Open Heaven 4 May 2023

Open Heaven Topic:

THE MEAL THAT GIVES LIFE

Memory Verse:

For the bread of God is he which cometh down from heaven, and giveth life unto the world. – John 6:33 (KJV)

Bible Reading: 

John 6:48-58 (NIV)

⁴⁸ I am the bread of life.

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

⁵⁰ But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which anyone may eat and not die.

⁵¹ 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.”

⁵² Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

⁵³ Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

⁵⁴ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.

⁵⁵ For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.

⁵⁶ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them.

⁵⁷ Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.

⁵⁸ This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your ancestors ate manna and died, but whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Open Heaven 4 May 2023 Message

Basically, the reason we eat is so that we can have strength, good health and life. When I was younger, we had a slogan that said, “We eat to live, we don’t live to eat”.

The regular meals we eat however, have some limitations. One of the limitations is that there is no one food that has all the nutrients in it, so no ordinary meal can give you all-round vitality.

There is however one meal that gives life in abundance. It is the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ. Until you eat this meal, you have no life in you (John 6:53).

In Joshua 14:6-14, one of the people who ate the Passover meal, Caleb , said at the age of 85, “I am still as strong today as I was 45 years ago“.

When you eat the Holy Communion, your strength is renewed; weakness becomes a stranger to your body. Some years ago, I went to hold a programme in a foreign country, and during one of my prayer walks in the morning, I started feeling faint.

I couldn’t walk much further and had to go back to my lodge. Later on, I recalled that we would be eating the Holy Communion that evening so that gave me hope. In the evening after eating the Communion, my strength came back to me.

In Psalm 105:37, the Bible speaks about the children of Israel who ate the Passover meal: there was no feeble one amongst them. They all had robust health. Sickness will become a stranger to you when you eat this special meal.

In John 6:54, the Lord Jesus Christ said concerning the Holy Communion: Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day. We eat to live, have strength and be healthy, but the Holy Communion goes far beyond those three basic things.

It acts as a medicine – not an ordinary kind of medicine, but one that defies death. Exodus 12:13 says death will pass over you when it sees the blood.

This is the blood of Jesus which is represented by the wine in the Holy Communion. I am believing God for you that when next you eat the Holy Communion, death will stay away from your home, in Jesus’ name.

Open Heaven Hymn: 

Immortal, Invisible God Only Wise

Open Heaven Point:

The Holy Communion is the most important meal anyone can eat.

Bible in One Year:

1 Chronicles 17, 1 Chronicles 18, 1 Chronicles 19