Essentials Of The Faith / Sunday Morning Sermon Series / John

John 6:29-40 07/31/05

Message: ‘Jesus: My All In All’ pt.2                                                                        Text: John 6:22-71
 

Introduction: Have you ever been hungry..but not sure what you wanted to eat? You stand with the refrigerator door open and look, and look. You close the door, walk around the living room, then go back to the fridge, open the door and look some more? Still not finding what you want…you go to the freezer. With the invention of the microwave oven, you can go from frozen to stomach in a very short time. But, nothing there quite does it for you. So what do you do? You go back and open the refrigerator door and look there again.

Background: Last time in Jn. 6:22-29 we saw Jesus explain to the people that their understanding of eternal life was incorrect. Like going to the fridge and never knowing what would satisfy your hunger, Jesus told them that as long as they focused on the physical (works) they would never find satisfaction in life, they would never see heaven.

That’s because the journey to heaven is spiritual not physical. They were looking for ways to work their way into heaven but Jesus was telling them it is not earned but given as a gift to all who believe.
   
Jesus asked the people in the crowd that day, and us this morning, to look past the physical and see the spiritual…to believe in him for eternal life.

Transition: Jesus had just revealed that he was God and the people knew exactly what he meant. So they ask him for proof.

4. John 6:30-33    Whose the Man: Moses or Jesus?
Read: John 6:30-31

Let me stop here for just a minute. ‘What miraculous sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do?’ Are you kidding me?

   Jesus was healing people everyday; that was one of the reasons they were following him around the countryside.
   He told people things only God Himself could know.
   He fed about 10-20 thousand people with what amounted to 2 sardines and 5 dinner rolls.

What more do they need? What does Jesus have to do, be crucified on a cross and rise from the dead?

You see, like a hunger that never quite gets satisfied, people who are motivated by the physical will never come to faith in Jesus. Like going to the fridge and seeing food that will nourish and keep you alive…but you want something else. No matter what they saw Jesus do, they wanted something else, something more. To them, seeing is believing.

That’s their mentality. That’s their hunger. Come on Jesus, yea, you fed us, once, ok, it was about 10-20 thousand of us, but Moses gave our ancestors, 2 million of them, bread from heaven for 40 years. Top that and we’ll believe in you.

Can you believe their greed, their self-centeredness? But, are we any different?

To many,  Jesus is only as powerful and as faithful as his next miraculous intervention in their lives.
    We so easily forget what Jesus has already done.
    Or worse, we associate Jesus’ miraculous interventions into our lives with luck, fate or coincidence. God forgive us.

Well, Jesus has a response to their request.

Read: John 6:32-33

Again notice that Jesus says ‘I tell you the truth’. What Jesus is saying here is the absolute truth from God himself.

So what does he say? Jesus corrects their misunderstanding of what happened to their ancestors. Jesus tells them it wasn't Moses who gave them the bread from heaven..it was his Father who is in heaven. Moses couldn’t give them bread from heaven…because he was on the earth. Only God, in heaven, could give them bread from heaven.

Then notice his transition into the gospel message. ‘For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world’. Not only is Jesus saying God is in heaven, but that he came from heaven, the dwelling place of God. Again, he is saying that he is God. And that he came to give life.

Transition: Do you understand what Jesus is saying? The crowd didn’t.

5. John 6:34-40    Jesus: the Bread of Life
Read: John 6:34

Once again the people see only the physical. They call Jesus ‘sir’ not ‘Lord’ or  ‘Master’ or even ‘teacher’…just sir. They had completely forgotten who he was, all they wanted was bread that would give them life…I believe, physical life, by physical bread like the manna their ancestors ate. They wanted to be able to go to the fridge and each time get exactly what they want and need…food to fill their stomach. While all the time, Jesus wanted to give them so much more.

Read: John 6:35-40

OK, let’s slow up a bit and break a few of the next verses down into bite size pieces.

Read John 6:35

First, Jesus is telling them that the bread of life is not a loaf of rye or whole wheat…the bread of life is a person.

Second, Bread of life means bread that provides and sustains life.
    Some of us here can do without bread in our diet and not miss it. Those on Atkins know what I am talking about. But, to the people living in Jesus’ day,
    bread was  not only essential to their diets, but a basic staple of life. 

Third, come to Jesus, believe in him and you will never go hungry or be thirsty. The Greek here is strong in the word ‘never’. It means absolutely, positively, never. Again, not physically, but spiritually. Your hunger for satisfaction, for significance, for acceptance and love, whatever the hunger that’s deep in your inner most being, will always be satisfied by God through your relationship with Jesus, His Son.

Read: John 6:36

Jesus tells them that seeing isn’t believing. If it was, then they would have believed because they saw him…but they still didn’t  believe. Believing then, has to come from someplace else..not from our seeing.

Read: John 6:37-40

To some there seems to be conflicting ideas in Jesus’ words here.
    In verse 37 Jesus says that ‘all the Father gives me will come to me.’ The context is salvation. He is saying that God intentionally moves or causes people to
    come to Jesus. That means they believe in him.

    In verse 40 Jesus says ‘everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life’. Again the context is salvation. To have eternal life means
    people have to seek Jesus and then believe in him.

In verse 37 salvation is God’s work. In verse 40 it seems to be saying that salvation is our work. Can both be true? Yes. Go back to verse 37.
    ‘All that the Father gives to me will come to me.’

God is the first cause, the initiator of the work of salvation , the work of grace in our life. God calls us, moves us, elects us, gives us, chooses us (Scripture uses all these terms to speak of salvation).

And when God calls us, we will answer, we will move, we will come to Jesus. That’s the sovereignty of God.
    That’s the doctrine that God is in control of all things and nothing happens by chance or luck or coincidence…especially something as important as our salvation.

But notice that when God calls, we come, we receive, we accept, we believe (all terms used in scripture of salvation). These terms specify an act of our will, an act of volition on our part. But, one that was not possible until we were first called by God.

How do I know salvation is first a work of God and not first our choice? One reason is because of the benefits.

First.Verse 37, 39.
    ‘All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me.

What Jesus is saying is once you are called, given, chosen, elected, saved by God, he will not change his mind. Never, under no circumstance, will you lose eternal life.

If salvation is my work, I couldn’t be assured of my place in heaven…for just as I choose to believe, I can choose not to believe and then lose my eternal reward.

But Jesus says he will not lose any the Father has given to him. Jesus always does the will of God and God’s will is that those he gives to Jesus will be saved, will be given eternal life and will never lose either.

But that’s not all. There’s more. Listen to verse 39-40.
    And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life and I will raise him up at the last day.’

Not only does Jesus promise all those God gives to him will be saved and never loose their eternal life. He says to guarantee this, I will raise them up on the last day. Do you know what this means?

  Jesus is saying we will be raised from the dead. We will be given life after death. Death has no power over those God gives to Jesus because God will break the chains of death, and make us live again…for all eternity, with Jesus in heaven. Amen?

If salvation was first our work, we could never be guaranteed that because we couldn’t be certain that we would always believe in Jesus.

And our belief in itself can’t raise us from the dead. Only God can do that…only God can guarantee our resurrection because salvation is first a work of God. Our believing is only possible because of God’s first work in us.

Conclusion
What is this first work of God in salvation? How does it work? What does it look like? I will have to get back to you on that.

What’s important to remember today is that if you are a Christian,

    God loves you and sent his son Jesus to die for you.
    He worked in our life and you came to Jesus by faith,
    you believed he died for your sins and
    you were given the gift of eternal life.

Not because of what you did, because of what Jesus did when he died for you on Calvary.

And…not only does God love you enough to send Jesus to die for you, he loves you enough to raise you from the dead.

One day we will all pass away, we will all die, we will all kick the bucket. But all those God has called, given, chosen, elected, saved, will be raised from the dead and given life in heaven. All because God first loved us.

That, my friend is the Good News of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

    There is life after death!
    We shall be raised from the dead, just like Jesus was raised from the dead.
    And we will live
    and so shall we ever be with our Lord.