On several occasions during His earthly ministry, Jesus revealed that He was eternal life in the flesh. Yes, hard to get your head around that, isn’t it? But there is no shortage of Bible passages that point to this fact. Jesus described Himself as “the vine” and believers as “the branches”, for example, and He emphasised that “apart from me you (pl.) can do nothing” (John 15:5). Now, we tend to think that Jesus meant here that without an intimate relationship with Him we cannot perform the ministries He did. And that would be absolutely true. But Jesus meant much more than that. Much more …
John 15:6 (NIV)
“If you do not remain in Me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned.”
Apart from, cut off from, separated from the vine, any vine branch dies. It is inevitable. This is the eventual plight of the believer who thinks that being a cut-off vine branch is OK – it isn’t. This is not why we were born again. Jesus also revealed that He was the bread of life …
John 6:35 (NIV)
Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to Me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in Me will never be thirsty.”
And …
John 6:48 (NIV)
“I am the bread of life.”
John uses bread as a symbol here. Bread was the basic food staple of Jesus’ day. It was just so basic for sustaining life, as was water. Bread and water – it doesn’t get any more basic than that for one’s physical nourishment. Of course, you will recall that Jesus again pointed to this issue in what we call the “Lord’s Prayer” …
Matthew 6:11 (NIV)
“Give us today our daily bread”.
But if we take John’s gospel narrative seriously (chapter 6) where he records the words of Jesus claiming to be the ‘bread of life’, and we now read Matthew and realise that, from a theological perspective, there is a double meaning at play – physical food and spiritual food, that is needed daily. Remember, bread is a basic daily staple, whether spiritual or physical. Both kinds of bread are vitally important.
Jesus also revealed Himself as the “living water” to the Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well that day.
John 4:10 (NIV)
Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water."
There it is again. John is ensuring that his readers clearly understand that Jesus is far more than offering a moral pathway in order for us to become “nice, moral persons” (i.e. ‘the way’); He is offering far more than indispensable, indisputable truth (i.e. ‘the truth’) – He is the life.
John 14:6 (NIV)
Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through Me.”
In other words, the way and the truth are means to one end, and that is that in Jesus we have life – and that is eternal life. The word used by John here for ‘life’ is zōē (ζωή), which is not the same word for our living, breathing, limited earthly life – it isn’t biological life. It is far more, and transcends time. zōē (pronounced ‘dzo-ay’) is the absolute fulness of life, both essential and ethical, which belongs to God. God is Creator and life-giver, and through the resurrection of Jesus zōē is imparted to born-agains during earth time, but it passes through death and is then fully realised and experienced. zōē is real and genuine, a life active and vigorous and supernatural now in time, it is devoted to God (the vine), is incredibly blessed (fruit), in the portion even in this world of those who put their trust in Christ. But after the resurrection it is consummated by unimaginable new experiences – starting with a new and perfect body – and will continue on forever.
So, vine, living water, bread come down from heaven. When we meditate on these things and understand them to be characteristics of the very nature of Jesus, we realise that everything about our Christian life now, future and in eternity is ultimately always about zōē - from the moment we are born again and into eternity. And along the way, the fruit of our lives (John 15) allows others also to taste of zōē, too, and be drawn to the Father.
Is morality important? Yes, of course. But whose morality and based on whose truth? And, yes, truth is important – there is plenty of deception out there that will head us away from zōe. In Jesus morality and truth becomes holiness – and holiness opens the floodgates of zōē (which was never meant to remain the small size of our initial born-again portion).
Being a Christian is not about morality and truth as end points. No! This is what messed up the Pharisees. No, these are a means to an end. That end is zōē.
John 1:3-5 (NIV)
“Through Him all things were made; without Him nothing was made that has been made.
4 In Him was zōē, and that zōē was the light of all mankind.
5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
It can’t. It is stronger than death.
What will you do with the bread of zōē? Oh, so much more to say on all this. More soon.
Think on these things …
Ps Milton