John 6:35

‘Jesus said to them, ‘I am the life-giving bread (bread of life), the one who comes to me will never hunger and the one who commits himself to me in faith will never thirst.”

Now the full meaning of what Jesus was saying is made clear. He was the One Who had come down from Heaven and was offering life to the world, and they must now ‘eat' continually of Him by coming to Him in full commitment to Him and His teaching, and putting their trust in Him. As they do so their spiritual hunger will be satisfied, and their spiritual thirst will be quenched. The coming was to be a continual one, as was the believing. They were to come and go on coming. They were to believe and go on believing. The life-giving bread was like the living water offered to the Samaritan woman in chapter 4. It would satisfy the soul and give life. It was Spirit imparted spiritual bread bringing Jesus home to their hearts.

We should note here that coming to Him was the equivalent of eating, for it would satisfy their hunger, and believing was the equivalent of drinking, for it would satisfy their thirst. It is preparing the way for the more difficult illustration later on. One meaning of ‘eating and drinking' is ‘coming and believing'.

It was a wonderful promise. He offers a full satisfying of the hunger and thirst of the soul. And the solution was available by response to Jesus Christ. And it was made available to those who continually came to Jesus Christ, and continually believed and trusted in Him. It was a wholly spiritual experience.

This is the first of the great ‘I am' sayings. The Pharisees rightly pointed away from themselves to God and to Moses, (although were often not loath to take great credit on themselves), but Jesus could point to Himself because of Who He was. If they would have life it was to Him that men must look and nowhere else, for He had come from God and God was working through Him as His Son. This deliberate and continual pointing to Himself, and calling on people to believe in Him, is a further indication of deity.