John chapter 6. And our attention should be focused
tonight upon verse 37, particularly the latter part of the text,
but I want to read the entire text, make a few comments by
way of a brief overview of the entire text and the relationship
of the first part, often neglected in even the quoting of this verse,
to show the relationship of the first part of the text to the
second, and then go into a very careful exposition of the second
part of the text before us. John 6 and verse 37, All that
which the Father giveth me, reading from the American Standard Version,
which more accurately captures our Lord's language at this point,
not all that the Father giveth me, but all that which the Father
giveth me shall come unto me, and him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. The first part of this text,
all that which the Father hath given me shall come unto me,
is in a very real sense a word of affirmation and consolation
to the Lord Jesus Christ himself. For you will notice that the
context of those words is the flagrant unbelief of the people
who have seen his miracle. They have eaten from that bread
which, though very meager in supply, fed five thousand. They have seen this miraculous
demonstration that this is no mere man, and yet our Lord says
of these very people who saw the miracles, and yet He says
of them earlier in the chapters, you'll remember, you don't seek
Me because you see the signs, that is, you don't seek Me because
you understand what that meant. You don't seek Me because there's
any spiritual perception. In fact, He says in verse 36,
I say unto you that ye have seen Me and yet believe not. In the
face of this tremendous display of His own power, this that should
have been proof positive and sufficient evidence that He was
what He claimed to be, they meet this great display of evidence
with stark, naked unbelief. And our Lord, as it were, consoles
Himself by saying, All right, I've displayed my glory. I've
demonstrated my power. You haven't believed? That's
all right. All that which the Father hath
given me shall still come to me. Your unbelief does not frustrate
the purpose of my Father. Your unbelief does not discourage
me into retreat. Oh no! I am grieved over your
unbelief. I am pained at your unbelief.
In a few short Years I will weep over your unbelief. When He cried,
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how oft would I have gathered! But, O
you unbelieving Jews, your unbelief has not frustrated me. Your unbelief
has not frustrated the purpose of my Father, for all that which
the Father hath given me shall come to me. O, the certainty
of His decree of election! There is a people that He has
given to me. and the certainty of the Father's effectual call. They shall come to me. The Lord
says, this comforts me in the face of unbelief. And so every
true servant of Christ has learned to draw comfort from the first
part of this text. When he seeks to demonstrate
the glory of Christ, the awfulness and the reality of hell, as we've
been doing in these past Lord's Day mornings, And in the face
of all that evidence and that clear truth, when men are still
unbelieving, what gives comfort to the heart of a servant of
Christ? All that which the Father hath given shall indeed come. The immutability of the decree
of election and the certainty of the Father's effectual call,
this is affirmation and consolation to the true child of God. And
the truths embodied in the first part of verse 37, I personally
and we as an assembly of believers, by and large, affirm, confess,
believe without reservation, without equivocation, without
hesitation. We gladly wear that confession
of our faith boldly and openly. And so the fact that I'm focusing
upon the latter part of the text is not that I'm made uneasy by
the first part of the text. It's not in any way that I do
not believe or confess the first part of the text. If I had a
group of discouraged ministers who had been ministering with
tenderness and with spiritual power in the face of unbelief,
we would just milk sweetness from the first part of the text.
But my purpose is not to console discouraged servants of Christ
tonight. My purpose is to give a message
of invitation and consolation, not to the servants of Christ,
but to needy sinners. And that's to be found, not in
the first part of the text, but in the last part of the text.
For the last part of the text declares, And him that cometh
unto me, I will in no wise cast out. What is our Lord saying?
Ah, here's what He's saying. I am consoled by the immutability
of the decree of election, by the certainty of the Father's
effectual call in the face of unbelief, and if in the midst
of general unbelief there should be one who wants to come, I'm
ready to welcome him. I'm ready to welcome him. Him
that cometh unto me in the face of this terrible unbelief, in
the face of this general indifference, if there's one amongst you who
has a longing to come, who has a desire to come, I'll welcome
him. A word of consolation and invitation
to the sinner. And that will be the focus of
our study tonight. Him that cometh unto me I will
in no wise cast out. a message of invitation and consolation
to sinners. Now, if you're not a sinner in
your own eyes, if you feel no need of a divine Savior, I have
no message for you tonight. You may as well just go to sleep,
or go home and you still have time to watch Ed Sullivan. I
still believe he's on at 8 o'clock Sunday night with me. But if
you're a sinner, and you know yourself to be one, And as we've
been considering the scriptural teaching of the doctrine of hell,
if you as it were can even feel some of the warmth of those flames,
and you say, oh, what is the way of deliverance? I believe
God has a word for you tonight, a word of invitation and consolation,
if there is but the slightest inkling of desire to seek salvation
by Jesus Christ. Well, how shall we think our
way through such a powerful text as this? Him that cometh unto
me I will in no wise cast out. Well, in the first place, I want
to briefly define what the word come means. Him that cometh unto
me. What does that word mean? Then,
having defined it, we shall consider three things. The object of the
sinner's coming, Christ himself. The necessity of the sinner's
coming. Him that cometh. The sinner must
come. And then the certainty of the
sinner's welcome. I will in no wise cast out. What did our Lord mean when he
said, Him that cometh unto me? Well, will you notice in the
very context of this passage, the word coming is a synonym
for believing. Notice verse 29. Jesus answered
and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe
on him whom he hath sent. Verse 35, I am the bread of life,
notice now, he that cometh to me shall not hunger, and he that
believeth on me shall never thirst. How is spiritual hunger satisfied
and spiritual thirst assuaged? By coming, which is the same
as believing. By believing, which is the same
as coming. Verse 40, This is the will of
my Father, that everyone that beholdeth the Son and believeth
on him. So when our Lord said, Him that
cometh unto me, He is simply using this verb of action to
describe the activity of saving faith. It is a beautiful and
simple definition or description of this. One of God's servants
has said, that coming to Christ means that movement of the soul
which takes place when a man or woman, feeling his sins and
finding out that he cannot save himself, hears of Christ, applies
to Christ, trusts in Christ, lays hold upon Christ, and leans
all his weight on Christ for salvation. When this happens,
a man is said in scriptural language to come to Christ. Or that beautiful
definition of Professor Murray's in Redemption Accomplished and
Applied, saving faith is self-commitment to Jesus Christ in all the glory
of his person and in the perfection of his work as he is so freely
and fully offered to us in the gospel. What is it to come? It
is to believe. What is it to believe? To cast
the weight of my sin-sick soul upon the Son of God as He is
offered in the Gospel. So much, then, for a definition
of the word come. Now we come to the heart of the
text. First of all, the object to which the sinner comes. Jesus
Christ Himself. Notice the wording, Him that
cometh to me. not to my cross, not to my doctrine,
not to my church, not to my ordinances, not to my servants, but Him that
cometh to me." He said, I am the object of the coming sinner. I am the exclusive object of
the sinner's faith. And this is the teaching of the
entire breadth of Holy Scripture. that Jesus Christ in the uniqueness
of His person and in the sufficiency of His work is the object of
faith in the coming sinner. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. Testifying repentance toward
God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. Passage after passage,
he that believeth on the Son So then the object to which the
sinner comes is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. But now, to what
kind of a Christ does the sinner come? He comes to this Christ
who is, first of all, unique in His person. And our Lord underscored
this in this very passage. Notice what He says of Himself
in verse 27. Work not for the food which perisheth,
but for the food which abideth unto eternal life, which the
Son of Man shall give unto you. For him the Father, even God,
hath sealed. The Father hath put a special
stamp of ownership and possession upon his Son. He is the unique,
one and only Son of Man. Him that cometh unto me, that
is, who comes to me in the uniqueness of my person. He speaks of himself
further in this passage as the one who has come down from heaven. Verse 33. For the bread of God
is that which cometh down out of heaven. Who is that bread?
Verse 35. I am the bread of life. Verse 38, For I am come down
from heaven. You see, when the Lord Jesus
said, Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out, and
set himself before his hearers as the object of their coming,
he did not leave it up to them to determine who he was. and
concoct any kind of Christ they would like to in their minds
and say, well, I'll come to that Christ because that suits me.
Oh no. He declares who he is in the uniqueness of his person.
And I would say to everyone here tonight, conscious of their sin
and of their need, The object to which you are to come is the
Lord Jesus, but not a Jesus whom you may concoct out of the stuff
of your own thinking, but that Jesus who is set before us in
the Gospels in the complete uniqueness of His person. That One who is
called by the prophet, the mighty God, though He is the Son given,
called by John, the Eternal Word, called by Paul in Colossians,
not only the Creator of all things, but the One in whom all things
hold together, the One spoken of in Hebrews as the One who
upholds all things by the Word of His power, And I think one
of the most beautiful summaries of this aspect of this unique
person is found in Isaiah 63 and verse 1, where we read in
this prophecy concerning the Lord Jesus this description of
his unique person. Isaiah 63, 1, Who is this that
cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah? This that is glorious
in His apparel, marching in the greatness of His strength, I
that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. There is the
identity of this unique person, the one who is mighty to save,
the one spoken of in Psalm 24 in verse 8, who is the Lord of
glory? And the answer comes back, the
Lord, strong and mighty. the Lord mighty in battle, or
as you think of the power of sin within your own life, as
you think of the enormity of your guilt, you know that your
need is to have one who is more than man, who has more virtue
and more merit than man can ever have, who has more power than
man can possess to break the chains that bind you. The object
to which the Lord invites you is Himself. in the uniqueness
of His person as the one who is mighty to save. Oh, that the Holy Spirit would
shine upon the face of Jesus in something of the might and
power of His saving mercy. Ah, but you say, I think I see
something of Him as mighty. But He seems to be so mighty
that He is beyond me. I need a Savior that I know will
come near enough to touch me in my need. I feel like the leopard
cast out of the camp of Israel, forbidden to come to the temple
to worship with God's people, cut off from fellowship with
His own covenant people so that when they see me they put the
finger upon the lip and they cry, unclean, unclean. I need
to know that there is One who is near me. God says in those
beautiful words of Hebrews 2 verses 14 and following, He took not
on Him the nature of angels, but He took on Him the seed of
Abraham. It behooved Him in all things to be made like unto His
brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest. He
came and He partook of flesh and blood, that through death
He might destroy him that had the power of death, and deliver
them who through fear of death were all their lifetimes subject
to bondage. And so God sets him before us,
not only in the uniqueness of his person as the one mighty
to save, but the one who is near us in his humanity, who knew
what it was to weep, to suffer, being tempted, to bleed, to die. As a man, he keeps the law of
God. As the God-man, he suffers and
dies. And as man, he triumphs. And
now there is a man in the glory, touched with the feeling of our
infirmities, who can sympathize with us in our need. Oh, I say
to you tonight on the basis of this text, the object to which
the Lord Jesus points the needy sinner is his own self, him that
cometh unto me, me in the uniqueness of my person, but also Me, the
Lord Jesus says, in the perfection of my work. For he went on in
this very discourse to say some strange words that have reference
to his saving work. Will you notice verse 51 of this
sixth chapter? I am the living bread which came
down out of heaven. If any man eat of this bread,
he shall live forever. And it's as though someone says,
but Lord, What kind of involvement with you is needed to partake
of this bread? And he answers the question,
notice, Yea, and the bread which I give is my flesh for the life
of the world. Verse 53. Jesus therefore said
unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh
of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have not life in
yourselves. He that eateth my flesh, and
drinketh my blood, hath eternal life, and I will raise him up.
Well, I thought he said, him that comes unto me I will never
cast out. I will raise him up at the last
day. Now he says, it's not only a matter of coming to him in
the uniqueness of his person, but I must eat his flesh and
drink his blood. What does that mean? It says I must have an
interest in, a participation in Jesus Christ crucified that
is just as real as the participation my body has with the food that
I eat. I take it to myself, I assimilate
it until it becomes a very part of my fingers, my hands, my eyes,
my hair, my nails, my skin, my bone, my brain tissue, until
what I eat is absorbed into the totality of my being. There is
this fusion of my very life with that which sustains life. Jesus
said, when you come to me, you come to me not only in the uniqueness
of my person as the mighty God and as the Son of Man, but in
the perfection of my work as a crucified Savior. You come
to me to be involved with me, not just as Christ, the one mighty
to save, Christ, the one sympathetic to succor and to save, but you
come to me as the crucified one. You come to me as the one who
gives his flesh for the life of the world. You come to me
and what is an offense to the world, my cross, which displays
the Father's wrath against sin and man's deep helplessness in
sin, that cross which is offensive to the world, becomes the very
pedestal of glory for the child of God. Come to me, he said,
not only in the uniqueness of my person, but in the perfection
of my work, that work by which I satisfied the wrath and justice
of my Father, that work by which I literally swallowed up His
wrath against all who come, that work which when accomplished
enabled me to cry, It is finished! The object to which the sinner
comes is the Lord Jesus. in the uniqueness of his person
and in the perfection of his work. Coming to Christ is a lot
more than a lot of people make it, isn't it? They allow them
to concoct a Christ of their own imagination, to whom they
think they may come on any terms of their own, and say, well,
I've come to Christ, and they use this text to justify it.
Ah, listen what's bound up in these words of our Lord. Him
that cometh unto me, the object of the sinner's coming, is the
Lord Jesus, but the Christ of biblical revelation in all the
uniqueness of His person and in all the perfection of His
work. And no one ever knows the benefits of the perfection of
His work who does not embrace Him in the uniqueness of His
person. And it's impossible to embrace Him in the uniqueness
of His person. without from the heart embracing
him in the perfection of his work. Do you tonight see a suitableness
in the sufferings of Christ? Suitable to care for your sin? Do you see in this one mighty
to save one who's able to loose the bonds of your own sin? Do
you? Then he says, come, come. Him that cometh unto me, not
the church, not the preacher, not the inquiry room, not an
altruist prayer, not the doctrines divorced from his person, not
even the promises. Christ presents himself in the
promises, but the promises are to be but the stepping-stone
to embrace Him. The living, reigning, exalted
Son of God is the object of the sinner's coming. That beautiful
old gospel hymn in our hymn book has captured it. The last stanza
which says, Lo, the incarnate God ascended pleads the merits
of his blood. Venture on him. Venture wholly. Let no other trust intrude. None but Jesus, none but Jesus
can do helpless sinners good. There it is in a nutshell. Well,
having considered the object to which the sinner comes, will
you notice in the second place in our text the necessity of
the sinner's coming. John 6, 37, the last part of
the text. Him that cometh unto me, I will
in no wise cast out. He is able, he is willing, but
it says, He that cometh, I will in no wise cast out. Now listen
carefully. It's the sinner who comes. God
doesn't come for him. He himself must come. As the old confession states
it beautifully in the section on the effectual call of God,
this little phrase, yet so as they come most freely. One of the great problems when
people begin to understand the first part of this text, that
there is a decree of election all that which the Father hath
given me. How anyone can face that text
and evade the clear implication there is a people given to the
Lord Jesus. And he says, they shall come.
When people begin to understand or confront the doctrine of election
and the doctrine of effectual calling that men shall be made
willing by the grace of God, then they make another conclusion
that they're not warranted to make. Well, if God has decreed
to save some, and if they most certainly shall come, I'll just
sit back until he brings me in. Ah, no. You sit back waiting
for him to bring you in, my friend, and you'll wake up in hell. He
says, you must come. You must come. You must come. You must come. He that cometh,
you come. He doesn't come for you. He doesn't
come on your behalf. You must come. You must come. May I suggest two things about
this coming? You must come personally and
individually. And it's set forth beautifully
in this text in the original. There are a lot of passages that
if you didn't know a letter in the Greek alphabet wouldn't bother
you at all. When you've got a good translation before you, an accurate
translation, a trustworthy translation, you're in good shape. But once
in a while there are shades of insight that come in the original
that you don't get. And this is one of those texts.
When Jesus says, all that the Father giveth me at the beginning
of the text, The translation of the American Standard is more
accurate. All that which the Father hath given me. He uses
a plural neuter. And he looks upon the whole body
of the elect as a great mass, the great church, viewed corporately,
not individually. Now other passages speak of election
in individual terms. He hath chosen us in Christ. speak unto so-and-so my elect
brother or so-and-so Rufus elect in the Lord unto our elect lady. So the doctrine that election
has nothing to do with some kind of faceless mass of people called
believers, but God doesn't pick individual people is utter foolishness.
It won't stand the weight of scripture. But nevertheless,
this text views the elect of God as a great body. Now notice, all that which the
Father hath given me shall come to me. That's the word of consolation
to Christ in the face of unbelief. But now when he wants to console
the sinner and encourage the sinner to come, he doesn't say,
and those that come to me, plural, or that which comes to me, neuter,
but he makes it an individual masculine. He that cometh unto
me. He that cometh. Isn't it beautiful?
He individualizes it. He personalizes it. He says,
out of all that great body that the Father has given, they come
individually, personally, consciously, one by one. One by one. And so I say the great thrust
of this text is not only setting before us the object to which
we come, but the necessity of coming. We must come personally
and individually. No coming by proxy. Some of you
may have had parents who presented you to the Lord in some kind
of a service of dedication. Others of you may have had parents
who presented you in what in their understanding was baptism
and gave you the seal of a covenantal relationship. But my friend,
that will never bring you to Christ. You must come personally. It's He that cometh to me. Mom
and Pop can't come for you. Family can't come for you. Preacher
can't come for you. You've got to come in personally,
individually. Rolling the weight of your own
sin-sick soul upon that unique person who's mighty to save you
in the light of His perfect work. Charles Spurgeon, that great
preacher for sinners, in preaching on a passage in the Sixth of
John, I Am the Bread of Life, said some words that fit so beautifully
into the text that we're considering tonight. Listen to them. Emphasizing
this as one of his sub-points, trust him for yourself, Spurgeon
says, that's the point. The hinge of the whole business,
he is a savior, I believe that. But I go further and resolve
he shall be my savior. May I say that? Yes. I'm permitted
to do so inasmuch as he says, him that cometh to me, I will
in no wise cast out. Scripture says that He is exalted
on high to give repentance unto Israel and remission of sins.
Therefore, I look to Him to give me repentance and remission of
sins. I trust Him in that respect,
and He is mine. He has said, It is finished.
The atonement is finished. I believe that it is finished
for me. A prominent point about the offering under the old law
was that the person who came with the sacrifice laid his hands
upon it and said, This is mine. You must do the same with Jesus.
Lay your hands on him and say, he is mine. This sacrificial
death is for me. Oh, but says one, suppose he's
not mine. What if I were to take him to
myself without warrant? Suppose such a thing for one
moment, yet he would be yours. If I was hungry and I ate a bit
of bread and after I'd eaten it, someone said, it's not yours.
I should reply, perhaps not. But how will you take it from
me now? It has nourished me. It has refreshed me. It is mine,
and none can deprive me of it. There is the point, you see.
If you take Christ unto yourself, the devil himself may say to
you, you have no right to him. But he cannot take away that
which you have eaten. Jesus himself will not quarrel
with you, nor blame you for taking him. For he has said, Him that
cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. You may summon a poor
man before the magistrate and say, He is a thief, for he stole
bread from my counter. You may put him in prison for
the theft, though I hope you would not if hunger drove him
to it, but you cannot get your bread away from him if he's eaten
it. So if you come to Christ and take him to yourself, he's
yours, and you shall live by him. Jesus said, he that eateth
me, even he shall live by me. Nor death, nor hell, nor time,
nor eternity can take Jesus away when once you have him within
you. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Swallow then the divine truth.
Let it go down quickly, for fear anybody shall come before it
is fully entered into your soul. Once there, it is yours. They
say that possession is nine points of the law, and I should think
in the case of eating of Christ it is the whole ten points, or
any other number of points, for there is no getting repossession
of that which a man has actually eaten. Get Christ, and Christ
is yours, yours by a kind of possession which will never be
disputed before the courts of heaven. The sinner must come. Oh, for some of you who have
even opened your mind to me, and expose some of your distress
and the consciousness of sin. Why do you linger away from a
Savior who gives an invitation as this? He says, I am the object
to which you come. Perfection in my person. Perfection
in my work. But then he says, you must come.
Him that cometh unto me. So you must come personally and
individually. And in the second place, you
must come heartily and unreservedly. No drawing near with the lips
while the heart is far from him. And in this very context, do
you know what it meant to come to him? It meant to jeopardize
life itself. For the claims of Jesus Christ
seemed blasphemous to these people. Notice verse 41. The Jews therefore
murmured concerning him because he said, I am the bread which
came down out of heaven. And they said, Is not this Jesus,
the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does
he say, I am come down out of heaven? You see, for any Jew in that
context to say, I believe his claims, you know what it meant?
It meant to put life itself on the chopping block. Well, it's a simple thing to
come to Christ, yes. In one sense it costs nothing,
but in another sense it costs everything. For that coming of
which Jesus speaks is not only a coming personally and individually,
but heartily and unreservedly. It means to embrace all of Jesus
with all of the demands of His person and all the humbling nature
of His work. To come to Him in the adequacy
of His work is to say, Lord Jesus, foul and full of sin I am. I do desire to eat of thy flesh
and drink of thy blood. I do desire to acknowledge that
I shall starve eternally if it is not for the life which your
death gives." Oh, what a humbling confession. Man wants to at least
say, Lord, I've whittled my pinky. I've scratched my ear. I've done
something that adds something to my acceptance. No, no. This
demand is coming unreservedly. nothing in our hands to bring.
It demands coming, acknowledging that the one who is mighty to
save is God, and God never bickers with sinners. He offers mercy
and says, bow, kiss the scepter of my son. Oh, how this text
has been abused, and it's been abused, but it's glorious in
its context, in its full and rich setting, Coming to Him is
a coming heartily, a coming unreservedly. There were people in that day
who came in a different way, and you know what happened to
them? Look at the sequel to this event, or the closing of it,
verse 60. Many therefore of His disciples,
when they heard this, said, Hmm, this is a hard saying. Who can
hear it? And Jesus said, You think what
I've told you up to now is hard? I'll give you something harder
yet. And so He did. He did. He preached human inability
to them. Call and you can't come except
the Father draws. Notice verse 65, and he said,
For this cause I said unto you, No man can come to me except
it be given to him of my Father. What happened then? Verse 66,
And upon this many of his disciples went back and walked with him
no more. Until he turns and he's just
got the twelve left and he says, Will you also go away? What was
wrong with these, quote, disciples? They came with reservations.
They came with some reservations about their own, quote, human
ability. And when Jesus said, look, you're
so bad that you can't even get to the remedy unless the Father
brings you there. No, not us. We have free will.
We're good Jews. Oh, we've done a few bad things. We're not helpless. They don't
want that saying. They go back. My friend, listen
to me. Listen. You come to Christ with some
imagined virtues of your own, and sooner or later you'll part
with Him when His Word begins to put the price upon those supposed
virtues. You come with reservations about
certain sins that you want to cherish, and sooner or later,
like Judas, who was in the twirls, you'll part with Christ for the
sake of that sin. To come to Jesus Christ not only
means coming individually and personally, but heartily and
unreservedly. For he said, If any man come
to me and hate not father, mother, brother, sister, yea, and his
own life also, he cannot be my disciple. Oh, he can openly identify
himself with me and my people and go through the motions, but
I'll never own him in that day. I'll say, Depart from me. I never
knew you. Oh, let me encourage you. Whether
you've been driven by the fear of hell or drawn by the loveliness
of the Savior to the place where you say, yes, I do long to come,
and I do long to come unreservedly and wholeheartedly, whether driven
by the fear of hell or drawn by the loveliness of the Savior,
whether terrified by the threats of God or enticed by the promises,
come. You must come if you would have
life in part. Oh, but someone objects. Pastor,
don't you believe what it says in verse 44? I can't come unless
the Father draws me. Oh, yes, I believe verse 44 with
all my heart. But I believe verse 37, be him
that cometh on a no wise cast out. I believe that. You see,
the cannot is basically a will not. For Jesus said in John 5,
you will not come. Why cannot men come? Because
they will not. And my friend, if there's the
slightest inkling of desire to come, you're welcome. Come! You see, verse 44 was not said
to discourage a sinner who longs to come. but the humble, proud,
unbroken heart that thinks it has the power of itself to turn
on the button of grace when it pleases. Don't take what is meant
to slay the proud, indifferent sinner and slay yourself with
it. Take that which the Lord gives to encourage the needy
sinner and venture upon it. See? Ah, but someone else objects.
I'm not deeply convicted of my sins. I don't have enough conviction! What does Jesus say? Him that
cometh unto me with fourteen ounces or seventeen pounds or
three tons of conviction, I'll in no wise cast out. No, him
that cometh! If you're convinced enough to
know that you deserve wrath, you cannot save yourself, sick
enough of sin to quit, then he says, Tom, listen, listen, if
God gave some of you a deeper measure of conscious conviction,
it might seal you in a state of self-righteousness. I've heard
some people who, by the way they gave their testimony, you know
what they were saying? Remember that Pharisee went up to the temple and said,
I thank Thee, I'm not as other men, I fast, I this, I don't
do that. I've heard people talk this way. I thank Thee, Father,
I didn't come like other people, dry-eyed, no groans, no long
period of heaviness and mourning. I thank Thee, Father, I didn't
come that cheap way the way other people came. But I thank Thee
that I lay under the whiplash of the law for ten years, or
I lay for six weeks with deep conviction, crying day and night.
You know what they've done? Their very conviction has become
a subtle form of self-righteousness. My friend, God knows just how
deep to wound you. And if He's wounded you enough
so that you know there's no healing in yourself, He says, come. Again, that old gospel hymn's
got it all there. Let not conscience make you linger,
nor a fitness fondly dream. All the fitness He requireth
is to feel your need of Him. That's it. But you say, Pastor,
didn't you preach to us where that dream first root is conviction
is sin? Absolutely. I'm not going back
on any of that. I can't. It's on mimeograph sheets out
there on the table. I've embalmed it in mimeograph ink. I can't
go back on it. The evidence is there. But never
did I say that that conviction must be measured by some human
standard. If the work of conviction has
gone deep enough to show you you deserve wrath, you've offended
a holy God, you deserve nothing but His wrath, and you're conscious
that help is to be found alone in that person, then Jesus says,
come, come. And all objections are swept
away by our Lord's words, him that cometh. I'll in no wise
cast doubt. Having considered then the object
to which the sinner comes, Christ himself, in the uniqueness of
his person, the perfection of his work, having considered in
the second place the necessity of coming, coming personally
and individually, heartily and unreservedly, now here's the
cream of the text, the certain welcome to the coming sinner.
What will happen if I come? If I roll the weight of my sin-sick
soul upon him, I've sinned against conscience, I've sinned against
light, I've sinned against privilege, I've sinned against the gospel,
I've sinned against the prayers of my mother, my father, my pastor. I've sinned with a high hand,
I've sinned with impunity. What will happen if I come? Two
things. The Lord says, Him that cometh
unto me, I will No wise cast out, by which our Lord is saying,
one, you will be received, and two, you will be kept. Notice how our Lord affirms this
matter of reception. He uses a double negative. And
again, in the original, this is vivid. It's as though our
Lord says, him that cometh unto me, I will not, I say I will
not cast him out. He gives a double negative. Now,
the strongest way to make a positive statement is make a double negative.
You say, may I come to your house? And I say, yes, if you come,
you will be welcome. But if I say, anytime you come,
you will never, never find a shut door. Boy, I really made you
feel welcome. Now, the Lord could have said,
him that cometh unto me, I'll receive. But he makes it even stronger.
Him that comes to me, I will not, no, never cast him out. So, we have in this wonderful
text the certain welcome to the coming sinner. You will be received. Do you come guilty? The Lord
Jesus says, because I died for sinners and satisfied the justice
of my Father, I will pardon. Do you come bound by the chains
of sin, which you feign a thousand times would have broken? Jesus
said, I'll receive you. And I'll receive you and break
the chains for whom the sun sets free, is free indeed. Do you
come weak? He says, I'll make you strong.
Do you come ignorant? I will give you light and sight.
Do you come proud? I will teach you humility. Take
my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of
heart. Oh, how can we say it more forcefully? You will be received. But only
the Holy Ghost can say it to your heart. That's what makes
the preacher feel so helpless. The mystery of preaching. Here
declaring the fact of this! But some of you will go away
still mourning beneath the weight of your sin unless the Spirit
is pleased through the Word to give you a sight of Christ that
you say, I do believe He means it. Even I will be received if
I come. But something even more wonderful
than being received you will be kept. For what comfort would
there be in the thought that, once received, I might after
twenty years be cast out? What could make hell worse than
the memory that I once knew the delights of salvation? And the
strong emphasis of this text is not upon the initial reception,
but upon the continual keeping power of Christ. That's the emphasis
of the text. Him that cometh unto me, what,
I will receive? No, I will never cast you out.
Well, he can't cast us out unless he's got us in, so the inference
is he will be received, but more strong than that, we will be
kept. I will never cast him out once
in the family of God. Will subsequent failure and delinquency
cast me out and disinherit me? No, the Lord Jesus said, I am
mighty to save, and as surely as I purchased forgiveness by
my death, I will secure the perseverance in holiness and obedience by
my intercession and by the indwelling of my spirit. So that the doctrine
I preach from this text is not once saved, always saved, no
matter how you live. That's a doctrine of hell and
it'll take multitudes to hell. What I preach to you is the glorious
biblical doctrine of the preservation and the perseverance of the same
God. Christ will receive us, and when
He receives us, He changes us, puts His Spirit within us. And
now at the right hand of the Father, He pleads on our behalf,
Father, keep them from the evil one. And the Father, in answer
to the prayer of the Son, sends His Spirit into the hearts of
His children. That spirit by which they're
sealed to the day of redemption, who stirs them up unto holiness
and obedience, who reproves them when they sin, that spirit who
convicts them, that spirit who communicates the fullness of
Christ. And so the Lord Jesus says in
this text, this certain welcome to the coming sinner, you will
not only be received, but you will be kept. And what's the
reason for both the reception and the keeping? Notice verses
38 to 40. And oh, what a shame to wrench verse 37 from its context,
as we've seen tonight in many other respects, but in this as
well. Why is it that all who come are
received and kept? Why, here's our Lord's answer.
John 6, verses 38. Four! Four! There's a connection. All that the Father giveth me
shall come, and him that comes I will in no wise cast out. For
this is why I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will,
but the will of him that sent me. And this is the will of him
that sent me, that if all that which he hath given me I should
lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. For this
is the will of my Father, that every one that beholdeth the
Son, and believeth on him, should have eternal life, and I will
raise him up at the last day." Oh, catch the glory of this!
Just as the Lord comforts Himself in the beginning of the text,
in the face of unbelief, with the glorious truth of the immutability
of the decree of election, with the certainty of the effectual
call, Then, as it were, he turns from his own comfort and opens
up the door of salvation to the sinner. Now, he says, I'm going
to buttress the door of the sinner with that same decree of God.
Isn't that beautiful? Why is it that I'll receive the
sinner and never cast him out? Because I came to do my father's
will. And what is my father's will?
That every one that he's given to me, I'll raise him at the
last day. Ah, but listen, not only is that
what the father has decreed, All that have been given shall
be raised, but get the wonder of verse 40. Everyone that beholds
the Son and believes, it's the Father's will that he should
be saved. God's decree is on your side,
sinner. You say, oh, God's decree frightens
me. I don't know if I'm elect. Ah,
listen. Jesus says, here, this is the will of my Father. Here
is the decree and purpose of my Father, that everyone who
beholds the Son and believes on Him, comes to Him, should
have eternal life. Do you behold the Son, as the
Holy Ghost enabled you to see Him tonight? And the uniqueness
of His person, perfectly suited to a helpless, needy sinner like
you? The perfection of His work, perfectly
suited to helpless, needy sinners? Have you beheld Him? Do you find
in your heart now motions toward Him, Lord Jesus? I come. You've broken every barrier down.
Lord, I come. How do you know you'll be welcomed?
Well, he says so. Hallelujah. How do you know you'll be kept?
He says so, yes. But his promise of reception
and keeping are buttressed by the decree of the Father. Both
to receive, this is the will of him that sent me, that all
who see and believe shall have eternal life, and that you'll
be raised up at the last day. Blessed be God for such a salvation,
coming out of eternity suffused with the decrees of God. And
yet reaching man in his sin with such simple, broad promises,
and when he ventures upon him, then buttressing the sinner with
those same decrees, assuring him that he shall be kept. Hallelujah! What a Savior! Blessed be God
for such a salvation. In eternity the Father and the
Son covenanted together. A people were given to the Son. The Son comes forth to die for
them, the Spirit now brooding and moving to draw them, and
the certainty of the purpose that they shall come, and that
every individual, as he comes, is welcome. Here it is, all spread
before us. Will you go on in your sin, in
your guilt, in your terrors of conscience, or will you The object
to which you come, not the front of this church, not to the preacher,
not to anything, but Jesus himself. Him that cometh unto me. He's the object of the sinner's
coming, in the uniqueness of his person, in the perfection
of his work. Secondly, the necessity of coming.
You must come. And by coming, I don't mean walk
an aisle. That's why we don't give invitations to walk aisles.
Coming to Jesus is not something you do with your feet. It's not
something you do with your hands. Believing is the activity of
the soul, the spirit, the inner man. It's rolling the weight
of the soul upon Christ. Self-commitment to Him. You must
come. You can come right where you
are. I think I'd be so thrilled I'd say, Let us now thy servant
depart in peace, for I have seen thy salvation. Should someone
come to me tonight and say, Pastor, I came while I sat tonight and
you preached, God enable me to come. God enable me to come. You must come. And if you do
come to the third point of our text, there is a certain welcome. He will receive you. He will
keep you. May God help you to come. May
God help you to come. I'm going to ask that we sing
in closing tonight that wonderful, simple hymn in which the action
of the coming sinner, the activity of his mind and spirit are so
beautifully captured. Just as I am without one plea,
but that thy blood was shed for me and that thou bidst me come
to thee, O Lamb of God, I come, him that cometh unto me. I will
in no wise cast out. Hymn number 431, the first tune
please. Hymn number 431.