The Extraordinary Offense of the Cross

We come now to one of the truly difficult sayings of Jesus. In fact, many of His disciples said: “This is a difficult statement, who can listen to it?” When they heard what Jesus said, they struggled with it and stumbled over it; it was scandalous to them. One of the questions we need to answer is: Why did Jesus choose to say this in the way He did?

We see in this passage that the offensive part of it is, essentially: “To have life, you must east my flesh and drink my blood.” He doesn't say it once, but three times. We have seen that in Scripture when something is repeated, it is important; but a third repetition is superlative.

Why did Jesus speak in such an offensive way? If we let the force of the text hit us, we can't help but feel some sense of discomfort and revulsion; it is offensive wording. One of the things this passage brings to us is that God often speaks in offensive ways; ways that offend our sensibilities. And when He does so, He does so intentionally and purposefully and perfectly. He knows exactly what we need.