The Father's Eternal Gift to the Son

Preached at Cornerstone Church in Cascade, IA on May 1, 2016
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Open your Bibles to John 6:35-71. This will be the third and last Sunday we spend this amazing chapter of John 6. We have a lot to cover so let's start with a quick review regarding what we have learned so far. At the beginning of John 6, Jesus and his disciples are in the middle of nowhere. Jesus's ministry he had become quite popular due to the signs he had performed and large crowds started to follow him. On this occasion they followed him into the wilderness where there was no food. Jesus had compassion for them and took five barley loaves and a couple of fish and fed all of them. 5,000 men, but with women and children included the number would have been more like 15,000.

After this Jesus retreated to a mountain and his disciples headed across the sea. In the middle of the night, Jesus crossed the sea by walking on the water. Once at the other side, Jesus and his disciples head to the Synagogue. At the same time, the crowd awakens and hears their belly's grumbling and goes looking for Jesus. They cross the sea and they find him. Without hesitation, Jesus rebukes them for seeking him for the wrong reasons, their grumbling bellies. So with that, let's pick up now in verse 35.

John 6:35-71 – “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. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50 This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

52 The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” 53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.” 59 Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.

60 When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?” 61 But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them, “Do you take offense at this?62 Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) 65 And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”

66 After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. 67 So Jesus said to the Twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?”68 Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” 70 Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the Twelve? And yet one of you is a devil.” 71 He spoke of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of the Twelve, was going to betray him.”

True and False Disciples

At the beginning of our text, verse 35, everything seems to be going great for Jesus's ministry. He is the Pastor of a mega Church. 15,000 people strong. The Synagogue at Capernaum was packed. Why? One reason, because Jesus was there. To the outward observer, all appeared to be well; For wasn't this the point of Jesus's earthly ministry, to gather disciples?

But as we saw from the earlier passages, these thousand of disciples were following Jesus for the wrong reason. If you recall, the previous day these disciples wanted to force Jesus to be King. They were not looking for a Savior, they were looking for a political figure. Likewise, as I said earlier, after the crossed the sea and found Jesus at the Synagogue, He immediately rebuked the crowd for seeking them because of the groaning of their belly, not the groaning of their heart.

He then launches into the reason why he fed the thousands. He wanted to say something about who he is and why he came. Verse 35, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” With this statement, Jesus begins a series of “I am” teachings that he proclaims in his ministry. As we continue to walk through the Gospel of John we will hear Jesus say, “I am the light of the World,” “I am the door,” “I am the good Shepherd,” “I am the resurrection and the life,” “I am the way, the truth and the life,” and “I am the true vine.”
With each one of these statements, Jesus was symbolically declaring man's complete and utter dependence on him. He was not merely teaching a moral lesson, he was proclaiming his necessity. His superiority. His preeminence.

This sermon of Jesus was starting to make the crowd squirm. Verse 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’?” The people were having a hard time squaring the humanity and divinity of Christ.

Hard Preaching

At this point, Jesus has a choice to make. He had 15,000 people eating out of his hand and they were starting to squirm in the pews. At this point he could become seeker friendly and tone down his message, so to appease the crowd, sugar coating his message; or he could stick to the truth, with all of its sharp edges. What does Jesus do? He doubles down.

Verse 51, “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” Once again, the congregation balked at this hard teaching, so what does Jesus do, he goes even deeper.  

Verse 53, “So Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day. 55 For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. 56 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”

Almost all of Jesus Sermons are point blank and intense, but this may be one of the most in your face teachings of Jesus. He was proclaiming hard truth. He was not pulling back. He was pressing in. He was using extreme symbolism to jolt the congregation from their stupor.

Eating and Drinking is Believing

But what does Jesus mean by eat my flesh and drink my blood? To answer this, we merely have to look at two verses side by side, verse 54 and 40. Let us start by looking at verse 54, “Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” Now let us look at 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.”

Do you notice the similarities? They are structured exactly the same, and they end the same, “has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day.” So who has eternal life? Who will be raised up on the last day? Verse 54 says those who feed on his flesh and drink his blood. Verse 40 says everyone who looks on the son and believes in him. So what does it mean to eat and drink Jesus? It means to look upon Jesus and believe. But Jesus is teaching that this belief is not a lukewarm belief it is a fully committed belief, no turning back. By this symbolism, Jesus is pointing to the fundamental truth that to believe means that you are all in, hook, line and sinker.

Many “Disciples” Left Him

So what was the reaction of the crowd regarding this preaching of Jesus? Verse 60, “When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”  Then in verse 66 it says, “After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.” This hard preaching of Jesus caused people to stop following Him. What Jesus was saying wasn't tickling their ears. It wasn't welcoming enough, or tolerant enough, or sensitive enough. So they left, to look for another preacher who would enable their sinful desires.

How many left? No one can be for sure, but you get a sense at the end of our text today that only 12 of his disciples remained. Jesus, with one in your face, hard preaching, truth packed sermon effectively lost 99.9% of his Church. He went from 15000 people to 12, and one, Jesus tells us is, the devil. If Jesus wanted to get his face on the front cover of Christian Today, this was not the way to do it. Hadn't Jesus read the 12 steps to Grow a Church? Why would Jesus preach such a difficult sermon? To get rid of the false disciples.

The people who looked like disciples, talked like disciples, walked like disciples were not disciples. And Jesus knew it. He knew that they were frauds. They were false converts. And they didn't even realize it, until they heard, for the first time some very hard preaching. Jesus, by the Sword of his tongue, the Word of God, cut off the dead branches that were attached to him. How do we know that they were dead branches? Verse 63, “ It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)” Those who did not believe (eat the flesh and drink his blood), did not have life. To not have life is to be dead. It wasn't that these disciples had believed and now don't believe. They just never truly believed. It was not as if they had life and lost life, they just never had life. These 15,000 followers were dead weight to Jesus. He did not want to build a Church full of dry bones, he wanted spiritual life coursing through the veins of his followers. So he cut them away by the preaching of hard truths.

Their is a philosophy among American Churches to be “seeker friendly.” What is meant by that is to preach sermons on Sunday morning that won't offend non-believers, or immature “believers”; to preach sermons that are sugar coated. To avoid preaching about hell, and sin, and death, and blood. But instead to preach about community, and inclusiveness, and love.

We at Cornerstone utterly reject that approach. Why? Because it stands in total opposition of the Bible. In fact Paul warns young Timothy, a Pastor, about this problem. 2 Timothy 4:3, “For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions.” America is full of these types of Churches, we will not be one of them. Because by the preaching of solid truth we find out, who is a true disciple and who is a false disciple. And we desire Cornerstone to be full of true disciples, not frauds.

The Apostle John said these words in 1 John 2:19, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.” To be of us, is to continue. If someone does not continue, then it means they never were believers.

The Father's Eternal Gift to His Son

But this leads us to a question. Why was their so many false disciples and so few true disciples in this story? Why not 50/50? Why does it appear that only 12 remained? The answer lies in verse 37, “All that the Father gives me will come to me” and verse 39, “And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me” and verse 44, “ No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” and verse 45, “Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me--“ and verse 65, “And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” and verse 70, “Jesus answered them, “Did I not choose you, the Twelve?”
In this short sermon, Jesus expressly states six separate times that true disciples are the ones that God gives to Jesus. The followers of Jesus are a gift from the Father to the Son. If your name is not written in the Lamb's book of life before the foundation of the world, then you will not be saved from Hell. This truth that Jesus is speaking like a broken record is called election. The word election is not my word, it is a Biblical word. It is found all throughout the Bible and it is speaking about what Jesus is speaking about in John 6. It is the understanding, that before time began God had in his mind those who he would give to his Son. These are the chosen ones. The Elect. The arranged Bride.

If you have come to Jesus and believed in Him as your Lord and Savior, it is because God has given you to Jesus. It is because God has drawn you to Jesus. It is because God has opened up your ears and taught you by the Spirit who Jesus truly is. It is because God has arranged your marriage.
And as Jesus says, “all that the Father gives me will come to me.” No one who is given to Jesus will reject Jesus. You can see this with Peter's own words in verse 68, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, 69 and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” Peter was welded to Jesus. It didn't matter how hard the preaching was. It didn't matter what the cost would be. Jesus was his greatest treasure, and he was never going to let go of Him.  

And when I say never, I mean never. For not only are believers a gift from the Father to the Son, but we are an eternal gift. Verse 37, “whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” Verse 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, “I will raise him up on the last day.” Verse 44, “I will raise him up on the last day.”
If God has chosen you, to be a gift to Jesus, you will believe. And if you believe, you will always believe. Why? Because Jesus is holding you in his hands until the end. You will be raised, you will be resurrected. You will live forever in the Glory of Christ's Kingdom. There is no power on this planet that is strong enough to break the union that was secured for you by the blood of Jesus. This is why we can speak in the present about having eternal life. The inheritance becomes vested at the point of union with Jesus, in his death and resurrection.

This is why Paul says in Romans 8:29, “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” This is the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. God has loved us and set his affection on us before time began, and despite our sin and our rebellion, he draws us to his Son and births us into a living hope, and we are predestined to make it to the finish line of Glory. Why? Because God is faithful. And this is the difference between a false disciple and a true disciple. One is a fraud, and the other is the eternal gift of the Father to the Son.