22 The Bread of Life—Part 3: Responding to the Bread of Life (John 6:60–71)

Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this said, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to them, “Does this cause you to stumble? What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him. And He was saying, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father.” As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore. So Jesus said to the twelve, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.” Jesus answered them, “Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of you is a devil?” Now He meant Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the twelve, was going to betray Him.(6:60–71)

Gospel preaching that fails to convey God’s Word accurately, and to command obedience, falls short of the biblical standard. Both John the Baptist (Matt. 3:2) and Jesus (4:17) charged their audiences to act on the truth they were given, exhorting them to “repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” and then demonstrate the fruit of true repentance (3:8). As a result of John’s confrontive preaching

the crowds were questioning him, saying, “Then what shall we do?” And he would answer and say to them, “The man who has two tunics is to share with him who has none; and he who has food is to do likewise.” And some tax collectors also came to be baptized, and they said to him, “Teacher, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Collect no more than what you have been ordered to.” Some soldiers were questioning him, saying, “And what about us, what shall we do?” And he said to them, “Do not take money from anyone by force, or accuse anyone falsely, and be content with your wages.” (Luke 3:10–14)

Peter’s sermon on the day of Pentecost also compelled a response:

Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brethren, what shall we do?” Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” (Acts 2:37–38)

Generally speaking, those who hear the powerful preaching of the Word will respond in one of three ways (cf. Matt. 13:3–9, 18–23). Some will scoff and react with outright rejection. Such were the scribes and Pharisees who responded to Jesus by consistently opposing His teaching and scorning His person. Their rejection culminated in Matthew 12:24 when, after seeing Jesus’ miracles, they attributed them to Satan: “But when the Pharisees heard this [the crowd wondering if Jesus was the Messiah; v. 23], they said, ‘This man casts out demons only by Beelzebul the ruler of the demons.’” They deliberately chose to dismiss the overwhelming evidence regarding who Jesus truly was.

Some will respond with a temporary or shallow faith. These false disciples are the curiosity seekers who are superficially attracted to Christ. But when He makes demands on them, or there is a cost to be paid for following Him, they disappear, desiring neither to let go of the world, nor to deny themselves (cf. Luke 9:23–25). John 2:23–25 discusses such people:

Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in His name, observing His signs which He was doing. But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men, and because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man.

In his first epistle, John further described them as those who “went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19). Their numbers include men like Demas (2 Tim. 4:10), Simon the magician (Acts 8:18–21), and, above all, Judas Iscariot (Acts 1:25).

Finally, some will respond with true faith. This small nucleus of true disciples is the “little flock” to whom the Father has gladly chosen to give the kingdom (Luke 12:32), having drawn them to His Son (John 6:37, 44). They believe savingly in Jesus as the Son of God and Messiah.

Jesus’ sermon on the Bread of Life, along with the response to it, is the thematic climax of the Lord’s entire Galilean ministry. The crowd’s reaction was typical, not only of the Jews of Jesus’ day, but also of all people who are confronted with the truth. Those who heard His message exhibited each of the three responses noted above. Some rejected Jesus before the sermon was even finished, interrupting it and “grumbling about Him, because He said, ‘I am the bread that came down out of heaven’” and “saying, ‘Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does He now say, “I have come down out of heaven”?’” (vv. 41–42).

Sadly, that response typified most of the Galileans. Although Jesus had taught in their cities and villages (Matt. 4:23) and performed many miracles in their midst (John 2:1–11; 4:46–54; 6:4–13; Matt. 8:2–4, 5–13, 14–17, 28–34; 9:1–8, 18–26; 12:9–14; 14:34–36; Mark 8:22–26; Luke 7:11–17), they still refused to believe in Him. Their willful rejection was inexcusable, and Jesus sternly rebuked two Galilean towns, Chorazin and Bethsaida, for their hardness of heart:

Then He began to denounce the cities in which most of His miracles were done, because they did not repent. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the miracles had occurred in Tyre and Sidon which occurred in you, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. Nevertheless I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. And you, Capernaum, will not be exalted to heaven, will you? You will descend to Hades; for if the miracles had occurred in Sodom which occurred in you, it would have remained to this day. Nevertheless I say to you that it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment, than for you.” (Matt. 11:20–24)

As Jesus concluded His words, the outright rejecters left, leaving only those who claimed to be His disciples—some of whom possessed genuine faith and some of whom did not. Verses 60–71 describe the reactions of those two groups (the false disciples and the true disciples) to the Bread of Life Discourse.

THE REACTION OF THE FALSE DISCIPLES

That the people introduced here are called disciples does not imply that they were true followers of Christ. The term mathetes (“disciple”) refers to someone who attaches himself to a teacher as a student or learner, but does not imply anything about the disciple’s sincerity or devotion. In addition to the disciples of Jesus, the New Testament also notes disciples of John the Baptist (Matt. 9:14), the Pharisees (22:15–16), Paul (Acts 9:25), and Moses (John 9:28).

While large crowds followed Jesus (cf. Matt. 4:25; 8:1; 19:2; Mark 4:1; Luke 12:1), especially early in His ministry, most of them were fascinated by the sensational miracles He performed—especially healing their diseases and, on at least two occasions, feeding them. But they were thrill seekers, not truth seekers.

The disciples introduced in verse 60 were no different. They were superficially attracted to Jesus by the miracles they had seen (v. 2), the meal they had eaten (vv. 3–13), and the hope that He would deliver them from the Romans (vv. 14–15). They were not ready to accept Him as the Son of God and the Messiah, but they had not yet chosen to abandon Jesus. That was about to change, however. By demanding that He be acknowledged as the Bread of Life (vv. 33, 35, 48, 50, 51) and insisting that eternal life is found only in fully committing to Him (vv. 51, 53–58), Jesus required more than they were willing to give. Consequently, they chose to turn their backs on Him and salvation.

Unable to swallow Jesus’ teaching any longer, these disciples, when they heard His words, said, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” It finally dawned on them that following Jesus meant far more than merely hanging around Him, hoping to see and experience the physical benefits of His power. The adjective skleros (difficult) literally means “rough,” “withered,” or “stiff.” Figuratively, it describes something harsh, unpleasant, or hard to accept (cf. Matt. 25:24; Acts 26:14; Jude 15). Here it and the parallel statement who can listen to it? describe Jesus’ statement not as incomprehensible, but as unacceptable. They rejected His words as objectionable and offensive. Like those who dismissed Jesus’ teaching outright, they were scandalized by His claim to have come down from heaven (vv. 33, 38, 41–42, 50–51), His contention that He was the only answer to mankind’s spiritual need (vv. 33, 35, 40), and His call for them to eat His flesh and drink His blood (51–57). In reality, however, what shut them out of the kingdom was not Jesus’ teaching being unacceptable, but rather their being unbelieving and unaccepting.

Their reaction is typical of false disciples: as long as they perceived Jesus to be a source of healing, free food, and deliverance from enemy oppression, the self-serving disciples flocked to Him. But when He demanded that they acknowledge their spiritual bankruptcy, confess their sin, and commit themselves to Him as the only source of salvation, they became offended and left. Like countless other false disciples throughout the history of the church, they followed Jesus for what they thought they could get from Him. True disciples, on the other hand, come to Christ poor in spirit (Matt. 5:3), mourning over their sin (5:4), and hungering and thirsting for the righteousness that only He can supply (5:6). Our Lord left nothing to doubt when He identified the elements of true discipleship:

If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself? (Luke 9:23–25; cf. Matt. 10:34–39)

False disciples do not follow Christ because of who He is, but because of what they want from Him. They have no problem viewing Him as a baby in the manger at Christmas; a social reformer with a broad message of love and tolerance; the ideal human everyone should emulate; or a source of health, wealth, and worldly happiness. But they are ya unwilling to embrace the biblical Jesus—the God-man who fearlessly rebuked sinners and warned them of eternal hell, and that salvation from that hell comes only through believing His words (John 5:24). Those who resist or reject Jesus’ teaching fail the test of true discipleship that He Himself laid down in John 8:31: “So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, ‘If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine’” (cf. 15:8). Continued obedience to the words of Jesus Christ always marks true disciples (cf. 1 John 2:3–5).

Since Jesus understood the heart of every person (2:25; cf. Matt. 12:25; Luke 5:22), He was conscious that His disciples grumbled (cf. John 6:41; Ex. 16:2) at His teaching, so He said to them, “Does this cause you to stumble?” Stumble translates a form of the verb skandalizo, which can mean either “to take offense” (e.g., Matt. 13:57; 15:12) or “to give up believing” (e.g., 13:21; 24:10). Both meanings are appropriate here; the false disciples took offense at Jesus’ teaching, and that caused them to abandon their superficial faith in Him.

Knowing that central in their rejection was His claim to have come down from heaven, Jesus asked, “What then if you see the Son of Man ascending to where He was before?” His implication seems to be, “If you saw Me go up into heaven, would that not convince you of My heavenly origin?” (The reference to His ascension also rules out any crassly literal interpretation of eating His flesh and drinking His blood, since Jesus would ascend bodily into heaven [cf. Acts 1:3–11].) It should be noted that some commentators see Jesus’ reference to ascending as an implied reference to His crucifixion (3:14; 12:32, 34), which led to His resurrection, and then His ascension. According to that view, the Lord was making a crucial point: If the false disciples were scandalized by His teaching, how much more would they be offended by His execution (cf. 1 Cor. 1:23)? In any case, Jesus left the question open-ended, because how His hearers responded to Him would determine how they would answer it.

As He did in 3:6, Jesus contrasted the Spirit who gives life with the flesh that profits nothing. Spiritual life comes only when the Holy Spirit imparts Christ’s life to the believer (Gal. 2:20; Col. 3:3–4). It does not come through “the will of the flesh” (1:13), which as R.V.G. Tasker notes, “signifies the outward to the exclusion of the inward, the visible apart from the invisible, the material unrelated to the spiritual, and the human dissociated from the divine” (The Gospel According to St. John, The Tyn-dale New Testament Commentaries [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975], 96). The Lord exhorted those who took issue with eating His flesh (v. 52) to focus instead on partaking of His Spirit (vv. 53–58).

Of course, no one can do that apart from hearing and obeying the words that Jesus has spoken, which, He declared, are spirit and are life. It is Jesus’ words that reveal who He really is. As noted earlier, accepting or rejecting those words separates true and false disciples. True disciples continue in His Word (8:31), which abides in them (15:7; cf. Jer. 15:16; Col. 3:16; 1 John 2:14); false disciples ultimately reject His word (8:37, 43, 47). To embrace Jesus’ words is to receive Him, for they reveal His person. Thus the Bible teaches that salvation comes through the agency of the Word of God:

Now the parable is this: the seed is the word of God. … The seed in the good soil, these are the ones who have heard the word in an honest and good heart, and hold it fast, and bear fruit with perseverance. (Luke 8:11, 15)

But He answered and said to them, “My mother and My brothers are these who hear the word of God and do it.” (Luke 8:21)

In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures. (James 1:18)

Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. (James 1:21)

For you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and enduring word of God. (1 Peter 1:23)

Jesus then said, “But there are some of you who do not believe.” As always with those who reject God’s offer of salvation, the issue was not a lack of information, but a lack of faith. The Lord held these false disciples personally responsible for rejecting Him, not because they could not understand, but because they would not believe.

While the Lord was certainly saddened by the false disciples’ unbelief, it did not take Him by surprise; Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe. He even knew all along who it was that would betray Him—Judas Iscariot, the supreme example of an unbelieving false disciple (see the discussion of vv. 70–71 below). Jesus’ parting words to the false disciples, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father,” reinforced His earlier teaching that God is absolutely sovereign in salvation (vv. 37, 39, 44–45). Verses 64 and 65 maintain the tension between divine sovereignty and human responsibility found throughout Scripture. On the one hand, unbelievers are condemned for their unbelief (v. 64); on the other hand, they are lost because the Father did not draw them (v. 65).

Sadly, but predictably, as a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were not walking with Him anymore. Abandoning any further pretense of being His followers, they deserted Him and joined the scoffers who had rejected Jesus outright. Ek toutou (as a result of this) could also be translated “from this time.” Both translations are correct. The false disciples permanently abandoned Jesus after this point as a result of His teaching in the sermon in general (especially vv. 48–58), and His condemnation of their unbelief in particular (v. 64). “What they wanted, he would not give; what he offered, they would not receive” (F. F. Bruce, The Gospel of John [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983], 164).

THE REACTION OF THE TRUE DISCIPLES

So Jesus said to the twelve, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.” Jesus answered them, “Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of you is a devil?” Now He meant Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the twelve, was going to betray Him. (6:67–71)

This is the first occurrence in John’s gospel of the term the twelve, which commonly designates the apostles in the Synoptic Gospels (e.g., Matt. 10:2; 20:17; Mark 4:10; 9:35; Luke 8:1; 18:31). John did not record the call of the Twelve and, except for verses 70 and 71, used the term elsewhere only in 20:24. It may be that the Twelve were all who remained after the temporary disciples left. Or Jesus may have spoken to them later in private. In the Greek text, the Lord’s question expects a negative answer, hence the NASB translation, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” Jesus used the defection of the false disciples to contrast the faith of the Twelve.

As on so many other occasions, Simon Peter acted as the spokesman for the Twelve (cf. 13:36–37; Matt. 14:28; 15:15; 16:16, 22; 17:4; 18:21; 19:27; 26:33, 35; Mark 11:21; Luke 5:8; 8:45; 12:41). His declaration,

“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God,” is reminiscent of his confession of Jesus as the Messiah in Cae-sarea Philippi (Matt. 16:16; cf. 14:33). While the crowd was only willing to accept Jesus as a kind of second Moses whom they hoped would supply their material needs, the Twelve saw Him for who He really is. There was no other teacher to whom they could turn, Peter said, for it was Christ alone who has the words of eternal life (cf. v. 63).

Yet, not even all of the Twelve had truly believed in and come to know Jesus, as the Lord was quick to point out. They must have been shocked when Jesus declared that there was a traitor in their ranks: “Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of you is a devil?” He is not here referring to election to salvation, but rather selection to apostleship. He chose twelve men, one of whom was to slander Him in the most unthinkable way. After Judas had been dismissed from the Upper Room the night of the Last Supper, then the Lord spoke to the remaining eleven as being chosen for salvation. As He said to them, “You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you” (15:16). His sovereign choice of them, both to salvation and apostleship, ruled out any pretentiousness or self-importance they may have otherwise felt.

The devil in their midst, of course, was Judas the son of Simon Iscariot. Iscariot derives from a Hebrew phrase meaning “man of Kerioth.” The reference was probably to the Judean village of Kerioth (Josh. 15:25), though there was also a Moabite town of the same name (Jer. 48:24, 41; Amos 2:2). Despite Judas Iscariot’s spiritual privilege, one of the twelve, the Lord knew that he was ultimately going to betray Him. (As the most notorious traitor in history, Judas is always introduced in the gospels as the betrayer of Jesus [cf. 12:4; 13:2; 18:2; Matt. 10:4; Mark 3:19; Luke 6:16].) Diabolos (devil) means “slanderer” (cf. 1 Tim. 3:11; 2 Tim. 3:3; Titus 2:3, where the plural form of the noun is rendered “malicious gossips”), or “false accuser.” It would accurately reflect the Lord’s intent here to render the phrase, “One of you is the devil.” Satan, the supreme adversary of God, used Judas as his tool in opposing the work of God (13:2, 27). As in the incident involving Peter’s presumptuous rebuke of Jesus (Matt. 16:23), the Lord identified Satan as the source behind Judas.

That does not exonerate or excuse Judas for his heinous act. The New Testament places the responsibility for Jesus’ betrayal squarely at Judas Iscariot’s feet. In the chilling words of Jesus, “The Son of Man is to go, just as it is written of Him; but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been good for that man if he had not been born” (Matt. 26:24).

Peter’s affirmation in verses 68 and 69 expressed two key marks of true disciples: faith (we have believed)—which marks their spiritual birth—and faithfulness (Lord, to whom shall we go?)—which marks their character. The perfect tense of the verbs translated have believed and have come to know conveys the idea of an act completed in the past, but with ongoing results. The initial faith of true disciples results in continued commitment and loyalty to Christ. Unlike the false disciples who had made a final decision to abandon Jesus, the Twelve (except for Judas) had made a permanent pledge to follow Him. In this way, John contrasted the stark difference between those who are fickle and those who are faithful.