LORD and SAVIOUR, JESUS CHRIST 105 and believe thee ? What daft thou work ? Our fathers did eat manna in the defert; as 'it is written, He gave them bread front heaven to eat. To, this objeétion, our Lord replied, Verily, verily, I fay unto you, Mofes gave you not that bread front heaven ; but my Father givethyou the true breadfrom heaven. The manna which fuftained the Ifraelites in the wildernefs, was not the produaion of Mofes, but the gift of God ; it was not font as ati evidence of Mofes being a great prophet, but was intended to carry on the defigns of Divine Providence, in the fupport of that peculiar people, and to be an emblem, or reprefentation of that true fpiritual heavenly bread, which God bath given for the fpiritual life of all who believe in his Son. Some of the audience, who had liften- ed with great pleafure, to the defcription which our Lord had given of the cm- leftial bread, werepoffeffed with an earneft defire to be partakers of fo great a blef- fing; and immediately cried out, Lord, evermore give us this bread. To which the Divine Inftruftor replied, I am the bread of ljfe : he that cometh to me. flzall never hunger; and he that believeth on me /hall never thir/t. But, continued our great Redeemer, as I have often faid, your na- tion obhinately and refolutely refills the light, and continues in unbelief, notwith- handing the manifeft and glaring evi- dences of divine power, which you have Teen, and the glorious fruits which would follow on your believing ; but think not, that your unbelief will prevent the riling glories of my fpiritual kingdom ; for many there are which my. Father hath given me, thefesfhall be induced by the power of his fpirit to come unto me, and him that cometh, I will in no wife coil out for I came down from heaven, not to do nine own will, but the will of hint that feat me. And this is the Father's will which hath fent me, that, of all which he hash No. 9. given me, Ifhould lye nothing, butfhould raife it . up at the left day. And this is the will of him that font me, that every one which Teeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlafling life : and I will raife him up at the left day. As the greateft part of the Jews were defirous only of temporal privileges and advantages from the Meffiah's kingdom, it is no wonder they fhould be offended at this doftrine ; they could not bear the thought, that a man who declined all earthly honours, fhould be fuppofed to be the Melliah: nor could they tell what he meant by calling himfelf the bread of life, and afferting, that he came down from heaven. With murmuring and difcontent, therefore, they haftily exclaimed, Is not this Jefas, the fon of ,fofeóh, whofefather and mother we know? How is it then that he faith, Icame down from heaven? To thefe degrading expr-.eRions, our Lord thought fit to reply, that no objelions arifing from the meannefs of his birth and education, could invalidate the tefti- mony of the miracles which he had wrought, or excufe their obttivacy and unbelief. But it was not ftrange, that they fhould oppofe and refill the truth, for it required the agency of divine power to teach them to underhand what he meant by declaring himfelf the bread of life and alfo it mull be the mighty power of God, which enabled them to receive him, and live upon him as fuch. A believing in the Son of GGod, as the only Saviour of Inners, and refting upon him for life and falvation, and thereby partaking of the divine nature, and receiving fpiritual nouriíhment from him, as the body does from corporeal bread, was not within the reach of the natural abilities of the unbe- lieving Jews, nor any of the human race, without divine affiftance t and, therefore, our Lord told them, No man can come to me, except the Father which hathfent me, draw hint. And he further prcceed- C c ed
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