I please God to bless us together
tonight as we consider his word. Let's turn to the Gospel of John
chapter 6 and we'll read verse 37. The Gospel of John chapter
6 and reading verse 37. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out. As we read a chapter like this
We find sometimes there are difficulties for our minds to understand really
what is being said. And sometimes we may feel like
those who murmured and couldn't understand what Jesus was speaking. I believe there is a view that
we should understand as we consider words in this chapter, to appreciate
that there are the two natures. First of all, there is our natural
body. And it is the natural body which
the Lord refers to when he speaks of those who were in the wilderness
and they ate that bread from heaven, that manna which was
provided. And that of course was a physical eating and that
was related to their physical bodies. But then there is the
other nature, our spiritual nature. And if we are dead spiritually,
there will be no feeding spiritually. But if the Lord gives us that
spiritual life, then there will be that feeding upon Christ. And not in a physical way, but
in a spiritual way, so that we do then feed upon Christ, on
his flesh and on his blood. Now, the other thing I would
just point out is, that in reference to these blessings, if they emanate
from God, we will realise, as we read towards the end of this
chapter, that the flesh profits nothing, because God will have the honour
and glory. And we may find sometimes there
are temptations which come into our lives, in our mind, into
our heart and we may appear, perhaps we may, request of the
Lord certain blessings that we believe we must have and that
we do need. Well, it may be true, but it
may not be true. And if we are given that grace
to stop for a moment and to analyze our prayers to understand that
should those prayers be answered to those requests that we have
come to God with, whether there would be any profiting of the
flesh. Now that may be a little hard
to discern, but nonetheless It is worthy of examination, because
sometimes there may be those desires which we may think are
good desires and are pure desires, but if they have been answered
in the way that we expected, we should have perhaps have claimed
a little merit ourselves, or we may have even been proud of
receiving such a blessing and have elevated ourselves perhaps
above others and think well of course so-and-so doesn't have
much to say and now I have this I'm able to speak of well the
Lord you see won't allow our flesh to glory and it may be
a necessary lesson it may be a painful lesson for us to come
to understand that the Lord brings those blessings about which will
be for his honour and glory and that our flesh will not profit. Well perhaps that might, I hope
it's a helpful introduction to such words as this here, this
evening. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me and him that cometh to me I will in no wise
cast out." I believe a word like this can be a comfortable word
and I believe it can be an uncomfortable word. It can be a comfortable word
to those who have the evidence of the life of God in their souls
and it can be an uncomfortable word to those who perhaps think
they do not possess the life of God in their souls. And it
may be an uncomfortable word to enable them to search and
to desire diligently, but Lord will look upon them and bless
them so that they have the understanding that the Father has come and
has drawn them unto himself. Now, the encouragement is, and
this is the grand truth of the Word of God, which you always
understand it to be so, Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise
cast out. That is, a very encompassing
and comprehensive statement. So let none of us think that
we are too bad, that we are too far off, we're too hard-hearted,
that we're too rebellious. Because here we have this statement,
him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. And the
word of God is true And the devil is a liar. The devil may say,
well that doesn't apply to you. You are the exception. Well,
may you have that faith, that God-given faith to lay hold of
a promise like this, because it is a promise. And it emanates
from the Saviour's lips. And how glorious it is to know
that whatever condition, whatever state we're in, There is a word
like this, him that cometh to me, I would in no wise cast out. Whatever condition we find ourselves
in, to be able to come to the Lord. We can't come too bad,
but we need to come in an honest way. When the Lord comes then
and breaks down all our self-righteousness. So we have to ditch all that
we thought was good. All that we thought we had received. That which was of the flesh. And we come then with nothing. Nothing in my hand I bring. That means we've been emptied
of self. Emptied of self. Nothing in my
hand I bring. And it is a good and a blessed
condition to be found like that. Because then, when we're empty,
then it is that God pours in the blessing. When we have something
of ourselves, there's not room for the blessing. But when we're
empty, then it is that the Lord comes and does pour in the blessing. And it's then that we come to
our God, praying earnestly that we might receive mercy, that
we might receive favour, that we may receive the blessing from
the Lord. And then it will be that we'll
come seeking that we may be those who spiritually feed upon Christ. As we come empty, then we come
needy. And when we come needy, then
it is that we look nowhere else, but we look to the Saviour, we
look to the Lord Jesus Christ, and we bless Him. Then we have
a word, or words like this, the Saviour gave to His disciples
and those that were there on that occasion, pointing out so
clearly the great and important difference between temporal blessings
and spiritual blessings, and how necessary it is for you and
me to have a right comprehension of our need of spiritual blessings.
We may be favoured with natural blessings and we should be thankful
for them. My friends, the great need we
have is a partaker of Christ. And the Lord Jesus speaks so
very clearly, doesn't he? When he says to the people, he
says, I am the living bread. The living bread. You see, he
says, your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. they naturally died. He then
says, this is the bread which cometh down from heaven that
a man may eat thereof and not die, because it is living bread. How
wonderful it is if we have a God-given hunger after living bread. How we naturally hunger after
the bread that perishes. What a blessing if we hunger
after spiritual bread, spiritual food, which will not leave us,
but that which will do us good. 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." Now this, let's be clear, this is a spiritual
feeding. It's not a natural partaking. It's a spiritual feeding as we
feed upon Christ. And that means to meditate upon
what He has done. The wonderful transaction which He
fulfilled in coming into this sinful world. Now, naturally,
we cannot understand and cannot appreciate this. And we read
here, the Jews therefore, strove among themselves saying, how
can this man give us his flesh to eat? An impossibility. And by nature, we cavil at statements
like this. Naturally, we reject statements
like this. Perhaps they are even repulsive
to us, to a natural man. But here we are speaking of that
spiritual man, that new nature. And so Jesus said, He tells them
very clearly, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the
Son of Man and drink His blood, ye have no life in you. It is therefore clear, is it
not, that we need that spiritual life and that spiritual feeding,
and that spiritual feeding is the Lord Jesus Christ. Do we then have a desire after
that knowledge of Christ? Do we have that spiritual desire
to truly feed upon the Lord Jesus Christ and meditate upon his
great and glorious work that he performed when he was on this
earth and even now that work which he carries on in heaven
itself with that wonderful work of intercession for his people. And so how important for us tonight
to have the evidence that we have spiritual life and that
we are a spiritual partaker of the flesh and blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now, you may say, well, that's
all well and good in theory, but what is it in practice? Well,
in practice it is, I believe this, that when the Lord comes
and shows us our need of a Saviour, and that He brings us down in
our own estimation of our own strength and our own ability,
so that we are indeed empty. And then we come hungry and thirsty
for the Saviour. And we come really in that way,
that simple phrase, give me Christ or else I die. And it's true. Unless we possess Christ, we
shall not be blessed with the gift of eternal life. And if
we'd been brought then by the Spirit of God, it is only the
Spirit of God which brings us there, then we would have the
evidence within our hearts that we are hungry and thirsting after
Christ. And if we're hungry and thirsting
after Christ, it is to feed upon Christ, and that means to be
a partaker of eating His flesh and to drink in His blood in
a spiritual way. Now, the word that we read here
this evening tells us, all that the Father giveth me shall come
to me. There are no failures with God's
plan. And God ordained in eternity
past, there would be those who would be called, whom he chosen,
for whom his Only Beloved Son would come and die upon Calvary's
cross. And they were given to the Son
to redeem. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. And therefore, how do we come? We come like this, don't we?
We come needy sinners, empty, nothing in our hand we bring.
And to continue then with that statement, simply, to thy cross,
I cling. What does that mean? It means
we're clinging to that finished work of the Saviour. It means all to us to consider
Him in His life, in His death, what He passed through, and what
he did in giving his life as that sacrifice for our sin, for
your sin and my sin, then it is that the gospel becomes precious
and becomes true and becomes wonderful to us and we rejoice
then as God gives us our spiritual eyes to behold the glorious truths
of the gospel of our salvation. And blessed with that, we understand
the truth that we read previously. I am that bread of life. He that cometh to me shall never
hunger, and he that believeth on me shall never thirst. You
may feel, well, I'm not sure if I believe. Well, in actual
fact, you will not really come to God in prayer, crying to the
Lord, unless you believe. God gives that faith to believe,
so that you do come then, when you're emptied of yourself, of
all your natural religion, and you come pleading to the Lord
and He will look upon you. He will remember you. He won't pass you by. Come where
you are, understanding the truth and the wonder of this word.
And he that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. Because we are accepted in the
Beloved. Because if we come to Jesus like
this, the Lord looks upon us And he observed, here is one
for whom I died. Here's one pleading for mercy,
pleading that he may receive the blessing, he may receive
that spiritual food. My friends, we need natural food
to live. We need spiritual food to live.
We cannot live spiritually without Christ. Our religion Our spiritual
life without Christ will not be a life. It'll be a void. There'll be nothing there. Nothing
to do us any real good. There won't be any feeding. But if we're blessed with this
spiritual life, it'll be feeding upon Christ. And the Saviour
goes on to say, whoso, there's some lovely whosoever's and whoso's
in the word of God, to no one's cast out, whoso eateth my flesh
and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life." If you've been blessed with a
hunger and a thirst for Christ, and Christ has turned and looked
upon you He looked upon you. Perhaps it might be even as it
was with Peter. Yes, he didn't deserve a look. Nonetheless, the Lord did look.
You might feel to deserve a look. The Lord does look. It had an
effect. It had an effect upon Peter.
He went out and wept bitterly. Except ye eat the flesh of the
Son of Man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso
eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life. And, the promise you see which
goes with this, and I will raise him up at the last day. Yes, to that glorious day of
the resurrection. He will be raised up, incorruptible,
because the Saviour has died for us. All that the Father giveth
me shall come to me. Now, as I said, these words then
will be comfortable to us if we know the blessing of the Lord.
They may be uncomfortable to us if we do not know the blessing
of the Lord, but it may be that we are uncomfortable because
we know that we need the blessing of the Lord. We know that we
need the gift of God of eternal life. We know that we need to
eat of the flesh of the Son of God and to drink His blood. Now
if you know that, the Spirit of God has given you that knowledge,
then in effect you do have the gift of eternal life, but you
may not be in the enjoyment of it. And it may be therefore you
need to press on and pray on and remember this word tonight,
Him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. But it doesn't say you will receive
an immediate blessing. But it does say that you will
not be cast out, but the Lord tries and tests the reality of
our religion and the Lord gives true faith and living faith and
that true faith and living faith is put to the test and it's a
good thing it is because we don't want to be found on a false foundation,
assuming that we possessed eternal life when in fact that which
we had was only of our own providing. And so therefore the Lord does
test our faith. The word is true, him that cometh
to me I will in no wise cast out, but it may be that the Lord
will be testing your faith and my faith, as we are called upon
to wait upon the Lord. and we are called upon to call
upon His name and we are to pursue the narrow way till Him we view. We are to pursue it. Yes, the
Lord gives faith and He gives strength and He helps us to do
that, to wait upon the Lord. But let us believe the great
truth that we have here before us. and him that cometh to me,
I will in no wise cast out. And you can come tonight and
you can plead that promise to God. And it's wonderful when
we can plead God's promises. We can come to him and say, Lord,
thou hast said, thou hast said, he that cometh to me shall never
hunger. And he that believeth on me shall
never thirst, and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast
out. And where that work of the Spirit
is in the soul, there will be a pleading of these things, and
you will be concerned that your pleadings receive answers. and you won't want to give up,
however difficult it may seem, and sometimes it is difficult,
perhaps I should say it's always difficult. Real religion is not
easy, because we have the great adversary of the devil, who is
always around us, yes, skirting around us, trying to frighten
us away, trying to stop us praying, making us to give up and to call
no more on Jesus' name. That's the devil's great aim,
and that's his great concern. But we can say, and you can say,
and you can tell him, Christ has died, yea rather is risen
again, and that your hope is built on what Christ has done. You are not relying on your own
righteousness. What a blessing then to come
to a position like this and to understand the great and glorious
truth of God. Now the Lord goes on to tell
us, for my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He reiterates the truth of these
things so that we are to understand this is a spiritual blessing
and a spiritual favour. But it is true. It is eating
the flesh of Christ and drinking His blood as we meditate upon
His death. The Spirit of God will lead you
to Calvary. That's where the blessing is
to be found. Viewing the crucified Saviour
and believing that He died, that you might possess the gift of
eternal life. Now, as by the Holy Spirit, you
and I come by faith and view of the Saviour, suffering, bleeding
and dying, what is that? That is feeding upon Christ. When we observe His abounding
love to such an unworthy sinner. You see, that is feeding upon
Christ. To realise that there was such
love toward us, that he was so willing to give his life, give
his life so that you and I might live. He says, as the Father
hath sent me, he sent his Son, into the world to suffer and
to bleed and to die. And I believe, again, as you
and I led into this, there'll be a blessing to realise also
the love of the Father in sending His Son, His only begotten Son,
His only begotten Son, who'd been with Him for all eternity,
and He willingly sent Him into this sinful world. as the Living Father sent me,
and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall
live by me." These are eternal blessings. These are not things
which perish with the using. The Israelites ate that manna
and died. If you and I eat this spiritual
food, we shall never die. we shall be with Christ forever
in eternity. Surely this, my friends, is the
great concern that all of us should have as to whether we
are a partaker of this spiritual food and therefore our eternal
life is secure. There is a need, I believe very
often, for these positive evidences of the life of God in the soul,
because it brings with it a gracious and humble assurance. An assurance
is something which is given, but it humbles us. We don't go
proudly with it, but it is a great comfort to know that the Lord
has died, that we might live and that we are feeding upon
Christ. The Apostle Paul, he said, I know whom I have believed. And the Church of God, by the
experience of the knowledge of Christ, do know. There may be
a tendency sometimes, sadly, to pretend that we don't know. But my friends, if God has done
anything in our soul, in our spiritual life? Dare we deny
the blessed work of the Holy Spirit? Dare we deny the love
of the Holy Spirit in conveying these truths to our soul? So
not only do we possess the love of the Father, the love of the
Son, but also the love of the Holy Spirit. Him that cometh
to me I will in no wise cast out. And so he says, as a living
father sent me and as I live by the father so he that eateth
me even he shall live by me. This is that bread which came
down from heaven. This is the spiritual food which
has come down from heaven. And again he just reiterates
the alternative of the natural life, not as your fathers did
eat manna and are dead. He that eateth of this bread
shall live forever." We need to know, do we not, that we possess
eternal life. My friends, eternal life must
be centred upon Christ. And the knowledge of Christ to
us all that He is our Saviour, that He is indeed our Beloved. You see, when you and I are led
to the cross by faith and we look there and what do we see?
We see the love of the Saviour, the love so great to us, so unworthy,
that He was so willing to die that excruciating death in order
to atone for our sin. In order that all our sins should
be washed away, there is only one way, in the precious blood
of the Redeemer. My friends, no shedding of blood,
no forgiveness of sin. The Apostle tells us in the Hebrews,
without shedding of blood, there's no remission, there's no forgiveness.
And how we need to know that we are under the blood. And that
means the death of Christ will mean something to us. It will
be life to our souls. The death of Christ will be life
to our souls. As we view there, in His death,
our salvation. Now, these things are very true
and they're very precious, but as we read together, there were
those who didn't receive it. They murmured. And the Lord said, doth this
offend you? He said, what and if ye shall
see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? It is the
Spirit that quickeneth. It's the Spirit that makes us
alive. And blessed be God it is so, because it's all the work
of the Spirit. It's all the Lord's work and
we shall rejoice in it and you'll be thankful that it's God's work
in your soul. And because it's His work, it
brings with it eternal blessings. It'll never perish. The Lord
did not die in vain. The Lord did not shed his precious
blood in vain. He died so that you and I might
live. He shed his blood so that our
sins might be washed away. It is the spirit that quickeneth.
The flesh provideth nothing. The words I speak unto you, they
are spirit and they are life. wonderful thing it is that we
have such an account like this in the sixth chapter of John
to show to us so clearly the difference between natural life
and spiritual life. The realization that all things
natural will perish and those spiritual blessings will be forever. Once in Him, in Him forever. And to such there is therefore
now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. And you and I, my friends, are
in Christ Jesus if we are a possessor of being a partaker of this spiritual
food, that means a partaker of feeding upon Christ as the one
thing needful to us. And so there were many, you see,
that went away. Jesus knew from the beginning
who they were that believed not and who should betray him. And then we come down to that
great question which the Lord spoke From that time, many of
his disciples went back and walked no more with him. They were offended
about the great truths of the gospel. They didn't appreciate
it. They didn't understand it. They were offended. And then
Jesus said unto the twelve, will ye also go away? And Peter answers,
really as a spokesman, and he said, to whom else shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal
life. My friends, these words that
we thought on tonight are the words of eternal life. And you and I can go nowhere
else. We can only come to the seizure. And as we then are blessed with
its coming, it is then, I believe, we then observe and understand
the great truth, all that the Father giveth me shall come to
me." And it really is true that those words that the Lord spoke
to his father, when he prayed that prayer to his father, later
on in his life, and we read these words, he speaks, he says, as
thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give
eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him." That means that
every child of God that were given to the Son, the Son indeed
would die for and through that He would be glorified. And this
is life eternal, that they might know Thee, the only true God
and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. The wonderful gift of this
eternal life. He says, I have glorified thee
on the earth. I believe as we by faith view
the Saviour, we will glorify God for all that he's done. We
will stand amazed and we will desire to exalt his name. It may be like this. Let us exhort
his name together. For what he has done, I have
finished the work which thou gavest me to do. Yes, there was
no failure. The work was finished. It was
complete. And my friends, our salvation
rests on the truth of these words. And may we not bless God tonight,
for such a word as this. I have finished the work which
thou gavest me to do, and now, O Father, glorify thou me with
thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before
the world was. I have manifested thy name unto
the men which thou gavest me out of the world, thine they
were, and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word,
now they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given
me are of thee." This blessed knowledge of God. Oh, my friends,
how valuable it is. It is an eternal blessing. And so tonight, may we rejoice
in the statement we read here. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. May we look back now and realise,
yes, the Lord's called us. We've come to him. He's drawn
us in an amazing way. We've been drawn to him. Not
perhaps in the way we thought, but now we acknowledge the blessing
of the Lord in drawing us. We bless him and I am able to
confirm, yes, all that the Father giveth me shall come to me and
him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. Amen.