He told us that he was to be “eaten”: “He who eats me shall live by me,…and shall live forever” (John 6:51). He, not the manna, is “the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die” (vv. 48–50). The practice of fasting goes together with this teaching about nourishing ourselves on the person of Jesus. It emphasizes the direct availability of God to nourish, sustain, and renew the soul. It is a testimony to the reality of another world from which Jesus and his Father perpetually intermingle their lives with ours (John 14:23).
