John 6 - the gospel is not for snacking

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(Written on my Blackberry; no picture today)
John six begins with the feeding of the five thousand and "walking on water" signs and more or less duplicates the stories in the other gospels. I won't repeat the comments  I made during my Matthew reading about these events.

I just participated in an inter-church communion service last night and so the metaphoric "eat my flesh, drink my blood" pronouncement is still fresh in my mind. In John's record, so much is made of the image and the fact that hearers were extremely disturbed by it that one wonders why Jesus didn’t choose a more palatable metaphor.

As I understand it, it's a simple declaration that following Jesus requires that his word, his teaching, his sonship must be absorbed in their totality; this is not a hobby or something that one does on weekends. You don't snack on Jesus; he must be your main course, your total spiritual sustenance. That has to be the message; not much is as repugnant to us as cannibalism.

Impressing this message on the disciples who didn't bolt on hearing this seems important in John. And in the early church and in ours, snackers will always be a drag; the pursuit of justice, mercy, faithfulness requires a full diet, a commitment to wholesome food on a daily basis.

Here in the 21st century church, it behooves us to be real about this image.




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