John's Gospel, chapter 6. We'll
be concentrating on two verses here, verses 28 and 29, but let
me set the context here for the lesson. This is right after Christ
had fed 5,000 men, plus women and children, off five barley
loaves and two small fishes. And they had gathered up the
fragments that were left over, 12 baskets full, after all had
eaten and were filled. And Christ went across the lake,
Sea of Galilee, I think, to Capernaum, and these that had eaten and
were filled, found him and they said, Lord, when, how did you
get here? Cause he didn't get in the boat
with the disciples. So, uh, these, this, uh, question
that we're going to look at here that they asked him and the answer
he gave them is from that context here. Then said they unto Christ, Verse
28, John 6, 28. Then said they unto Christ, what
shall we do that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered
and said unto them, this is the work of God, that you believe
on him whom God has sent. That's the title of my message,
as I told you, Whom God Has Sent. That's what we're going to be
looking at. That's why I opened up earlier with that question
from the blind man who had been healed. Who is He, Lord, that
I might believe on Him? Believing is a paramount teaching
of the Scriptures. Even the natural minds of men
can clearly see that believing is very important in the Scriptures.
John 3.16, 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. Romans 10.13-14, For whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved, How then
shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? John
3, 36, He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life, and
he that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath
of God abides on him. No question, these verses and
others like them calls natural man to put the emphasis of the
scriptures on believing. The problem is most believe without
identifying and distinguish the Christ we're to believe in. Most
assume that all who named the name of Christ are believing
on the same person. And so they assume that everyone
claiming to believe in Jesus is believing the one God has
sent. Nothing could be further from
the truth. The work of God is not only that
sinners believe. Many believe. Many claim to believe
on Jesus. My question for us today is this. Is the Jesus you're believing
on the one whom God has sent? Now, most do not know that there's
more than one that men call Jesus. Most have never even considered
that that might be trusting a counterfeit Jesus. Most who claim to believe
in Jesus have never entertained the idea that they might not
be trusting the one whom God has sent. I'll show you in one
point of this message that such thinking is dishonoring to Christ
and is therefore deadly. It leaves sinners on a road that
seems right, but it's a road that ends in death. There are
many contradictions that exist in the minds of men by nature
concerning what we claim to believe and what the Bible actually teaches. A contradiction is a belief of
something that denies or contradicts or stands in opposition to obvious,
plain, clearly taught truth. Today, we'll be dealing with
beliefs that contradict the clear testimony of the scriptures.
For example, Example of a contradiction in the scriptures. To believe
that God loves all without exception is a contradiction. Psalm 5.5
says, God hates all workers of iniquity. Romans 9.13 says, Jacob
have I loved, but Esau have I hated. All are not saved. Many perish,
but not one sinner God loves will perish. Whom God loves,
he saves. His love is his purpose to save. His love has provided everything
necessary for the objects of his love to not perish, but to
enjoy all the benefits and blessings of salvation. Let me read you
1 John 4 verses 9 through 10 concerning the love of God and
its objects. In this was manifested the love
of God toward us because that God sent his only begotten son
into the world that we might live through him. Herein is love,
not that we love God, but that he loved us and sent his son
to be the propitiation for our sins. God sent Christ into the
world. The result of His coming was
life through Him. He is the propitiation. He is
the penalty-bearing sacrifice that satisfied God. No sinner
God loves, no sinner Christ died for, no sinner God provided a
propitiation for will perish. To believe that God loves all,
even those who ultimately perish under His eternal wrath, is a
contradiction, a clear contradiction of the Word of God. Now in the
message today I want to show you three contradictions which
exist in the minds of all of us by nature concerning this
subject, the one whom God has sent. Here's the first contradiction. that Christ, that one whom God
has sent, died for any sinner who will ultimately perish. That's
a contradiction to the word of God. Or stated another way, that
Christ's death was effectual to one sinner he died for, but
is not effectual to every sinner he died for. That's the same
thing stated two different ways. In this point of the message,
I want to show you the effectual nature of Christ's death. By
Christ's obedience unto death alone, he accomplished the complete
salvation of every sinner he died for. The scripture is clear
that the blood of Christ obtained eternal redemption. Look with
me, if you will. Hold your place there in John
and look over at Hebrews 9. Hebrews 9 and verse 12. Gonna
look at a couple of verses here in Hebrews. Christ obtained eternal
redemption. Hebrews 9, 12. Neither by the
blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he, Christ,
entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal
redemption." Now this reference is to the eternal redemption
Christ obtained as opposed to that temporal relief brought
by the blood of Old Testament sacrifices. Eternal redemption
is redemption from the eternal wrath of God, which all of us
deserve. It's salvation, full and complete,
based on nothing but that which Christ obtained by His death.
Christ obtained redemption by His own blood, it says. In other
words, redemption is the product of Christ's obedience unto death
alone. It's not a combination of Christ's
death plus something the sinner does, like believe or reform
or do whatever. To believe that any sinner Christ
shed his blood for can perish is to believe that his blood
did not obtain eternal redemption. It's a denial of Christ. It's
a contradiction of what the scriptures right here in this verse Hebrews
9, 12 and others make clear. To believe that any sinner Christ
died for can perish is also to believe that Christ's death did
not put away sin. Look on further in that same
chapter at Verse 26, Hebrews 9, 26. It says, For then must
Christ often have suffered since the foundation of the world,
but now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put
away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. If Christ was like the
Old Testament priests who offered the blood of bulls and goats,
which could never take away sin, then He would have needed to
suffer often, But he wasn't like the Old Testament priest or the
Old Testament sacrifice. His sacrifice was not like theirs.
His one sacrifice was better, infinitely better than all their
sacrifices put together. His one sacrifice did put away
sin. No sinner Christ died for can
perish. Their redemption has been obtained. Their ransom has been paid. Their
punishment is complete. Their sins have been put away.
There's no possibility that any sinner Christ died for can perish.
Christ has already endured the full punishment those sinners
deserve, and there's no possibility that a just God will punish them
with that same punishment. The one just God and Savior who
sent Christ sent Him to save His people from their sins. In
other words, He sent Him to deliver His people from the eternal punishment
they deserve. Matthew 121, call His name Jesus
for He shall save His people from their sins. And Christ finished
that work. How can you be sure Christ finished
that work? Well, he stated from the cross
in John 19.30, it is finished. That's what he was talking about.
But one of the main ways we can know, probably the main way we
can know, is because God raised him from the dead. Christ went
to the cross, let me quote Romans 4.25, Christ was delivered up
to the cross because of our offenses and raised again because of our
justification. Christ went to the cross because
the sins of his people were imputed, charged to him, and he was raised
from the dead because he had accomplished everything that
a just God needed to justify his people, declare them not
guilty but righteous in his sight. Again, to believe otherwise,
is a denial of Christ. It's a denial of the God who
sent him. It's blasphemy against God and Christ for such to be
preached and believed. It's to look within for salvation.
And worst of all, the worst thing of all, is to not look to the
one whom God has sent for all of salvation. That's the first
contradiction. That any sinner Christ died for
can perish. Why can't they? Because Christ
has obtained their eternal redemption. Here's the second contradiction.
That any one of us by nature worships and trusts that one
whom God has sent. That any of us by nature worship
the Christ of the scriptures. To believe that you do is to
contradict the scriptures. No sinner starts their religious
lives trusting the Christ revealed in the gospel. Even the elect
of God. chosen by God from all eternity,
blessed with all spiritual blessings in Christ, redeemed by the blood
of Christ, justified by the imputed righteousness of Christ. Even
these sinners don't start out worshiping the one whom God has
sent. To get to this Christ, we have
to be brought to this Christ. To get to this Christ, we must
be born of God. Abraham was an idolater in Ur
of the Chaldees until God delivered him by the preaching of the Gospel. Saul of Tarsus, Paul the Apostle,
was by his own testimony a blasphemer and an enemy of Christ until
God delivered him by the preaching of the Gospel. And you and I
are the same until God delivers us. The scripture is clear. None,
none, absolutely no one seeks after God. None fear, none reverence
the God who justifies the ungodly. Romans 3, 11, and 18. Now, this
is the very definition of ungodliness. To have no reverence for the
God who justifies the ungodly based on the imputed righteousness
of Christ. That's the very definition of ungodliness. We must first
be delivered from our ungodliness. We must first be delivered to
the God of the Scriptures, a just God and Savior. And we must be
delivered to Him by the Christ of the Scriptures, the Lord our
righteousness, the one whom God has sent, the one we don't know
by nature. God must deliver this. Here's
a verse that Jim read this morning, John 6, 45. It is written in
the prophets, and they shall be all taught of God. Every man,
therefore, that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh
to me. God delivers us the same way
he delivered Abraham, the same way he delivered Saul of Tarsus.
He delivers us by teaching, by the preaching of the gospel.
We must hear the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ.
Listen to this familiar passage out of Romans 10, verses 13 through
15. For whosoever shall call upon
the name of the Lord shall be saved. That's an absolute statement.
Whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. How
then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?
And how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard?
And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they
preach except they be sent? As it is written, how beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace and bring
glad tidings of good things. The gospel must be heard. The
spirit of God works under the gospel in regeneration. Not under false gospel. Not under
any other message seeming to be the gospel, but the gospel
alone. And when he does, when he works under the gospel in
regeneration, sinners experience a deliverance. And that deliverance
is clear in the scriptures. Look with me at Romans chapter
6, verses 17 and 18. Romans 6, 17. This is talking about a deliverance
that all who are born of God experience. Romans 6, 17, but God be thanked
that you were the servants of sin, but you have obeyed from
the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. And
we'll see that which was delivered you literally should read to
which you were delivered. That's important. Verse 18, being
then made free from sin, you became the servants of righteousness. Now these verses speak of a radical
change in the mind of a sinner. This radical change is a deliverance. It's a liberation. That's what
being made free in this context means, liberated. You were the
servants of sin. You were ignorant of the one
God sent. You were ignorant of who He is,
God-man. You were ignorant of what he
accomplished, put away sin, redeemed his chosen people, brought in
everlasting righteousness. You were ignorant that God is
just to justify ungodly sinners on the basis of his imputed righteousness
alone. And being ignorant of him and
his righteousness alone, you were going about to work out
your own salvation. That's what you were. But you
were delivered to that form of doctrine which is the gospel. And the Spirit of God enabled
you to believe that gospel. He enabled you to obey that gospel
from the heart. That's what he's talking about
when he says obey from the heart, is to believe it. And being delivered
to the gospel, being delivered to the Christ revealed in the
gospel, being delivered to his righteousness imputed for all
of salvation, you became the servants of righteousness. Whose
righteousness? The righteousness of the one
whom God has sent. None start out servants of righteousness. All start out in bondage. All
start out trusting a counterfeit Christ. All start out looking
within for salvation. All start out trusting our own
supposed righteousness, the one we think we've worked out by
our doing. We are all by nature like the Pharisees Christ addressed
in Luke 18, who trusted in themselves that they were righteous. We
had to be made free. We had to be liberated. And we
first had to be delivered from the counterfeit Christ we trusted
and the idol we worshiped. Christ's specific mission in
coming to this world was to save His people from their sins. I
already quoted Matthew 1.21. If you don't know that He has
done that, what? Saved His people from their sins.
Then you don't know the Christ who came. If you don't know how
Christ saved his people by establishing the one righteousness based upon
which God is just to justify ungodly sinners, you don't know
the Christ who came. For me to believe that the Christ
preached under the gospel is the same one who's preached under
any other message that is not the gospel, that's a contradiction
of the scripture. Therefore, to believe that any
one of us by nature worships and trusts the one God sent is
a contradiction. The one God sent is not identified
or distinguished under any message except that message wherein the
righteousness of God is revealed. Any message that doesn't tell
you how God is just to justify an ungodly sinner like you or
me based on the imputed righteousness of Christ, it's not the gospel.
Sinners have to be delivered to that form of doctrine, the
gospel. We have to be delivered to the
one whom God has sent. We don't start out looking to
the Christ of Scriptures until the Spirit of God does His work
in us in regeneration. That's the second contradiction.
Here's the third contradiction concerning the one whom God has
sent. That something I do makes up at least some part of the
ground or basis of my salvation. That something I do makes up
some part of the reason God blesses me, favors me, saves me. I know
I don't save myself, but don't I at least have some part in
determining whether I'll end up in heaven or hell? In other
words, my salvation, isn't my salvation certain because I've
done my part to seal the deal, to close that bargain? That's
what we think by nature, but that's a contradiction of the
scripture. If any part that I play in salvation
is the cause or reason God saved me, then that part becomes my
savior. This is but another contradiction
to the Word of God. Why do we think this way by nature?
It's because we don't know the One whom God sent. We don't know
Him. We don't know His work. We don't know what He's accomplished
for His people. All who are now reconciled to God were alienated
to God and enemies in our mind by wicked works, Colossians 1
and verse 21. The wicked works Paul writes
about here that alienate us from God, they're not our immoralities,
they're our religious works that alienate us. They're our attempts
to gain God's favor by something we do, even something we think
God has enabled us to do. All of us by nature are in bondage
to a sin that we don't even recognize as sin. That's how blind and
how ignorant of God we are by nature. We recognize immorality
to be sin. We recognize lawlessness to be
sin. We recognize perversion to be
sin. But what we don't recognize as
sin are all our religious efforts to please God. Now Christ addressed
this issue in his day with some who didn't see this bondage,
just like none of us saw it by nature. Look at John 8, just
a few pages over from John 6 there. John 8 and verse 31. This is
Christ addressing this issue in his day. Then said Jesus to
those Jews which believed on him, if you continue in my word,
then are you my disciples indeed, and you shall know the truth,
and the truth shall make you free. He's telling them here
You need to be made free. You're in a bondage you don't
see. Verse 33, they answered him, we be Abraham's seed, and
we're never in bondage to any man. How sayest thou you shall
be made free? Jesus answered them, verily,
verily, I say unto you, whosoever committeth sin is the servant
of sin, and the servant abideth not in the house forever, but
the son abideth ever. If the son, therefore, shall
make you free, you shall be free indeed. Whoever commits sin,
he says, is the servant of sin. Committing sin is thinking that
you're in the household of God because of something you've done
or because of something you've been enabled to do. Thinking
you're there in the household of God. based on anything other
than the imputed righteousness of Christ is committing sin.
Now that's a servant's attitude. It's the attitude of all of us
by nature. It's the attitude of all whom Christ has not yet
liberated. In 2 Thessalonians 2, Paul called
this sin that deceives us all by nature, he called it the deceivableness
of unrighteousness. It's unrighteousness. We don't
see it that way. It's the sin which remains in
them that perish because they refuse to see the love of the
truth, to receive the love of the truth that they might be
saved. In other words, they continue on in their deceived state. They
continue on in bondage. They perish because they refuse
to see this sin and repent. They perish because they refuse
to let the Son set them free from this bondage. If the Son
shall make you free. He's the one that's got to free
you. Can't be freed any other way. This is an automatic conclusion
of all who don't see Christ's death accomplishing the salvation
of every sinner he died for. It's an automatic conclusion
of all who have never been delivered from the Christ we started out
trusting and believing in. It's an automatic conclusion
of all who are ignorant, are not submitted to God's righteousness,
the righteousness of Christ as the only ground of salvation.
The salvation which is of God is certain. Not because of us,
not because of sinners or anything we do, it's certain because of
the work Christ has accomplished for those he died for. Listen
to John 6, 29 again. This is the work of God. It's
the work of God that you believe on him whom God has sent. Even believing on him is not
something we work out. It's the work of God. Before
that, all work All who work are looking within
for salvation. Romans 10.3 says, For they, Israel,
being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish
their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the
righteousness of God. That's what we're automatically
doing before God shows us Christ. and that salvation is based on
him alone. This kind of thinking supposes
some other way, even many other ways of salvation other than
by the death of Christ alone. Many ways seem right to natural
man, but the end of all those ways is death. How many ways
can a man be righteous before God? Natural man says there are
many ways. There's the moral way. Live a good life. Do right
by your fellow man. Be a good neighbor. That's the
moral way. There's a legal way. Do your best to keep the Ten
Commandments. Be a good law keeper. And then there's a religious
way. Go to church. Pay your tithe. Read your Bible. Pray. That's
how we think by nature. But the Bible says none of these
supposed ways is the way. The Bible says there's but one
way of salvation. Jonah the prophet said it. Salvation
is of the Lord from beginning to end. Christ himself said,
I'm the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the
Father but by me. The gospel alone rightly answers
this question. How can a man be righteous before
God? How can God be just to justify
an ungodly sinner? A sinner who is righteous in
God's sight is one who has been made righteous, made righteous,
not by their doing, but by Christ's doing. We see this in the representation
of Christ. If you look over at Romans 5,
verse 18, we'll see that we're made righteous
by Christ's work alone. Romans 5, 18. Therefore, as by
the offense of one, judgment came upon all men to condemnation.
That's by the one offense Adam committed in the garden, charged
to the account of all whom Adam represented. Even so, by the
righteousness of one, the free gift came upon all men and the
justification of life. That's the one righteousness
worked out by Christ which God has charged, freely charged the
account of all those that he chose in him. Verse 19, for as
by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, that made
means legally constituted. legally accounted sinners by
Adam's one sin charged to us. So, by the obedience of one,
shall many be made righteous." Legally accounted righteous based
on Christ's righteousness imputed. So we see that the gospel alone
answers the question of how a sinner is made righteous. He's made
righteous by imputation. And we see it in the reconciliation
of Christ. Look on over a few pages to 2
Corinthians 5 and verse 20. We usually quote verse 21, but
we're going back to verse 20 here. 2 Corinthians 5 and verse
20. Now then, we are ambassadors
for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us, we pray you
in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God, upon what basis? Verse
21. For God the Father has made God
the Son incarnate, to be sin for us who knew no sin, that
we might be made legally accounted the righteousness of God in Him.
So that's made righteous by representation, made righteous by reconciliation. What gives you, what gives me
the confidence that we're saved? That you're going to heaven when
you die? If your answer is, because I believe that Christ died for
me, your confidence is in your believing. Because you just as
certainly believe that those who don't believe that Christ
died for them are going to end up under God's wrath. That's
confidence in faith, confidence in the flesh. And such confidence
is a contradiction to the word of God. The gospel commands sinners
to find confidence in that Christ whose death, whose cross has
saved every sinner he was given. The gospel commands sinners to
find confidence in that one whose resurrection from the dead is
proof positive that Every sinner he died for is justified. He's
not guilty, he's righteous in God's sight. And they're justified
on the basis of his imputed righteousness alone. To be ignorant of God's
righteousness is to be ignorant of the one whom God has sent.
And it's also to be ignorant of the God who sent him, the
God who justifies sinners on the basis of his work alone.
God sent Christ to save his chosen people, and he did. He laid down
his life for his sheep. His obedience unto death has
brought complete salvation to his household. It's the revelation
of him by the gospel and the Spirit's work under that gospel
that brings deliverance, liberation to sinners who by nature think
that we're saved some other way. Make your boast, find your confidence
in Christ and in Christ alone. Galatians 6, 14, but God forbid
that I should glory or find confidence save in the cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto
the world. 1 Corinthians 1, 31, according
as it is written, he that glorieth, he that finds any confidence
before God, let him find it in the Lord. Will you find your
salvation to be the work of God? Will you be delivered from these
specific contradictions to God's clear testimony? Will you be
delivered from that one whose death left any sinner he died
for in danger of perishing? Will you be liberated from the
counterfeit you started out with? Will you believe in him alone
whose righteousness alone enables God to justify the ungodly? His people will in every generation. His people will all rest their
complete salvation in Him because this is the work of God, that
you believe on Him whom God has sent.