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The Desire of Ages
dwells in us; and the Spirit of God, received into the heart by faith, is
the beginning of the life eternal.
The people had referred Christ to the manna which their fathers
ate in the wilderness, as if the furnishing of that food was a greater
miracle than Jesus had performed; but He shows how meager was that
gift when compared with the blessings He had come to bestow. The
manna could sustain only this earthly existence; it did not prevent the
approach of death, nor insure immortality; but the bread of heaven
would nourish the soul unto everlasting life. The Saviour said, “I am
that bread of life. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and
are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a
man may eat thereof, and not die. I am the living bread which came
down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever.”
To this figure Christ now adds another. Only through dying could He
impart life to men, and in the words that follow He points to His death
as the means of salvation. He says, “The bread that I will give is My
flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”
The Jews were about to celebrate the Passover at Jerusalem, in
commemoration of the night of Israel’s deliverance, when the destroy-
ing angel smote the homes of Egypt. In the paschal lamb God desired
them to behold the Lamb of God, and through the symbol receive Him
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who gave Himself for the life of the world. But the Jews had come to
make the symbol all-important, while its significance was unnoticed.
They discerned not the Lord’s body. The same truth that was symbol-
ized in the paschal service was taught in the words of Christ. But it
was still undiscerned.
Now the rabbis exclaimed angrily, “How can this Man give us His
flesh to eat?” They affected to understand His words in the same literal
sense as did Nicodemus when he asked, “How can a man be born
when he is old?”
John 3:4
. To some extent they comprehended the
meaning of Jesus, but they were not willing to acknowledge it. By
misconstruing His words, they hoped to prejudice the people against
Him.
Christ did not soften down His symbolical representation. He
reiterated the truth in yet stronger language: “Verily, verily, I say unto
you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye
have no life in you. Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood,
hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. For My flesh is