"The Lord is my portion, says my soul."
"For my flesh is the true food, and my blood is the true drink." John 6:55
Life is sustained by life. It is God's ordained law in nature, His yet higher law in grace. The believer is the subject of spiritual life, but his life springs from, and is nourished by, life--the life of Jesus. His soul lives, but only as it is fed and nourished by the life blood of the Savior. "The blood is the life." "It is the blood that makes atonement." Jesus having given us His flesh to eat, offers yet more. He presents to us a cup to drink, a wondrous cup, such a cup as angels never tasted; and yet the vilest of earth's fallen race are permitted to drink freely of it, have drank deeply of it, are drinking of it now, and will continue to drink of it until they pass to that bright and holy world where "they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more;" but, where they shall eat of the "hidden manna," and drink from the "pure river of the water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and the Lamb." And now what are we to understand by our Lord's words--"My blood is the true drink."
The first thought which they suggest is, the believer's experimental acquaintance with Christ. To taste or to drink of a thing is to have an experimental knowledge of it. There are many religious professors who read of Christ's blood, and hear of Christ's blood, and outwardly commemorate Christ's blood, but who never spiritually and experimentally drink of Christ's blood. Oh, let us not be mere professing, theoretic Christians; but real, vital, experimental Christians--living by Christ, living on Christ, and, having Christ in us the hope of glory, looking forward to that blessed hope of being with Christ forever.
Another idea is, the soul-quickening, nourishing power of Christ's blood. We drink naturally that our life may be strengthened, refreshed. Thus we drink spiritually and by faith of the blood of Christ, that the Divine life within us may be invigorated, revived. "Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink His blood, you have no life in you." Oh, there is nothing which so truly and so effectually moistens and nourishes our Christian graces as the blood of Jesus. As there is life in the blood, so the blood constantly flowing around our living, believing, loving hearts, nourishes the roots of our grace, and causes faith and love, peace and joy, patience and hope, to bloom and blossom, and bring forth fruit in our souls.
Our Lord also signified by the expression the continuous application to the sin-healing, guilt-cleansing efficacy of His blood. As our natural thirst needs incessant supplies, not less intense and imperious is the thirst of the spiritual healthy soul for the constant application of the blood that cleanses from all sin. Our spiritual travel through a sin-polluted and sin-polluting world, involving constant contamination and taint, demands our frequent washing in atoning blood. "A person who has had a bath needs only to wash his feet; his whole body is clean." O my soul! keep the roots of your profession well moistened with Christ's blood. Keep your heart constantly sprinkled with Christ's blood. See that all your religious doings and duties are cleansed in Christ's blood. Live near the Fountain, live, yes, in the Fountain.
"So shall your walk be close with God,
Calm and serene your frame;
So purer light shall mark the road
That leads you to the Lamb."
Constrained by love, and in the exercise of faith, approach, O my soul, the Table of the Lord, and eat of His flesh and drink of His blood in obedient, grateful remembrance of Him who gave His life a ransom for you, and who said, "Do this in remembrance of me." "Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day." Let no sense of unworthiness, weakness of faith, or coldness of love keep you back; since you come, not to remember yourself, but your Lord--not to commemorate your love to Him, but His great, His dying love to you.
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