What Does John 6:54 Mean?

(54) **Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood.**—The thought advances from the negative to the positive. The previous verse stated the condition without which they could not have life. This verse declares that they who thus eat and drink possess that life now, and that it is eternal. (Comp. Note on John 6:47.) The thought advances, too, from the “ye” of those immediately addressed to the “whoso,” which has no limit but the fulfilment of the condition. The word for “eateth” is a stronger word than that before used, meaning literally the act of dividing the food by the teeth; but this meaning is not to be pressed. It is simply the present tense, which describes the process of eating, and is the same word which is used in John 6:56-58, and in John 13:18. The sense of the word in the only other place in the New Testament where it occurs (Matthew 24:38) confirms this. **And I will raise him up at the last day.**—The thought of the eternal life, which is the present possession of the spirit in communion with God, leads on once again to the fuller expansion of that life in the final victory over death. (Comp. John 6:40; John 6:44.)