John Gospel Chapter 6 (Eucharist)

[dizzy_dave]

In Johns Gospel chapter 6 Jesus says I assure you unless you eat my flesh… you will die, etc. What does this mean? How are we to take this. There are many Catholics who eat the Eucharist and will die (go to hell?) What did Jesus mean exactly when he spoke this?

 

[Christy_Beth]

During His sacrifice on the cross, Christ gave His body and blood for our salvation. In John 6, He is saying that we are to “eat” His body and blood. Read, also, the accounts of the Last Supper. He told His disciples that the bread was His body, “broken for you.” And He said the wine was His blood, “shed for you.” It was His sacrifice and He wants us to remember it.

The Eucharist is called the “unbloody sacrifice.” The bread and wine become for us the body and blood of the Lord. When we partake of this, we are taken into us Jesus Christ. He has said that we cannot be saved without Him. He needs to be “within” us. Not just physically either. It is also a spiritual reality. He needs to be with our souls and hearts as well.

I don’t know how else to explain this. And I’m sure I probably made a mess of it. Hopefully someone else will come here and explain it better.

 

[copland]

To not die means to not die spiritually, the 2nd death. Read Reveation 20:14.

But as was said before, this goes beyond physical, it is also spiritual. But if you are truly in the state of grace and receiving the body and blood of Christ, then you are not going to hell. But yes there are those who are not in the state of grace but are still receiving the Eucharist, read 1 Corinthians 11:27-29 about those who receive the Eucharist in an unworthy manner and about how they bring judgment upon themeslves.

 

[trogiah]

Jesus clarifies the meaning of this phrase later in chapter 6

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Then many of his disciples who were listening said, “This saying is hard; who can accept it?”
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Since Jesus knew that his disciples were murmuring about this, he said to them, “Does this shock you?
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What if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?
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It is the spirit that gives life, while the flesh is of no avail. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life.”

The eating of Jesus flesh is a spirtual action. Which is not to say that it isn’t very real. Spirtual matters are in fact more important than physical matters. Elsewhere in chapter 6 Jesus says:

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“Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him the Father, God, has set his seal.”

So what is this food? In chapter 4 Jesus talks about the food that he eats - while his disciples are trying to get him to eat ‘regular’ food

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Meanwhile, the disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat.”
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But he said to them, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.”
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So the disciples said to one another, “Could someone have brought him something to eat?”
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Jesus said to them, "My food is to do the will of the one who sent me and to finish his work.

I think that is probably the clearest explaination of what it means to “eat the flesh of Jesus”

Just as Jesus was fed and sustained by doing the will of God, we are called to feed on him by keeping the commandments he left us. If we follow the path Jesus showed us. We are feeding on him.

-Jim