The Catholic Church, however, goes a little further. It is the only religion that teaches and believes that the communion bread and wine is not just a reminder but is the literal flesh and blood of Jesus. In fact, it is taught and believed (through the doctrine of Transubstantiation) that the priest miraculously transforms the bread and wine into Jesus’ actual body and blood, which the people then partake of, thus fulfilling the scripture in John 6:53, 54, to eat his flesh and drink his blood, thus having eternal life.
Besides the scripture in Hebrews that contradicts Jesus’ being offered over and over again, there is another troubling aspect of this belief. If it were true, this would implicate that the Catholic people would be the only ones who could have eternal life, since they are the only ones who are eating his flesh and drinking his blood, through Transubstantiation, which can only be performed by a Catholic priest. Therefore, to be a true Catholic, and believe this teaching, you must also believe that no one else but Catholics can go to heaven. [To read more about Transubstantiation, see Transubstantiation: The Sacrifice of the Mass here]
Matthew 13:10, 11, 13
Jesus often taught his disciples using parables and metaphors. A parable is like a riddle with a hidden spiritual meaning or truth. However, no one can understand or see the true meaning unless the Holy Spirit opens one’s eyes to see it, and opens one’s ears to hear what Jesus was really saying (and this happens when one is born again).
The gospels are also full metaphors. Such as, “I am the vine” (John 15:1), “I am the door” (John 10:9), “I am the shepherd” (John 10:11), and “I am the bread of life” (John 6:35). According to Webster, a metaphor is “a figure of speech in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable, in order to suggest a resemblance.” Then in John 3:3, when Jesus told a man named Nicodemus, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God”. Nicodemus, whose eyes and ears were not opened yet, tried to understand this saying naturally. He asked Jesus, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?” (John 3:4). But Jesus was speaking to him about being born again spiritually and not physically or naturally (John 3:5-7).
So is the case with John 6:53-56. Men, like Nicodemus, try to interpret Jesus’ parable to mean that we must eat his body and drink his blood physically, in the Eucharist. But Jesus meant that we must eat his flesh and drink his blood spiritually, to have eternal life. In John 6:63, Jesus explained to them that his words (parables) were to be taken spiritually, because the flesh cannot profit them (eating something physically).
John 6:58, 63
This is the bread which came down from heaven. It is not like the manna which our forefathers ate and yet died. He who takes this bread for his food shall live forever. ….It is the Spirit that gives life, He is the life-giver; the flesh conveys no benefit whatever – there is no profit in it. The words that I have been speaking to you are spirit and life.
If this be so, how do we eat his flesh and drink his blood, spiritually, to have eternal life?
We can compare “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5), with “Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eats my flesh and drinks my blood, has eternal life” (John 6:53,54)
To be “born of water” is speaking of water baptism. This is when a person repents of his sinful nature and surrenders his life to Jesus, that he might be saved and changed into His likeness. Likewise, when someone “eats His flesh” is when they have allowed Jesus to come and live in them (John 6:56 “he that eats my flesh and drinks my blood lives in me and I in him).
The only way Jesus can live in me, and save me, is to fill me with His Holy Spirit. This fulfills the other part of John 3:5, “Except a man be born of water, and of the Spirit”, and of John 6:53,54, “Except you eat my flesh and drink my blood”.
Jesus was a man, with physical blood flowing through Him. But He was also God, with spiritual blood flowing through Him. This spiritual blood was the Holy Spirit, which anointed him to go about doing the works of his heavenly Father – healing the sick, curing lepers, raising the dead, etc. (Acts 10:38; Luke 4:18)
We too partake of this same spiritual blood when we allow him to fill us with the same Holy Spirit, so we can also go about doing the same works of our heavenly Father. (Romans 8:9-11; John 14:12,16,17)
1Thessalonians 1:9
For they themselves volunteer testimony concerning us, telling what an entrance we had among you, and how you turned to God from your idols to serve a God who is alive and true and genuine.
The Spirit spoke this scripture to me one morning during a mass, as I was watching a priest lift up the Eucharist and say, “this is the lamb of God, which takes away the sins of the world”. It was then that I realized that this sacrament was not only a false teaching and a false hope of eternal life, but it was also an idol, and the practice of idolatry.
By definition, an idol is anything that man makes with his hands and worships as God, or as Jesus. Yet, it has no eyes to see, no ears to hear and no hands to save you. According to scripture, God does not, nor ever will He, dwell in anything that man makes with his hands. (Acts 17:24,25; Hebrews 9:24,25; Psalm 115:4-8)
When the Spirit of God departs from a people because of their idolatry, the leadership has to replace His invisible presence with something physical that the people can see and touch and call it God. This happened in the Old Testament in Exodus 32:1-5. Moses went up the mountain for 40 days, and in his absence the people had Aaron make them a golden calf to worship. God spoke this scripture to me when praying about the eucharist and sacrifice of the mass: “and the Lord said unto Moses, get thee down; for thy people which you brought out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside out of the way…they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and sacrificed unto it, and said ‘These be thy gods, Oh Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt’”.
The same thing happened again in 1 Kings 12:25-33, when Israel was divided between Jerusalem and Bethel. The presence of God was at Jerusalem in the house of God (verse 27) where King Rehoboam reigned. But King Jeroboam in Bethel did not want his people to leave to go to Jerusalem. So, he made two calves of gold and set them up in Bethel and Dan, and said to the people, “Behold thy gods Oh Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” In chapter 13, God sent a prophet to rebuke him for doing this.
The Lord has shown me that this is no different than what the Roman Catholic church did in the fourth century, when they established the doctrine of Transubstantiation, the Eucharist, and the sacrifice of the Mass. When the priest raises the host up in the mass and says, “This is the lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.” This is the idol they have set up in place of God’s presence.
People build idols of wood, stone or, in the case of the eucharist, bread, and worship it as their god. Why? Because as Psalms 115:5 says, “they (idols) have mouths, but speak not.” The eucharist cannot speak to you – but the Holy Spirit will. It is the same today, though, as it was with Israel of old. When Moses led them out of Egypt, to the mountain of God, God said, “If you will obey my voice, and my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people…you shall (all) be unto me a kingdom of priests and an holy nation”. Genesis 19:5-6.
In chapter 20, however, verses 18-19, when the people heard God’s voice, they told Moses, “You speak to us, and we will hear: But let not God speak with us, lest we die”. (Also found in Deuteronomy 5:25.) Even in the Garden, when Adam and Eve heard God’s voice, they ran and hid themselves. And idol will not speak to people and tell them to change and die to their sins and self-life or reveal the will of God for their life.
Hebrews 3:15 and Hebrews 4:7-10 says that “Today if you will hear His voice do not harden your hearts (as Israel did). For this is the rest that He has promised His people.
Matthew 11:28 Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy burdened, and I will give you rest.