John 6:60-65 On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and the are life. Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him. He went on to say, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.” From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.”  

The crowd wasn’t complaining about Jesus’ teaching because it was confusing, though they had suffered some confusion along the way. As Mark Twain once quipped, “It’s not the parts of the Bible I don’t understand that bother me. It’s the parts I do.” This was a hard teaching in the sense that it was hard to accept. Jesus’ words were unbending, unyielding, incapable of being bent or twisted into an idea they might find more appealing or sensible.

This is a good place to pause and ask Jesus’ question of ourselves. “Does this offend you?” Constance began crying in my class. It had just dawned on her that Jesus not only died. He died because of us, because of her, for her sins. She didn’t want Jesus to die because of her, to think that somehow she helped kill him. She was objecting to the whole arrangement. She wanted out of it. It offended her.

Peter pulled Jesus aside. Jesus had just revealed for the first time, plainly, that he had come to die. This would be no accident, no mistake. It was his mission, his purpose. Peter pulled Jesus aside and started rebuking him. Jesus’ death would rob him of his dearest friend and destroy his dreams of earthly glory. It offended him.

Jesus offers a bitter pill to swallow. What does his death say about us? How horrible must we be for that to be the solution! At least when I am sick, I take the medicine until I am cured and can stop taking it. Jesus talks about remaining in us and we in him: something all the way to the end and eternal life. We never stop this feeding. We never lose our need.

Author Brennan Manning dedicates his book The Ragamuffin Gospel, “for the inconsistent, unsteady disciples whose cheese is falling off their cracker…for poor, weak, sinful men and women with hereditary faults and limited talents…for the bent and the bruised who feel that their lives are a grave disappointment to God…for smart people who know they are stupid and honest disciples who admit they are scalawags.” And if we take Jesus’ words here seriously, Manning may have even understated our condition. Does this offend you, Jesus’ gift to address such a need?

Do we want to connect ourselves so closely to the one whose gift is his flesh, which he will give for the life of the world? Like Master, like disciple; like teacher, like student. Those who follow the dying Savior will find no earthly glory for themselves. Will we so easily let go of our earthly dreams for him? Does the very thought make us feel a little like George Banks in the movie Mary Poppins, after he is sacked by the bank?

“A man has dreams of walking with giants,
To carve his niche in the edifice of time,
Before the mortar of his zeal,
Has a chance to congeal,
The cup is dashed from his lips,
The flame is snuffed aborning,
He’s brought to rack and ruin in his prime.

My world was calm, well ordered, exemplary,
Then came this person, with chaos in her wake,
And now my life’s ambitions go
with one fell blow,
It’s quite a bitter pill to take.”            

What about this crowd’s problem with Jesus’ call for such utter faith and trust in him–that we take Jesus in whole, not just the parts we like? Following him like that means saying “no” to ourselves over and over again. Following him like that might make us a stranger, an oddball, in our own culture, our own circle of friends, our own family. We should not be surprised that many still won’t accept what he is giving today.