Bread for our Journey: John 6.25-59

6²⁵When [the crowd] found him across the lake, they said to him, 'Rabbi, when did you get here?' ²⁶Jesus answered them and said, 'You are not looking for me because you see signs but because you ate from the loaves and were fed. ²⁷Work not for the food that perishes but for the food that remains for everlasting life, which the Son of Man will give you, for the Father, God, authenticated him with his seal.' ²⁸Then they said to him, 'What shall we do, to work God's works?' ²⁹Jesus answered and said to them, 'This is God's work: to be faithful to the one that he sent.'

³⁰Then they said to him, 'What sign are you doing, so that we may see it and be faithful to you? What work will you do?' ³¹Our ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, just as it is written, 'He gave them bread from Heaven to eat.' ³²Then Jesus said to them, 'Amen, Amen, I say to you, Moses did not give you bread from Heaven but my Father gave you the true bread from Heaven, ³³for God's bread is what comes down from Heaven and gives life to the world.' ³⁴Then they said to him, 'Sir, always give us this bread!' ³⁵Jesus said to them, 'I am the living bread: anyone who comes to me will not be hungry and anyone who trusts in me will not ever be thirsty.

³⁶'But I say to you that you have indeed seen [me] and you do not have trust. ³⁷Everything that the Father has given me will come to me and I will not cast out anyone who comes to me, ³⁸because I have come down from heaven not to carry out my own will but the will of the one who sent me. ³⁹This then is the will of the one who sent me: I shall not lose anything of all that he has given me, but I shall raise it up on the last day. ⁴⁰For this is the will of my Father: everyone who sees the Son and puts their trust in him shall have everlasting life and I will raise them up on the last day.'

⁴¹Then the Judaeans grumbled about what he had said, 'I am the bread that came down from heaven'. ⁴²And they said, 'Isn't this Jesus son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now claim, "I have come down from Heaven"'? ⁴³Jesus answered and said to them, 'Don't grumble among yourselves! ⁴⁴No-one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them, and I will raise them up on the last day. ⁴⁵It is written in the prophets, "And they shall all be taught by God": all who have listened to the Father and learned come to me. ⁴⁶Not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who comes from the Father: he has seen the Father. ⁴⁷Amen, Amen I say to you, the one who trusts has everlasting life. ⁴⁸I am the living bread. ⁴⁹Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness and they died; ⁵⁰this is the bread that has come down from Heaven so that whoever eats of it will not die. ⁵¹I am the living bread that has come down from Heaven; if someone eats from this bread they will live forever, and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.'

⁵²Then the Judaeans quarrelled among themselves, saying 'How can this fellow give us [his] flesh to eat?' ⁵³Then Jesus said to them, 'Amen, Amen I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. ⁵⁴Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has everlasting life, and I will raise them up on the last day. ⁵⁵For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. ⁵⁶Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me and I in them. ⁵⁷Just as the living Father sent me, I myself live through the Father and anyone who eats me will live through me. ⁵⁸This is the bread that came down from Heaven: the one who eats this bread will live forever, not as the ancestors ate and died.'

⁵⁹He said this when he taught in the synagogue at Capernaum.

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