6:47-51 The advantage of the manna was small, it only referred to this life; but the living Bread is so excellent, that the man who feedeth on it shall never die. This bread is Christ's human nature, which he took to present to the Father, as a sacrifice for the sins of the world; to purchase all things pertaining to life and godliness, for sinners of every nation, who repent and believe in him.Your fathers did eat manna - There was a real miracle performed in their behalf; there was a perpetual interposition of God which showed that they were his chosen people.

And are dead - The bread which they ate could not save them from death. Though God interfered in their behalf, yet they died. We may learn,

1. That that is not the most valuable of God's gifts which merely satisfies the temporal wants.

2. That the most distinguished temporal blessings will not save from death. Wealth, friends, food, raiment, will not preserve life.

3. There is need of something better than mere earthly blessings; there is need of that bread which cometh down from heaven, and which giveth life to the world.

49. Your fathers—of whom ye spake (Joh 6:31); not "ours," by which He would hint that He had a higher descent, of which they dreamt not [Bengel].

did eat manna … and are dead—recurring to their own point about the manna, as one of the noblest of the ordained preparatory illustrations of His own office: "Your fathers, ye say, ate manna in the wilderness; and ye say well, for so they did, but they are dead—even they whose carcasses fell in the wilderness did eat of that bread; the Bread whereof I speak cometh down from heaven, which the manna never did, that men, eating of it, may live for ever."

But I am that bread of life, who came out of the highest heavens, from the bosom of my Father; that bread, which if a man eateth thereof, he shall never die eternally. Eating Christ in this text signifieth no more than believing in him, so often before mentioned under the notion of coming to him, believing in him, &c. And believing is fitly expressed by this notion of eating; because as eating is the application of meat to our stomachs, for the sustenance of our bodily life; so believing is the application of Christ to the soul, for the beginning and increase of spiritual life, and at last obtaining life eternal.

This is the bread which cometh down from heaven,.... Namely, that of which he had spoken John 6:32, meaning himself:

that a man may eat thereof, and not die; for this heavenly bread is soul quickening, soul strengthening, and soul satisfying food; nor can there be any want where this is: eating of it is not to be understood corporeally, as these Capernaites took it; nor sacramentally, as if it was confined to the ordinance of the Lord's supper, which was not, as yet, instituted; but more largely of eating and feeding upon Christ spiritually by faith: he is, by the believer, to be fed upon wholly, and only; all of him, and none but him, and that daily; for there is the same need of daily bread for our souls, as for our bodies; and also largely and freely, as such may do; and likewise joyfully, with gladness and singleness of heart: such as are Christ's beloved, and his friends, "may" eat; they have liberty, a hearty welcome to eat; and so have everyone that have a will, an inclination, a desire to eat; and all overcomers, whom Christ makes more than conquerors, Sol 5:1 Rev 2:7; which liberty is owing to Christ's gracious invitation, and to his and the Father's free gift; and to the openness and ease of access of all sensible sinners to him: and the consequence and effect of such eating is, that it secures from dying, not from a corporeal death, to which men are appointed, and saints themselves are subject; though it is indeed abolished by Christ as a penal evil; nor shall his people continue under the power of it, but shall rise again to everlasting life: but then they are, through eating this bread, secured from a spiritual death; for though there may be a decline, as to the exercise of grace, and a want of liveliness, and they may fear they are ready to die, and conclude they are free among the dead, and that their strength and hope are perished; yet he that lives and believes in Christ, the resurrection, and the life, shall never die; and such are also secure from an eternal death, on them the second death shall have no power, nor shall they ever be hurt by it.

{p} This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die.

(p) He refers to himself when he speaks these words.