Reformed Baptist Church in O'Fallon, Missouri
HomeSermonsCommunionThe Bread of Life

The Bread of Life

Sermon Transcript

The following is a lightly edited transcript generated from the audio; it may contain small errors.

John 6:22–71

If you would open your Bibles to the Gospel of John chapter 6. We’re going to read, starting in verse 22 to the end, which is John chapter 6 verse 22. “On the following day, when the people who were standing on the other side of the sea saw that there was no other boat there, except that one which His disciples had entered, and that Jesus had not entered the boat with His disciples, but His disciples had gone away alone—however, other boats came from Tiberias, near the place where they ate bread after the Lord had given thanks.” Now the context, ate bread, before this the early part of John is the account of where Jesus fed the multitudes, He gave them bread. So this is important. Verse 24, “When the people therefore saw that Jesus was not there, nor His disciples, they also got into boats and came to Capernaum, seeking Jesus. And when they found Him on the other side of the sea, they said to Him, ‘Rabbi, when did You come here?’ Jesus answered them and said, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set His seal on Him.’ Then they said to Him, ‘What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?’ Jesus answered and said to them, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.’ Therefore they said to Him, ‘What sign will You perform then, that we may see it and believe You? What work will You do? Our fathers ate the manna in the desert; as it is written, “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”’” What’s really funny about this question is He had just fed the multitude. Right? Well, show us a sign. “Then Jesus said to them, ‘Most assuredly, I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but My Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is He who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’ Then they said to Him, ‘Lord, give us this bread always.’ And Jesus said to them, ‘I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen Me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.’”

The Jews then complained about Him because He said, “I am the bread which came down from heaven.” And they said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How is it then that He says, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” Jesus therefore answered and said to them, “Do not murmur among yourselves. No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me. Not that anyone has seen the Father, except He who is from God; He has seen the Father. Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me has everlasting life. I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and are dead. This is the bread which comes down from heaven, that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever; and the bread that I shall give is My flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world.” The Jews therefore quarreled among themselves, saying, “How can this Man give us His flesh to eat?” Then Jesus said to them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, 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. For My flesh is food indeed, and My blood is drink indeed. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on Me will live because of Me. This is the bread which came down from heaven—not as your fathers ate the manna, and are dead. He who eats this bread will live forever.” These things He said in the synagogue as He taught in Capernaum. Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, “This is a hard saying; who can understand it?” When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples complained about this, He said to them, “Does this offend you?” Well, I’ll change my message. Oh, no, He didn’t say that. “Does this offend you? What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who would betray Him. And He said, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.” From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more. Then Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you also want to go away?” But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. Also we have come to believe and know that You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the twelve, and one of you is a devil?” He spoke of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, for it was he who would betray Him, being one of the twelve.

Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your Word and we thank You, Lord, that Your Word reveals to us who You are and who Your Son is. And we pray that as we look at this text today Your Holy Spirit would grant us wisdom and insight. We might understand what it really means that Your Son Jesus is the bread of life, the bread from heaven, the bread that we need to feed on. And I pray that truly today we would feed on Him and we would grow thereby. We pray in Your name, amen. God is good, amen.

This Passage Is Not About the Lord’s Supper

So I’ve taught on this passage in different contexts, Bible studies, Bible class, I believe I preached on it before, but I’ve never done so in the context of the Lord’s Supper. And the reason is, is because this passage is not about the Lord’s Supper. Although surprisingly, many, many times people take this text and apply it to the Supper, and the result of that unfortunately has been some false doctrine which has been in the church for actually quite a long time. So my first point is really several points and I want to clarify what the text is not saying. And it’s necessary to do that because it’s been so misused over the years. So the way this text is [audio unclear] the body and blood of Jesus. This is called transubstantiation and they believe that when the priest says the words in the Mass, this is My body, that there is a literal, a physical change and the bread literally becomes the body, the wine literally becomes the blood, not figuratively, but literally. So one thing is transformed into another by the words of the priest. Now, as I go through this and I mention the Catholic Church or the Roman Catholic Church, I’m not criticizing any particular Roman Catholic individual. I’m often asked by some Protestants who are very anti-Catholic, do you believe a Catholic can be saved? I say of course because I believe a Protestant can be saved. I know saved Catholics and unsaved Catholics and saved Protestants and unsaved Protestants and you can go through every denomination. What I’m critiquing today is not any individual. I’m critiquing a particular teaching of the denomination which is unscriptural. This doctrine particularly was one of the main causes of the Reformation. One of the main causes of the break in the Western church during the 16th century.

Now, one other footnote on history for all you history buffs. Any history buffs out there? No? A couple? This transubstantiation was not even thought of in the church until the 9th century. And in the 9th century, a lone monk wrote a treatise on the Lord’s Supper or communion, in which he asserted that when Jesus said, this is My body, He meant it was literal, the literal body and the literal blood of Jesus. And at the time, his view was actually criticized and attacked by other Roman Catholic theologians. It was not until the 16th century during the Reformation time and what is called the Council of Trent that this idea of transubstantiation was actually officially endorsed by what is called the Roman Church. Now one more footnote. You guys have your coffee today? All right, good. One more footnote is this, is that the word Catholic today in our society, and especially in this area, which is very Catholic, right? You think of the Roman Catholic Church, but most people just say the Catholic Church. However, there’s a difference. The church of Jesus Christ was one church until the year 1054. In 1054 what happened was called the Great Schism. And the Great Schism is when the church became officially divided between East and West. The Eastern church was predominantly Greek and they had a Greek liturgy. And the Western church was predominantly Latin and they had a Latin liturgy. And for political reasons and some theological reasons, the church officially split, there was a schism in the church. So before 1054, when you read in the creed where it says, I believe in the church, any Protestant can say that because the Catholic church simply meant the universal church, all true believers. That’s all it meant. You could say, I’m a Catholic with a small c, because you believe in the communion of the saints, that all those who know Jesus Christ are one in the Spirit, amen? We’re all one. We believe in the communion of the saints. So we believe in the small-c Catholic church. We could also say we’re Orthodox, with the small o, because we believe in right doctrine, correct? So we’re small-c Catholic and small-o Orthodox. But today, when we speak of the Catholic Church, it’s actually the Roman Catholic Church and the Greek Orthodox Church. And they are still to this day officially divided over doctrine. The Western Church, what became the Roman Church is something that evolved over many years. Even this one is an innovation. It wasn’t discussed until the ninth century. It wasn’t adopted until the 16th century. One of the most controversial doctrines in the church [audio unclear] Praise the Lord. When I’m just talking to people, I can make mistakes. But once I’m in the chair, once I’m behind the pulpit, once I speak as God’s representative, whatever I say is true, it cannot contain error in it. Was not proposed until the 19th century. The idea that Mary, that the mother of Jesus, Mary, was herself conceived immaculately, it’s called the Immaculate Conception, that is not the virgin birth of Jesus, that’s the conception of Mary, was also a 19th century development. So the Roman Catholic Church today was definitely not the church of the first ten centuries, and not even all of it was the church until the 19th century. So, you have to keep that in mind when you look at different authors and when you read different books, because there’s a lot of confusion and people think that the church, the Roman Catholic Church today is identical to the church in the seventh or eighth or sixth century. It was not. It was very different. So that’s a historical footnote. This particular teaching on transubstantiation was a novelty in the ninth century and wasn’t formalized until the 16th century.

So in a nutshell, as I mentioned, what it says is that when the priest says, this is My body in the liturgy or the Mass, there’s a transformation that takes place, and the bread becomes the body, and the wine becomes the blood, and it is a literal transformation. So when you take the wafer and you drink the wine, you are literally eating the flesh of Jesus and drinking His blood. Now, what’s wrong with that? There you go, it’s not scriptural. Let’s mention a few things. First, this text in John 6 was given by Jesus, really this discourse, this sermon by Jesus was given months if not years before the Lord’s Supper was even instituted. There’s nothing in this passage where Jesus is talking about the Lord’s Supper. The Lord’s Supper itself, as we learn later in the Gospels, was a Seder meal. It was a Passover celebration meal. It was what’s called a sacrificial feast celebrating the deliverance of the Jews from Egypt. And when God passed over the sins of the firstborn, because the blood of a lamb was, a lamb was slain and the blood of that lamb was put on the doorpost, that’s in Exodus 12, etc. That’s what a Seder dinner was. It was a memorial dinner regarding the first Passover and the deliverance of the people based upon the shedding of blood. Got that? Jesus, during that meal, said, by the way, this meal is about Me. And He handed the bread, the bread in the Seder, talks about this is the bread of affliction. Jesus took the bread and said, this is My body. Then He took the cup and said this is My blood. I’ll get to that more in a moment. So what happens is that this text here, John 6, is a discourse Jesus gave many, many months or years before the Lord’s Supper was even instituted. So then what happens is certain commentators, Roman Catholic, take John 6 and then take the text in Matthew, Mark, and Luke regarding the Supper and they conflate them. Okay, they conflate them. Just because something is talked about in one text and something similar is talked about in another text, it doesn’t mean you can take those two texts and say, well they’re talking about the same thing, because it’s simply not true. You know the Bible says when Jesus came in John 1, John looked at Him and said, behold the Lamb of God, right? Well Jesus told a parable about a little sheep that went astray. Was He talking about Himself, because He was a lamb? Does that mean Jesus got lost and we had to go find Him? Well of course not. So just because there’s a word, a similar word, the same word in one text and in another or even a similar idea in one text and another, it doesn’t mean you can take those two and say, oh, they’re talking about the same thing. And that’s often done with the Book of Galatians and the Book of Romans. People say Galatians is a short version of Romans. It’s not. It’s a very different book. And they talk about similar things, but Paul addresses these things from a different angle and he’s making different arguments. So it’s lazy to just conflate these things. And it’s tempting because if you’re the kind of Bible reader I am, when I see, I have a reference Bible, you know, you have references in your margins, right? And so there’s a little letter or number by the verse, and here’s other references that relate to this. And then when you go look them up, some of them don’t really relate at all. They might just have the same word in it, but it’s not really a verse that should be [audio unclear] the Supper and was talking about the bread and the bread here. We know from this passage that it wasn’t speaking literally. How do we know this? Look at John 6. Look at what He says. In verse 60, many of His disciples when they heard this said, this is a hard saying, who can understand it? If you understand this text where Jesus is saying, literally, eat My flesh and drink My blood, well, this is cannibalism. Well, that’s a hard saying, isn’t it? Of course it is. Like, oh, OK, well, this is difficult. What does Jesus say in verse 63? It is the Spirit who gives life, and the flesh profits nothing. He just said, eat My flesh. And then He turns around and says, the flesh profits nothing. If He were speaking literally as we use that term, saying eating My flesh, because then He turned around and says the flesh, it’s not the flesh, it’s the Spirit, the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit and they are life. They must be understood spiritually or figuratively, not literally.

Literally True and Figuratively True

Now this gets into a whole discussion about how you read your Bible. Now let me ask you a question, or let me say this. Suppose someone said to you, do you believe the Bible is true? I guess you’d say yeah, right? Anybody here believe I was true? Okay. Now if somebody said, do you believe the Bible is literally true? I’m making, you mean you believe the Bible is literally true? You’d probably say yeah. Would you say yeah? But once you assert the Bible is literally true you’re really saying the Bible is also figuratively true. Huh? It’s because the Bible itself has all sorts of figures of speech in it. So when we use the word literally, you mean really true? Yeah, really true. So if Jesus tells a parable, which is not a true story, historically, do you believe it’s true? Well, yes or no. Yeah, you believe the meaning is true. But it’s clear that He’s not saying this really historically happened. He’s saying, I’m going to illustrate a truth by telling you a story. And so what you believe is literally true is the meaning of the story. So when you take literalism literally you get this problem here in John 6 where when Jesus says flesh, drink My blood, you have to take it literally. Right? Jesus says in this passage that He is the bread from heaven or the bread of life. Now was Jesus a Hostess brand, or was He? I mean, what kind of bread was He? Was He white bread? No, He was Middle Eastern. See, He’s brown bread. See, multigrain bread? Was Jesus multigrain? No, He was unleavened though because He was Jewish, right? We know, unleavened bread. Well, we’re laughing because this shows the implausibility of this over-literalism, right? Jesus said, I am the light of the world. Was He made out of wax? Were they able to, a flame coming out of the top of His head? Well, of course not. Jesus said that He was the door. Did He have hinges? Were they on the left or the right? Did it open one way or both ways? Did He have a lock on the door? Where was the lock? Was that His navel? Maybe. I mean, let’s just speculate all we want because we’re making the Bible say things it’s not saying, right? So when John pronounced Jesus the Lamb of God, which takes away the sin of the world, he didn’t mean Jesus literally had a bunch of wool and hooves. He didn’t mean that literally, but he meant truly this is the Lamb of God. So what did the Lamb symbolize? What’s the figure involved? What’s the truth He’s pointing out through the figure of the Lamb? He’s the sacrifice that takes away the sins of the world. And everybody in the audience who is Jewish understood exactly what he was saying. Not that He was literally an animal. Jesus said that He was the vine. Well, I mean, was He really, was Jesus really a plant? Or was He a human? Or did He change back and forth? So when Jesus said He’s the bread, He doesn’t mean it literally, although He means it truly. And thus when He says, you must eat the bread, He doesn’t mean it literally, but He means it truly. Do you understand the difference? So you can say, I believe the Bible literally, but that means you have to believe in all the different kinds of figures of speech that are in the Bible. Right? Now here’s a book for you. It’s called Figures of Speech Used in the Bible. E. W. Bullinger, it’s a thousand pages. So whenever you have insomnia, you call me, I’ll loan you the book. And he goes and he explains all the different figures of speech in the Bible. So I believe in the Bible literally. I believe every word is true. But I believe it’s true in the way that it was meant to be true. Right? So if there’s a figure of speech which illustrates something, that the illustration is true. But I don’t believe Jesus was a piece of bread. I don’t believe He was made out of wax. I don’t believe He was a plant. I don’t believe He was a literal door with a lock and key. I believe He was a human being, human soul, just like you and I, and I also believe He is truly divine. God incarnate, God in the flesh. So what happens here is that the literalists have said that when Jesus says I’m the bread it’s literal and when He said take this, the bread, take the bread and eat this, this is My body, they take that literally. Not it represents My body but it is. And so then they use this text to support that text and that text to support this text and you get transubstantiation.

How Transubstantiation Undermines the Ordinance

Another problem with the doctrine is that it destroys the very sacrament or ordinance. An ordinance or sacrament involves two things. It involves a sign and a thing that is signified. Right? So in baptism you have the water, right? And then the water represents the Holy Spirit. You have the thing and the thing signified. In the Lord’s Supper you have the thing, the elements, the bread and the wine. And then the thing signified, which is the body and the blood. If you say the bread and wine literally become the body and blood, then you have the thing, but you don’t have the thing signified. You don’t have two things anymore, because they become one thing. If the bread literally becomes the body and the wine becomes the blood, then there’s no longer any sign involved because it is that thing. And this is very, very important because this error has led to several other errors. And let me just mention two. It has led to the problem of idolatry in the church. Because in the Roman liturgy, when the priest says, this is My body, he bows down to the wafer. And all of the congregants are encouraged to worship the host. And they believe that this bread is the literal body of Jesus and they worship it as such. And secondly, because of this belief, they also teach that the host, when it is broken, is not just symbolizing the death of Jesus, but that Jesus is being sacrificed again for our sins. Again, I’m not making this up. I grew up in the Roman Catholic system. I’ve studied it and they teach that the Mass is not a symbolic acting out of the death of Jesus, but in fact there is a new sacrifice that occurs in the Mass, a repeated propitiation for our sins. But that’s not what Scripture says.

Once for All: Hebrews 9–10

Look at Hebrews for a moment, if you want to go to Hebrews 10. Let’s start in 9:23. Now, in the preceding verse in 22, the author says, without shedding of blood, there’s no remission of sin. It says, “Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.” The copies being the earthly temple versus the heavenly temple. “For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another—He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment, so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.” This was an annual, the high priest would go into the temple annually to offer the blood on the Day of Atonement, and what we’re being told there is that if Jesus did that, then every year since the world began, He would have to suffer again. Hallelujah. “For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, make those who approach perfect. For then would they not have ceased to be offered?” In other words, if the worshiper was made perfect by the sacrifice, there’s no longer any need for the sacrifice to be repeated. So they were repeated because in the Old Testament they were only a shadow. They’re only a temporary covering, if you will, that God acknowledged in light of the coming of the Messiah who was going to once and for all take away the sins of the world. “For then would they not have ceased to be offered? For the worshipers, once purified, would have had no more consciousness of sins. But in those sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins. Therefore, when He came into the world, He said: ‘Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You have prepared for Me. In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You had no pleasure. Then I said, “Behold, I have come—in the volume of the book it is written of Me—to do Your will, O God.”’” This is Christ speaking before He came. Previously saying, sacrifice and offering and offerings for sin You did not desire nor had pleasure in them, which are offered according to the law, then He said, “Behold, I have come to do Your will, O God.” He takes away the first that He may establish the second, the first economy of sacrifices. “By that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Amen. Once for all. “And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God.” One sacrifice for all time. That was Calvary, amen? Give it up for Jesus. 14, “For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.” There is no more sacrifice for sins. The one sacrifice was Jesus on Calvary 2,000 years ago. He died for the world, He was buried, and He has risen from the dead. And it is our faith in Him which unites us with Him and that the benefits of His death now are imputed to us. We are made righteous, we are cleansed and sanctified by the work of Jesus Christ once and for all. There is no need for a ritual. There is no need for a repeated propitiation. There’s no need for a continual sacrifice because the one sacrifice was offered once for all by Jesus on the cross. So this notion of a literal body and a literal blood has led not only to an idolatry of the host, it has led to ultimately a false doctrine of salvation. And this is why it’s so dangerous.

Come, Believe, and Feed on Christ

Now as we conclude, as I said earlier, the point of the sermon is not Catholic bashing. The point of the sermon ultimately is that you understand the Supper, that you understand what you are doing. And I would venture to say regarding any of your Catholic friends that if you ask them over, just have lunch and say, could you explain to me transubstantiation? I will venture to say that the vast majority of them will not be able to, and many of them have probably not even heard the word. But they are faithful congregants and they follow the lead of their leaders. And our responsibility is to share the Scriptures with them and share the truth with them, of course, in the love of Christ. We are all saved in spite of our errors, right? None of us are perfect theologians. We don’t understand it all. I talked to somebody when I came in this morning who was sitting in their chair reading. I said, what are you reading? He said, I’m reading about the Trinity. And I said, well, do you understand it now? If we had to understand the Trinity to be saved, none of us would be saved. If we had to understand the hypostatic union, none of us would be saved. If we had to understand many things of Scripture, we would never be saved. But if we don’t understand the atonement, we are most certainly in danger of not being saved. [audio unclear] a life of utter desolation and outer darkness, Jesus says. But God loves us, amen. For God so loved the world that He gave His Son, and that word give means He gave Him as a sacrifice, that whoever believes in Him would not perish, but have everlasting life. And Jesus says in our passage here in John 6, let me read it as we close. I’m sorry for going over my time. No, it’s certain, 35. “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.” When Jesus says you have to eat His flesh or drink His blood He doesn’t mean it literally, He means it figuratively, for it means you must come to Him and receive Him and take Him into yourself. But it’s not physical, it’s spiritual. And you do that by believing. If you believe in Him, He says you will never thirst. 37, “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out.” Verse 39, “This is the will of the Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day.” When you believe in Jesus Christ as the one who died for your sins and rose from the dead, when you acknowledge your need for Him as your Savior, then you understand that He is the source of life, the source of eternal life. That’s what the metaphor of the bread means. You feed on Him by believing in Him. When you believe in Him, you receive His life into your soul. It’s called the new birth. And you now have eternal life. You’re born again in God’s kingdom and you will live forever. And though your body may die, He will raise you up in the last day and you will live forever with God. Amen. And if you believe that, you’re invited to take the Supper because the Supper symbolizes the body broken and the blood shed. It symbolizes it. And so we do this to remember once again that the basis of our relationship with God is all of grace. The basis of our relationship with God is Jesus Christ. It is in Him that we have life. It is by knowing Him that we have life. It is by feeding on Him that we have life. And we feed by faith. Amen.

Father, we thank You for the gift of Your Son, and we thank You that His body was broken, His blood was shed, and we thank You for this ordinance that You’ve established in Your church to remind us of His sacrificial work for us, which was completely and totally a work of grace. We do pray that as we take the elements, they would be blessed to our souls, Lord, as we feed on Jesus through faith in Him and His work. And we pray in His name, amen.