I am the bread of life. John 6:35.

Physically we live by bread. Spiritually, we live by Jesus Christ and by the Word of God.

Many things that we considered luxuries years ago have now become necessities. We live by automobiles, by electrical appliances, by various services of government, all of which we consider indispensable to our daily existence. However, should these things be taken from us, we could still survive. This is not true of spiritual bread. We can never have too much of the bread that comes down from heaven.

Bread is basic. Physical starvation is a very real threat to hundreds of millions of people on the earth. Yet far more people starve spiritually. The greatest threat to spiritual health and life is the seeming apparent limited supply of the Bread of Life. Yet God has provided us with an abundance.

In a way, spiritual starvation depends on our spiritual appetite, on the quality of our appetite. To live by Jesus involves our dependence, our daily surrender. We are to need Him as much as we need physical bread. When we hunger and thirst for righteousness spiritual life is never withheld from us. Christ is indispensable to our everyday life. He really does meet our needs.

Christ came into the world not merely to educate the mind. He is a far more living and virile power than any of the intellectual movements in the world. Christ is not simply a new and more intelligent system of thought. This is involved, but Christ offers its the gift of new life, a new power from above. Christ comes to us not simply to correct our thinking, but to communicate life from God. We live by His life, which He brought into the world. We do not reduce divine reality to a creed. Behind all the truths of God's Word is the living Christ and the Holy Spirit. Out lives are involved with them. In the Bible God does not give us a series of lectures on religion. He gives Himself. There is no substitute for the real thing. The true and living God makes the difference in our lives.