A Crashing Crescendo!

Texts: Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18; Ephesians 6:10-20; John 6:56-69

So today we complete the journey we've been on for five weeks now through chapter 6 of St John's gospel.  I said at some stage of the journey that there is a sense in which we might look at this chapter as a piece of musical composition, because of the way that St John has used a small number of ideas and phrases and woven them in and out of the text as it's gone along.  The idea of bread coming down from heaven like the manna in the desert has developed into the idea of Jesus himself being that bread: the idea of life (or eternal life) is another that has been with us along the way, and it too has evolved and grown as the chapter has developed.  And joining these two themes together has been the central idea of the divinity of Christ – Jesus as the One who comes down from the Father and who will later return to the Father.

Well, if we want to continue the musical motif, we can say that today we are reaching a tremendous crescendo, with the percussion and brass sections to the fore!  The chapter is ending in uproar, with many people voting with their feet.  Jesus has pushed them too far this time.  They protest: "This is a hard saying.  Who can accept it?"  But far from backing off, Jesus continues to press the argument.  He asks them: "Does this offend you?  What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before?"

And that's an interesting response, because he seems to be responding to their first complaint, rather than their second.  We noticed two weeks ago that the audience was getting restive over his repeated assertions that he had come down from above, or had come from the Father.  At first, they were more puzzled than upset; they simply didn't get what he was saying.  But as they thought about it, and as he kept playing on this theme, they came to realise that this was a claim to be equal to God, to be divine.  That raised their temperatures more than a little bit.  And Jesus' response today seems to be challenging them on this ground.  What if you see me ascend to the Father?  Will you believe in me, then?

But as we saw last week, they had a second ground of objection, and it is this second issue that seems, in St John's narrative, to be the trigger that really sparked this outburst.  Last week, in very graphic language, Jesus was telling them that unless they ate his flesh and drank his blood they would not have life (eternal life) in them.  And we accepted (I hope!) that Jesus was talking about the Eucharist.  He was saying (courtesy of St John) that only those who receive Communion will have eternal life.

These are the clues I mentioned last week that lead scholars to say that a major split was occurring (or perhaps had already occurred) in the community of faith from which this gospel emerged.  Clearly there were some who would not accept the divinity of Christ, and would not accept the necessity of Communion; or at least, would not accept some of the teaching surrounding Holy Communion.  Perhaps they did not object to its use as a memorial to Jesus, but they did not like the idea that it was essential to eternal life.  either way, the idea of a split is underlined by some of the language that follows in this passage.

The St John has Jesus say: "The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life.  Yet there are some of you who do not believe"; and then adds his own comment: "For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him."  In other words, those (in John's community of faith, who were rebelling were actually failing to believe in Jesus, and were guilty of betraying him just like Judas did.  Strong words, suggesting the bitterness of the splits within this community of faith.  And then comes the clincher:   St John writes, "From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him."

There's the crisis; people are now deserting Jesus, because they can't accept his hard teaching.  And St John, with wonderful dramatic instincts, has Jesus turn to his disciples, and ask, "You do not want to leave too, do you?"  Now, what echoes can we pick up here?  Well, the Church invites us this morning, to think of Joshua's final address to the people who have entered the Promised Land.  Whom do you wish to follow?  The dangers and hardships are behind them.  They've come out of Egypt with all the risks involved in making their escape; they have survived years of deprivation wandering the desert; and they have invaded Canaan and subdued its inhabitants.  The hard work has been done.  But now they face a new danger – complacency.  The old human tendency to relax when the battle has been won, and take peace for granted.  In faith terms, to plead for God's help when things have turned to custard; but to forget God when all is again well.

So Joshua addresses them bluntly.  They must decide whom they will follow.  They can't have a bob each way.  They must give their total allegiance to God, and reject all other pagan gods, whether they are the ancestral deities from Mesopotamia, or the gods of Egypt, or the gods of the Canaanites.

Well, maybe there is something of this in the back of St John's mind as he writes today's passage; but far more likely, in my view, he is thinking of the episode when Jesus and his disciples were discussing public perceptions of Jesus; and then Jesus asked them, "Who do you say I am?"  Again, it is Peter who answers for them all; but the terms of his answer are slightly different this time.  They have been tailored to fit the context of this chapter.  "Lord, to whom shall we go?  You have the words of eternal life.  We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God."

We are back to the theme of eternal life.  The disciples cannot leave Jesus because he is the sole source of eternal life.  How can that be?  Because he is the Holy One of God – code for God himself.  St John spells all this out even more clearly in chapter 5 of his First Letter: "God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.  Those who have the Son, have life; those who do not have the Son, do not have life."

This is, indeed, a hard saying; and as somebody commented to me after the service last week, universalism is so much easier.  But what if it's wrong?  What if St John has got it right and we don't tell people what it says?

As always, St Paul has something relevant to say:  "Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador in chains.  Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should."

And as the whole Church should, too.