John 6 32 thru 47

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1 “The Father’s Will,” John 6:32-47 (January 11, 2015) 32

Jesus then said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” 34 They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.” 35

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. 36 But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. 37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” 41

So the Jews grumbled about him, because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42 They said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?” 43 Jesus answered them, “Do not grumble among yourselves. 44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets, ‘And they will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me— 46 not that anyone has seen the Father except he who is from God; he has seen the Father. 47 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life. PRAY At Grace Bible Church, we believe in teaching straight through the Bible – just beginning in chapter one, verse one of a particular book of the Bible, going as far as we can in 35 minutes on a particular Sunday, then pick up the next week where we left off. However we don’t typically go straight through a book year-round until we finish it. Instead, we typically vary the diet of Bible a bit more than that. So, our general scheme of teaching, is to teach through an Old Testament book in the fall. In the spring we teach in a New Testament gospel. And in the summer, we’ll cover a New Testament epistle. If we don’t finish a particular book in that season, then we’ll come back to that book the following year. In January 2012 we started preaching the gospel of John – chapter one verse one. We made it into chapter three that spring. Then, in January 2013, we picked up in chapter three and made it into chapter six that spring. We took off last year because we devoted the entire year to 1 Corinthians. But now, January 2015, we are picking up where we left off in the gospel of John and covering John 6 beginning in verse 32. And, Lord willing, this spring we’ll cover several more chapters in this gospel, and next spring do the same.

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

2 In this text, what we learn about the core, fundamental precept of Christianity, which is grace. This is a text about grace. And I want to look at it under three headings: first, the nature of grace. Second, the reason for grace. Third, the implications of grace. First, the nature of grace. Let’s be clear about what the word “grace” means – it’s not a word like “hair” or “floor” that it’s obvious to everyone what it means. The best twoword definition I know of grace is this: unmerited favor. Grace means that someone has decided to be kind to you, to give you something, even though you didn’t deserve it. Even though you haven’t earned it, haven’t “merited” it. Grace means unmerited favor. This is a fundamental concept in Christianity, and this is what this passage is about. So, in this passage, Jesus is addressing the crowd of Jews who is following him around all over the region of Galilee, in Israel. And he says to them, verse 32: “Jesus then said to them, ‘Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.’” And the people reply in verse 34: “Sir, give us this bread always.” The people weren’t saying they deserved anything from God, Jesus doesn’t say they merited anything from God, but still they are talking about receiving this gift from God, this grace. Christianity is unique among world religions, because every other religion operates on the basis of merited, not unmerited, favor. Every other religion says, “If you obey God, if you do the right things, if you accrue enough merit, then you’ll be blessed, then you’ll be favored.” If you follow the five pillars of Islam, then you’ll be a good Muslim and when you die you’ll go to paradise, you’ll be blessed. If you follow the Eightfold path in Buddhism, then you can achieve Enlightenment and you’ll be blessed. If you accrue enough karma from good works, then in Hinduism you can break the cycle of reincarnation and reach a state of nirvana, and then you’ll be blessed. Every other religion and worldview, if you do enough good things, make enough right moves, then God will bless you. In other words, you can be good enough to get God to bless you. But Christianity says, “It is impossible for you to merit favor with God. You are so sinful, you are so messed up, you will never earn God’s blessing on your life. At first, that sounds like horrible news, right? “But in Jesus Christ God has shown you unmerited favor, undeserved blessings. And if you just believe this good news, this good news that in Jesus Christ all your sins are paid for, that in Jesus Christ God loves you and accepts you no matter what, then you’ll be blessed.” Christianity is not about merited favor. Christianity says you can’t merit favor from God. But God can show it to you anyway, and he has in Jesus. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Christianity is not just different from every other religion in the world, it’s also different from every other relationship in your life. Christians, no one in your life will be more gracious to you than Jesus. So, for example, I was part of the Greek system in college, and we had this event every fall and spring called “rush,” when we would choose new members. And when we got

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3 together to pick the guys we wanted, we didn’t show unmerited favor. There was no grace. We wanted the athletes, we wanted the face guys, we wanted the guys with money, we wanted the guys who were popular – when we favored these boys with our invitation to them to join our fraternity, we based it on their merit. When one of the athletic programs at Ole Miss offers a scholarship to someone, certainly that’s a blessing to the kid involved, but it’s a merited blessing, it’s merited favor. Why? Because that scholarship is being offered on the basis of this high school student’s athletic ability. He’s earned it based on his talent and hard work. I played basketball for my high school basketball team, I even started, but still no one came around Kosciusko High School 20-plus years ago wanting to offer me a basketball scholarship. Why? I wasn’t good enough. I hadn’t merited the favor. The business world is certainly like this – no one gets a job, nor does anyone keep a job, based on grace, but only because your employer thinks you’ll add value to the business – either through your work or through your connections. Because if you have the right last name, you can do horrible work and still get hired, but that’s not grace. Your name merits the favor of your employer. Even family is like this. Why do two people get married? They get married because they each like how the other person makes them feel. Ladies, when you get or got married, you didn’t go randomly pick some guy who is both ugly and a jerk and say, “Hey, I’m going to show you grace. I’m going to let you marry me.” No, he rightly had to in some way show himself to be worth marrying, to be worthy of sharing your life with him. And even with our children we don’t always show grace. It’s true – good parents do often, regularly give their kids, things they don’t, strictly speaking, deserve. Little treats, little toys, little happys – sometimes big ones. But often, our kids irritate us. We get mad at them. And when we do we don’t immediately forgive and embrace and love our kids. We hold it against them, we show our anger, and we don’t show them affection. Even after we’ve disciplined them, we stay mad at them. What’s that? Withholding grace. Friends, the only relationship you will ever encounter in this universe where someone is completely and totally gracious with you from first to last is if you get in a relationship with the God of the Bible, the Father, through the work of the Son, Jesus Christ. If you have trusted in Jesus Christ, and you believe that he lived the life you should have lived and on the cross he died the death you deserved to die, then the Father will only and always show you unmerited favor. No matter how unimportant you are, no matter how you mess up, no matter how you sin, no matter how bad a Christian you are (no matter how rarely you pray or go to church or read the Bible or tithe). It does not matter – because of what Jesus Christ has done for you, God will only and always show you grace. It’s only and always unmerited favor. Second, the reason for grace. I don’t think you really get Christianity and how wonderful it is, how amazing it is, until you begin to grapple with the reason why God shows you

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

4 this grace in the first place. Have you ever wondered – why does God show me unmerited favor in Jesus Christ? What does he get out of it? What’s his angle? Over and over again in our passage for today Jesus says that God’s grace is the will of the Father. Jesus says in verses 38 and 39, “I did not come to do my will but the will of him who sent me.” Verse 40: “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” So, at some point in eternity past, God decided, he made it his will, to love sinners so much so that he would send Jesus to die for their sins. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life.” But we still haven’t answered: why was it the Father’s will to do this? Why did he decide to make it his will to love you in that way? This is an incredible kind of love the Father shows us, an incredible grace he gives us – why did he decide to do it? I once heard a preacher out it like this: when you get married, and your wife says to you, “Do you love me?” of course you will say, “Yes, dear, I love you.” But then what do you say when she says, “Why? Why do you love me?” In response, you could say to her, “Well, your daddy had a lot more money than the other girls – that’s why I love you.” Or, you could say, “You let me do whatever I want to do, that’s why I love you.” Those would be stupid things to say, and boy I hope none of you have said that, but you could say them to her. Or, you could choose more diplomatic (and, hopefully, truthful) things to say, such as, “I love you because you’re beautiful.” Or, “I love you because you’re so kind to other people.” “I love you because you’re a great mother.” “I love you because you are so fun to be around.” But even with those great complements, if those really are the reasons you love her, then your love for her might be conditional. Because she almost certainly will not always have that beauty. And she may not feel like she’s a great mother. And she may not always be kind, and she may not always be fun. The only thing to say that’s safe and secure when your wife says, “Why do you love me?” is this: “I love you just because I love you. My love for you is not based on your beauty, or your kindness, or your skills at being a mother, or your fun-loving nature – though those things are wonderful. I love you just because I love you.” And guess what, friends? That’s the reason God has shown us grace. I love Deuteronomy 7:6-8: “The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. 7 It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

5 with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.” In other words, the reason God has shown you grace, the reason God loves you, is because he loves you. He loves you just because he loves you. Grace means that the reason God loves you cannot lie inside of you – remember, you can’t merit God’s favor. Therefore, the reason must lie inside of God, inside of his character. And his character is unchanging. Therefore, his grace, his love for you in Jesus, must be unchanging. One of my favorite hymns of the faith talks about this part of God’s character. It’s straight from Lamentations 3 and James 1, and it goes like this: “Great is thy faithfulness, O God my Father, there is no shadow of turning with thee; thou changest not, thy compassions they fail not, as thou hast been thou forever wilt be.” That’s good news – the reason God loves you lies not in you, but in God and his character, his heart. And that will never change. Third, the implications of grace. When this kind of grace comes into your life – when the God of the universe unilaterally decides to love you like this – obviously there must be implications in your life. I want to show you three: first implication, you are worse off than you realize. Read verse 44: “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” The Greek word translated by the word draw there is the Greek word elkuo which, in other contexts, means to drag or haul. It’s a strong word. The same word is used in James 2:6, where James talks about the rich who oppress the poor and drag them into court. Jesus is saying here that your situation in your sins is so bad that it’s not just that you can’t earn God’s favor. It’s so bad that you don’t even want to. Our minds are so warped by sin that we will never on our own choose to believe the gospel and receive the unmerited favor of God. We will always reject it.” “The natural person [that’s us, before we know Jesus] does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.” 1 Corinthians 2:14. When we hear the word “folly” we might tend to associate it with harmless fun, something like “jolly,” not a big deal. The Greek word translated there is moria and it literally means “madness,” “insanity.” The natural man will never accept Christianity because it is madness to him. In our natural state, in our sins, we are so sinful, we are so depraved, will always reject gospel of Jesus Christ as foolishness. You know why? Because we are absolutely in love with being in control of our lives. But in Christianity the man Christ Jesus comes along and say, “If you want to follow me, if you want to live, if you want everlasting life, you must die – you must give me your life, you must let go of all the control. You must

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

6 accept my grace. It’s the only way.” And the Bible says that to the natural man that’s folly, it’s madness, so we will never naturally choose it. You cannot choose to do something you know is fooloish. It’s impossible. You may think, “Well, J.D., I don’t know about you, but back in my high school days I chose to do all kinds of foolishness. I willingly chose foolishness. I don’t know about you – you’re a pastor and all.” Guess what? Pastors were once young, too. Everyone when they’re younger does things that their older selves would call foolish. But in the moment, when you’re young and you’re doing these things, they aren’t foolish – they’re fun. And the reason you chose to do these things when you’re young is that at that moment, the potential for fun and thrill outweighs the risks of any given situation. I remember one time in high school a bunch of us were driving down a county highway late one night and we stopped on a well-known bridge over a river, and there at the bridge there was a deep, well-known swimming hole. And one of my friends said, “I think I’m going to jump into the water tonight.” We all said, “Yeah, right,” but he climbed up on the guardrail – you couldn’t see anything out there, couldn’t see the water, there are no lights out there except the headlights off our cars on the surface of the bridge, and the bridge is at least twenty feet from the water. And he jumped – it was like he was jumping into the abyss, but he jumped and, in a few seconds, we heard a splash. I thought it was madness – there could have been driftwood stuck under the bridge and he could have landed on it, certainly could have been snakes, but he jumped, because it wasn’t foolishness to him – it was fun. The next year we’re driving down that same highway and he says, “I think I’m going to jump off again.” So we stopped, and he climbed up on the guardrail, and it’s just as dark as it was the year before, can’t see anything but the headlights on the bridge, but the second time he couldn’t make himself jump. Why? What had been fun just twelve months before became foolishness. The things of the Spirit are foolishness to the natural man. Therefore, God must make you willing to choose Jesus. He must change your heart so the gospel no longer seems like madness to you. Now at this point a lot of Christians get nervous and scared and say, “But J.D., what if the Father hasn’t drawn me? What if I can’t come to Christ because the Father hasn’t dragged me to him?” Stop right there. Don’t you see? Your desire, the slimmest desire to come to Christ, is indisputable evidence that God has you in his arms and is drawing you to him. The gospel is not folly to you any more; the Father is drawing you near. If you’re sitting out there and everything I’ve said sounds like foolishness to you and you’re bored, that’s one thing. But no one who has ever wanted to come to Christ has been turned away. If you want to come to Christ at all, then without a doubt the Father has already begun to draw you. Second, grace means that no one can boast. If salvation weren’t completely by grace, if some part of it (even if it was just our belief) was something that we could take credit for,

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

7 then we could boast about it. And guess what? We would. We would feel superior to those who don’t believe. “Look at those people – those atheists, those Muslims, those Hindus – they are so wrong, so deluded in their beliefs.” But it wouldn’t stop there. We’d look at all the professing Christians around us who aren’t as serious about Jesus as we are and we’d say, “Look at those people – those nominal Christians, those cultural Christians – they don’t go to church like I do, that don’t read their Bible and tithe and raise their children like I do. They’re so lazy, they’ve sold out.” And then, we’d look at all the professing Christians around us who do seem more serious about the faith than we do, and we’d despise them. We’d say, “Look at those people – they must be trying to earn their salvation. Those legalists, going on mission trips, going to multiple Bible studies per week, serving the poor. And all that study of the Bible and they don’t know that salvation is by grace. Those people.” Friends, if there is any possible way for a sense of superiority to creep into our lives, it will. We will despise the people around us. But the Bible absolutely refuses to allow us to do that. Even our belief in Jesus, the Bible says, is the result of grace. Ephesians 2:89: “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this [faith!] is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” When you see that even your faith in God is a gift, you can’t feel superior to anyone no matter what they believe. You come up to a Satan-worshiper smeared in goat’s blood, with a marijuana joint in one hand and pornography in the other, still you can’t feel superior to him. And when that becomes real to you, then not only will you be humbled in your Christianity, but you’ll be humbled everywhere else. 1 Corinthians 4:7: “What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?” When you realize that even your faith in God is a gift, you’ll realize that everything else in your life is, too. And so you won’t be proud. You won’t be arrogant. Most marriages aren’t ruined because of any big sin like adultery or abuse, but because both the husband and the wife are too proud to admit when they are wrong and ask for forgiveness. That’s true of all relationships, by the way. But if you realize that no one can boast, that all that you have is a gift, you can’t be proud. You can’t sit there and wait for the other person to make the first move. No one can boast. Then you’ll be humble, you can go and be a restorer of relationships, and not a party to their destruction. Third, grace also means you are way better off than you knew. Look at verse 35: 35 Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. Verse 37: 37 All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. Verse 39: 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. Verse 40: 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

8 Finally, verse 44: 44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. Do you notice all the wills and shalls? Jesus is absolutely certain – he will save his people. They will believe in him, and he will raise them up on the last day. They will rejoice with him in the kingdom of heaven. How can he be so sure? Because of the power of the gospel. The power of the gospel is not just that you might be saved. The power of the gospel is that your salvation does not rest finally in your decision but in God’s decision to show you grace. And his grace means that he will never let you go – you shall not hunger, you shall not thirst, he will never cast you out and he will raise you up. I don’t know of anyone who said it better than Charles Spurgeon. In one sermon, he said this: “I love God’s “shalls” and “wills.” There is nothing comparable to them. Let a man say “shall,” what is it good for? “I will,” says man, and he never performs; “I shall,” says he and he breaks his promise. But it is never so with God’s “shalls.” If God says, “shall,” it shall be, when he says, “will,” it will be. Now he has said here, “many shall come.” The devil says, “they shall not come” but God says, “they shall come.” Their sins say, “you can’t come;” God says, you “shall come.” You, yourselves, say, “we won’t come;” God says, “you shall come.” Yes! there are some here who are laughing at salvation, who can scoff at Christ, and mock at the gospel; but I tell you some of you shall yet come. “What!” you say, “can God make me become a Christian?” I tell you yes, for here in rests the power of the gospel. It does not ask your consent; it gets it. It does not say will you have it, but it makes you willing in the day of God’s power. Not against your will, but it makes you willing. It shows you its value, and then you fall in love with it, and straightway you run after it and have it. “They shall come! They shall come! ye may laugh, ye may despise us; but Jesus Christ shall not die for nothing. If some of you reject him there are some that will not. If there are some that are not saved, others shall be. Christ shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hands. They shall come! They shall come! And nought in heaven, nor on earth, nor in hell, can stop them from coming.” For Christians, grace means that in the final analysis, when all the results are in, when all of life has been lived and the day is done, everything will be okay. Everything will be okay. Everything will be more than okay, in fact, because grace means that one day all who have trusted in Jesus will be with him, will be in his arms, and he will himself wipe away every tear. Grace means that there is nothing to worry about, nothing to fear. That’s good news. When my wife and I first moved to Starkville to pastor a church there, we had really young children. They were both in diapers, and soon we had a third child. But Mimi quickly became part of a Bible study led by one woman in particular, who was many years older than her – all of her children were grown and had families of their own. And so many times Mimi would go worried about our kids, she was a new mom, she didn’t

© 2015 J.D. Shaw

9 know and I didn’t know what we were doing with them, and this woman would tell her, “It’s going to be okay – you’re investing in your kids now, and this stage will pass and everything will be okay.” And that would really encourage her – funny, it didn’t encourage her when I tried to tell her that, but when this woman who had been there and done that told her, she would come home from Bible study encouraged and ready to face a new day. And don’t we all wish we had someone in our lives who we trusted, who had been there and done that, who could look at us and tell us, “Everything is going to be just fine”? But we do have that. We have Jesus. Jesus has been there, he has done that – he’s been to the cross, and he’s paid the penalty for our sins. We have his sacrifice on the cross, his resurrection from the dead, and his ascension to the right hand of the Father guaranteeing us that no matter what we might go through right now, everything will one day be wonderful. He will make everything right. He will wipe away every tear. And not because of anything we have done, but because of grace. 39 And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Amen.

© 2015 J.D. Shaw