Turn with me to the fifth chapter
of the book of John, John chapter 5. John chapter 5, a familiar verse
here that we have read many times and heard used as a text for
various discourses. But let us look at it again this
evening. John chapter 5 verse 40. And
you will not come to me that you might have life. You will not come to me. That's what every man needs is
life. Life is bound up in the Prince
of Life, the Lord Jesus. That's where life is. It's in
Christ. you and I are ever to have that
life, we must come to Him to receive it. But here our Savior,
in His discourse to these unbelieving Jews, says, Ye will not come
to me that ye might have life. The previous verses plainly testify
and bear witness of who he is. And yet, in the face of this
testimony, he says, you have no will or inclination to come
to me by faith that you might have eternal life. From what
is said here and from what we know of the heart and the nature
of unregenerate men, we know that it's the want of will to
come to Christ that is what is involved in man's
laying back. A want of will. He has no will
to come. He has no will. The best The translation of this
expression is this, you do not will to come. You have no heart
to come. You have no desire to come. You
have no inclination to come to me. It is not man's sin or sins
alone that hinders him from coming to the Lord Jesus. All manner
of sin is forgiven, may be forgiven by the Lord Jesus Christ. It's
not any particular decree of God. It's not a limit in the
work of the Lord Jesus Christ in redemption. It's something
far more than this. It's a man's own personal, real
unwillingness to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. He tells them
here, let's look at it for a little bit, he tells them here that
they have received an abundant evidence of his being the sent
one of God, but yet, in spite of this, they reject him. Look
up here. He said in verse 30, I can of
my own self do nothing. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment
is just because I seek not my own will. but the will of the
Father which hath sent me." Now, if I bear witness of myself,
my witness is not true. There is another that beareth
witness of me, and I know that the witness which he witnesses
of me is true. That's John the Baptist. He sent
unto John, and he beareth witness unto the truth. Our Lord is the
truth. But he said, I receive not testimony
from man, But these things I say, that ye might be saved." John,
he's talking to John, verse 35, "...he was a burning and shining
light, and ye were willing for a season to rejoice in his light."
That is, John was a prophet. All men, well, not all men in
an absolute sense, but all men generally speaking at that particular
time acknowledged that John was a prophet sent from God, but
yet John was a witness of the true life. John bare witness
that Jesus Christ was the Lamb of God. Now I'm saying that our
Lord's telling them here that all of this abundant evidence
is evidently set before you. There's no reason why You should
reject me as the Son of God. I'm the sent one of God. The
Scriptures plainly testify of me. As a matter of fact, he goes
over here in verse 46. Look at that, the next to last
verse. He says, For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed
me. For he wrote of me. And these
Jewish people were very religious people. And they were sticklers
for the Law of Moses in its varied forms. And they said they believed
in the one God. And he told them this was a heavy
charge laid against the Jews because they prided themselves
in their unflinching confidence in the one God of Israel. And he said, For had ye believed
Moses," you have a zeal for God, you say you believe in Moses,
you say that you believe in the one God. And Moses, he says,
wrote of me. If you believe Moses, you would
have believed Me, for he wrote of Me. But if you believe not
his writings, how shall you believe My words?" Well, he goes on here
and he's talking about John the Baptist now. He says he's a burning
and shining light. In verse 36 he says, But I have
a greater witness than that of John. He said, the works which
the Father hath given me to finish, the same work I do. He said,
they bear witness of me that the Father hath sent me. But the charge is, ye will not
come to me. You won't come to me. Ye will
not come to me that ye might have life. that as the Father Himself which
hath sent me hath borne witness of me." You remember that our
God, our Heavenly Father, He bore witness of the Lord Jesus
Christ with an audible voice from heaven. He spoke from heaven
in words that men could understand. Think of it. He said, This fellow right here, the Lord
Jesus Christ, this is my beloved Son, here He is. He said, this
is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. He spoke in an
audible voice. He spoke in words. God did from
heaven. And bear witness of who the Lord
Jesus Christ was. So you can see here that there
is the credibility of the Lord Jesus Christ is established here
in this chapter before these unbelieving Jews. And yet in
spite of the credibility of these witnesses, the miracles, the
miracles, the bringing from the dead, giving life to dead men,
giving sight to blind men, giving hearing to deaf men, curing men
of all sorts and manners of diseases. In the very midst, feeding thousands
and thousands of people on a couple of loaves and a couple of fishes. Miracle after miracle. He said,
these miracles I do, they bear witness of me. The Father bears
witness of me. This is my beloved. John the
Baptist said, Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin
of the world. Yet in light of that, he said,
ye will not come. Why? He said, Moses. You say
you believe in Moses? Why? He said, the writings of
Moses. They speak of me. All of those
Old Testament sacrifices. the tabernacle, the going out
of Egypt, the coming into the land of Canaan, the setting up
of various statues and laws, all of these things speak of
me. And you will not come to me that
you might have life. You will not come. Well, I'm
convinced, brethren, that our Lord Jesus Christ throughout
the Scriptures here gives a free and full invitation to every
guilty sinner. He says, Come unto Me and I will
give you rest. I was reading here before church
in the seventh chapter of the book of John that our Lord said
this. He said, In the last day, the
great day of the feast, Jesus stood and he cried, saying, If
any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. What I'm saying
is, or trying to impress upon our hearts, is that our Lord
gives a free and full invitation to every guilty rebel, every
guilty sinner. Whether the sinner be ten years
old or twenty years old or a hundred years old, the Lord gives a free
and full invitation to that guilty sinner and says, Come to me that
you might have life. Come to me and I'll give you
rest. The charge is made here, but
you will not come. But you will not come. Men will not come to Christ.
They just will not come to Christ. Now, who will they come to? They'll
come to a ceremony. Men will come to a ceremony,
but they won't come to Christ. There is multiplied thousands
and thousands of people right now that have come to a ceremony,
but have never come to Christ. They have seen to it that their
children was educated in the catechism of their religious
preference or their religious denomination. They have seen
to it that their children were religiously named at a certain ritual in
the church, baptized a certain day, sprinkled that is, had certain
representatives, godfathers and godmothers, They have been taught
the ceremonies and the rituals of the church. They know about
the candles, they know this, they know that. They have become
members of a church. You see, men will come to a ceremony. Men will come to a ceremony.
But men will not come to Christ. Life is in Christ. We sang there
that hymn, Pat led us in. I know whom I have believed. I know whom. Life is in a whom. In a person. That's where it's
at. And Jesus said, Come unto me
all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Here he charged these Jews. He said, But ye will not come
to me. You'll come to a ceremony. You'll come to the When a Jew is 12 or 13 years
old and is approaching manhood and they have this certain ritual
for him, well, he'll come to that. But he won't come to Christ. He'll come to a ceremony. He'll come to a ceremony and
he'll even come to a program of religion. He'll come to a
program of religion. He's got some religion, he'll
come to that. He'll come to a system of doctrine.
He'll come to ceremony, he'll come to a program of religion,
and he'll come to a system of doctrine, but he won't come to
Christ. That's what he will do. That's
what he will do. But he won't come to Christ. Why? What hinders a man from
coming to Christ? If he's religious, we know by
nature he's religious, if he'll come to a ceremony and if he'll
come to a a religious system and if you'll come to a doctrine,
why is it that he will not come to Christ? Now, there's, as I
said, let me emphasize again, there's thousands and thousands
and thousands of people right now that have come. They have
come to a religion. They say, yes, I believe this
and I believe that and I go to church every whip stitch and
I give a little money every once in a while and I don't cuss and
I don't drink and I don't do this and I don't do something
else. I've got some religion. They'll come to that religion.
They never come to the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? What hinders men
from coming to Christ? Well, I'll be brief here this
evening, as brief as I can be, and then we'll go home. But I
got five things that I want to say in regard to why men will
not come to the Lord Jesus Christ. And I want you to seriously consider
them and think about them. And if there's some of you here
this evening and you have not come to the Lord Jesus, you've
come to a doctrine. You've come to a doctrine. I
believe this. You've come to a system of religion. or a program of religion, a system
of doctrine or ceremony, but I want you to think about it.
I want you to think about it. I want you to do this. I want
you to, where it says, and ye will not come to me that ye might
have life, I want you to get alone by yourself, somewhere
by yourself, and take that ye out of there and put an I in
there. And I want you to say out loud to yourself, I will
not That's exactly what that means. I will not come to Christ. You say that out loud to yourself
and consider if you dare to. Don't say, I cannot come to Christ.
Don't say that. That's not what the Scriptures
say. Say, I will not come to Christ. I will not. I have no
desire, no inclination, I have no heart to come to Christ. I will not come to Christ. I'll
come to religion, I'll come to doctrine, I'll come to something,
ceremony, but I will not come to Christ. Put that word I in
there. If you so dare. You put it in
there and say it out loud where you can hear yourself say it.
I will not come to Christ. Why? what hinders man from coming
to Christ. Number one is because this will
that we're talking about, this will, I will not, ye will not
come to Christ. I will come to doctrine, I'll
come to religion, I'll come to this, I'll come to that. I will
not come to Christ because the will of man is in bondage to
SIN. It's in bondage to his sinful
nature. In bondage, he needs to be captured
by the Spirit of the living God, and he needs to have God cut
the chains of sin that bind his will. He's got to bind his will
and make him free. Free from what? Free from the
power and dominion of sin. He's a slave to sin. Every man
outside of the Lord Jesus Christ, whether he will bow to it or
not, or give assent to this statement or not, is of little value to
me, but I know that every man outside of the Lord Jesus Christ
is in bondage to sin. Sin has a domineering power and
influence over his life. And he loves it. He loves it.
Let me read something to you here in the book of Romans. Romans chapter 6, I believe it
is. It says here, Knowing this, that all man is
crucified with Christ, that the body of sin might be destroyed,
that henceforth we should not serve sin. That is, the man that
has been regenerated and quickened by the Spirit of the living God
through the Word, he has been brought to the place that he
will not serve sin. He may sin, but he will not be
sin's servant. And there is a difference. For
he that is dead is freed from sin. That is, he is freed from
the bondage of sin. Sin has no more dominion over
that fellow. Sin does not rule his life in
a domineering sense. Sin is in him. He has a sinful
nature. But the bondage of sin has been
cut. The shackles of sin has been
broken. And he's not now the servant
of sin. He's freed from this power, this
domineering influence of sin. See, now if we be dead with Christ,
we believe that we shall also live with Him. knowing that Christ
being raised from the dead dieth no more, death hath no more dominion
over him. For in that he died, he died
unto sin once, but in that he liveth unto God. Verse number 11, talking of the
Lord Jesus Christ, He died unto sin once. Sin's demands. Sin's punishment. Sin's penalty. He died unto it. Why? He had
no sin. He did as our representative.
He did for his people. For his people! Now look. Look at that 11th verse. Likewise,
that word reckoned means considered. Reckon ye also yourselves to
be dead indeed unto sin. Reckon it to be so. It is so. It is so because Christ died
unto sin once. For who? For me. For you if you
are a believer. If you are a guilty sinner. So
reckon yourselves indeed dead unto... I don't feel like it.
Well, reckon yourself to be so. Well, I don't feel like I'm that
way. If you believe we're in Christ Jesus, reckon it to be
so. Let not sin therefore reign,
reign as a king in your mortal body, that you should obey it
in the lust thereof. Neither yield ye your members
as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, because sin does not
have this domineering power over you now. But yield yourselves
unto God as those that are alive from the dead. You are alive
from the dead in Christ. He died, he was buried, he rose
again, he is seated now on God's right hand and you are in him.
You are alive from the dead, you do not die anymore. That
is in regard to the penalty of sin. As those who are alive from
the dead and you are members as instruments of righteousness
unto God for sin. It shall not, not maybe, not
you have an option. Sin shall not have dominion over
you. It will not have dominion over
you. What I'm saying is this, brethren. What hinders men from
coming to Christ? I'm saying that man's will. You will not. I will not. The
will is in bondage to sin. You will not come to me that
you might have life. You see, the natural mind, the
natural mind is enmity against God, against truth, against peace,
against holiness, against righteousness, against justice, and what have
you. Carnal mind is that way. It's in bondage. It's in bondage. Jesus said, You will not come.
It has to do with your will. It doesn't have anything to do
with your sins, or not all. It doesn't have anything to do
with the decree of God back yonder in eternity. It doesn't have
anything to do with the sufficiency of the atonement in Christ. It
has to do, first and foremost, primarily with a man's will.
You will not. You will not. You have no inclination
to do so. You have no desire to do so.
You will not come to me. I've given you plenty of evidence,
Jesus, that of who I am. John the Baptist said, I'm the
Lamb of God. The Scriptures testify of me. You search the Scriptures
wherein you think ye have eternal life, but the Scriptures bear
witness of me, he said. My miracles bear witness of me.
God spoke in an audible voice from heaven and said, this is
my beloved son, but you will not come. You will not come.
You will not come. What's the problem? What's the
problem? The will, the will is in bondage to sin. That's the
problem. That's the problem right there, in bondage. Captured,
captured by the devil, and the devil holds a man fast. Oh no. Number two, that's the first
thing. Number two, why do men What hinders men from coming
to the Lord Jesus Christ? It has to do with the will. Secondly,
the love of this world. They love this world. You will
not come to me that you might have life. Men love darkness
rather than light. Why? Because their deeds are
evil. To ask a man to love what he
hates and hate what he loves is to ask the impossible out
of Him. He loves this world. He loves
darkness. He loves darkness because His
deeds are evil. And thirdly, the traditions of
religion. You see, man is religious by
nature, but not righteous. He's religious by nature. He's born that way. born religious,
but he's not righteous. Now, he'll invent a God to worship,
and he'll bind himself to laws and to rules, but he will not
worship the God of grace or seek the mercy of the God of grace. He will not. He will not. Because
of the traditions of his religion. And fourthly, professions of
faith and religious experiences. Someone said the best place to
hide from God is in the church. That's the best place for a man
to hide from God. You see, people say, I know I'm
saved and I made a profession years ago and so don't disturb
me in my refuge. I remember years ago when I was
at the Willowtree Church preaching. That was one of the charges that
A fellow brought against me privately, told me this privately. He said
this. He said, I'm a deacon of this
church and I have been for a number of years. A number of years. And he said, my father before
me was an influential member of this church. And he said,
my wife's people were members of this church. He said, all
of my circle of close friends are identified with this church.
But he said, You have come here. And he said, You have... This
is the word that he used. He used the word disturbed. He
said, You have disturbed me. You have disturbed me. And he
said, I can't stand it. And you know what he done? He
sold out. He sold his house and everything
else and moved away and joined another church so he wouldn't
be disturbed. He didn't want to be disturbed.
by one of God's prophets. I can never swear it was that.
He didn't want to be disturbed. I'm saying the best place for a man
to hide from God and hide from the gospel of redemption is in
the church. He hides under a religious profession
that he made, whether he made it 10 years ago or 25 years ago. He says, I made a profession. He says, don't disturb me in
my refuge. I'm all right. I feel all right.
Everything was going fine until you come along, and you said
some things. You said some things, and now I'm disturbed. I'm disturbed. I talked to a fellow one time
who was telling me what a wonderful Christian he was and what great
peace that he had and all of that, and he'd been delivered
from the clutches of alcohol, and we talked a while, and I
told him, I said, well, just don't... take it as a sure sign
that you're a Christian simply because you quit drinking. I
said, there's more to it than that than just quit drinking.
I said, you don't have to be a Christian in order to quit
drinking. I said, you can quit drinking anytime, whether you're
Christian or not. So I said, I don't want you to
labor under a false hope here. And I began to talk to him. began
to talk to him. And you know what he said? He
said, you've mixed me up. He said, I'm all mixed up now.
I don't know which way to turn. The next thing you know, he went
back to drinking. You disturbed me. You disturbed
me in my religious profession. I thought it was all right until
you come along with the Word of Truth. Now I'm disturbed. Well, that's the reason why men
won't come to the Lord Jesus Christ. because of professions
of faith and religious experiences that they've had. I talked to
a fellow one time. He died here not so long ago.
He must have been about 50 years old. It was about 20, 25 years
ago I talked to the fellow. And I said, well, why don't you
come to church? I'd like for you to come down.
Well, he said, I am a Christian. I said, well, do you go to church?
No, I said, I don't go, but he said, I'm a Christian. And so
I tried to, you know, he's leaning on something there. He's leaning
on something. I tried to knock the prop out
from under that which he's leaning on, that he might fall flat on
his face and see the helplessness of trying to save himself or
the helplessness and hopelessness of trusting in anything apart
from the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And he was so upset about
this, the next day, when I see him, he made a point to come
to me and show me his religious baptismal certificate. He said,
you didn't hardly think I was a Christian. He said, you didn't
hardly think I was saved yesterday, did you? And I said, well, I
don't know about that. He said, well, look here. Look
here, he said, I went home and I found this. This is a certificate
that shows you when I was baptized. I was made a prophet of faith
and baptized ten years ago down in Webster Springs. That's why men won't come to
Christ. Because of religious professions
and religious experiences. Won't come. Won't come. Come
something else. They'll come to symbols and ceremonies,
doctrines, religion. They won't come to the Lord Jesus
Christ. And lastly, ignorance, ignorance,
ignorance. This is the most humbling charge,
I guess, that one can make against today's religionists. But Jesus
Christ said, you neither know me nor my Father. The Apostle Paul said there in
the 11th chapter of the 12th chapter of the book of Romans,
he said they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. You see, in our ignorance, in
our ignorance, our wicked hands, on orders from our wicked heart,
crucified the Lord of glory. We did. We did. Our wicked hands
did it, on orders from our wicked hearts, and we crucified the
Lord Jesus Christ. Men and brethren, what shall
we do? What shall we do? We must come. to Jesus Christ in true repentance
and faith. But no man can come unto me,
our Lord Jesus Christ said. No man can come unto me except
my Father which sent me for that man. What will we do then? Let us then cry mightily unto
God, our Heavenly Father, Who can tell if God will turn away
his anger and grant unto us the will to come to the Lord Jesus
Christ? He may do it. He may do it. You
will not come to me. It's all bound up in your will.
You will not come. Your whole nature is opposed
to God and it's against God. And in your heart you despise
Him, you don't like to admit that, but you do, you despise
Him. And you won't come to Him, you
won't bow to Him. But I'll tell you this, if you'll
come, if you'll call unto God and tell God, Lord, I desire,
I want to come, I want to understand. Give me an honest heart that
I can approve of. the Lord Jesus Christ and recognize
Him for who He is and what He does. I want to be saved from
my sins and from the power of sin, from the influence of sin. Lord, I want this, I desire this
more than life itself. Who knows? I believe you will. I believe you will. I believe
God will give you the will to come to Him. And if you will
come to Him, if He gives you that will and you will come to
Him, I'll tell you what He'll do. You come to Him and bow to
His feet. You know what He'll do? You bow
at His feet and He'll pick you up in His arms. God will do that. I remember that prodigal son.
I remember him. He was down there in that terrible
distance from God. in a terrible state and a terrible
condition. Down and out and didn't have
anything. Didn't have anything. The Spirit of God sent a famine
there and that fellow got hungry. And oh, he began to think and
consider. And he said, why, in my Father's
house, my servants, they fare a whole lot better than I'm faring.
He said, I will arise. He just didn't resolve something. But he put action into his resolutions. And he said, I will arise and
go to my Father. That's what I'll do. Well, you
know the story. Oh, how the Father loved him. Our Heavenly Father loves guilty
sinners. He loves sinners. He doesn't
love righteous people. He hasn't got anything for righteous
people. Poor sinners. Poor sinners that have no hope,
that have been stripped of every vestige of hope, every bit of
it. Every leaf of that apron has
been stripped from them, and they stand before Him guilty
before God. They haven't got anything to
commend themselves, and there they are. And I'm telling you,
that fellow that's been brought to that place, God loves him. Oh, what's involved in that?
What's involved in God loving a man? Boy, more than I could
tell. I can't even go to first base
on that one. I can't even get a good foul
ball on that. God loves a sinner! But I know how He manifested
and evidenced that love towards that prodigal son. When that
prodigal son came, It says that the father ran, the father, the
father ran out to meet that poor, guilty, undeserving, hell-bent,
hell-deserving sinner. God ran out to meet him. God
Almighty, it says, did something there that staggers my very imagination. Threw His arms around that sinner's
neck. God put His arms around that
man and God kissed that man. I say, I loved him. God loves
sinners. Don't you ever deny that God
loves sinners. You just look at the cross. Look
at the cross. If you ever see the cross in
its true light, you'll see that God loves sinners. Christ died
for sinners. God loves sinners. Oh, God would
never give you the will to come. Give you the will to come. And
by His feet, He'd pick you up in His arms and He'd give you
a kiss that you'd never forget. He'd smother your soul with kisses. And that's so. God help us. Remember now, I said before you
at the outset here, if you're here without Him, don't you say, I cannot come.
Don't you blame it on the church. Don't you blame it on your friends,
on your parents. Don't you blame it on your husband,
on your wife. Blame it on the preacher. Don't
you say, I cannot come. You say, I will not come. I will
not come. God so loved the world that he
gave the Lord Jesus Christ to die for sinners, guilty sinners. Jesus said, you will not come
that you might have life. He throws it all back to you.
He puts it all back in our laps and says, You will not come.
Something like, You will. Something like, You will. It's
in bondage to sin. Oh Lord, if that's so, do something
for me. Do something for me that I might
have the will to come. I desire to come. That I might
have the will to come. That I might understand the blessed
gospel and approve the Lord Jesus Christ and His Lordship. my Savior and my Redeemer. Let's
stand and we'll be dismissed.