THE LORD JESUS AS FOOD FOR THE BELIEVER (1)
P.M. It is thought that in these readings, we may enquire together about the Lord Jesus as food for the believer. We may look in this reading at the Lord Jesus as the One who has come in to give life, and then this afternoon look at the sin-offering, and tomorrow morning at the peace-offering. The brethren will recall that in Acts 27, when the shipwreck was about to take place and the sailors had struggled through the storm, Paul “exhorted them all to partake of food, saying, Ye have passed the fourteenth day watching in expectation without taking food. Wherefore I exhort you to partake of food, for this has to do with your safety” (vv.33,34). That has weighed with me very much in recent days. The great source of food is in the person of Jesus Himself. We may not in these readings touch great heights, but one’s desire is that something might be worked in us in reality in order to build up a constitution that will be able to stand in the testimony in the absence of Christ.
The brethren know the history of the children of Israel well. They had eaten the passover in Egypt, and they were under the shelter of the blood. I trust that everyone here is under the shelter of the blood, because if you are not, you are in a very dangerous position. The children of Israel had come under the shelter of the blood and they had crossed the Red Sea, accepting in principle that Christ had died for them. Then they came into the wilderness, but they murmured because there was no water. Moses cast wood into the water and it became sweet (Exod.15:25); that is another reference to the death of Christ. But then there was murmuring again because there was no food and Jehovah rained bread from heaven. We might get some impression as we proceed in this reading that what God has given us is what He Himself delights to feed upon; it is bread from heaven. He has brought us into the wilderness where there is no other supply, so that we might come to appreciate the Man in whom everything for God is centred, and He has given us that Man as food for our souls. They had the manna as far as the land and when they reached the land the manna ceased – it is here in our circumstances of daily life that the Lord would become to us the Source of food.
When we come to John 6, we may find it testing as we enquire together about what that food is. The Lord Jesus speaks of it, “he also who eats me shall live also on account of me”.
J.C.G. It is a wonderful thing that God provides for our spiritual sustenance. Naturally speaking, if we do not eat food then there is fainting and withering away, and so it is spiritually. The reference in the Psalms to eating the bread of the mighty (Ps.78:25) shows how God Himself is set to provide for His saints, do you think?
P.M. Yes. That reference could be rendered “angels’ food” (AV). Think of angels feeding on the manna. They are created beings and they need food as we do, and God has given the angels food; He has given them the manna, the bread of the mighty. He has given it to them because the angels operate in relation to the will of God. The importance of the recognition of the will of God may come out in these readings. It says in another psalm that they fulfil His will (Ps.103:20). That is the place that angels have; they feed on the One who came to do God’s will, and that is the food for us.
J.C.G. It says “I will rain bread from heaven” (v.4). Perhaps we do not take sufficient cognizance of the bounty which God has in the manhood of Christ for us to absorb, to help us to grow spiritually. That would help us in wilderness conditions.
P.M. I am sure it would. What a God He is! When they murmured against Him, He rained down bread from heaven. He gave them in type the One that was to be here in circumstances such as we are in, and in those circumstances He fulfilled the will of God.
J.A.B. You spoke in your prayer about God giving us food that He Himself feeds on. What did you mean by that?
P.M. What I meant was “the bread of God”, John 6:33. It is not exactly bread from God, it is “the bread of God”; it is what God delights in, which is Christ. Just think of it for a moment; after thousands of years, God had here One who had come out of heaven into manhood, and in that condition, in the every day circumstances of life, His whole consideration was for the will of God. How much that meant to God. It says “Thou tookest no pleasure in burnt-offerings and sacrifices for sin. Then I said, Lo, I come (in the roll of the book it is written of me) to do, O God, thy will”, Heb.10:7.
J.A.B. It helps us to understand what we mean when we speak of feeding on Jesus. Always guarding the uniqueness of God’s appreciation of Christ, we can delight in Christ as God does. We are to have Him in our affections, to think about Him and what He is to God. Is that what feeding is?
P.M. Yes. It is to affect both our minds and our affections, and it comes through meditation and prayer.
R.Gar. Going back to the food of angels, they saw Stephen’s face as the face of an angel (Acts 6:15). In the midst of the most difficult circumstances, there was a man who could say, I see the heavens opened and the Son of man standing at the right hand of God (Acts 7:56). Was Stephen feeding on Christ in that sense, and becoming like Christ? They saw his face as the face of an angel; it has been said that his face was a heavenly face. Is that what the Lord means us to be like here in the wilderness?
P.M. Yes, they saw that. Stephen’s face was as the face of an angel. How much had been worked out in his life; it was only a short time after the Lord Jesus had gone into glory, and since the Spirit had come. How much had been worked out in that short period of time which came into display in one who was set here for the will of God. That was seen in Stephen. The manna would remind us that the Lord Jesus always considered for God. We speak of self-will, and I know it in myself; it comes in easily, even among the people of God. Samuel said “rebellion is as the sin of divination, And selfwill is as iniquity and idolatry”, 1 Sam.15:23. The will of our Lord Jesus was always in perfect accord with the Fathers will, and doing the Fathers will was His motive. What a wonderful, blessed occupation He is for us. In Exodus 16 they were moving through a scene in which every other resource had been cut off from the people of God, and in principle He gave them One to feed on who was entirely devoted to the will of God.
R.D.P. It is a remarkable expression, “on the face of the wilderness”. It says it was on the ground as well, but first of all it says it was “on the face of the wilderness”, as if the food lay on every aspect of their circumstance. It was not just for the meetings or the operations of the camp, but on the whole face of the wilderness there was food in relation to the presence of Christ here.
P.M. Yes, it lay round about the camp. It brings out the availability of it to the people. It was just where they were; it affected every aspect of their lives. The perfect humanity of Christ, in all its evenness, in all its fragrance to God, was in type there for them, and was going to affect every circumstance in which they were. But it fell on the dew.
D.A.B. Is the order in which the Lord serves our food important? I was thinking that the children of Israel had the passover first. They did not seem to get the moral gain of it. They wanted flesh to eat, without appreciating what the passover meant, and then they had these quails, which are food without exercise. But the manna was food with exercise. The Lord presents food with exercise first, and then later on in John 6, He returns to the passover. So the need for exercise is to be aroused first before we can really feed on His death and be formed by it, would you say?
P.M. God gives us the type of food that suits just where we are in our souls. The quails here would be a reference to the manna being available because death had come in. We could never really appreciate what the manna is to God apart from the death of Christ, and it was here in perfection in the eye of God and He delighted to rain the manna from heaven in order that they might partake of it. We are moving through a scene where man is exerting himself, setting aside the things of God publicly; even the professing church is doing it, and we feel these things. But if there is to be a heavenly testimony while moving through such a scene, it requires that I feed on a heavenly food.
D.A.B. I was thinking that when they said “we sat by the flesh-pots” (v.3), they expected to nourish themselves without any exercise. Some of us perhaps are examples of what happens if you eat without exercise. The Lord was training His disciples, and the disciples were accustomed to the idea that food came with exercise. Even with the manna, the people had to exert themselves to gather it.
P.M. Yes; to get it they had to bend down to gather it.
R.T. It says in verse 4 “that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or not”. Is the appropriation of the food to be reflected in our state? It is to produce the character of the food that we are eating, but it requires exercise and it requires chewing.
P.M. That is right. God has our state in mind in what He has provided for us, does He not? He knew what the people were, and when they murmured He met them not on the basis of demand, but in principle He met them in the richness of the supply of the One who was to complete everything for His satisfaction. He fed them with the fulness of that food. It is to change our taste for everything else.
R.T. The manna could fit in anywhere; it is meant to produce lowliness in our walk and attitude.
P.M. That is one’s exercise, that in feeding upon the perfection of this blessed Person, there might be formed in us the features of holiness and committal to the will of God that were seen in perfection in Jesus.
D.B.R. Does the wilderness require a certain constitution that can only be built up by feeding on Christ as the manna? They had to gather it and then it had to be eaten. We need to be inwardly affected by what you are presenting. It says that Jesus was “holy, harmless, undefiled, separated from sinners”, Heb.7:26. I was thinking too of the particular features of the manhood of Christ where there is lowliness seen. That is not natural to us; it has to be built in morally into our constitutions.
P.M. Yes, it can only be formed as it is built into our constitutions. It will only be seen in testimony as it comes from what we are inwardly as having fed on this blessed Man;
‘Faithful amidst unfaithfulness,
Mid darkness only light”. (Hymn 230)
What a different kind of person Jesus was to all who were here, a Man whose resource was drawn from the Father. He drew nothing from the wilderness. God leads us a certain way in our histories to cause us to prove that the wilderness itself cannot supply the nourishment and form the constitution that is required for being in it in relation to the will of God. But the Lord Jesus can, and if I might speak reverently, that blessed Person, as the manna, is to form us in our inwards as we move through the wilderness.
J.C.G. You mentioned about the goodness of God in divine grace acting here. There is a reference to the quails, but it is immediately set aside. We do not hear any more about the quails until Numbers 11, so that the whole of this section is taken up with the beauty and importance of the manna in contrast to the quails. We need to follow that. You mentioned earlier about self-judgment; that is involved in what we absorb of the manna, of Christ in manhood.
P.M. I am sure of that. We will come to that in more detail in chapter 6 of John, as drinking His blood and feeding on His flesh. But here the supply is full, as you mentioned earlier. God rained the manna from heaven; it is as if God would say; ‘You do not belong in Egypt; I have brought you into the wilderness, but you do not belong in the wilderness, and I am going to give you heaven’s food to sustain you in a foreign territory while you are moving here’.
R.Gr. The question they asked is important; “What is it?” Do you think we should approach this line of teaching with a sense of wonder, and never let it become common?
P.M. I think so. We need to understand that there was another order and kind of Man here, distinct from all that had been here before.
R.Gr. So there was nothing around them or in their experience by which they could measure this. This was new; that would cause this upsurge in their hearts.
P.M. “What is it?” It is like “What sort of man is this … ?” (Matt.8:27); “Who then is this … ?” (Mark 4:41); “Never man spoke thus, as this man speaks” (John 7:46); they “wondered at the words of grace which were coming out of his mouth”, Luke 4:22. I ask not only the young people, but all of us, have we fed on this kind of Man? We have to move in the business world. I can remember being in admiration of a man who was running our company; he was very successful and you begin, if you are not careful, to act as he acted. The Lord would take us into the wilderness to feed on a Man that did everything differently. Every kind of circumstance was affected by the manna, and the Lord would have us to feed on Him as apart from everything else.
G.B.G. In Nehemiah when the children of Israel’s failures are described, it says that “Thou gavest also thy good Spirit to instruct them, and withheldest not thy manna from their mouth, and gavest them water for their thirst”, Neh.9:20. Despite the catalogue of their failures, God did not withhold the manna. Do you think the manna therefore helps us in our state, improves our state? Even though there is a bad state, the manna is available.
P.M. That is just what we are seeking to get at. The manna is provided from God to build up an order of man that can move here in the wilderness setting. That does not come from outward direction, it comes from an inward constitution that is built up as feeding upon Christ.
G.B.G. It is very attractive; God from His side never withheld the manna, even though it was not appreciated. It was always there.
P.M. In Numbers, the people said “our soul loathes this light bread”, (chap 21:5); do I not find that in myself? There is naturally speaking no beauty that we should desire Him (Isa.53:2). I have to come to a judgment of the order of man that does not appreciate Christ. The Spirit is given to the believer in view of our having some appreciation of Christ in keeping with God’s appreciation of Him.
D.J.H. So it says “ye shall be filled with bread” (v.12). There is no room for any other.
P.M. That is a very necessary word, because the enemy would seek to fill our souls with all sorts of things. We have the facilities at our disposal to feed on whatever the enemy would seek to give. The answer to it lies in the manna; being filled with it so that there is no desire for anything else. I begin to prove that Christ is so attractive not only to God, but He is becoming attractive to me as the One who is different to every other source of supply. What a Man He is!
N.J.H. Why does the dew come first?
P.M. I wondered whether the dew involves the operations of the Spirit of God Himself directly in the soul of the believer, producing something in which features of the perfection of Christ can be formed and be appreciated.
N.J.H. The Spirit of God must give us the taste for it. The Spirit is said to quicken, so the whole matter draws us into life. Is that right?
P.M. Yes it is, and it is important to lay hold of the fact that we are dependent on the Spirit for any appreciation of Christ. Naturally we do not appreciate Him, but the Spirit works in us in order that the Man who is the centre of God’s universe might become increasingly precious to us.
D.B.R. It speaks about “the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ”, Phil.1:19. I was thinking about what was mentioned about our being filled; there is a supply that can fill us with the spirit of that kind of Man. The very spirit that was displayed in Jesus Christ as the Man in the wilderness is the Spirit that is available to us.
P.M. Yes, “the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ” is from the divine side unlimited. It is that kind of Man which is sufficient to fill the heart as we move through this scene of the rejection of Christ, so that He is held in believers’ affections in testimony.
T.C.M. So this food is not only for our survival. You referred to Acts 27; it is to do with our safety, but it says there that they all ate and were satisfied. It is not just for survival but for our satisfaction as well.
P.M. Yes. The Israelites in Numbers lost that satisfaction, but Christ is sufficient to satisfy. Have I proved that? Young people, have we proved that Christ is sufficient to satisfy our hearts while we are moving here in the scene of His rejection? We do not need to draw on the system that is around us, because the One who has come out of heaven is the only One able to fill our hearts and satisfy them; not satisfy us with what belongs in the wilderness, but satisfy us with that which belongs in heaven. It is wonderful.
Q.A.P. The Lord Jesus knew perfectly when to appeal to Jerusalem; “how often would I have gathered thy children as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings” (Matt.23:37), but when He went into the temple, He knew when to take a stand in faithfulness to the Father because things were not pleasing to the Father. I thought that there is food for us as we feed on the Lord Jesus in the different circumstances in which we see Him in the gospels.
P.M. There is food for us in every circumstance in which we see Him in the gospels. Mr Darby said that when meekness was called for, He was meek, ‘when indignation, who could stand before His overwhelming and withering rebuke?’1 That was the same Man, but here in lowly humiliation, here as the One who moved in communion. There was a Man on earth who drew everything from the Father, not just in His coming into this scene, but moment by moment. There was never a moment when He was not in communion with the Father. What delight the Father had. He could not take his eye off Christ.
Q.A.P. He could say that the Father loved Him because He always did the things that were pleasing to Him (John 8:29). Is there a suggestion of a moral reason there?
P.M. Yes, and a suggestion of the manna, because nothing that He did was for His own glory. The Lord Jesus never promoted Himself; everything He did was for the delight and glory of the Father, “I do always the things that are pleasing to him”.
A.G.M. You mentioned earlier that we have to bend down to gather the manna; could you say more about that please?
P.M. Well, is that not one of the moral glories that came out in Jesus; His lowliness, the One who “having been found in figure as a man, humbled himself”, Phil.2:8. Think of the perfection of a Man who humbled Himself.
A.G.M. So we have to give up everything of ourselves to take account of the Man who humbled Himself. You mentioned meditation earlier; do you think that comes by way of meditation?
P.M. I think so, and the going out every morning to gather the manna would link with that. They could not keep it overnight; if they did, the worms would work in it. It had to be fresh. What sustains us in the testimony is not something that we knew ten years ago, (not that there is any change in the divine word) but it is the fresh supply, as our brother said, “the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ”. It is the maintenance of the fresh supply of food in relation to a Man who was here for the will of God.
J.A.B. Do we find that our lives depend on this food? The Lord said; “He that believes on me has life eternal. I am the bread of life”. There is no life outside of what you are speaking about, not any life worth living anyway!
P.M. In chapter 3 of John’s gospel, the Lord Jesus speaks of the Spirit’s work in new birth, and a divine operation in new birth must come first. Then what has been born of God can only be satisfied and sustained by what is of God. It cannot be sustained by anything else. Now I have to say to myself, have I found what is of God in my own soul? That is an important question in our histories. We are touching on basic truths, dear brethren, and I do not apologise for that. I have to touch and locate what is of God in my soul, and that can only be fed by what is from God. That is what we have in John 4; we have the living water, the wells of salvation, and the free flow of the Holy Spirit. Then we come to chapter 6 and there is bread which is from God, and it is in the person of Jesus.
J.W. They said to one another “What is it? for they did not know what it was”. The manna was readily available but I wondered if there was a suggestion that there is always something that is beyond us in the Lord Jesus. I was thinking of that verse where they said “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him”, Mark 4:41. The manna was readily available, but is there always something there that is beyond the human mind?
P.M. Yes, the natural man could not understand it; they say “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary … ?”, Mark 6:3. But there was there that which was of a completely different character of life altogether and it came from heaven. We belong to heaven. Those that are redeemed belong to heaven through the work of Christ. He has put His claim upon us and the Holy Spirit has operated in new birth, and now serves us in order that we might be fed and sustained here in relation to another order of life altogether.
R.H. Would feeding on the manna in a habitual way bring about features of manhood with us, which would enable us to proceed through wilderness surroundings where there is so much antagonistic to those that love the Lord? Is it a habitual matter? It does not happen all at once; we begin to feed on the Lord from an early stage when we come to know Him, but it becomes a habitual matter. Is it a matter of growth and formation?
P.M. That is what this food is for. It is to build up a constitution that is able to stand in the scene in relation to the will of God, and in relation to a Man who is in another world. That is what we come to in John 6, that He is the Centre of another world altogether.
R.T. It says here in verse 20 “But they did not hearken to Moses”. Is that where the failure came in? They were not under his authority when the food was left until morning.
P.M. Yes, and that comes out in the history of the children of Israel. They murmured against Moses, that is, against the authority of Christ seen in expression in Moses. They set aside Moses’ word, and really what they were doing was setting aside all that was from God, because they rejected the authority of the One in whom God had vested everything. Our blessing lies in coming under the authority of Christ and the authority of the word of God.
R.T. That is important, because there are many alternative foods available to us, but there is authority in what God provides. It has an end in view as we are subject to that authority.
P.M. Yes. I get nothing if I am not subject. The Lord Jesus was always subject. Feeding on the manna would help us to feed on the One who was always in subjection to the will of God.
R.Gar. Is that seen in the Lord Himself; “My food is that I should do the will of him that has sent me, and that I should finish his work”, John 4:34. Just before that, He says “I have food to eat which ye do not know” (v.32). There is only one kind of food as far as the Lord is concerned in John 4. The disciples went away to look for other food but there was only one kind of food, and that is what we should be resting our souls on.
P.M. I think so; the will of God is related to our place here in the testimony. The purpose of God stands related to our place eternally, but the will of God stands related to our place here in the testimony. Paul says “For this is the will of God, even your sanctification”, 1 Thess.4:3. It is that we should be set apart from all that is here. The manna, and the feeding in John 6, has in view setting us apart from all that marks the world that has rejected Christ, so that we might be here in relation to God’s will.
D.J.Wr. I wondered whether rightly viewing the loaf on Lord’s day morning would remind us of the kind of manhood of Jesus that you have been speaking of. In taking up a body that was prepared for Him, He came here to do the will of God:-
‘Nothing but His will Thy measure
All along that suff’ring way’. (Hymn 30)
That should be a weekly reminder to us, do you think, as to how we are to be?
P.M. Yes, and it would revive our affections as we are occupied with the One who had no other motive but to do the will of God.
J.C.G. The word in John 6 is “I am the living bread which has come down out of heaven”. That is important in relation to the deadness of what is around us.
P.M. The Lord Jesus is the living bread and He gives living food for His own. That comes out in John 6. Peter says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast words of life”. Where will you find “words of life”? What is in view in John 6 is that as having had individual histories and transactions with the Lord Jesus personally, we are brought into circumstances where we can be at home in the company.
J.C.G. I thought of Caleb. One of the things that he said was that “Jehovah has kept me alive, as he said, these forty-five years”, Josh.14:10. God kept him alive; Caleb had a constitution because he was feeding on what God provided. It saw him right into the privileged position of the inheritance.
P.M. Yes, and therefore this living food has come to us. The “Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”, John 1:14. Think of the magnitude of such a simple statement; “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us”. The Lord Jesus has come right to where we are in order that we might feed on His flesh and drink of His blood, available to us because He has been into death and has come out of it.
P.A.G. You said in your opening remarks that John 6 might be difficult, and verse 60 says “Many therefore of his disciples having heard it said, This word is hard; who can hear it?” Can you help us as to what was in your mind?
P.M. “Unless ye shall have eaten the flesh of the Son of man, and drunk his blood, ye have no life in yourselves”. I wondered if we could get some help as to that because it seems to me to be vital if a living testimony is to be maintained here. Earlier Jesus says “This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, that one may eat of it and not die”. No doubt that is what He goes on to speak of; “I am the living bread which has come down out of heaven: if any one shall have eaten of this bread he shall live for ever”. That is something that He viewed as having happened, “shall have eaten”. It is the reception of the blessed Man who has come into flesh and blood condition, received into believers’ souls as the One who is able to give eternal life to the world. But when we come to this further section, there is something to be worked out in us. It is not only that He has given His life for our eternal salvation but He has given His blood and His flesh that we might have life in ourselves.
P.A.G. So is part of the test then that accepting the death of Christ, eating His flesh and drinking His blood, does not improve me in any way whatsoever? It displaces me utterly, and that is the hard thing.
P.M. That is one of the hardest lessons that we have to learn. The Lord Jesus came into the condition of flesh and blood. He speaks here of those two features as separate, involving that He went into death in order that we might feed on that death and find that everything that marks what is according to nature, and according to the first order, will never produce life, but will only produce death. The Lord Jesus has become available through His death so that we might arrive at an order of life in ourselves that has its origin in the death of Christ.
D.A.B. Was the hard bit that He was going away? He said “If then ye see the Son of man ascending up where he was before”? I was thinking that the passover involved a change of place, and all the people of Israel could bring into the wilderness was unleavened bread. No other food came from Egypt. There was a separation from the world in which the disciples would have been happy to remain. I wondered if it is new food for a new place for the believer. I accept what has been said about the way in which the manna sustains us here; it sustains us because we do not belong here.
P.M. That is an important point reached in the soul of the believer, that through redemption I do not belong to this scene. I belong to another world. The One who is the Centre of it is the One who has paid the price of my redemption, but He is not on the cross now, He is in heaven. But in this section, I come to accept that everything that was according to the first order of man had to be removed in the death of Christ because God has another order of life altogether in view. He would give us that life in ourselves.
D.A.B. It would also make it easier to see that this is all from the Father. The Father is Someone who we can come to know. Following up what was said a moment ago about Moses, the Lord said that it was not Moses that had given them the bread out of heaven, but His Father. That comes with the idea of authority which has been referred to. We hear of the Father and we learn from Him, and we learn what the will of the Father is. Those things direct us to this kind of food and this kind of place.
P.M. The Lord Jesus lived on account of the Father. Eating His flesh and drinking His blood has in view that we should come to live on account of the Lord Jesus, it says, “he also who eats me shall live also on account of me”. That is what is in view, that through the acceptance of His death upon ourselves, we should come to feed on a Man who is in the presence of God, and live on account of Him.
D.A.B. I might be quite willing to accept that He died for me, but I feed on that which was given for me. That is a blessed privilege which the believer has.
P.M. It is, and I might say without being critical of other believers, that it is a privilege that is little known in Christendom. Little is said about the moral bearing of the death of Christ. A great deal is said as to the life of Jesus, and we rejoice in the life of Jesus, but little is said as to the moral bearing of His death. It could not be, because the system itself would have to give way to it.
P.J.W. Is there a link with what Paul says as to “always bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body”, 2 Cor.4:10. I was thinking about the word being hard; the note to the dying of Jesus speaks of the ‘putting to death’ which is what needs to be done. That order of man has to be put to death in me, do you think?
P.M. Yes, because man according to flesh was never the purpose of God. He had man in Christ as His purpose, and this section that we have read would help us. We must come to it that man according to flesh had to be removed in the death of Christ, and that the Lord went that way so that His flesh and His blood might be available as nourishment to us in view of another order of life altogether.
R.Gar. Is there a moral order in this? ‘Shall have’ eaten His flesh and drunk His blood; that is the death of Christ removing the old order of man in me. Then eating His flesh and drinking His blood is the current operation of eating, it is the new order of man in me that now can appreciate the kind of Man who was here with a view to going into death. When we have the constitution resulting from “he also who eats me”, we can then enjoy Him as the raised and glorified Man where He is in the presence of the Father.
P.M. That is helpful. We must have it in order; “he also who eats me shall live also on account of me”; He is not only my source but He is my object in the scene where He is. The Lord Jesus lived on account of the Father because the Father was the source of everything in His pathway here, and the object in all that He did. Then He says that through the drinking of His blood and the feeding on His flesh, we are to appreciate a new order of life, and I can feed on Him where He is and live in relation to that blessed Man (v.57).
D.B.R. In verse 56, He says “”He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him”. That is a very blessed result to be reached.
P.M. Yes, “dwells in me and I in him”; that is related to the place which I have in His affections and the place which He has in mine. There is a new object for my affections in another world and I come to it through the feeding and the drinking. I come to prove that there is another Source of life who can satisfy me in another world altogether.
D.B.R. It gives the Lord complete satisfaction, and if we tasted that, it would preserve us from the disposition to go away that comes in at the end of the chapter. If we are truly satisfied with Christ in this way, dwelling in Him and Him in us, that would be the whole objective of our lives, do you think? It would cover the whole course of our lives.
P.M. And the Spirit is here as the One who quickens us in relation to that Man where He is. We could not touch this without the quickening power of the Spirit.
We are coming to the close of this reading. Maybe we might ask our own souls – have I not only understood the teaching, but do I know the experience? Is the experience of living on account of Christ something that I know? Is the quickening power of the Spirit to cause me to live in relation to that world known to me? Quickening is life that is not bounded by death, it is an order of life that is sustained and to which death cannot attach. The Spirit has come to quicken us in relation to a Man who is the Centre of God’s world and to hold us in relation to it.
D.A.B. Is what has been said about satisfaction really union? It links with “In that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you”, John 14:20. In spiritual things, I get food through the Head; the Lord Jesus is the source of my food.
P.M. That is so vital, because He is available as Head to each one of us individually, so that we can draw everything from Him, but to do that I must have finished with the Adam, because I cannot have two heads. If I have finished with that order of man, Christ becomes the Head and His headship is pure and holy. If I am drawing from Him, and you are drawing from Him, we shall walk along together.
D.A.B. I was thinking that we sometimes find what I might call the directional side of headship exercising, but to understand that I am connected to a perpetual, living, heavenly Source of soul nourishment is very attractive.
P.M. And it underlies the fact that His life is my life. I do not have a different life from my Head. He is living to God and living for the pleasure of God, and the believer as having Christ as his Head is also living to God.
KEY TO INITIALS
J.A.B. John Brown Grangemouth
D.A.B. Andrew Burr London
R.Gar. Robert Gardiner Kirkcaldy
G.B.G. Bruce Grant Dundee
J.C.G. John Gray Grangemouth
P.A.G. Paul Gray Grangemouth
R.Gr. Robert Gray Grangemouth
N.J.H. Norman Henry Glasgow
R.H. Robert Hodge St Ives
D.J.H. David Hutson Edinburgh
P.M. Paul Martin Colchester
A.G.M. Alex Mair Cullen
T.C.M. Tom Munro Grangemouth
Q.A.P. Quentin Poore Swanage
R.D.P. Ron Plant Birmingham
D.B.R. David Robertson Dundee
R.T. Robert Taylor Kirkcaldy
P.J.W. Philip Walkinshaw Strood
D.J.Wr. David Wright Havering
J.W. James Webster Fraserburgh