John 6

1Some time later Jesus went away across the Sea of Galilee, which is also called the Sea of Tiberias. 2A large crowd kept following him, because they kept seeing the signs he was doing by healing the sick. 3Jesus climbed up into the hills and sat there with his disciples. 4It was nearly time for Passover, the Jewish festival. 5Jesus looked up and saw that a large crowd was making its way toward him. So he asked Philip, “Where are we going to buy bread to feed these people?” 6Jesus said this to test Philip; he already knew what he was going to do. 7Philip answered him, “Bread costing more than half a year’s wages would not go far enough to give each of them even a little.” 8Then Andrew, one of his disciples and the brother of Simon Peter, said to him, 9“There is a young boy here who has five loaves of barley bread and two small fish. But what good is that with so many people?” 10Jesus said, “Tell the people to sit down.” Grass grew thickly in that spot. So the men sat down, about 5,000 of them. 11So Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and shared them out among the people sitting there, and the fish too, as much as anyone wanted. 12Once they were all full, he told his disciples, “Pick up the broken pieces that remain, so that nothing is lost.” 13They did so, and from the five barley loaves they filled twelve baskets with the pieces that remained after everyone had eaten. 14The people who had seen the sign he did kept saying, “This really is the Prophet, the one who is coming into the world!” 15Jesus realized that they were about to come and carry him off to make him king, so he went back up into the hills, alone.

16At evening his disciples went down to the shore. 17They boarded a boat and were making their way over the sea to Capernaum. Darkness had already fallen, and still Jesus had not come out to them. 18The sea was getting rough, whipped up by a strong wind. 19After they had rowed about 3 or 3½ miles, they caught sight of Jesus walking on the sea and getting close to the boat, and fear took hold of them. 20But he told them, “It is I. Do not be afraid.” 21Now they wanted to take him into the boat, and right away the boat arrived at the land they were heading for.

22The next day the crowd that had stayed on the other side of the sea saw that there had been only one boat there, and that Jesus had not gone on board with his disciples. The disciples had left by themselves. 23Some boats from Tiberias, however, came in near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord gave thanks. 24So when the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum to look for him.

25When they found him on the other side of the sea, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?” 26Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. 27Do not work for food that passes away, but for the food that remains for eternal life, the food the Son of Man will give you. For he is the one God the Father has marked with his seal.” 28So they asked him, “What are we to do, to be doing the works that God asks of us?” 29Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God: that you believe in the one he sent.” 30So they said to him, “Then what sign will you perform for us to see, so that we will believe you? What work are you doing? 31Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” 32Jesus told them, “Truly, truly, I tell you, Moses was not the one who gave you the bread from heaven; my Father is the one who gives you the true bread from heaven. 33For the bread of God is the one that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” 34Then they said to him, “Sir, give us this bread all the time.”

35Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. Those who come to me will never be hungry, and those who believe in me will never at any time be thirsty. 36But I said it already: you have seen me, yet you do not believe. 37Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and I will never send away anyone who comes to me. 38For I have come down from heaven not to carry out my own will, but the will of the one who sent me. 39And the will of the one who sent me is this: that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it all up on the last day. 40For what my Father wills is this: everyone who sees the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I myself will raise them up on the last day.”

41Then the Jews started grumbling about him, because he had claimed, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42They kept saying, “Surely this is Jesus, the son of Joseph? We know his father and mother. So what does he mean by saying now, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” 43Jesus answered them, “Stop your grumbling to one another. 44Nobody can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them. And on the last day I will raise them up. 45In the Prophets it is written, ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard the Father’s teaching and learned it comes to me. 46This does not mean that anyone has seen the Father. Only the one who has come from God has seen him. 47Truly, truly, I tell you, anyone who believes has eternal life. 48I am the bread of life. 49Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and yet they died. 50Here, by contrast, is bread coming down from heaven: whoever eats it will not die. 51I am the living bread, come down from heaven. If anyone eats this bread, they will live forever. The bread I will give is my flesh, and I give it so that the world may have life.”

52At this the Jews began to quarrel fiercely among themselves. “How can he give us his flesh to eat?” they said. 53Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I tell you, if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, there is no life in you. 54Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and on the last day I will raise them up. 55For my flesh is genuine food, and my blood is genuine drink. 56Anyone who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I remain in them. 57The living Father sent me, and I live because of him; in the same way, anyone who feeds on me will live because of me. 58This, then, is the bread that came down from heaven. It is not like the food the ancestors ate, for they died; anyone who eats this bread will live forever.” 59All this he said as he taught in the synagogue in Capernaum.

60When they heard this, many of his disciples said, “This message is harsh. Who can bear to listen to it?” 61Jesus was aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, so he said to them, “Does this make you stumble? 62Then what if you were to see the Son of Man going up to where he was before? 63The Spirit is the one who gives life; the flesh is of no benefit at all. The words I have spoken to you are spirit, and they are life. 64Yet some among you do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the start who the ones were that did not believe, and who would be the one to betray him. 65And he added, “This is the reason I told you that no one is able to come to me unless it has been given to them by the Father.”

66At this, many of his disciples drew back and stopped going about with him. 67So Jesus asked the Twelve, “Surely you do not want to leave as well?” 68Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom would we go? You have words that bring eternal life. 69We have believed, and we know, that you are the Holy One of God.” 70Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose the twelve of you myself? Still, one of you is a devil.” 71He meant Judas, son of Simon Iscariot. Judas was one of the Twelve, and he was going to betray him.