Chapter 6

1After this, Jesus crossed to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, also known as the Sea of Tiberias.

2A large crowd followed him because they were watching the signs he performed by healing sick people.

3Jesus went up the hillside and sat there with his followers.

4Passover, the Jewish festival, was near.

5Jesus looked up and saw a large crowd coming toward him. He asked Philip, “Where can we buy bread for all these people to eat?”

6Jesus said this to test Philip, because he already knew what he was going to do.

7Philip answered, “Two hundred denarii—about two hundred days’ wages—would not buy enough bread for each person to get even a little.”

8One of Jesus’ followers, Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter, said to him,

9“There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two small fish. But what good are they among so many people?”

10Jesus said, “Have the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass in that place, so the men sat down, about five thousand of them.

11Jesus took the loaves, thanked God, and distributed them to the people who were seated. He did the same with the fish, giving them as much as they wanted.

12When everyone had eaten enough, Jesus told his followers, “Gather the pieces that are left so that nothing is wasted.”

13They gathered them and filled twelve baskets with pieces left from the five barley loaves after everyone had eaten.

14When the people saw the sign Jesus had performed, they said, “He truly is the Prophet who was expected to come into the world.”

15Jesus knew that they were about to come and seize him to make him king, so he withdrew again to the hillside by himself.

16When evening came, Jesus’ followers went down to the sea.

17They got into a boat and started across the sea toward Capernaum. Darkness had already fallen, and Jesus had not yet come to them.

18A strong wind began blowing, and the sea grew rough.

19After rowing twenty-five or thirty stadia—about three or four miles—they saw Jesus walking on the sea and coming near the boat. They were terrified.

20But Jesus told them, “It is me. Do not be afraid.”

21They were willing to take him into the boat, and immediately the boat reached the shore they had been heading toward.

22The next day, the crowd that had remained on the other side of the sea realized that only one boat had been there. They knew that Jesus had not entered it with his followers, but that his followers had left alone.

23Then some small boats came from Tiberias and landed near the place where the people had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks.

24When the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his followers were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum to look for Jesus.

25They found him on the other side of the sea and asked, “Teacher, when did you get here?”

26Jesus answered, “I tell you the absolute truth: you are looking for me not because you saw signs, but because you ate the loaves and had enough.

27“Do not work for food that spoils. Work for the food that lasts and gives eternal life. The Son of Man—a title I use for myself—will give you this food, because God the Father has placed his seal of approval on him.”

28The people asked him, “What must we do to carry out the work God requires?”

29Jesus answered, “The work God requires is this: trust in the one he sent.”

30They replied, “Then what sign will you perform so that we may see it and trust you? What will you do?

31“Our ancestors ate manna, the breadlike food given in the wilderness. Scripture says, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”

32Jesus told them, “I tell you the absolute truth: it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven. My Father is the one who gives you the true bread from heaven.

33“For the bread God gives is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

34They said to him, “Sir, always give us this bread.”

35Jesus told them, “I am the bread that gives life. Anyone who comes to me will never be hungry, and anyone who trusts in me will never be thirsty.

36“But as I told you, you have seen me and still do not trust me.

37“Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and I will never turn away anyone who comes to me.

38“I have come down from heaven not to do what I want, but to do what the one who sent me wants.

39“This is what the one who sent me wants: I must lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them from death on the last day.

40“For this is what my Father wants: everyone who sees the Son and trusts in him will have eternal life, and I will raise that person from death on the last day.”

41The Jewish listeners began grumbling about Jesus because he had said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.”

42They said, “Isn’t this Jesus, Joseph’s son? We know his father and mother. How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

43Jesus answered them, “Stop grumbling among yourselves.

44“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws that person to me, and I will raise that person from death on the last day.

45“The writings of the prophets say, ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has listened to the Father and learned from him comes to me.

46“This does not mean that anyone has seen the Father. Only the one who comes from God has seen the Father.

47“I tell you the absolute truth: anyone who trusts has eternal life.

48“I am the bread that gives life.

49“Your ancestors ate manna in the wilderness, and they died.

50“But this is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that anyone may eat from it and not die.

51“I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever. The bread I will give is my own body, given so that the world may live.”

52The Jewish listeners began arguing fiercely with one another. “How can this man give us his body to eat?” they asked.

53Jesus told them, “I tell you the absolute truth: unless you eat the body of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life within yourselves.

54“Anyone who eats my body and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise that person from death on the last day.

55“For my body is true food, and my blood is true drink.

56“Anyone who eats my body and drinks my blood remains in me, and I remain in that person.

57“The living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father. In the same way, anyone who feeds on me will live because of me.

58“This is the bread that came down from heaven. It is not like what the ancestors ate before dying. Anyone who eats this bread will live forever.”

59Jesus said these things while teaching in the synagogue, the Jewish meeting place, in Capernaum.

60After hearing this, many of his followers said, “This teaching is hard to accept. Who can listen to it?”

61Jesus knew within himself that his followers were grumbling about this, so he asked them, “Does this offend you?

62“Then what if you see the Son of Man going up to where he was before?

63“The Spirit gives life; physical flesh by itself achieves nothing. The words I have spoken to you are Spirit and life.

64“Yet some of you do not trust me.” Jesus had known from the beginning which people did not trust him and which one would betray him.

65Jesus continued, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father grants that person the ability.”

66Because of this, many of Jesus’ followers turned back and no longer traveled with him.

67So Jesus asked his group of twelve closest followers, “You do not want to leave too, do you?”

68Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, who else could we go to? You have words that give eternal life.

69“We have come to trust and know that you are God’s Holy One, the one set apart for him.”

70Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose all twelve of you? Yet one of you is a devil.”

71Jesus was speaking about Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot. Although Judas was one of the twelve, he was going to betray Jesus.