decline in the UK and the turning away from Him – but pray that instead of trying to alter the message God might give us more preachers who will declare it, that He will intervene to transform lives in the way only He can!

And may we live to see better days! Days when the many begin to follow Him and who embrace what formerly they regarded as hard words and come to see that He truly is the living bread come down from heaven!

Amen.

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