Will you stand with me for the reading of God's word? We're turning to Exodus chapter 16, and then to John chapter six. Exodus chapter 16, we'll read the first four verses, the opening of this account of God's gift of manna, the bread from heaven to his people, and then to John chapter six. Exodus 16, one, and they journeyed from Elam and all the congregation of the children of Israel came to the wilderness of sin, which is between Elam and Sinai on the 15th day of the second month after they departed from the land of Egypt. Then the whole congregation of the children of Israel complained against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the children of Israel said to them, Oh, that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat and when we ate bread to the full, for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger. Then the Lord said to Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you. And the people shall go out and gather a certain quota every day, that I may test them, whether they will walk in my law or not." Now to John 6. A little change to your bulletin. We'll begin reading with verse 35. And this teaching on our Savior, the bread of life. 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 and 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. The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God endures forever. We're turning this morning in the preaching of God's word to John chapter six, John's gospel chapter six, this discourse of our savior, Jesus Christ, in which he lifts up himself as the bread of life, the bread of God sent from heaven. One of the things that should constantly delight you and me about the Word of God is its simplicity, the way in which God in His Word graciously comes in close, condescends in His mercy and in His kindness to us, and uses simple illustrations, simple pictures to teach us about profound spiritual and eternal truths. We heard preaching A couple weeks ago from Matthew chapter 13 and the parable of the sower, a basic and simple picture of a sower, a farmer with seed, putting that seed in the ground and the various types of soil. And the profound picture that this is of God's kingdom advance through the preaching of the word, the spreading of that seed, the reception of that word preached. In Old Testament, example, the law of the Lord, Psalm 19, the law of the Lord is more to be desired than gold, yea, than much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. You might think as well of the picture of Israel, the Old Testament, coming to the promised land, a land flowing with milk and honey. images and pictures that even your youngest children know. And here are no less than these other examples. Here in John chapter six, our Savior uses such a simple and profound picture to teach us about himself. I am the bread of life. Perhaps you children enjoy homemade bread. Perhaps your mother will make homemade bread with perhaps bread starter and pull the bread out of the oven, a warm loaf, and you enjoy sinking your teeth in that fresh bread with the butter slathered over it. And even you, the youngest among us, know the reality here that God has illustrated for us the sufficiency and the glory of our Savior in a simple picture that runs through this chapter. Our Lord Jesus says, I am the bread of life. Yet as simple as this picture is, as profound as it is, yet it is misunderstood. It's misunderstood by the Jews who complained against Jesus, who refused to understand their hearts being hardened in unbelief, unmoved by his proclamation of himself, as simple as this picture was, the Jews rebelled against it, refused to hear the clear and the simple and the plain preaching of Jesus Christ. And no less the Jews in Jesus' day, but you and I gathered here this morning. How you respond, how you understand, and how you respond this simple picture of our Lord Jesus Christ as the bread of life. As the bread of God who has come down from heaven. How you understand this truth and how you respond to it by the grace of God determines everything. To lay hold on this truth. that Jesus is the bread, the true bread of God sent from heaven. To lay hold on this truth is to have life, to have the future resurrection from the dead, to have communion with God. It's a simple picture, but you and I must eat to live, to eat physical bread, to have our meals set before us where we enjoy physical nourishment. So you and I are called in this passage to lay hold of the bread of life, to understand who Jesus is as the bread of life, and to cling to him in faith. Indeed, to use the graphic language as the discourse continues, language that we'll look at shortly, eating his flesh and drinking his blood, to lay hold on eternal life. As we study this discourse of our Savior, this teaching of our Savior, I want us to ask a few simple questions, very simple questions. First, what does Jesus mean when he says, I am the bread of life? Again, this comes up several times in the discourse implied in verse 33. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. Our Lord Jesus references himself. He makes it explicit in verse 35. And Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. In verse 48, I am the bread of life. Again, verse 51, I am the living bread which came down from heaven. How are you and I to understand this profound statement of our Savior? Second, how are you and I to respond to this truth? Physical bread does you no good if you simply look at it from a distance and admire it. There's no nourishment unless you partake, unless you eat. What does it mean? How are we rightly to understand these statements, these graphic statements of our Savior about eating and drinking His flesh and His blood? And then what are the blessed benefits that come to us when we partake by faith of our Savior? What does our Savior mean by this simple statement? How are we to lay hold on Him as the bread of life? And then what are the blessed benefits that flow to us when we have eat? First, our Savior's plain and clear statement. I am the bread of life. And to really understand what our Savior is teaching us here, we have to know the whole context of John 6. A key detail that you may be tempted to overlook, but please do not, is back in verse 4 of the chapter. All of these events, Come to us in the chapter, come at the time of the Passover. Now, the Passover, a feast of the Jews, was near. And you'll recall the Passover, that Old Testament feast of the Jews, when they remembered God's redeeming act. and bringing them out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. That event of Passover, when the sacrificial lamb was killed and its blood was applied to the doorposts of the people of God, every household in Israel, so that the death angel who brought death and judgment on the Egyptians would pass over the people of God, sparing them, and the idea that the meat of that lamb would be eaten by the covenant people of God. The Feast of Passover is near. As well, associated with the whole Exodus and God's redeeming act in bringing His people out of bondage, is what we read in Exodus 16, and the gift of manna, the heavenly bread sustaining the people of God. We ought to have these things in our mind. In this chapter, there's then a miracle in which our Savior feeds the 5,000 children. You remember the story of the young man the five loaves and the two fish. Something that seems so small, inability to feed the gathered multitude. But our Savior in His grace and His abundant mercy feeds the 5,000 with the bread and the fish. multiplying, showing even in a practical sign, a miracle, the truth that he is in fact the bread of life. But as we continue through the chapter, our Savior moves past the miracle to instruct us regarding who he is as the bread of life. So I mentioned a few moments ago, the Jews did not understand it. They didn't get the miracle that Jesus had done. In fact, they follow him because they ate of the loaves and their bellies were filled. They came, as it were, for the fellowship meal and not for the preaching of the word. We see this in verse 26, as Jesus has begun his discourse, his teaching the significance of the miracle. 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. And he exposes their motives in verse 27. 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. Our Savior is exposing the true desire of these Jews in their unbelief. They were motivated by fleshly appetite. They wanted their bellies filled, but they had no appetite for the things of God. They had no appetite for the bread of God sent from heaven. And the only thing they could think of as they reflected on the miracle that Jesus had done and as they heard his teaching regarding the fact that he is the bread of life, They associated Him with Moses. Here's a miracle worker. Here's a wonder worker. Here's a great prophet whom we can follow. And they completely, in their unbelief, missed the point of what our Savior came to do. Our Savior proceeds in the discourse to lift up Himself, that He's not come as a mere prophet. He's not come as some kind of wonder worker, sensation producer. He's come down as the bread of God from heaven to give life to the world. That Moses pointed to Him, to Christ, the better than Moses. the true bread of God sent from heaven. And we have the refrain again, as our Savior becomes more and more explicit and he lays this truth on the conscience of his hearers, I am the bread of life. He that comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst. Verse 35. Jesus has not come merely to fill bellies with physical bread, but he's come to bring salvation, to bring life, everlasting life, to the spiritually hungry. So I am the bread of life, this glorious pronouncement of our Savior. You know, our English translations often miss the significance of what our Savior is declaring here when he lifts up himself as the bread of God come down from heaven. Here, the Greek is, ego eimi, I am the bread of life. One with the Father, the true God of true God. Remember, this ought to bring in your mind Exodus 3 and the burning bush. As Moses encounters the living God, he beholds, I am that I am. The self-sufficient God of the universe. Jehovah, the one living and true God. The one besides whom there is no other. What our Savior does here is he affirms that he's better than Moses. Not another miracle worker, not another prophet, but the true bread of God sent from heaven, equal with the Father. I am the bread of life, one with the Father in every way. This echoes, of course, the truth that John has been laboring to teach us. all through His Gospel, beginning with the opening verse of the Gospel. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. And we read of this One who is the Word, verse 14, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. And our Savior gives us the first of seven such statements in his gospel. I am the bread of life. To those who are hungry, spiritually hungry, whose appetites are not focused merely on physical food, bread, but who feel their unworthiness and their sinfulness, Christ here proclaims his sufficiency. the fact that he's sent from the Father to bring life to the hungry. I am the bread of life. Of course, if you know the rest of John's gospel, you know that our Savior will make similar statements. I am the light of the world, the one who brings light and true spiritual sight to those who are blind. He is the door. and the Good Shepherd, the resurrection and the life, the way, the truth, and the life, and the true vine. The first of these glorious statements, I am the bread of life. Look no further. This is the Savior who is abundantly sufficient and able to save completely all those who come to God by Him. Here's the wonder of the incarnation, the fact that our Savior Jesus Christ took on our flesh. The one who is I am that I am and also true man in our flesh. One who is able to sympathize with us in every way yet without sin. One who is tempted like we are yet without sin. One who brings everlasting life to the hungry. I am the bread. And if this is true and it is that our Savior Christ is the true bread of God come from heaven, I am the bread of life, then to respond to Him, to respond to Him is absolutely critical. There's no neutrality and there's no middle ground. You either believe and partake of the bread of life come down from heaven or you don't. It's not as if you can be neutral here. You either receive the bread of life or you do not. The Jews continually through this passage, miss the point of what our Savior is saying. Verse 41, the Jews then complained about him because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. As well, verse 52, how can this man give us his flesh to eat? In their blind unbelief, apart from the wooing and the drawing power of the Spirit of God, they were blind. They were dead. in their trespasses and sins, and in their hunger, failing to miss, failing to understand, failing to take hold of the bread of God sent from heaven. As I said a few moments ago, you must, it's not enough if you're going to eat, if you're going to satisfy physical hunger, it's not enough to just look at bread on a table. You must partake. You must eat. You must come and partake. So it is with our Savior, the one who is the bread of life, the one sent from the Father. He calls for a response. Now what does it mean? to take part, even using the graphic language that I referenced a little bit ago that we read, starting with verse 53 and following, what does it mean to eat of the bread of life? How are we to understand this language? John Calvin says that as long as Christ remains outside of us, and we are separated from Him, all that He has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value to us. You see what he's saying there? As long as Christ is outside of you, the bread of life, the One who is sufficient and able to save, the Word made flesh, the One mediator, the One who is able to bring life and salvation, as long as you're outside of Him, all that He's suffered and done, even as we see these physical signs of bread and wine pointing to His atoning work, all that He's suffered and done is of no effect. They call the Gospel, is not merely to know certain things about Jesus Christ, but to lay hold of Him. And the link here is faith, living faith in Jesus Christ, the bread of life sent from the Father. Faith in Him and in Him alone. We don't commit the error of the Roman Catholic Church and others who would interpret these verses, verse 53 and following regarding eating the flesh of the Son of Man and drinking His blood as a literal eating and drinking, as if all that we needed to do was to come to the Lord's Supper, come to the sacrament and eat the bread and drink the wine. No. What our Savior is laying upon your conscience and upon mine is the fact that we must lay hold of Him in saving faith. Believe, we are called to believe in him. Isn't this the teaching of our Savior in verse 40? 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. As well, verse 47. Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in me has everlasting life. And it's clear as well that just as our Savior subsisted and drew his life from the Father, so we are to draw our life from him, the bread of life. Verse 57, as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on me will live because of me. What does it mean to Even in this graphic language, to eat the flesh and to drink the blood of our Savior Jesus Christ, it is to lay hold of Him in faith. To recognize that He alone is able to meet the deepest cravings, the deepest hunger of your soul. To recognize in Him the only Savior of sinners. the only hope of his people in life and in death, the only one who can forgive your sins, the only one who can bring you into the father's house, the only one who can give you the life everlasting. It is to come to the end of yourself and to lay hold of Jesus Christ, repenting of your sins and trusting in him, not to hold Him at arm's length, not merely to say, oh yes, I can confess this truth that He is the bread of life, but to come in faith, to believe in Him, to come to Him, to lay hold of Him by faith. And is not this consistent with that free and that clear and that strident call, the gospel that we read throughout all the scriptures, Isaiah 55, 1. Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. And you who have no money, come by and eat. Yes, come buy wine and milk without money and without price. The gracious invitation as well of Lady Wisdom in Proverbs 9. Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Forsake foolishness and live, and go in the way of understanding. And the blessed words of our Savior to come to Him in Matthew 11. Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. The bread of life for the spiritually hungry. To believe on Him, to lay hold on Jesus by faith, is to eat the bread of life. To eat His, even this graphic language of eating His flesh and drinking His blood. Again, going back to the simple picture of our need for physical sustenance and physical bread. We eat because we're hungry, because of the hunger pains that we feel. in our stomachs. You eat because of hunger. And this is the proclamation of the gospel. You must understand your neediness and your hunger in coming to Christ. The fact that there's no satisfaction in the empty husks of sin. The fact that only Christ is sufficient to save and able to save. You must see your sin for what it is and sense your spiritual hunger and neediness. And perhaps that's you today. Outside of Christ. You've never laid hold on Him by faith, repenting of your sins and trusting Him, coming to take hold of the bread of life. And you've pursued sinful pleasure. You've given way to the appetites of your flesh and the things that you've looked at online, the way in which you've pursued money and pleasure, pills, pursuing all of these other things, and you've come up empty and hungry, the call of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ to you today is this, I am the bread of life. He that comes to me will never hunger, and he that believes on me will never thirst. Come to Jesus Christ by faith. Augustine, the church father, said this, believe, believe, and you have eaten. to lay hold on Christ by faith. What are the blessed benefits of laying hold, of trusting in Jesus Christ as the bread of life? We see these in verses 53 and following. 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. But, verse 54, whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life as well. 58, he who eats this bread will live forever. The life everlasting. The blessed benefit of believing, of laying hold, of eating the bread of life, partaking of our Savior by faith is life everlasting. And not merely a future life everlasting, but a life that has already begun. in our men's fellowship yesterday. We're reading Ted Donnelly's book on heaven. And we reflected on the fact that for the believer, united to Jesus Christ, you already have this principle of eternal life. You've been brought from death to life. Yes, you look forward to the full realization of that life in the new heavens and new earth, but it's heaven begun now. Particularly here, as you sit under the preaching of the Word and you hear the Word of the Kingdom of Heaven, of the Bread of Life proclaimed as we come in a few moments to the Lord's Supper. Here's a foretaste of the life everlasting. In the words of Paul in Ephesians, we've been raised to sit together in Christ in heavenly places. Our citizenship is in Heaven where we look for the return of our Savior Christ. You eat of this Bread of Life. You have the life everlasting. True life. Unlosable life. Unshakable life. As well, the promise of the resurrection. Verse 54, the one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood, has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day." A future resurrection of the body for all those united to Jesus Christ as the true bread of God sent from heaven, the one who brings everlasting life to have the sure hope of the resurrection. And don't let anyone tell you that that resurrection has already happened. There's a future resurrection. We believe in the resurrection of the dead, that just as surely as our Savior has conquered and is our risen and ascended King at the right hand of the Father now, so all who are united to Him will rise again from the grave. If you'd partake of Christ, lay hold on him by faith, the promise of the gospel is that he will raise you up at the last day to the glory of his own name. Eternal life, the promise of future resurrection and satisfaction in Christ. Verse 55, for my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. And for those who have eaten forbidden fruits, who have eaten the bread, secret sin, and given way to the cravings of your sinful flesh, know this, that when all those other things, the pleasures of a sinful world, leave you empty and hungry, Christ alone fills you. That Christ alone satisfies. Learn to abhor. Learn to abhor the emptiness of vain pleasures, of vain and earthly pleasures that can never satisfy your soul. Psalm 107 declares to us that our God satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness. And you may be in a difficult place today. Very little money, physical suffering, the loss of a loved one and great sorrow and grief. But know this, that try as we might to pursue pleasure, to think that if I just had the one other thing, I would truly be happy. That's really the lie of the wicked one. True satisfaction is found in Jesus Christ, the bread of life. come down from heaven, whose flesh is food indeed, and whose blood is drink indeed, spiritually given to us by faith. And then union with this one. Reunited, verse 56, he who eats my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me and I in him. Union with Jesus Christ for all who will turn from the emptiness carnal pleasure and run to Christ, laying all on him as the bread of life. He gives union with himself, brings you into fellowship with himself. He is the vine, you are the branches. You're in him. There's no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. Nothing can separate you from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, your Lord. Union with the God-man, the one who is himself the bread of life. And in that union, communion with the Father. As verse 57, as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so he who feeds on me will live because of me. Life and communion with the living God. For all who trust in Jesus Christ, lay hold on him as the bread of life. As we approach The supper, the holy supper of the Lord. I'm going to call all of you to examine your spiritual appetites. Where are your desires? Are you hungering and thirsting for righteousness? Or have you given your desire, your heart, your affections to the sinful passing pleasures of this world? Examine yourself. Examine yourself. of your knowledge and love and desire for Jesus Christ, the bread of life. Meditate as well on this truth that I've just brought out from the text, your union with Christ. The Lord's Supper is indeed a feast of union with the one who is the bread of life, where you, by faith, feed on him, where you take For your hunger and your neediness, His worthiness and His blessedness. Meditate on your union with the one who is the bread of life, even as you come to the supper. And anticipate the glory of heaven and the marriage supper of the Lamb. These sure promises of the life everlasting, the sure promise of the resurrection of the dead, that even as we come to the Lord's supper to take of these visible signs and seals, of our Savior Jesus Christ. We look forward to the day when we sit with Him at the feast above, the marriage supper of the Lamb, full and endless, everlasting communion with God in Christ by the Spirit. Think of these things as you partake of the sacrament today. One final phrase in our text. Verse 51, the bread that I shall give, our Lord Jesus says. Verse 51, the bread that I shall give is my flesh, which I shall give for the life of the world. Back to the Passover. What our Savior Jesus is teaching us is not only that he fulfilled the type of the manna in the wilderness, that he's the true bread. that while the fathers ate the manna in the wilderness and then they died through those years of wilderness wandering, he himself, beyond the manna, is the Lamb of God, the Passover Lamb Christ, our Passover sacrificed for us, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 5, that he himself bore our sins in His body on the tree. The Lamb of God slain for our sins. The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. The one whose blood cleanses us from every sin. And as we come, we partake of His flesh, His broken body and shed blood, given for the life of the world. Christ, our Passover, has been sacrificed for us. Lift your eyes to the cross, the full glory of the bread of life broken for sinners. Confess your sins and unworthiness and partake in faith, embracing this One who is the bread of God sent to us from Heaven. Let's all pray. O Lord, our God, we praise You for the promises of the Gospel, But the one who comes to you will never, taking part of the bread of life, will never hunger again, and the one who believes in you will never thirst. We praise you, O God, for the bread of life, for hungry and empty and unworthy sinners. We ask, O God, for the grace of your Spirit to draw any who are yet outside of Christ to bow their knee to our Savior Christ, to partake of him by faith, Help all of us to examine our hearts even as we come to your supper. We ask that you would lift our eyes to Christ at the right hand of the Father now, and the anticipation that we have of the life everlasting and the marriage supper of the Lamb, in which we'll enjoy unbroken communion with you, our Triune God. Forgive us of our sins and teach us to delight in you. We pray these things in Christ's name, amen. Now may the God of peace, who brought up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well-pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.