Quote:
The food we eat does a constituting work within us. This is a picture of our Christian life. We need to eat Christ as the living bread from heaven embodied in His words of eternal life, as the tree of life. By eating Christ we can be constituted and supplied with Him as our life element so that we can grow in life and be transformed in life.
Witness Lee
From AllinclusiveChrist.Org
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WL often spoke about
eating Christ, and this topic was one of the major themes of his ministry. More and more, however, I can't help but notice how much he misrepresented the context of this subject. WL taught that to eat Christ is to become constituted with Christ, or later on he taught that to eat Christ is to become Christ. Consequently, when discussing the subject of eating Christ, LCers will often say things like "you are what you eat." That is hyperbole, however, and it is the context under which they intend to understand the concept of eating Christ.
Peter's words in John 6 to provide a bit of context as to what Jesus was really talking about
: "But Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life." Like everyone else, the disciples didn't really understand what Jesus was talking about, but at least Peter already understood that by following Jesus, they had found eternal life. So when Jesus said that by eating Him, they would have life, I’m sure Peter must have picked up on the fact that Jesus wasn’t speaking about cannibalism, but it was related to eternal life.
Jesus was clear that eternal life is gained by eating His flesh and drinking His blood. He was also clear that to eat Him is to abide in Him, which would suggest a metaphorical view of eating Christ for sustenance/growth. What He never spoke about was eating for the mere sake of constitution - what I would call “eating for the sake of eating.” Simply put, LCer have the wrong goal in mind.