If we had to answer the question “how can I receive eternal life?” or “what is it to be a Christian?” very few of us are likely to turn to John 6:54: “Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”
If we want to be saved and have eternal life, and if we want others to be saved also, we must understand what is meant by this verse. It seems to be a deliberately provocative statement by Jesus, and indeed it provokes a strong response:
“On hearing it, many of his disciples said, ‘This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?’” (John 6:60)
The langauge Jesus has previously used is deliberately sacrificial:
“I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." (John 6:51)
Jesus is explaining that his sacrifcial death will be necessary to give spiritual life. Just as the bread he gave sustains physical life, so his body, given (i.e. sacrificed) is the means of eternal spiritual life. But ‘eating’ flesh and ‘drinking’ blood are nonetheless shocking images. We understand what they mean by comparing v54 with v47:
“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:54)
“I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life.”(John 6:47)
Eating and drinking are paralleled with faith. But rather than lessen the impact by saying ‘oh this strange language of eating flesh is only referring to belief in Jesus’, in fact this should increase our understanding of faith ‘this is no mere intellectual assent – it is the same as eating the flesh of Chrsit.’
This image show us that the object of faith is Jesus’ sacrificial death for our sins. Faith doesn’t mean just ‘believing in God’ or ‘vaguely hoping that a higher power will make things turn out for the best’. Faith is faith in the death of Jesus as the only means of our life.
But this image also shows us something of the character of faith. It is no mere intellectual assent. Whilst no physical eating of Christ’s body is implied here, the incorporation langauge shows us that we need to really take hold of Christ’s sacrifice for us, it needs to be our bread – what we rely on to live day by day, we need to ‘own’ the scandal of his body broken and blood poured out.
This is why when Jesus asked us to remember his death, he gave symbols of bread and wine to help us do so. As we eat bread and drink wine in the Lord’s supper, we feed on Jesus’s death in our hearts by faith.
If the image of feeding on Jesus’ body and blood is offensive to us, and we would rather a more sanitised, rational description, perhaps the cross itself is offensive to us, and we would rather a more sanitised way to be saved. But in fact the bloody, bruised and lifeless form on a Roman crucifix is our only hope of eternal life.
This is indeed a hard teaching. Many today turn back from Christianity at this point, just as they did in Jesus’ day. But, as Peter said to Jesus, to whom else shall we go?
Perhaps, in order to safeguard the centrality and the scandal of Christ’s death in our place, we might change the way we think and speak of receiving eternal life. Whilst we’ll still treasure John 3:16, John 3:36, John 6:47 and other such verses, lets never be ashamed to say in answer to the quetsion ‘how may I be saved’ in the way Jesus does here:
“Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:53-4)
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