Well, Terence has read to us
from this 6th chapter of John. I simply this afternoon want
to face you with five redemptive truths that our Lord Jesus preached
here in John chapter 6. If we want to know what the Lord
Jesus Christ preached, then we'll have to go and look at it in
the messages that He preached. And here in John chapter 6, I
want us to look at these five redemptive truths that the Lord
Jesus Christ Himself preached to us. And there's no doubt. They're plain. He sets them forth
so plainly when He preaches. First of all, I want to look
at them here. The first truth is found here in John 6. And
it's in verse 37 and verse 39. The Lord says here plainly that
the Father has given to Him a people to save. Now, I'm aware that
the Scripture teaches in other places that everybody belongs
to the Lord Jesus Christ. The Father has put all things
into His hands. He's made Him to be Lord both
of the dead and the living. And the Scripture teaches us
that all men are coming to the Lord Jesus Christ. They are coming
physically to Him someday. Unto Him shall all flesh come,
even to those who are incensed against Him they shall come. Every knee shall bow before the
Lord Jesus, and every tongue confess that He is Lord to the
glory of God. So all men belong to Him. But in the sense that He is teaching
here this evening in verse 37 and verse 39, All that he is talking about
here are those that the Father has given to him to save. Look what he says in verse 37.
All that the Father giveth me shall come to me. Now you see
here it's a particular people. Not everybody is coming to Christ
to be saved by Him. But those that the Father gives
to Him, they're coming to Him. And He says here in verse 39,
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. So there is a people that Lord
Jesus said who has been given Me of My Father. And he says,
they are coming to me. They are coming to me to be saved
by me. And I will keep them and not
lose any of them and raise them up at the last day. So he is
teaching there is a people that the Father has given to him for
this cause. To save them. To save them. Over in, I want you to look at
this passage with me, where you're turning over to, Isaiah chapter
8. The Lord is always, He is throughout, especially the book
of John, speaking of those whom the Father hath given to Him.
He said there in the tenth chapter, He said, Other sheep I have which
are not of this foal. Them also I must bring. And Benny
went ahead to say, My Father which gave them to me is greater
than all. And in the seventeenth chapter,
in his prayer to the Father, he said, Father, You've given
me power over all flesh, that I should give eternal life to
as many as Thou hast given to me. And Brother Glenn read that
in verse 24. Is it Brother Glenn of John 17?
about where the Lord says, Father, I will that they whom Thou hast
given Me be with Me where I am. So we see that this gift that
the Father made to the Son, these people, they're always on His
mind. They're always on His thoughts.
He always is looking to them and their salvation. He values
them. No doubt, not just because that
He loves them Himself, but because they're a gift of the Father.
They're given to me of my Father, and He's so concerned about them
that He prays for them. That Father in the end of the
age when the world has passed away with the great noise, and
stands before the judgment, and I pray at that time, Those that
you've given Me, be with Me." So see how concerned about Him
He is. See how He loves them. And yet before He ever comes
into this world, in Isaiah chapter 8, in verse 18, before He ever
comes into this world, these people are on His mind. Look
here at what He says in verse 18. We know this is speaking
of the Lord Jesus Christ because Hebrews chapter 2 quotes this
verse and attributes it to the Lord Jesus. In verse 18, here
is what He says to His Father. Behold, I and the children whom
the Lord hath given Me are for sons, and wonders in Israel from
the Lord of hosts, which dwelleth in Mount Zion." So from before
His coming to the very time that He was here preaching about it
until the end of time, the resurrection at the last day, His mind is
on these chosen people, these gifts of God. Now, you can look
at this truth And you may want to put some terminology to it. You say, well, we should call
it this or we should call it that. That's all right. That's
all right. But when we look at a teaching
like this and put terms on it, what happens? Somebody comes
along and they don't understand the terminology that we put on
it. So what we have to do is come
here and say, here is what the Lord Jesus preached. He preached
that the Father had given Him a people out of mankind to save
them. And you say, prove that to me
by Scripture. Well, here it is then. Lo and behold, here it
is. That is indeed the truth. And
Christ preached it and set it forth so clearly. And here is
the benefit that He says they enjoy from Him. In verse 37,
he says, "...all the Father gives to me," look at this, "...they
shall come to me." There's the benefit of it. What does the
chosen people do? What does these loved ones do? They come to Christ. And secondly,
he says here in the last portion of verse 37, "...I will lend
no wise for no reason," no cause. Never, any place at any time,
will I ever cast them out. And then he goes on there in
the last portion of verse 39, and he says, I will raise them
up at the last day. These are blessed people. They're
a gift of the Father to the Son, and they're coming, they're coming
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Now that's what he preached.
But secondly, right in the face of this, look in John chapter
6 and verse 44. Right in the face of saying that
those whom the Father has given to me shall come to me, he turns
right around in the face of that and look at this. No man can
come to me. Now if somebody said, boy, your
preaching is confusion. If your preaching seems so contradictory,
look at the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, all the Father gives
to me shall come. Each and every one of them shall
come. And then He turns right around and says, no man can come
to Me. Look here in chapter 5 in verse
40. Look in chapter 5 in verse 40.
Here's what the Lord had already told these people. He says there in verse 39, search
the Scriptures, in them you think you have eternal life. And they
are they which testify me. And you will not come to me that
you might have life. Now here he's talking about people's
rebellion. You won't come. You just will
not come to me. But in John chapter 6 and verse
44, he's speaking of man's inability. Man does not have the ability
to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. And he says this is universal.
No man can come to me. See, it's not just the poor and
the ignorant and the unlearned and the uneducated. But it's
the theologians, it's the preachers, it's the educated people, it's
universal. No man can come to me. You know, I think of all the
consequences of our fall. If you look at all the ways in
which the fall of humanity has affected us, and my, look how
it's affected us. Look how it's affected us morally.
Look at the immorality that's in the world today. That's the
effects of the fall. But I think of all the dreadful
effects of the fall. Here is the most serious one.
And I say that for this reason. When we fell back there in the
garden, not only did we lose life, we died. In the day that you eat, you'll
die. We lost our righteousness. And to add on top of that, now
we're told that we can't even come to the One that's able to
save us from our awful situation. If we fail and we have the ability
and the power to come, that would be one thing. But now here the
Lord Jesus Christ says, no man can come to Me. He does not have
the ability to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. And he mentions
this again over here in John 6, verse 65. Look at this. Therefore said
I unto you, no man can come to Me except it were given to him
of My Father. Now this is what I call a redemptive
truth. A redemptive truth. No man has
the ability to come to Me. Why would I call that a redemptive
truth? For this reason. If we do come,
it's because it's given to us to come. It's a part of grace. It has to be given. We must be
saved from what we are. We must be saved from our inability
as well as any other sin. No man can come to Me except
My Father which sent Me draw him." There are many steps in
God's redemptive purpose. In Romans chapter 5 we are told
this, when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ
died for the ungodly. And now here in verse 65 we are
told, when we were without any ability to come. The Father drew
us graciously. He gave to us grace and strength
to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. And when you and I read verse
37, all that the Father gives to me shall come to me, and read
verse 44, with it, no man can come. When we read this together,
it shows us that we were not given to Christ. because of anything
that God saw in us. Did God look down through time
and say, well, I see that that man is going to come, so I'm
going to give him to my son to save him. It doesn't make sense,
does it? Because he said, no man can come
to me. No man can come to me. And again,
you and I may put terms on this truth to identify it. We may
call it total depravity. And when we do that, all these
questions begin to gender up in people's mind, don't they?
But if we just don't put terms on it and come here and look
at it and say, here's what Christ said, no man can come to Me. You say, Bruce, explain that.
I can explain that very easily. No man can. Come to me. You know what our
problem is, brothers and sisters. And I put my finger on it this
morning, didn't I? We just don't believe it. Ain't
that our problem? A man came up to me, a pastor
I used to have years and years ago. He came up to me and said,
well, I don't understand that particular doctrine. No, that's
not your problem. You just don't believe it. You
just don't believe it. Why would any man stand up and
say, I can come I can come too. The Lord is dealing with everybody
the same, but it's left up to me. I can come. Well, you're
different than everybody else. There's no believer that believes
he has the ability to come to Christ. He doesn't believe that. He believes Christ. He comes
here and looks at this point. No man can come. And this is
what he says in his heart. That's truth. That's the truth. Somebody will say, Bruce, people
are going to use this truth as an excuse not to come. Well,
sure they will. Sure they will. People do it
all the time. If I can't come, then I'm not
going to be concerned about coming. That's right. That's right. You won't be concerned about
coming. That disproves the point, does it? Men will take advantage of God's
free grace any way they can. When they hear that God justifies
us freely, they'll say, let us sin then, that grace may abound. No man can come. And that truth
shall stand no matter how people abuse it. No man can come to
me. The third truth the Lord Jesus
preached is here, falling right on the heels of this one. In
verse 44 and verse 45. When He said, No man can come
to Me, that establishes that we don't have the ability then
to make us admire and love and appreciate the Father's free
grace. He says, Except the Father which
hath sent Me draw him, and I will raise him up at the last day.
It is written in the Prophets. Here's what's written. They shall
be all taught of God. Every man, therefore, that hath
heard and learned of the Father, he cometh unto Me." First of all, the Lord Jesus
said, they will not come. And then He says they cannot
come. Then when He sufficiently shut us up and made us realize
our inability to come, and the hopelessness and helplessness
we're in if He leaves us to ourselves, then He turns and says, except
the Father draw you. And then what's the consequences
of that? Oh, we glory in Him, don't we? We glory in Him for
drawing us, for bringing us. knowing that it's His prerogative
to do so. And all that humbles us in the
dust. And we appreciate Him so much. I love the terminology the Lord
uses here in these two verses. Notice how He says, He said,
no man can come to Me except My Father which sent Me. Draw him. Draw him. I love that. I love
that. I know in a certain sense in
which we're driven to Christ. We flee to lay hold upon the
hope set before us. We flee to Christ. If you flee,
that indicates there's something behind you driving you, doesn't
it? When they fled to the city of refuge, it's because the avenger
of blood was on their trail. And they kept looking back, thinking,
if I can't get to that city of refuge, I'm a dead man. So they
were driven in there by the thoughts of the awful wrath that was behind
them. But here the Lord Jesus uses this appealing word. The Father draws. You know what
that indicates? That indicates that He's standing
right out in front of us, doesn't He? And He's gently tugging us,
gently pulling us in His direction. He's not behind us beating us
and driving us along. He's in front of us drawing us,
drawing us with cords of love. In verse 45, He's speaking here
to our hearts. And He's teaching us. Did you
notice that? I love that term. They that have
heard and learned of the Father. They've heard Him. Boy, that's
something that you have to be so careful with because have
you ever heard God? We hear people all the time say,
God spoke to me. It would scare me to death if
God spoke to me. Wouldn't it you, to be honest, You know,
if I was going outside and suddenly I heard a voice, Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr He's opening your understanding. He's making you to know yourself.
He's making you to know your sin. He's making you to know
His holiness. You begin to see these things
as you never saw before. You know what men's trouble is
today. You know why men won't come to God by Christ. They don't see any beauty in
Him. They don't see any glory in Him. They think basically,
oh, He's sort of like us. They don't see His glory and
His immensity and His holiness and His grace and His love. They
don't see the glory of God. So they're not attracted to it.
And they don't see their own sin and a need of Christ to save
them and be a mediator until God begins to teach them. And boy, He begins to kill you.
He just begins to kill you. He begins to kill you to self-salvation. He begins to kill you to self-ability. He begins to kill you to your
sinful pleasures. Do you notice in your experience,
before the Lord saved you from the power of sin, He saved you
from the pleasure of it? Then you get sick of sin. I mean,
you know, you just go in the world and you're just buying
everything and enjoying pleasures. And all of a sudden, the Lord
begins to open your understanding. He begins to teach you, sometimes
so gradually. And you just get tired of the
world. I'm sick of the world. I'm sick of self. And what do
you finally do? You finally come to God by Christ. It is written in the prophets,
they shall be all taught of God. Every man who hath heard and
learned of the Father comes to Me." He comes to Me. You remember
when Paul was preaching to Lydia and those women? The Scripture
says the Lord opened her heart. that she attained unto those
things which were spoken of Paul. And I imagine he was doing sort
of what I'm doing this evening. He was just opening up the Scriptures
and talking about these things. And all of a sudden, the Lord
opened her understanding. That's what it means to be taught
of God. He teaches us. And when He does, He so shuts
us up to everything else but Christ. And we come to Him. We come to Him. And I love what the Lord Jesus
says here. He says, Every man... Did you
notice this? Now this is His Word. All I've
done is steal His outline. And I'm preaching what He preached. This is nothing new. It was preached
almost 2,000 years ago. And here's what He says. Every
man who hath heard and learned of the Father, He comes to me." You can't deny this, can you?
This is too plain. Now, if you put some title on
this, and you say, I believe in irresistible grace, somebody
is going to run over to Acts chapter 17, and it says, you
do always resist the Holy Ghost. And they say, man, you know what
you're talking about. So let's not even put a title on it. Let's
just repeat what Christ said. Every man, every single individual,
man or woman, boy or girl, whom God has taught, they come to
Christ. Every one of them. Every last
one of them. Every last one of them. He has
the power. He has the wisdom. He has the
ability to so teach a man, so draw a man, that he leaves him
no place else to go but to the Lord Jesus Christ. God's doing His best to save
you. Well, now listen. Now listen.
How does that go with this message Christ's preaching? God has done
everything He can do for you and the rest is up to you. Now
wait a minute. Wait a minute now. The Lord Jesus
said, every man whom God has taught comes to Me. Every one of them. God doesn't
come to these people and try. God doesn't come to these people
and say, I've done everything I can do and now I'm just waiting.
Brothers and sisters, it's not like that, is it? I have told people for years
now, if God dealt, if God drew every man to Christ as He drew
me, He'd save everybody. And I bet you feel that way about
yourself, don't you? Did He leave you any options? Did you say, well, it's just
up to me. I can choose or I can reject. I can come or go away. Did those thoughts ever come
to your heart? Did you really believe it was
optional? No! He removed all the options. He
shut every other door. And there was one place for you
to go, and that's to Christ. Give me Jesus or I'll die. Now, wasn't that the way you
felt? And only God can bring a man there. And listen to me,
brothers and sisters, if you don't bring a man there, that
man won't be brought. Because no man can come. He can't
come. Coming to Christ for life means
God's killing you to yourself. Coming to Christ for joy means
God's killing you to your own worldly pleasure. Coming to Christ
to be saved by His righteousness means God's killing you to your
own And no man can do that for himself. No man can come to me except
my Father draw him. Fourthly, here in verse 51, the
Lord Jesus sets another truth forth. And this truth is very
emphatic. It leaves no room for misinterpretation. It's too plain. for us to miss
what he is teaching. Look here at what he says in
verse 51. I am the living bread which came down from heaven.
If any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever. Now look
at this. And the bread that I will give is my flesh which I will
give for the life of the world. Now, if the world perishes after
Christ has given His life for it, then somehow or another this
statement is not true. The Lord said, I give my life
upon the cross of Calvary. I'm dying in order for the world
to live. Now, first of all, before we
go off into this, Is this a true statement or not? Did He say, did He say, I am
giving my life to give the world a chance? Is that what He said? I am giving my body upon the
cross of Calvary in order that if they will appropriate what
I've done, they could be saved. Did He say that? There's no conditions
that comes with this Word. It's an emphatic statement. It's not an explanation of anything. It's just a statement of fact. I give my flesh for the life
of the world. And it comes down to this, not
explanation, but do we believe it? Do we believe it? I saw a sign not long ago out
in the field. It was a church sign. And it
says this, Jesus loved you enough to die for you. Won't you do
something for Him? In other words, won't you return
the favor? Verse 51 is not about our Lord's
motive in giving His life. He's not speaking here about
why he did it. He's not saying, as he said in
other places, out of love, out of my goodness. Greater love
hath no man than this. But he's not speaking here of
his motive. He's speaking here of his purpose. I gave, I'm giving my flesh for
this purpose. I'm going to save the world by
it. By my dying breath, I'm going
to give life unto the world. It's not an offer. It has nothing
to do with any of that. It's just an emphatic statement
about what He's going to do as a result of His death upon Calvary's
cross. Now, the Jews understand perfectly
what the Lord Jesus was talking about. I want you to hold John
chapter 6 and turn over to Joshua with me. Turn over to Joshua chapter 2. When you talk to a Jew in the
Old Testament, and they make such a statement like, my life
for yours, my life for yours, they knew what you would say. That if it comes down to the
situation and circumstances, where you could and had to give
your life for My life, then I had to go free. If you gave your
life, then I could go free. The Lord Jesus said, I'm giving
My life upon the cross that the world can live. And the Jews
understood this language. Look here in Joshua. Look in chapter 2. This is where
they had sent the spies over Jordan. They came into Jericho. Do you remember that occasion?
And they came to this harlot's house. And the king of Jericho
and his army was looking for these two spies, and they came
to Rahab's house, and she took them up on top of the roof and
hid them where the army, the soldiers couldn't find them.
And here's what she said in verse 9. Look at this. She went up
unto them on the roof after the soldiers left. And she said unto
the men, I know that the Lord hath given you the land, and
that your terror is fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants
of the land faint because of you. She said, I know God's given
you this land, and you're ready to come over to Jordan. And we're
scared to death. We Gentiles are scared to death.
For we have heard how the Lord dried up the waters of the Red
Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what He did unto
the two kings of the Amorites that were on the other side of
Jordan, Sihon and Og, of whom He utterly destroyed. And as
soon as we heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither
did there remain any courage in any man because of you. For
the Lord your God He is God in heaven, above, and in the earth
beneath. Now, therefore, I pray you, swearing
to me by the Lord, since I have shown you kindness, that ye will
also show kindness unto my Father's house, and give me a true sign,
a true token, and that ye will save alive my father, and my
mother, and my brother, and my sister, and all that they have,
and deliver our lives from death. And look at this, and the men
answered her, Our lives for yours. If ye utter not this our business,
and it shall be when the Lord hath given us the land, that
we will deal kindly and truly with thee." She said, give me
a sign. And they said, here's the sign
we're going to give you. Our lives for yours. Our lives for
yours. What did the Lord Jesus mean
when He said, I give my flesh for the life of the world. My
life for yours, he said. That's what he meant. My life
for yours. You remember when, and I think this is probably
a better example still, you remember when they had the famine down
in Israel, and Jacob and his children lived there in the land
of Canaan, and Joseph had been sold down into Where was Joseph sold into? Egypt. Sold out into Egypt. And his
brother went down and he kept Simeon. And he says, you bring
your young brother back and I'll let Simeon go. I'll let old Simeon
go. They went back and told their
father Jacob, said, boy, he's a mean man. He's kept Simeon.
And we're not going back. If you'll let us take little
Benjamin, your sweet little child with us, we'll go back if you
don't. We ain't going back. Because he dealt with us in a
rough way. He's the Lord of the land, they said. And finally,
Jacob said, I'm going to send him back. No, he's not going
back. I ain't going to lose him. He's my little darling. And Reuben,
the elder brother, came. Reuben. Reuben. He's unstable
as water. He comes and says, Dad, if you'll
let Benjamin go down, He said, I'll bring him back and set him
here before your face. If I don't, you kill my two sons. How do you like that? Well, that's
pretty good, ain't it? Yeah, you didn't bring him back,
so now I'm going to kill two of my great-grandsons? My grandson? He said, Reuben, he ain't going
with you, buddy. He ain't going down with you. And Judah came
and said, Father, If you'll let him go with me, I'll be a charity for him. And if I don't bring him back
and set him here healthy before your face, you let me bear the
blame forever." And you know what he said? I'll
send him with you. I'll send him with you. You're
going to be assured of it. And he went down there to Egypt.
And sure enough, Joseph was there. Joseph caught him up again. Put
their money back in their sacks and everything. Sent the soldier
out and brought them back to his house. And they said, God's
found us out. We're in trouble. God's found us out. And all of
them started confessing. And they didn't know who Joseph
was. They just knew He was the Lord
of the land. They didn't realize He was their brother. And Judah said, you keep me and
you let Him go. He said, no, no. You go back
home to your father's house. I'm keeping that young kid myself.
He's staying with me. And Judah came and bowed down
before Joseph and said, listen, please listen to me. I promised
my father that I would be a charity for this lad. And I told him
if I didn't bring this lad before him safe and sound, I'd bear
the blame forever. And he says, now take me and
let him go home. Joseph couldn't take it anymore.
The tears began to flow. You know what he saw in that.
He saw Christ. He saw Christ our surety. He
saw Christ when the Lord Jesus said, My life for the life of
the world. That's a wonderful statement,
ain't it? My life for the life of the world. Is the Lord saying then that
He's going to save every individual in the world? No, He's not saying
that He is. A lot of people are still going
to perish, been perishing through all these centuries. He's not
saying He's going to save every individual without exception.
But that His purpose was to save the human race from its toll. An eternal and utter ruin. One man gave a good example,
illustration of this. There was a cat there somewhere
in Africa, one of the big cats, was about to go extinct. And they sent some people in
there and they passed some laws. And they went in there with the
purpose of saving the cat. And after a couple of years,
they issued the statement, we have saved the cat. We have saved
this cat. It didn't mean they saved every
individual cat. But they saved this family, this
breed of cat, from extinction. That's what the Lord Jesus is
saying. Brothers and sisters, what if
the Son of God had not have gone to the cross? What if He had not atoned for
sin? Where would humanity be? Extinct,
wouldn't it? There is no humanity. Oh, there
is, but where is it? Look down in that abyss, in the
lake of fire. There's where humanity is. Every
member of it is perished. It's extinct. None of them have
been saved. So the Lord Jesus comes and He
says, I'm going to save humanity. Just like those eight souls were
saved in the ark, do you know God saved humanity? He saved
the world. What if there hadn't been an
ark? There would have been no humanity. What if there was no
Christ? There would be no humanity. Brother Glenn read it this morning.
Who is that around the throne of third heaven? Who is that singing, Thou wast
slain and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood? Out of every
kindred and tongue and people and nation. That's what the Lord
Jesus is saying. I have saved humanity by giving
my flesh upon the cross. And it's a very emphatic statement.
He said, this is my purpose to do it. When Jesus went to the
cross, brothers and sisters, He had a purpose. He had a purpose. He knew what He was doing there.
He knew who He was going to save there. If I had to look at the cross
and just say, well, it's a hit or miss, may or may not, left
up to man, wouldn't that be so discouraging? Wouldn't that be
so Christ dishonoring? To bear a man's sin and suffer
for his sins and then that man perish? That can't be. It just can't be. Christ died
with a purpose. And that is a redemptive purpose.
And He will have that purpose accomplished. Fifthly and lastly
is this, and I'll close. I want you to notice very carefully
how sure and certain and fixed this statement is. Look here in verse 37 again. The Lord Jesus said, All the
Father gives to me, they shall come to me. Now is that fixed? Is that fixed? I want you to
look. I just want you to look at how
certain and fixed some people's destiny is. This is destiny. We hear this word talked about
today, but it don't mean anything. But when you come to the Scriptures,
you look at this, you realize what true destiny is. Here are
some people and their destiny is fixed. They are coming to
Christ. They shall come. That's unavoidable, ain't it?
That's inescapable. And He says here, I will never
cast them out. Now that's fixed, ain't it? There
will never be a soul that comes to Jesus Christ and Christ casts
them out. It's never happened, never will.
Never will. And here in verse 39, he says,
I will raise him up at the last day. Now I want you to notice, I want
you to read these carefully. These things aren't said here
Conditionally. There's no condition put on these
things. If you find in other places there
are conditions, then those conditions must also be met. But here there's no condition.
You say, what if a man don't come? Now wait a minute. What
if a man don't come? He says they shall come. What
if Christ cast one out? Wait a minute, He said He wouldn't.
Did He not say that? What if He doesn't raise that
man up at the last day? That's impossible. You say, well,
explain that to me. Here we go again. Here we go
again. See? Ain't that our trouble? Let's fuss about this. But over
here it says this, over here it says this. What does it say
here? This is planned. Let's not go
over there to another scripture we can't understand. Let's stay
right here and say, here, these things are fixed. I will raise
Him up at the last day. That sounds pretty certain, doesn't
it? That sounds sure. This is what
Christ preached. In our Christian experience,
what's going on? Well, we're struggling. You're in the same shape I'm
in. You have some bad weeks. You struggle against temptation.
Sometimes you fall. Sometimes you give in. You go
with this heavy heart. You weep a lot. You worry a lot.
You fret a lot. And you just keep on hanging
on. You keep on praying. That's our experience. But in the purpose of God, how
is it? When we come here and hear the
Lord Jesus speak like this, how is it? It's fixed. How does that
make you feel? If you just believe it and live
in the faith of it, how does that make you feel? It doesn't
matter what goes on between here and the resurrection. Your eternal
destiny and everlasting happiness is fixed. As clear as Jesus Christ
Himself can fix it. I will raise Him up. He's coming to me. I will not
ever cast Him out. And I'll raise Him up at the
last day. And He's going to be with me.
Now brothers and sisters, if we lived in the faith of that,
how would that affect us? It ain't so much getting it in
your intellect. It's so much believing it. I run out of notes. Must be time
to quit. Do you believe the preaching
of Jesus Christ? If He was here this afternoon
and preached this message, would you believe that the Father has
given Him a people to save? Would you believe that? I'm not saying you're able to
intellectually sort all of this out. I'm not saying that. But
do you believe it just because He said it? Do you believe that you don't
have the ability to come to Christ when you first came to Him and
now? Do you ever get so cold? Do you
ever feel yourself so cold and so foreign it scares you? And you realize, Lord, if you
don't draw me, I ain't coming. And you pray like the church
of old, draw me, and then we'll run after you. That's Him showing
you your utter inability. It makes you appreciate Him. And when He draws you, as He
helps you to discern that He is indeed drawing you to Himself.
And He helps you to discern that. When you're going astray, He brings you back. He brings
you back. He brings you back. You keep
coming. You just keep on coming. Do you believe that Jesus Christ's
death upon the cross is enough to save you? Is it enough that
Jesus died and that He died for you? Is that enough? Do you go saying, oh, He's done
no more for me than He did Pharaoh? He did no more for me than He
did Judas. Can you really say that? Will your conscience let
you say that? Can you earnestly say He had
no real purpose in His death? Can you look upon the bleeding
Son of God and really say that? How do you feel when at any time
It dawns upon your mind and your heart that He has fixed your
eternal destiny. How does that affect you? Do
you believe it?