Knowing Jesus

“You are my witnesses”  — this is the LORD’s declaration — “and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. No god was formed before me, and there will be none after me.

For God loved the world in this way: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that anyone may eat of it and not die.

I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

So Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves.

The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day,

because my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink.

The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.

Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.

This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna your ancestors ate — and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.”

He said these things while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.

Therefore, when many of his disciples heard this, they said, “This teaching is hard. Who can accept it?”

Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were complaining about this, asked them, “Does this offend you?

Then what if you were to observe the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?

The Spirit is the one who gives life. The flesh doesn’t help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.

But there are some among you who don’t believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning those who did not believe and the one who would betray him.)

He said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted to him by the Father.”

From that moment many of his disciples turned back and no longer accompanied him.

So Jesus said to the Twelve, “You don’t want to go away too, do you?”

Simon Peter answered, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life.

We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”

Jesus replied to them, “Didn’t I choose you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.”

He was referring to Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son, one of the Twelve, because he was going to betray him.

Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

When it was evening of that first day of the week, the disciples were gathered together with the doors locked because they feared the Jews. Jesus came, stood among them, and said to them, “Peace be with you.”

Having said this, he showed them his hands and his side. So the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.

Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you. As the Father has sent me, I also send you.”

After saying this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.

If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.