Cheryl Schatz

Mark you said:

regarding my exegesis you said…
” Jesus revealed in verse 33 that the bread of God (which is later revealed as His flesh) is given for the life of the world. So naturally the crowd asks for this bread. They were not asking for something that He wasn’t offering.”

You’ve missed the point. The crowd asked for the bread becasue they thought it was physical like with Moses(32). That is why when Jesus continues they actually abandon him- only after they realise what he is ‘actually’ meaning. They are not naturally asking for ‘the bread that gives eternal life in the spiritual sense that Jesus means.

I understand that they don’t fully understand what Jesus was offering, but the point that I was making was that they asked for what Jesus was offering – this eternal bread. The fact that Jesus offered the bread shows that it was given for their behalf, not just for given for the elect.

Your last sentence is wrong. They ‘were’ asking for something Jesus wasn’t offering. Jesus was not offering physical bread like they wanted. Once they realise the truth of what he means, they run, they do not ask again for the spiritual bread.

Mark, they were asking for everlasting bread. They just didn’t understand that it was “spiritual” everlasting bread. They did not run because they found out that it was spiritual bread. They run for another reason. We will get into that when we continue shortly in the passage.

“So the question I would like to ask, did Jesus offer eternal life to the crowd?”

No he did not offer- he told them to ‘believe’, there is a difference.(29). Problem was the crowd was blind to what he was saying- as we have already agreed they were thinking physically not spiritually. And as we will see no one can ‘believe’ unless God enables them.

The problem that you have with the text is that Jesus said that what He gives is for the “world” and although the crowd misunderstands what it is that He is giving, they do understand that they are included in the term “world” otherwise they would not have asked him to give them the bread.

John 6:33–34 (NASB)
33 “For the bread of God is that which comes down out of heaven, and gives life to the world.”
34 Then they said to Him, “Lord, always give us this bread.”

If Jesus gives life to the world, then God is merciful to enable all to believe. If God does not enable all to believe, then it would be a lie to say that Jesus gives life to the “world”. All are “able” unless they reject what they have been given.

“What you missed is that Jesus said “whoever” which is not a term that limits faith in Jesus to a select few who are alone “gifted” with faith. Rather they come and they believe as their own action since the word “believes” is a present, active verb. It is not passive as if it were a gift given.”

Again you missed the point of the verse. The question is can everybody ‘come’ and thus ‘believe’ in the first place? John 6 says no- only those the Father enables can ‘come’ and therefore believe.

That is not true. God enables all. But when ones who have been enabled harden their heart against God and refuse to believe, they will not be drawn to Jesus. Is that fair? Of course it is. If they refuse to believe the Father, why should He draw them to Jesus? We will see more of this in the coming verses.

‘Whoever’ means exactly what it means- whoever the Father enables to come will never thrist or hunger- or paraphrased God’s call does not come back empty. I agree that the ‘belief’ of the person is their own choice and action- that has never been a matter of contention so the present active confirms what i believe.

Whoever means whoever. If God was picking favorites to come to Jesus then the term would not be “whoever” but “the elect”. It would be a definite people not a general term.

And how can the “belief” of a person be their own choice if God gives faith as a gift? If faith is a gift that one receives without doing anything on their own, then the belief would be passive as it would be given to the person and not something that they themselves must do. You are being inconsistent here.

To be continued…