Daily Meditations on the Bible / We stand with Israel
John 6:51
” I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
Yes, we probably could have lumped all of these bread comments into one batch and baked the whole thing together, but this is three minute Bible not 51 minute Bible or some such thing. So in keeping with the three minute theme, we are visiting familiar territory again. Continue reading “Repetition”
John 6: 49-50
” Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, yet they died. But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die.”
Throughout the Gospels, there is a battle that rages between Moses and Jesus. Unfortunately for the Jewish leaders, the battlefield existed only in their minds. In reality, Jesus and Moses both serve the same God and both taught the same lessons about serving God: Love God above all else and your neighbor as yourself. Continue reading “Moses vs Jesus”
John 6: 48
“ I am the bread of life.”
My neighbors have a cat. They also have two dogs and several kids. Because of the dogs mainly, but maybe because of the kids, too, the cat spends a lot of time outside, and most of the time seems to spend that time in my yard. After several years of trying to chase the cat out of my yard, I finally gave up and decided to be friends with the cat. I even gave her a name, a “street name” if you will. I call her Smudge because she is a light colored cat with a dark smudge of color across most of her face. Continue reading “Smudge”
John 6: 47
” Very truly I tell you, the one who believes has eternal life.”
This is one of those verses that presents the Gospel in its simplest form. The one who believes has eternal life. Wow. That is pretty simple! But simple is not always easy to do, nor is it always something we can easily grasp. Continue reading “Simple Gospel”
John 6: 46
” No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father.”
There He goes again! Talking about heaven like he has been there!! Who does this Jesus guy think he is??
Time and time again Jesus speaks as if he is from a different planet, but in fact, he is from a different reality altogether. A spiritual reality. A reality invisible to our eyes of flesh but something we can glimpse with our heart if we try.
Imagine being a Pharisee who is vested in maintaining the status quo. Imagine that this Jesus guy comes along and turns your world upside down by apparently breaking religious laws about the Sabbath (supposedly from God, but in fact from men) and doing things like touching the unclean. (Of course, an unclean person would be “clean” after Jesus touched them!) As a Pharisee, you are looking at a nobody, an itinerant Rabbi from the backwoods of Nazareth. An un-pedigreed bumpkin followed around by a bunch of hayseed backwoods sheepherders. Continue reading “Jesus Guy”
John 6: 45
” It is written in the Prophets: ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me.”
In yesterday’s verse, we hear Jesus saying that “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them…” Today he quotes scripture saying, “They will all be taught by God,” and that “Everyone who has heard the Father and learned from him comes to me.” Continue reading “Sense”
John 6: 44
” No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
This verse is a bookend to verse 37 where Jesus says, “All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away.” It almost sounds like people have no choice in the matter. Yet it is important (oh so important!) that we remember Jesus’ perspective. He does not speak as though he were only a man. He speaks as one who has “come down from heaven” (verse 38). He speaks as one who sees us from God’s perspective. One who sees inside men’s thoughts and hearts. Continue reading “Perspective III”
John 6:43
‘ “Stop grumbling among yourselves,” Jesus answered.’
Sometimes Jesus says things to the Jews and Pharisees that apply to a lot more people than just the Jews and Pharisees. “Stop grumbling among yourselves” is good advice for anyone, but especially good advice for those who believe in Christ and call themselves Christians. Continue reading “Grumbling”
John 6: 41-42
‘ At this, the Jews there began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?”’
How can Jesus say he “came down from heaven” when he was born right here on earth? Well… how else would you come down from heaven? I suppose that Jesus could have come as he was before he was born. But how would mere man have been able to stand in the face of such power and majesty? Continue reading “Coming Down”
John 6:40
” For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”
By inference, Jesus refers to what he taught Nicodemus in chapter 3 where he says, “Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.” Everyone who “looks to the Son” and believes in him shall have eternal life. Continue reading “Uncomplicated”