The day after Jesus multiplied the loaves and fishes, the crowd found him on another side of the Sea of Galilee, which Jesus had crossed by foot over the water during the night. “Rabbi”, they questioned, “When did you come here?” (John 6:25) Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek me, not because you saw the miracles, but because you ate of the loaves, and were filled.”
In the ancient Greek of this verse the word “miracles” stands for “signs”. In other words, the crowd had benefited from the miracle of provision the day before, but had missed the “sign” that pointed to Christ’s body as the “bread” that he would give for the life of the world. Jesus identified the “bread” as his “flesh” — the body he would offer to God on the Cross as a sacrifice for the sins of the world.
The “bread of life” provides for those who are as dependent on the Lord’s body for life as much as the children of Israel were on the manna provided them from heaven during their stay in the wilderness. God had “opened the doors of heaven” and rained down manna for them to eat. He had given them “the corn of heaven”. “Men ate angel’s food…” (Psalm 78:23-25)
The Hebrew word for “corn” means “increase” or “growth”; it pictures a ripe ‘ear’ of grain. In John 12:24 Jesus speaks of himself as “a grain of wheat”.
In the context of the “sign” miracle of the previous day — the provision of food for the hungry 5,000, and now the demand of the Jews for a manna-like “sign” of the kind Moses had given their forefathers, we can discern a stream of thinking, which flows from the loaves and fishes “sign” to “the bread from heaven” and then to the “flesh” of Christ toward the end of the Lord’s discourse (John 6:55-58)
“For my flesh is food indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him. As the living Father has sent me, and I live by the Father, so he who eats me shall live by me. This is that bread which comes down from heaven: not as your forefathers ate manna, and are dead. He that eats of this bread shall live forever.”
That “bread” — Christ’s body — “came down” from heaven when “the power of the Most High overshadowed” the virgin, Mary. “I came down” refers to the word or “logos” formed in the womb of Mary during her pregnancy. When born, the “word made flesh” was named Jesus, whose glorified body is the believer’s “bread of life.”
By faith the believer partakes of and lives by his “flesh” daily, just as the children of Israel partook of and lived by the manna. We too live by what we eat, both physically and spiritually.
Misunderstanding the spiritual meaning, or perhaps misusing it with evil intent, Roman authorities accused the first Christians of practicing cannibalism.
Jesus said, “You are from beneath, I am from above.” Those who are “born from above” (“born again”, KJV) are able to perceive the kingdom of God (John 3:3). The New Testament Greek means “from top to bottom”, and is used as such to describe the tearing of the temple curtain (Matthew 27:51).
There are multiple levels of meaning in the sixth chapter of John’s Gospel. The first is the miraculous but straightforward miracle of the loaves and fishes. The second is the manna that had come down from heaven during the Israelites’ 40 years in the wilderness. The third is the continual descent, after Christ’s ascension into heaven, of the “flesh” or “life” of Jesus that comes to those who in faith depend on it for spiritual sustenance.
The “sign” miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes was a pointer to the multiplication of the body of Jesus in response to the faith of believers, throughout the ages. But those who “ate and were filled” the bread that God provided from heaven failed to see this “sign”.
Sadly, many who now eat the bread and drink the wine during communion fail to grasp the forgiveness and healing provided for them in Christ through his broken body. And, just as the “carcasses” of those who did not believe in the wilderness “fell”, so too do the bodies of those who eat and drink unworthily become “weak and sickly” and many “sleep” – die prematurely.
Why? Because they do not “discern” the Lord’s body as the life on which they depend for spiritual and physical sustenance and vitality. Every good gift and every perfect “comes down” from the Father…” Forgiveness and healing included! (James 1:17) Jesus “came down” from heaven 2,000 years ago, and still does so when we commune with God through him. Not just in church during Communion but also in our everyday lives!