Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.<\/p>\n
57<\/sup> Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me.<\/p>\n 58<\/sup> This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever.“<\/p>\n 59<\/sup> He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.<\/p>\n 60<\/sup> When many of his disciples heard it, they said, „This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?“<\/p>\n 61<\/sup> But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, „Does this offend you?<\/p>\n 62<\/sup> Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?<\/p>\n 63<\/sup> It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.<\/p>\n 64<\/sup> But among you there are some who do not believe.“ For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him.<\/p>\n 65<\/sup> And he said, „For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.“<\/p>\n 66<\/sup> Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.<\/p>\n 67<\/sup> So Jesus asked the twelve, „Do you also wish to go away?“<\/p>\n 68<\/sup> Simon Peter answered him, „Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.<\/p>\n 69<\/sup> We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.“<\/p>\n (Joh 6:56-69 NRS)<\/p>\n Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n 68<\/sup> Simon Peter answered him, „Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.\u201d\u00a0 Peter\u2019s answer to Jesus is one we all know well.\u00a0 It has been a part of our liturgy for years, although we sang it more when we used the green Lutheran Book of Worship.\u00a0 Those words, which in our liturgy are a part of the Gospel Acclamation, seem to be a simple declaration of truth in the midst of an interesting back and forth between Jesus and his disciples.\u00a0 But the reality is that statement, while truthful, has a lot of issues.<\/p>\n As we wrap up our incursion into John\u2019s account of the Gospel during this time after Pentecost, let us remind ourselves of where we have been and where we are now.\u00a0 We began several weeks ago with Jesus feeding the 5000.\u00a0 Then the crowds found Jesus on the other side of the sea and wondered how he had arrived there.\u00a0 They demanded a sign.\u00a0 And then John named this group as Jews.\u00a0 Jesus over and over used the \u201cI am the bread of life\u201d motif with them, describing how his flesh and blood provide life.\u00a0 Our Gospel, like several of the past few weeks lessons, begins today with the very verses we heard at the end of last weeks.\u00a0 And then we get to the difficult part of this text.\u00a0 John records the disciples saying \u201cThis teaching is difficult; who can accept it?\u201d\u00a0 Yes\u2026.who can accept it?\u00a0 Who among us is worthy enough to accept it?\u00a0 Are we?\u00a0 Were the disciples?\u00a0 How about the 12 apostles?\u00a0 Well looking at this text we see that because of Jesus\u2019 words, many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.\u00a0 Could this be the seventy-two disciples that Jesus sent out in Luke 10?\u00a0 He sent them out to heal the sick, to preach, and to receive what is offered to them, rather than taking their own supplies.\u00a0 If so, these disciples that turn back in John\u2019s account are already witnesses to the power of Christ at work in the world.\u00a0 Luke says when they returned even demons submitted to them.\u00a0 So they are not new to the ministry of Christ.\u00a0 And yet his words offend them to the point that they leave.<\/p>\n So what about the apostles?\u00a0 Are they able to accept the teachings of Christ?\u00a0\u00a0 Well, they are not pure either.\u00a0 Peter famously rebuked Christ.\u00a0 Judas betrayed him.\u00a0 Thomas doubted.\u00a0 But yet these are the ones that Jesus chose.\u00a0 These are the ones that he called from their jobs, their families, and their lives, all to follow him.\u00a0 And from them and their issues comes this truthful statement:\u00a0 68<\/sup> „Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.\u201d\u00a0 Like the apostles, we too have been called by Christ.\u00a0 We have been washed in the waters of the font and marked as a child of God forever by the Spirit.\u00a0 There are times we act like Peter.\u00a0 There are times we act like Judas.\u00a0 There are times we act like Thomas.\u00a0 But in all those times we can come back to Peter\u2019s statement: \u201cYou have the words of eternal life.\u201d\u00a0 No one else but Christ.\u00a0 Like Peter, we can attach ourselves to the Word of God, which Christ describes as forever according to Luke:\u00a0 33<\/sup> Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away. (Luk 21:33 NRS)\u00a0 For the past few weeks as we have journeyed through John we have come to know how to attain eternal life.\u00a0 And all those words have come from Christ.\u00a0 They are God\u2019s Word, sent from the Father through the Son by the power of the Spirit, here with us forever.\u00a0 God\u2019s Word is unchanged and will remain unchanged because it is for all creation.\u00a0 It is for the 72 disciples, the 12 apostles, the church triumphant, and for us as a part of the church militant.\u00a0 It is a gift of God\u2019s grace, passed on to us all, so that one day we may join with all the saints in light in God\u2019s Kingdom, where we will live forever.\u00a0 In the name of the Father, the +Son, and the Holy Spirit.\u00a0\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A sermon on John 6:56-69 | Pentecost 13B\u00a0 August 22, 2021 | by The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS | Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them. 57 Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4526,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,157,108,110,235,250,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-5637","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-johannes","category-beitragende","category-current","category-engl","category-judson-f-merrell","category-kapitel-06-chapter-06","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5638,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5637\/revisions\/5638"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5637"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=5637"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=5637"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=5637"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=5637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}