We're going to continue with
this theme of the necessity of hearing the Gospel preached.
We're going to be in John chapter 6. And I'm just going to sort
of go through John chapter 6 and give you an overview and point
out a few things to you. The Lord Jesus Christ is mainly
speaking in this passage. But it begins with Jesus feeding
a multitude bread. And then as we go along, we're
going to see that He's going to declare In His Gospel, I am
the bread of life. And then finally, the Lord Jesus
Christ is going to declare how it is that He feeds His children. This is how He did it then when
He stood on this earth. This is how He does it now. Look
at John 6, verse 63. It is the Spirit that quickeneth. the flesh profiteth nothing the
words that I speak unto you that's the title the words that I speak
unto you they are spirit and they are life through his gospel
the Lord Jesus Christ speaks and his words are spiritual life
in the new spirit that he's made within a believer. And it's by
hearing his words, his gospel, that the Holy Spirit quickens
the inner spiritual man, the true believer. That's where the
believer is. So that through the Spirit, the
fleshly man and his deeds are mortified. Now I want you to
turn back with me and we're going to start at the beginning of
the chapter and work our way back up to this point. First
of all, the flesh profits nothing. Christ's words turn us from our
own fleshly wisdom and power to Christ the power and the wisdom. Now start here in John chapter
6. You know the context. The Lord has a great multitude
following Him because they saw some miracles He did when He
healed some that had diseases. And verse 5 says, When Jesus
then lifted up His eyes and saw a great company come unto Him,
He saith unto Philip, Whence shall we buy bread that these
may eat? And this he said to prove Philip,
for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, 200
penny worth of bread's not sufficient for them, that every one of them
may take a little. One of his disciples, Andrew,
Simon Peter's brother, saith unto him, there's a lad here
which hath five barley loaves and two small fishes, but what
are they among so many? Philip was a believer. And he knew the Lord Jesus had
turned water into wine. He had witnessed the Lord heal
helpless, impotent sinners. But Philip turns to his own power
and his own wisdom. And by doing so, he turned a
fellow brother to the flesh instead of to Christ. Our flesh is leavened. And a little leaven, a little
flesh leavens the whole lump. But thank God, our Lord Jesus
Christ keeps us, He feeds us, so that we shall not be tossed
to and fro. But we'll be established, not
by our own flesh, not by the fleshly strength of men who would
feed us the flesh and have us turn to the flesh. But what our
Lord does next here is an illustration. This is an illustration of what
our Lord does through His gospel, through the Holy Spirit, through
His pastors and His teachers. Look at verse 10. Jesus said,
Make the men sit down. That's Christ's Word to me and
that's Christ's Word to you. O man of flesh, sit down. Verse 6 says, Now there was much
grass in the place, so the men sat down in number, about five
thousand. The spiritual lesson right there
is, what's going to make a sinner sit down? Green pasture. When Christ the Shepherd commands
His sheep to sit down, He makes us willing by leading us to Him
who is our green pasture. The Lord takes what is despised.
What the flesh esteems as weak and base, not able to profit
anything, not able to accomplish anything, and with that He feeds
multitudes. Christ is the bread that's despised,
that's base and weak and considered foolish by wise men. His gospel
given to His messengers is how He feeds. But just like those
few loaves and those few fishes, What pleases God is regarded
as foolishness and unwise to the carnal flesh. And yet this
is how Christ Jesus feeds multitudes. He takes things that are not
esteemed at all by men and feeds them. And we must hear his gospel
so that we're turned from our power and the wisdom of our flesh
just like Philip was and just like Andrew was. Now secondly,
through his word, Christ separates his children from the vain imagination
that we can make Christ king. Look in verse 14. Then those
men, when they had seen the miracle that Jesus did, said, This is
of a truth, that prophet, that shall come into the world. And
when Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take
him by force to make him a king, He departed again into a mountain
Himself alone. And when even was now come, His
disciples went down into the sea and entered into a ship and
went over the sea toward Capernaum. They did that, Matthew tells
us, because He told them to depart. He left and He told them, leave
this place, leave this multitude, get away from them. The flesh
can confess Christ with the mouth and can follow Him just as these
multitudes did. but the flesh vainly imagines,
our deceivable, deceitful, carnal heart that's still with us, imagines
that we can make Christ King. Christ is King and Christ is
Savior. He came into the world already
so. We read in Matthew 2.2, where
is he that is born King of the Jews? And Luke said, For unto you is
born this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ
the Lord. The Lord commanded His disciples
to depart from these men, and they obeyed Him. You know what
the Lord does through His Word, through His Gospel? He makes
His people obedient. He makes His people follow Him.
He separates the believer from that which is vanity. And He
does so by ministering to the hearts of His people in His high
priestly office. You see, if they could have taken
Christ and made Him king, you know what would have been bypassed?
His work as our high priest. He had to go to the cross and
lay down His life offer himself as a lamb without spot and without
blemish to God. He had to offer himself to God
and his blood to God. And then he has to come as a
high priest and minister unto his people. The high priest came. Remember how Moses came to the
priest when he was in that office and he applied the blood to his
right ear so he could hear, to his right thumb so he could work,
to his right big toe so he could walk. Christ has to do this in
his high priestly office and through his word. When he does
this, he purges the conscience and he makes his children bow
to Christ our King, cast all our care on Christ our Savior,
and he does it through his work as mediator, through his office
of being our high priest. And if we can make him King,
That's a tradition of men. Make Christ your Lord and your
Savior. You can't do it. You can't do
it. That's a tradition of men. Vainly
received and carried on, and it bypasses what his high priestly
office is. He must do the work. But through
his word, he makes himself the prophet, the priest, and the
king to his people. And then through His Word, Christ
saves us from the darkness of this world and from our own unbelief. Look in verse 17. And it was
now dark, and Jesus was not come to them, to His disciples. They
had departed. And the sea arose by reason of
a great wind that blew. Who controls the wind? And who
controls the sea? He does. So when they had rowed
about 25 or 30 furlongs, they see Jesus walking on the sea
and drawing nigh unto the ship. And they were afraid. But he
saith unto them, It is I. Be not afraid. And then they
willingly received him into the ship, and immediately the ship
was at the land whither they went." You see, in His wisdom
and His power, the Lord sends us great waves of trial. And as believers, we start to
row, and we start rowing feverishly. And we know He walks on the waves.
We know He controls the wind. We know He controls the trial.
And yet, in our own unbelief, it won't allow us to receive
Him until Christ speaks the Word,
His Word, and says, It is I. Be not afraid. And when He does
that, He makes us willingly receive Him into fellowship. And immediately, immediately,
we're delivered. He does that through His Word,
through His Gospel. Now, this is the next thing.
Through His Word, Christ keeps the believer striving only for
Christ. Look in verse 26. These fellows came after Him.
Verse 25 when they had found him on the other side of the
sea they said unto him rabbi when camest thou hither And he
doesn't even answer their question He cuts he gets right to the
heart of the matter because there's no guile in Christ. There's no
deceit in him He spoke clearly plainly to everybody he spoke
to and he got right to the issue and And he says this, Jesus answered
them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, you seek me not
because you saw the miracles, that is, not because you saw
Christ, the power and wisdom of God, but because you did eat
of the loaves and were filled. Natural flesh, the flesh that's
in us, the flesh that is still with us, brethren, seeks Temporal
gain seeks Christ for temporal gain But Christ speaks his word
effectually into the believers heart and he says this verse
27 labor not for the meat which perisheth Strive not for the
meat that perisheth work not for the meat that perisheth food
for the body is not food for the soul and Earthly riches are
not heavenly riches sensual appetites Pleasures and honors from this
world is bread of deceit Verse 27 but labor for that meat which
endureth unto everlasting life Which the son of man shall give
unto you For him hath God the father sealed This is his work
Everlasting life is Christ's gift, given freely by Christ. And God the Father has given
his Son to give this meat. It's quickening, spiritual, soul-refreshing,
soul-strengthening meat by which believers are nourished and grown
and supported. This is His work. He told us,
we saw in that message, the way of death and the way of life.
He said, strive to enter into the straight gate, into the narrow
way. And He said, I am the way. Strive to enter into Him. Then
Christ must feed us this meat because the fleshly nature seeks
only deceitful meat. Our fleshly nature seeks works
of God whereby we can separate ourselves, whereby we can make
ourselves accepted of God. Look at verse 28. Then said they
unto him, What shall we do that we might work the works of God?
Verse 29. Verse 29, Jesus answered and
said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him
whom he hath sent. I'm going to talk about this
a little later, but brethren, what we're learning here, what
the Lord is teaching here is the life and the strength for
mortification. for separation, for being separate
from Balaam, for being separate from Balaam, for being separate
from idols, for being separate from that work which is defilement,
is having these promises. It's the Word of Christ. It's
the full, complete salvation of God in Christ Jesus that strengthens
us and as we grow to behold Him by faith through the Spirit,
our flesh is mortified. That's how we mortify this flesh. Not by works that we can do to
do it. If the message is telling you,
now fornication is evil, and it is, now you need to abstain
to it, abstain from it. And I go into great detail of
how bad it is and how evil it is and how you should abstain
from it. And you start working feverishly to abstain from it.
And you abstain from it. And every other outward sin. And you abstain from it so that
you're as spotless as the Pharisees. You're still committing fornication. because it's not the Spirit of
God. It's not Christ's words working
in you that has separated you from that very defilement of
thinking we can do it. This is the work of God. This is how this work of God
is accomplished. Believe on Christ Jesus the Lord. It's accomplished through faith.
How many times do you find in scriptures that just shall live? How? By faith. All right, let's
move on now. Our fleshly nature likes to exalt
man over Christ. What they're about to say to
him here is they're about to say Moses fed the children for
400 years in the wilderness with manna. Now you fed 5,000 one
time, you're going to have to show us what you're going to
do for us in the future. Now listen to what he said, verse
30. They said therefore unto him, what signs showest thou
then that we may see and believe thee? What dost thou work? Our fathers did eat manna in
the desert. As it is written, he gave them
bread from heaven to eat. Then Jesus said unto them, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, Moses gave you not that bread from
heaven, but my Father giveth you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he which
cometh down from heaven and giveth life unto the world." He said,
what I'm going to do for you, if I'm going to do something
for you, it's going to be what I do right here and right now. It's
me. It's me, he said. And they heard
that He was going to give them this carnal bread. And they said,
Lord, evermore give us this bread. We want to see it perpetually.
Give it to us from here on out. Just this earthly bread. That's
not what He's talking about. Where you begin is where you're
going to end. And as you go, you're going to grow more and
more and more and more closer to Him. Not further and further
away from Him. Not more and more self-dependent.
Not more and more self-sufficient. More and more dependent. Narrow
is the way. How narrow? Christ is the way. It's as narrow as Christ. That's
where we're going. That's where we're headed. And
we're going to all stand before Him one day. That's where we're
headed. Straight to His face. He sat
in error. And then, this is what He said
to him, verse 36. But I said unto you that ye also
have seen Me and believe not. Because we can't. By nature,
we can't. We cannot. Unless we're fed Christ,
unless we're continually fed a steady diet of Christ the bread,
the flesh will be strengthened, the flesh will be puffed up,
knowledge puffeth up, the flesh will become arrogant, just like
we see in these men right here. And the diet of bread that perishes
tosses men to and fro. Instead of giving life, instead
of edifying the inner spirit, instead of turning us from the
flesh to Christ alone, a steady diet of flesh, of touch not,
taste not, handle not, is going to gender to self-righteous arrogancy. Every time. Every time. He said, it is the spirit that
quickeneth the flesh profiteth nothing. It's the spirit that
quickeneth in the beginning, and it's the spirit that quickeneth
all along. And the flesh profiteth nothing
in this. The words that I speak unto you
are spirit and are life." Now, here's the second point. The
words that Christ speaks into the heart that He's made new
are spirit and life. They're the heartbeat of the
believer. They're the food of the believer.
They're the sustenance of the believer. They are the life of
the believer. Christ's words feed the inner
man, with Christ Himself the bread of life. Look at verse
35. Jesus saith unto them, I am the bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never
hunger. And he that believeth on me shall
never thirst. When you've turned to yourself,
And I've turned to myself and tried to get myself out of a
jam. Tried to fix something. Tried
to accomplish something by my strength, by my wisdom, whatever. When you've done that, have you
found yourself to hunger and thirst? Your appetite wasn't
filled. The problem wasn't solved. But
have you ever come to Christ and not been filled? Not had
your appetite filled and your thirst quenched? Has it ever
happened? Verse 47. He says, Verily, verily,
I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life. I am that bread of life. Look at verse 50. This is the
bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof
and not die. Verse 51, he says, I am the living
bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread,
he shall live forever. And the bread that I will give
is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. He
gave his flesh as a sacrifice to God for his people. And he
gives unto his people, through his gift of faith, his flesh. He's given us of His fullness,
brethren. It pleased God that in Him should
all fullness dwell. He is the fullness of the Godhead. God the Father, God the Son,
God the Holy Spirit. God the Father told Moses, I'll
show you my glory. But the only place you're going
to see my glory, Moses, is in the cleft of the rock. And that
rock is Christ. That's the only place you're
going to see God's glory. He said when the Holy Spirit
comes, the Holy Spirit's not going to speak of Himself. The
Holy Spirit's going to speak of Me. And He said He'll guide
you into all truth. And He said, I am the truth.
Full obedience to God. is ours through faith in the
obedience of Christ. Christ our obedience. Full justification
from the law's penalty is ours through faith in Him who justifies. Full righteousness is ours through
faith in Christ our righteousness. Full perfection of holiness is
ours through faith in Christ our sanctifier who sanctifies. Full redemption is ours through
faith in Christ, our Redeemer. Full acceptance is ours through
faith in Christ, the Beloved of the Father. For it pleased
the Father that in Christ should all fullness dwell. Listen to
what Paul said in Colossians 1.21. You that were sometime
alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works. What kind
of wicked works? What are the works that I may
do, that I may work the works of God? Do you realize that the
first wicked work that was ever committed after the fall was
the wicked work of trying to cover our nakedness by our own
religious practices? That was the very first wicked
work ever performed in this earth. And if you'll go through Scripture
and read, that's the wicked work God's got to save us from. He's
thinking we can have another covering, another acceptance,
another sanctification, another justification, another righteousness
than Christ. God's people are trees of righteousness
planted by Christ Jesus, the river of life. And for years
and years and years, just like Adam did, We tried to hide ourselves
amongst God's trees, thinking God wouldn't find us if we just
looked religious, looked like one of the trees. But God knows
us. He knows our heart. He looks
on the heart. He said, Yet now hath He reconciled you in the
body of His flesh through death to present you holy and unblameable
and unreprovable in His sight, if ye continue in faith, grounded
and settled. Where? Grounded and settled where?
In Christ. Trust in Christ. Be not moved
away from the hope of the Gospel. Who is the hope of the Gospel?
Christ, which ye have heard. Who have you heard? I pray you've
heard Christ, which was preached to every creature which is under
heaven, whereof I, Paul, am made a minister. Now look here in
our text. is soul-strengthening words. These are soul-strengthening
words that Christ gives, that He declares. And they're words
of assurance because they declare to us that in nothing, in absolutely
nothing, will He leave us to depend upon ourselves. Now watch
this. Verse 37. He says, "...all that
the Father giveth Me shall come to Me." and him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out." For I came down from heaven, not to do mine
own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is the
Father's will, which hath sent me, that of all which he hath
given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again
at the last day. And this is the will of him that
sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth
on him, may have everlasting life. Now listen to this promise.
And I will raise him up at the last day. Now that's strength
right there, brethren. That's strength that'll separate
you from the evil. Sanctify them through thy word.
Thy word is truth. Keep them from the evil, he prayed.
How? Through this word that declares
he will. Jesus therefore answered and
said unto them, murmur not among yourselves. No man can come to
me except the Father which has sent me. Draw him, and I will
raise him up at the last day. God's gonna draw. That's what
he said. He's everyone that the father give me shall come Why
cuz the father shall draw him and I will raise him up Now that's
strength. That's the power. That's the
food. That's the dynamite Our life began by the father drawing
us to Christ the bread he gave us life he gave us faith to eat
his flesh and drink his blood and Look here at verse 53. Jesus said unto them, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, Except you eat the flesh of the Son
of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso
eateth my flesh, that ETH on the end of the King James text
means continues to eat. Keeps on eating. Whoso eateth
my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life, and I will
raise him up at the last day. For my flesh is meat indeed,
and my blood's drink indeed." And we continue to walk throughout
our daily lives, quickened, strengthened, and kept separate from the evil
by His words abiding in us. Believers live continually upon
our living bread through faith. Look at verse 56. He that eateth
my flesh and drinketh my blood dwelleth in me and I in him. As the living Father hath sent
me. It gives us an illustration of
it, an example. This is how real it is. As the
living Father hath sent me and I live by the Father. So he that
eateth me, even he shall live by me, Christ said. Well, here's the third thing.
I want to ask you a question. How are we continually fed Christ's
bread? Look back down there at verse
63. It is the Spirit that quickeneth,
the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you,
the words that Christ Jesus speaks unto you, our spirit and our
life. It's what he quoted up there
in verse 45. Look back up there with me, verse
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 gets His bread
one place, finds His life one place, continually feeds one
place, He cometh unto me, Christ said. It pleased God to save
them who were being saved through the preaching of Christ and Him
crucified. How shall they believe on Him
of whom they have not heard? How shall they hear of Him without
a preacher? And how are they going to preach
unless they be sent. Sent by who? When Christ ascended,
He gave pastors. He sends them. And He gave them
for one reason, for the purpose of feeding, of edifying His children. Not with wisdom of words, with
Christ's words. Our Lord was so clear here, so
plain in His speaking here. You can't understand it without
the Spirit. But when He gives you of His
Spirit, these words become clear and plain, unmistakingly so,
so that you understand that Christ is our life. And that's why Paul said this.
He said, My speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of
man's wisdom. Do you know what that is? It's unclear. It doesn't shut sinners up to
Christ Jesus, the bread. It caters to men. It feeds the
flesh of men. It gives men something to look
into other than Christ alone. Christ spoke this word to these
folks to other folks, whether he was in the synagogue, whether
he was on the street, wherever he was, this is how he spoke.
This is exactly how he declared the truth. And this is how Paul
declared it. Paul said, not with wisdom of
words, not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration
of the Spirit and of power. You know what Paul is saying?
Not that you get all worked up and when you're all full of fire
and life and that you've got the power and the Spirit. Only
the Spirit and the power. Christ is the power. Christ is
the power and the wisdom. Only when you have been made
alive by the power and wisdom of God can you speak. plainly,
without any fear of men, and tell sinners, you're not going
to sanctify yourself. It's by the promise of God. It's
by His promise of what He's accomplished. It's by His work. It's by that
continual feeding of Christ in the heart that the inner man
is strengthened. And through the Spirit, we mortify the deeds
of the flesh. It's only going to come that
way. in 1 Corinthians 1, and we're
going to look at this later too in another text, in another message.
But Paul said, he quoted what the Lord spoke over in Isaiah
when He said, He's going to bring the wisdom of men to nothing
and an understanding of the prudent to nothing. You know what they
were doing in Isaiah? Men would stand in the gate.
They would stand in the way. And they would rebuke men who
were turning the things of God upside down. How'd they do it? They preached Christ. Because men were turning things
upside down. What is it when you turn things
upside down? You put God on the bottom and
man on the top. And he said, I'm going to bring
all that wisdom and that understanding of the wise and prudent who turn
things upside down to nothing. And how am I going to do it?
I'm going to take a few fish and a few loaves. We despise
beggarly things that people despise and don't esteem. Christ the
bread. through his gospel, through his
faith, weak messengers, and he said, and I'm going to feed the
people the bread because my words are spirit and are life. And
so Paul said, I do this in demonstration of the spirit and power that
your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the
power of God. Christ is the power of God. And
through his words, which set forth the glory of God in Christ
Jesus, and that is where the glory of God is seen in the face
of Christ Jesus, When He commands us to mortify the wicked works
of trusting in touch not, taste not, handle not, the wicked works
of our fleshly sins, He strengthens us with righteousness that is
freely ours by Christ our righteousness. He strengthens us, separates
us from all uncleanness, mortifies the flesh in our daily lives
through the Holy Spirit as He strengthens us to believe Christ
is our sanctification. Our bodies are the temple of
the living God when He makes us to see what He's done for
us spiritual harlots and how He won't leave us and forsake
us, but He'll keep us in spite of us. That's what's going to
cause you to come out from among them and be touched not to unclean. We're brought into liberty by
Him through the message of Christ our Redeemer. And we're grown
in wisdom through faith. The more that we hear, the more
that we hear, the more that we feed, the more that we eat, the
more that we feast upon this feast of fat things, of wine
on the leaves well refined, which is Christ Jesus the Lord our
righteousness. He's our power and He's our wisdom.
And we have proof right here that this works. That His words
are life, they're spirit and they're life and they effectually
separate His people from all uncleanness to live upon Him
alone. We've got proof right here. Through
this simple message He brings. The Lord knew that these followers
weren't His sheep. And He didn't commit Himself
to them. He didn't reveal Himself in them. And by this He shows
us in a negative way that His words are spirit and they are
life. Because these men could not separate
themselves from unbelief. They could not separate themselves
from the uncleanness of their fleshly religion and the love
of the flesh to believe on Him. They couldn't do it. Look at
verse 60. Many therefore of His disciples, these that were following
Him, listening to Him, learning of Him, they weren't true. Believers
they were just following him learning when they heard this
word they heard him say that I'm the bread of life You got
to eat my flesh and drink my blood live up on me by faith
They said this is a hard saying Who can hear that? Who can who
can hear it can you hear it? Is it a hard saying to you that
Christ is all? Is that a hard saying to you?
You've got something else." They had something else. They had
other things they were interested in. They said, that's a hard
saying. Who can hear it? And from that
time, verse 66 says, from that time many of His disciples went
back and walked no more with Him. But now he's going to show
us how this Word is Spirit and it's life and how it does separate
sinners from unbelief and from the works of religion and from
the works of the uncleanness of the flesh and the lusts of
the flesh and the pride of life. Watch. Verse 67, Then said Jesus
unto the twelve, Will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered
him, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. And we believe and are sure that
Thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. You know what
He said in Matthew? The Lord said, Blessed art Thou,
Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood didn't reveal that to you,
but My Father which is in heaven. That's why the continual hearing
of the gospel of Christ is a necessity to every believer. It's life. You're at the table right now.
And if you don't eat, you're going to perish. You're going
to shrivel up and die away. You'll be tossed to and fro because
your fleshly strength, your fleshly wisdom is strengthened and your
inner man is weak and can't thrive. He said, the words that He speaks
unto you are spirit and are life. That's why the Apostle Paul said
this, we preach Christ crucified. Unto the Jews, a stumbling block. Unto the Greeks, foolishness. But unto them which are called,
drawn by the Father, made to eat the bread of life. Both Jews
and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. Because the foolishness of God
is wiser than man and the weakness of God is stronger than man. the words that He speaks unto
you, their spirit and their life. We have to have Him. We have
to have Him. This is how He grows us. This
is how we live. We have to have Him. Amen.