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The Gospel of John, Chapter 6.

Jesus saw that he was confronted by danger to himself from two sources – a) the Pharisees and Sadducees; and 2) the people who would make him a king – by force (John 6:15).  The people seem to have been rather ho-hum about the physical healing Jesus did, as recorded in John 6:2, but mightily impressed with the provision of bread.  “Jesus answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Ye seek me, not because ye saw the miracles, but because ye did eat of the loaves, and were filled” (John 6:26).  However this opened the way for Jesus to declare himself to be the “bread of life” (see John 6:35).

Jesus also said he was the giver of living water (Chapter 4), and “the light of the world” (John 8:12).   He was continually confronted by minds which questioned his authority to make such statements.

So…we mortals need bread, water and light – they are life to us.  Jesus was saying that it was the Christ which gives us these blessings.  Jesus came to teach these truths because mortals needed help.  In Science & Health with Key to the Scriptures (S&H) by Mary Baker Eddy (p. 494:11) we find this statement: “Is it not a species of infidelity to believe that so great a work as the Master’s was done for himself or for God, who needed no help from Jesus’ example to preserve the eternal harmony.  But mortals did need this help, and Jesus pointed the way for them.  Divine Love always has met and always will meet every human need.”

Our task is to exchange the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul, to change things into thoughts.  This we do through the metaphysics of Christian Science, S&H being our authority:

p. 269:14: “Metaphysics resolves things into thoughts, and exchanges the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul” and

p. 123: 14: “Divine Science, rising above physical theories, excludes matter, resolves things into thoughts, and replaces the objects of material sense with spiritual ideas.”

Joyce Voysey