Fully Alive

Written by Nikki Horne

In the message series for August we have been talking about Jesus as the bread of life. In John 6:51, Jesus says, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” He is the living bread that came down from heaven. As I think about this verse, the two words that stand out to me are “…live forever. ”

Many of us have conversations with others throughout the day about our busy schedules, meeting deadlines, volunteering responsibilities, etc. But there is a big difference between doing life and having life within us. Doing life and having life is what Jesus is concerned about. Jesus says, “Eat me. Drink me.” This is the only way we have life within us. Any other diet will leave us empty and hungry. 

It is easy to spend a lot of time and prayer trying to create a life we want. Even though our intentions are good, we live less than fully alive. We may wonder, “What am I doing with my life?” We wonder if this is all there will ever be. Life in Christ is the medicine we need to be fully alive. We need a steady diet of this food! I think of the verse from Philippians 1:21: “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain.” This verse explains that life here on earth is meant to live for Christ, to have a relationship with Him, but death will be even better because we will be in the presence of the Lord.

Jesus wants a relationship with us. And the exciting and hopeful outcome of having that relationship with Jesus and accepting Him as our Lord and Savior is that we get to live forever with Him.

To be fully alive is to eat and drink the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ. When we get a taste of it and love Him so deeply, something in us dies and somehow we are more fully alive than ever before. Everything seems to fit together because we are living for something so much bigger, more beautiful than we could ever imagine.