#JESUS2019 - Daily DevotionalsSample

 “Eating meat?!”



For cannibals, this is a dream, for everybody else it is a strange thought. It is not just a strange idea for vegetarians, vegans, flexitarians and freegans. What a strange idea to eat Jesus and to take him in… What does JESUS really mean here? Does he seriously want his audience - back then, but also today - to grab cutlery and order a portion of “Jesus - well done”?

Jesus repeatedly uses imagery in his narratives, parables and explanations of seemingly “difficult” contexts. It makes a huge difference whether something is said in a sober, matter-of-fact way or in a way that is lively and engrossing. 

An example:

Ordinary, boring, without punch: Our customers enjoy looking at our shop windows.

Vivid, stimulating and compelling: Excited customers push their noses into our shop windows.

At the core they are identical, but the effect is different.

Jesus knows this all too well and applies this language. Imagery helps us to understand connections and makes it easier to remember things. But what does he mean by us feeding on his blood and flesh? Well, in our everyday lives we use similar formulations: when a book fascinates me, I express this by saying that I ‘devoured’ it. Of course, I don’t mean that I ate it, but that I absorbed the content. On the other hand, there are things in my life that feel like a weight inside me. Such things are “hard to digest” or “give me food for thought”, until they are resolved.

Whoever “eats” Jesus’ “flesh” and “drinks” his blood will have eternal life and will be raised up (John 6:54). The parallel which explains this a bit better can be found in verse 40. It says that whoever “looks to” the son and “believes” in him will receive eternal life and be raised up. So taking in “flesh” and “blood” is seeing Jesus and believing in him. So, it is not about cannibalism (which is what the first Christians were sometimes accused of by outsiders), but about this image of how much Jesus wants us to absorb him, his being as well as his words.

In those days, it was common to use the term “drinking water” when listening to the rabbis (the scholars). And people said that good scriptures and teachings need to be devoured in order to be fully understood. As the church father Origen said: things need to be absorbed into oneself, into one’s spirit, so they can fully be understood. In the Greek text the word “sarx” is used. This word does not mean the meat we put on our plates, but the human flesh through which blood flows, flesh that is alive.

We use similar phrases today. For example, an amazing post on social media, or a tweet by XY, is something you let “sink in”, and if it is especially important, you will also share “it”.

ACTION STEP:

Every time you “stumble across” visually descriptive language in advertising or in business, remember that Jesus changed mindsets and lives with this style of language. Next time when you talk about Jesus, use your own imagery. 

Heiko Kienbaum – ICF Friedrichshain