Stress Test Devotional May 4
May 04, 2024
Is Jesus describing cannibalism? This was actually a charge some Roman officials levelled at their Christian neighbors, based on the language of “body and blood” used in communion services. The New English Bible translates the reaction of the crowd to Jesus’ teaching about eating his flesh and drinking his blood this way: “This is more than we can stomach! Why listen to such words?!”
But this language is actually an Aramaic metaphor for unreserved commitment. When people gave themselves completely to a task they would say, “I have eaten my body and drunk my blood.” When a commander called for total loyalty of followers he would demand they “eat his flesh and drink his blood.” Even in English we talk of “sweating blood”, and when we’ve got something someone wants we say, “eat your heart out!” Lloyd Ogilvie points to Winston Churchill’s famous call for total commitment in the fury of Nazi menace. Churchill asked for “blood, sweat and tears.” Jesus’ language of “eating and drinking” his body and blood is a call for unreserved and total commitment, in the form of a graphic metaphor.
Notice that all of the “I am” sayings are metaphorical. Some truths can only be expressed metaphorically.
Have you had different stages of commitment in your relationship with Jesus? Where are you now?
FAMILY TIME
With whom do you have an unreserved commitment?
