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I. WHAT IS IT TO LIVE.

1. Anything lives when it fills up the capacity of its being. Animal life does not consist in material force but in organic vitality. In man, however, we see the added element of spiritual existence.

2. Here comes up the everlasting fact that man is not like the brute satisfied with meat and drink, but yearns for what is beyond. And as there is harmony in the universe there must be something more than the material for man.

II. THE HIGHER NATURE MUST HAVE ITS FOOD, OR IT DIES. Christ saw the spiritual nature of man in all its priceless capacity and quenchless immortality, and to that He addressed Himself when He bade His hearers eat of His flesh and drink of His blood.

III. EACH KIND OR NATURE IN THE UNIVERSE IS LINKED IN ITS OWN CHAIN OF DEPENDENCIES. The body depends on things material; but the moment we look on the spirit of man we must ascribe it to some higher source than matter. The affection of the human heart; the yearning for the beautiful and the good; the intellect; the sense of sin and moral freedom, whence came they? If you could take away every other proof of the existence of God, this spirit proves the Being of a moral and intelligent Source over and above the material world.

IV. EACH THING IS LINKED TO THINGS OF ITS OWN KIND.

1. The soul, living, intelligent, and morally conscious, is linked to an intelligent and moral God, and by Him, and in Him alone, can it live. It cannot link itself to mere sensation and matter.

2. Jesus brings men into communion with that infinite intelligence, love, and freedom by bringing man's soul into communion with Himself, so that living in Him we live in the Father, and as Christ becomes assimilated to our inner spiritual being, so we truly live.

V. WE NOT ONLY LIVE IN, BUT BY JESUS. This brings into view His essential personality. "I am the Bread, the Way." "He that believeth in ME," etc. No other teacher ever so spoke. Plato or Confucius may have said, "Believe this truth," but never, "I am the truth, believe in me." Christ saves us not merely by the truth He revealed, but by Himself.

VI. THIS LIFE IS A PRESENT EXPERIENCE. Not merely is going to live, but liveth. Religion is an end as well as a means. It is not simply something that helps us to live by and by, but something by which we live now. The great essential things are those we live by, not for. Bread, water, air — we do not live for them, but by them. So we live by religion, heaven, Christ, not for them. Conclusion:

1. See what an argument this is for the truth of the religion of Jesus, because it shows us how we truly live. We live by Jesus now because —

(1)  He fills up our higher faculties;

(2)  draws out our best affections;

(3)  gives us the truth of our higher being.

2. Have you ever really lived?

(E. H. Chapin, D. D.)

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KJV: They said therefore unto him, What sign shewest thou then, that we may see, and believe thee? what dost thou work?

WEB: They said therefore to him, "What then do you do for a sign, that we may see, and believe you? What work do you do?