is not the gospel of God. You
can just mark that down. It is not the gospel of God. Our Lord, the one who is said
to be meek and lowly of heart, offended when he preached. He offended many people. He gave
unto God the honor and the glory due unto his name. He did not
dignify the flesh. He never had one good thing to
say about this flesh, ever. The Word of God from Genesis
to Revelation has nothing good, ever, to say about this flesh. Ever. And our Lord never dignified
it. He didn't recognize dignitaries. He didn't say, well, we're glad
that Simon the Pharisee is here tonight. He never recognized
him. He made sure that he gave unto
God all the glory and honor when he spoke. When he spoke. And when he spoke, he preached
the truth. He is the embodiment of truth.
And when he spoke, he preached the truth. The truth about God. They thought they knew God. You know, there's a scripture
in Job that says they were confounded because they had hope. You realize
how many people die in false religion who have a hope of going
to heaven to find out they missed it. They missed it. How upset
they're going to be to find out they missed it. You know, one
time I was preaching in Madisonville, Kentucky, years ago, and I was
on my way home. It was dark. It was thundering
and lightning and just a storm going on, and I was driving along,
and I looked over to the right. There was a sign, and it said
Bowling Green. I thought, how in the world,
how in the world did I get to Bowling Green? I'm headed to
Ashland, and I was so mad. I was mad all the way from the
rest of the way home. Every time I drive 30 minutes,
I think I could be, I keep thinking where I could have been if I
had not messed up. And you can imagine, you just
multiply that, magnify that infinitely. Those who have a false hope,
how confounded they're going to be when they realize they
missed it. They missed it. Our Lord preached the truth about
God, about himself. We'll see that in this chapter.
He preaches and tells them about himself. I'm the bread of life.
I'm the bread that came down from heaven. And they got upset
about that. He claimed to come from heaven. He preached the truth about us.
our need, our need of Him. And we naturally find, naturally,
now by nature, we naturally find truth to be offensive. Isn't that amazing? I think this is a testament to
our depravity, is that when someone tells us the truth, it can actually
make us mad. Truth should never make you mad.
Anybody tells you the truth, you should thank them. Really? If somebody says to me, John,
you're overweight, I should thank you. Thank you. Thank you for telling me that.
But you know what we do? We get offended. We get offended
because of the truth. We naturally think we're better
than we are. We naturally think we are more intelligent than
we are. Ask any man in here, any man, how tall he is, and
then subtract at least one or two inches, and you'll get it.
You'll be closer to being right than he is. We just can't do
it. That's who we are. We want to
be thought of as great. We want to be thought of as intelligent
and wise and all, you know, tall, dark, and handsome. Oh, well, you want the truth?
Do you? Only the truth. You know, the
scripture says you shall know the truth. And what's that going
to do for you? And the truth shall set you free. A lie will never set you free.
Listening to a lie, believing a lie will never set you free.
Telling a lie, you always have to remember how you told it.
But you never have to remember how you tell the truth. Because
it never changes. It never changes. When the Lord speaks, He tells
it just as it is. He doesn't take the edge off
of it. He doesn't compromise. He doesn't have a group of Pharisees
gathered and then He just compromises. Take the edge off of it a little
bit. No, He doesn't. He doesn't. Makes a man. Makes
a man. But our Lord speaks, He tells
it just as it is. That's why people took up stones
to stone Him. They tried to kill Him. They
didn't try to kill Him when He was feeding them, which He does
in this chapter. In this chapter, our Lord feeds
5,000. He feeds 5,000 and after that
He goes over to Capernaum. He sends His disciples ahead
of Him, and then He walks on the water. They're in a storm,
and He walks on the water and meets them, and then they land
in Capernaum the next day. The next day, people are looking
for Him. And they see that He's not there,
so they find out He's over in Capernaum, so they get in a boat,
and they go to Capernaum. And then in verse 26, Well, verse
25, when they had found him on the other side of the sea, they
said to him, Rabbi, when camest thou hither? When did you come
over here? Jesus answered them and said, you see, he doesn't
answer their question. He didn't say, well, I came over
this over last night. You know, we got the boat, we
left. He didn't answer their questions. God's not up for answering
our questions. He gives no account. The scripture
says in Job, he gives no account of any of his matters, and that
just makes us mad. By nature it does. Not after
God saves you. But I tell you, sometimes it
will flat disappoint you. You have any plans just last week
that didn't go right? Or not all things of God? Why are you disappointed? I'll
tell you why you're disappointed, because His will was done instead
of mine. And that's when we get disappointed.
And that reveals a lot about us. And we need to know that. We need to know it. But Jesus
answered them and said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I'll
tell you why you came over. I'll tell you why you came over.
I'll tell you what you're looking for. It's not because you saw
the miracles and thought, this is the Son of God. No man can
do miracles like this but the Son of God. No, that's not why
you came. He knows why every one of us
is here. I'll tell you why you came, because you did eat of
the loaves. You got a free dinner out of it. Oh, somebody was telling me not
too, it's been, that's not been too long ago, he was talking
about a conference he went to, and the first thing he said to me
was how good the food was. He got a free dinner, got a free
dinner. You did eat of the loaves and
were filled. Now don't labor, don't strive, don't give your
life and your heart for the meat of this world, for that meat
that perishes, but for that meat which endures into everlasting
life. which the Son of Man shall give unto you, for him hath God
the Father sealed. But I'll tell you the truth.
I'll tell you why you came. My reason for coming and him
telling the truth about why I came may not be the same. I hope it
is. I hope it is. But he stopped
them right in their tracks and said, I'm going to tell you why
you followed me. I'm going to tell you why you came across the pond. And that's because
you got a free dinner out there. Not because of the miracles.
Not because you think I'm the son of God. Not at all. Now while he was feeding the
5,000, and before this he had done some healing, they loved
him. They were going to take him and
make him king. At one point they were ready to take him and make
him king. But when he began to preach to them, they turned on
him. Oh, I tell you, it's amazing
how fickle the crowd is, isn't it? The same crowd, the same
crowd that cried, Hosanna, glory to God in the highest, when he
came riding in the town on that donkey, that is the same crowd
that cried, crucify him, a little bit later. Same crowd. Same crowd. When he began to preach the truth,
and tell them the truth, and to expose who he is, I am the
bread of life. Not like the bread that your
fathers ate in the manna, or ate in the wilderness, over there
in the, let me see here, verse 30, look in verse 30. They said
therefore unto him, what size showest thou then that we may
see and believe thee? What doest thou work? Or they
just, they saw the miracles before, how many you want? Our fathers
did eat manna in the desert, as it is written, he gave them
bread from heaven to eat. And Jesus said unto them, verily,
verily, I say unto you, Moses did not give that bread. 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 into the world." This is who
I am. I am the bread of God. I'm from God. I came from above. He said over here in one place,
your fathers, in verse 49, your fathers did eat manna in the
wilderness and they're dead. There's no life in the types.
There was never any life in the tithe. But here's what he's saying. Your fathers ate that man in
the wilderness, and they perished. They perished. They're dead.
He's not just saying they died. You know, when he spoke of Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, he said that God is not the God of the dead,
but of the living. And here he says your fathers ate it, and
they're dead. That bread didn't give them life
in any way, shape, or form, and they perished. How many, how
many that walked in that wilderness, how many of the original group
went into the land of Canaan? Two. Joshua and Caleb. The rest of them died in unbelief. Unbelief. They, they were offended. They
were offended when he began to tell them who he was. He told
them the truth about God. We'll see a little bit more of
that here as I go along. It offended them. It says in one place, many
of them walked off. They left him and walked no more
with him. See, they followed him while
he was feeding them. And they followed him when they
saw the miracles. But when he turned and preached the gospel
to them, preached the truth to them, many of them were offended.
And the thing that offended them was his substitutionary work.
He said, you got to eat my flesh and drink my blood. And their logic thinking, human
logic. Now this is human logic. They
were thinking, we're not cannibals. And he wasn't talking about that
at all. He's talking about faith. He's
talking about eating his flesh and drinking his blood. He's
talking about faith, receiving him and living on him by faith. believing on him and following
after him. And then they were offended, listen, they were offended
because he didn't have any pedigree. What's he telling us this? How
about this man letters having never learned is what they said. He didn't go to our school. He
didn't graduate with our class. He has no college degree. What's
he doing talking to us about, you know, Those Pharisees were
offended at that. Because I'll tell you what, they
spent a long time, about 26 years. About 26 years of learning. And
this man comes on the scene, and then he gets all this popularity,
people follow him, and it offended them. They said, look in verse 41,
42. He talks about being a bread from heaven, coming down from
heaven. And they say, and the Jews, In verse 41, the Jews then
murmured at him, because he said, I am the bread which came down
from heaven. And they said, is not this Jesus,
the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? And they're
nobody. They're nobody. He's a carpenter.
Over Mark, he said, this is the carpenter's son. We know your
brothers and sisters. And it says, and they were offended.
They were offended. They were offended that he had
no pedigree, offended of his birth. We know your parents. They were offended at him. He
just offended them. One of them said, can any good
thing come out of Nazareth? Come in here, come in here. This
man from Jesus of Nazareth. And Nathaniel said, can any good
thing come out of that place? Surely not. Surely not. What did our Lord say? What did he say that offended
them? He spoke of God's sovereignty
in saving sinners. That's what he spoke. Look at
verse 38 and 39. Let's go to verse 37. All that
the Father giveth me shall come to me. And him that cometh to
me, I will know why is cast out. For I came down from heaven.
That's where I came from. I'm from above. You're from beneath.
not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me. And
this is the Father's will." You'd think we'd just get up on the
edge of our seat because he's getting ready to tell us the
Father's will. He's telling them the Father's will. "...which
hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me, I should lose
nothing." Not one hair of their head shall perish of the ones
the Father gave me, but should raise it up again at the last
day. And this is the will of him that sent me, that everyone
who seeth the Son and believes on him may have everlasting life,
and I'll raise him up at the last days." And then that's when
they murmured. That's when they murmured at
him. He preached God's sovereignty. God saves whom he will. Whether it be a Gentile or a
Jew, God saves whom he will. You know, in all the years, and
I'm going on about 40 years since I heard the gospel and believed
it, and talked to different people over the years, in the workplace,
places I've preached, not one person Not one person has ever
been upset that God did not provide a Savior for the lost angels.
And not one person was ever upset over God electing a multitude
of angels not to fall. Have you ever met anybody upset
over that? But when you mention God's sovereignty in your life, when you mention God, it's all
right for God to be sovereign in somebody else's life or some
other realm. But when you mention God's sovereignty
in my life, that's a different story. That's a different story. Now you're getting mad. Now you're
getting mad. God creating upsets no one. Might have upset Darwin, but
no one else. God creating upsets no one. But God saving? God saving
whom he will? Offends every lost soul out there. Everyone out there outside of
Christ, does not believe Christ, hates the fact that God Almighty
is sovereign. That He does as He will, with
whom He will, when He will. Do you know anyone wiser to do
that? Do you? God is infinite in wisdom. Henry said one time, God is going
to save everyone He can wisely save. he is. He is. The potter exercising his right
over the clay offends the clay. Until he strips you by grace
and brings you to yourself, gives you a new heart, a new spirit,
a right spirit, then you say amen. Then you say Amen. When God saves you, but you know
salvation is a, I've been saved, I'm being saved, and I shall
be saved. And if there's one thing I have
learned over the years, that all the grave clothes did not
fall off that day. And all my ignorance was not
removed that day. Salvation is a process. God saved
me. I'm saved. The day He saved me,
called me by His grace, gave me a new birth, I'm as saved
as I'll ever be. But there's a process of growing
in grace and in knowledge of Christ and learning of God and
learning the truth and learning to submit to His will and not
be so upset about it as time goes by. Because we still do.
Now we do. We have We have plans, we have
things we want to do, we have things we want to accomplish,
they don't happen, and we get upset. Jonah, when God took that
gourd, you know, he raised that gourd up overnight. Jonah's sitting
there basking under that, and it was hot, and Jonah's sitting
there under that gourd, and he just had, you know, this is a,
oh it's a blessing. And then God took it down. He
killed it. Sent a worm. Killed it. And then
Jonah was angry. Angry? Johnny, you should be
just as happy when you're under the shade as when you're out
there in that hot sun. It reveals a lot about us. How much sin
is still in us. When we take the crown off the
head of fallen man. Let this be said on television.
You see there's some nasty, some nasty letters you get. When we
take the crown off the head of fallen man and put it on Christ's
head, where it belongs, that's when you find out who loves Christ
and who loves self. It's who gets to wear the crown
at the end of the day. Me or Christ. Christ, I'm nothing. He's my everything. All in all. All in all. Here's what offends man. God
is sovereign and God's will, God's will is to be done. God's will is to be done. Our
Lord spoke of the sovereign will of God. This is the will, he
said, of him that sent me. Now what do you think about it?
It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what I think
about it. This is the will of Him that sent me. He didn't come
to ask our opinion on anything. You notice when God created Adam,
he was the last thing created? God created everything just as
He willed it to be, then gave it to Adam. Then created Adam
and put him in the garden. He didn't say, Adam, you like
it? He didn't create Adam and say, what do you think about
it? How do you think I ought to make a tree? How do you think I ought to make
a cow? He created everything exactly. exactly the way he willed
it to be. And then he created Adam and
put him in the garden and said, now take care of it. Dress and
keep it. Be still and know that I'm God. But they got upset and men get
upset over God's sovereignty and salvation. I talked to a
man one time, a family member, and I was talking to him about
the sovereignty of God's salvation. He said, you mean that God may
not save my children? I said, He may not. He said,
I don't want that. I don't want anything to do with
that. Well, first of all, it doesn't matter if you want anything
to do with it or not. It doesn't matter. It is what it is. And we face the truth. And those
whom God saves, they bow to it. And would have it no other way. No other way. Look over in Luke
chapter 4. Luke chapter 4. Give you an incident here of Christ preaching the sovereignty
of God They got mad. This is Luke 4, Luke in verse...
Let me find a place. In verse 25. Verse 25. But I tell you of a truth. I'm
telling you the truth. Here's the truth, I'm telling
you. Many widows were in Israel in the days of Elias, when the
heaven was shut up three years and six months, when great famine
was throughout all the land. But unto none of them was Elias
sent, save unto Sarepta, a city of Sidon, unto a woman that was
a widow, a Gentile woman. She took care of him. And many
lepers were in Israel in the time of Eliseus the prophet.
Many lepers, many Israelites were lepers. And none of them
was cleansed, not one of them, except Naaman the Syrian, whom
they hated. And all they in the synagogue,
when they heard these things, what things? The sovereignty
of God, God saves whom He wills. God saves whom he will. When
they heard these things, they were filled with wrath, rose
up and thrust him out of the city and led him to the brow
of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might cast
him down headlong. But he, how did he do this? But he, passing through the midst
of them, went his way. They didn't even notice. They're
just like, where'd he go? And he was walking right through
the midst of them. Sovereignty and salvation just
makes men mad. As I told you, it says in Job
33, he gives no account of any of his matters. I'm gonna go
too long here. But when you take the book of
Job, and you look what all happened to Job, then you get over to
the chapter there, around, what is it, 38, somewhere in there?
God speaks. Does he say, Job, I'm sorry I
didn't, I'm sorry I had to do that. That proved poor. Sorry
I had to do that. You know what he says? Job, gird
up your loins like a man, and I'm going to ask you some questions,
and you answer them. He doesn't apologize. He doesn't
say, I wish I didn't have to do that. He just says, gird up
your loins like a man, Job, like the man I've made you, and I'm
going to ask you some questions, and you give me the answer. Where
were you when I laid the foundations of the earth? Boy, read those. Read those chapters. And you
know, at the end of that, Job said, By the hearing of the ear,
I have heard of thee. But now, and that's why I was
talking about salvation being a process. Now, mine eye seeth
thee, and I abhor myself. You know, a believer repents
when God saves a sinner. Repent. But you know, as life
goes on and you learn more about yourself, you abhor yourself
more now than you did then. You're like, I thought I was
bad then. I'm rotten. Oh, wretched man that I am. Paul
said that after God saved him. A few years after he saved him. Oh, what a wretched man I am.
I don't live like a wretch anymore, but I still am one by nature.
I have that nature. God, He gives no account of any
of His matters. Because I said so, makes men
mad. You teenagers, any of you teenagers
still at home, mom and dad says do something. Why? Because I
said so. That just makes you mad and never
want to slap somebody. Doesn't it? It does. You want an answer. You want to know why. When you read the Gospels, look
at it. Christ rarely ever answers a question. He'll ask the question. He's not on trial, we are. He's not the one on trial. Hath not the potter power over
the clay? Can he not make, if he will, one lump unto honor
and another unto dishonor? Can he not do that? Absolutely. And He proves it every day. He
proves it. Then Christ preached man's inability
to come to Him. You know, today's religion is... Won't you accept Jesus as your
personal Savior? Won't you come to Him? Won't
you do this? Won't you do that? Christ said you can't by yourself. of your own strength. You cannot
come to Christ. You cannot come to God. He said
you can't come to the Father. If you try, first of all, you're
showing that you're ignorant of your need of a mediator. Look in verse 44. No man can
come to me. It's impossible. It's absolutely
impossible for any man to come to me, accept the Father which
hath sent me, draw him, except he first woo me and draw me and
create life in me. I do not believe God and then
I'm born again. I don't believe God until the
new birth happens. Dead people don't believe. The problem is we don't believe
what dead is dead. We don't realize what dead is.
Is there any degree of dead? I don't know why we don't understand
about that. It says we're dead in trespasses
and sins. There is no such thing as degrees
of dead. Dead is dead. I've heard someone
say, well, they're barely alive, or they're just barely hanging
on. I've never heard anybody say,
well, he's barely dead. No, if he's dead, he's dead. You can
call the coroner. It's done. And man is dead in
trespasses and sins. He is completely, in every way,
shape, and form, dead to God. He's dead to God. He whittles
one out of his own, of his own imagination, and it'll always
be how he thinks it ought to be. And it's how he sees himself
normally. He'll be whittling something
out that kind of mirrors him. No man can come to me 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,
and they shall be all taught of God. Every man, therefore,
that heard and learned of the Father, taught of the Father,
called by Him, comes to me. Comes to me. That offended them, their inability
to come to God. They said, we be Abraham's seed.
We be not born of fornication. We are the sons of Abraham. We
are automatically in the covenant. No, you're not. No, you're not. Everyone is sons of Adam first,
right? And we're not sons of Adam first.
Born into this world, sons of Adam. The Jew and Gentile trace
their lineage all the way back to one man, Adam. Adam. We know from the scriptures that
every human being is spiritually dead, blind, deaf, until God
gives them life. Until God, just like that baby
in Ezekiel 16, laying in the field, when I passed by you,
the time was love, and I said unto you, live. Live. You can't be taught until you're
alive. You can't learn anything till you're alive. And we can't
learn anything of God till God gives us life. And we can't come
to God unless He draws us. We're totally shut up to His
mercy, His sovereign mercy. Then Christ spoke of the regenerating
work of the Holy Spirit. He said in verse 63, it's the
Spirit that quickeneth. Look here in verse 63. It says in verse 61, when Jesus
knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said to them,
does this offend you? What if you see the Son of Man?
If you think this offends you, wait till you see the Son of
Man. Ascend up where he was before. It's a spirit that quickens,
it's a spirit that gives life. The flesh profits nothing. The
words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are
life. Except a man be born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. No matter how intelligent a man
is. Nicodemus, probably one of the most intelligent men of that
day, was just dumbfounded when the Lord said, you must be born
again. You know what he thought of?
How can I go back to my mother's womb and then be born again? This is, now listen, this is
the leader. This is a leader. And he was spiritually, absolutely
spiritually ignorant. Ignorant. He didn't have a clue
what the Lord was talking about. And you wouldn't either. And
I wouldn't either. Unless we're born again. Unless we're born
again. Then Christ spoke of the need
for faith. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood." Apart from that, apart from faith
in Christ, you perish. You perish. You perish. Apart from exercising faith in
Him, you perish. He says here, He that eateth
my flesh, in 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, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me,
even he shall live by me. And that live by me is daily. Daily. Wake up daily. The just shall
live by faith daily. That's every day. I don't turn on CNN to see what's
going on. In fact, I don't turn that stuff
on anymore anyway. It just drives me nuts. The best thing to do is turn
to the Word of God and see what's going on. To live on Him daily. And when
you hear all the news that's going on, let us never forget
that Christ is on the throne. And he is absolutely orchestrating
everything going on on this earth. You and I, I can't understand
it. The good things and the bad things, all the stuff, what a
mess. And yet it is being perfectly orchestrated by a man seated
at God's right hand. By Christ. Seated there. And that made him mad. I made
it mad for him to say, you've got to live by me. If you're
going to have life, if you're going to come to God, it's going
to be through me. And they're looking at a man standing in
poor garb. They're looking at a man that
does not have a crown on his head, no halo hanging over his
head, no robe. They're looking at a man, if
you would Unless God gives you different eyes, unless He gives
you the eyes of faith, if the Lord walked in here as He appeared
then, you'd be disappointed. You would say just the same thing
they'd said. This can't be God. This can't be God. Isn't that
what it says in Isaiah 53? There's no beauty. When we shall
see Him, when He comes, when He came as a substitute, there's
no beauty that we should desire Him. There's nothing about him
that's going to attract you and get your attention and say, wow. No, actually, when they saw him,
they were offended. He claimed to be the Son of God. Son of
God wouldn't look like this. Son of God wouldn't dress so poorly.
Son of God wouldn't hang out with sinners. Surely the Son
of God wouldn't hang out with publicans and sinners. And they
said, this man eateth with publicans and sinners. You think a Pharisee
would do that? A Pharisee wouldn't be caught
in a mile of them. They wouldn't drink at the same
fountain. They wouldn't eat at the same
restaurant. They wouldn't do it. But yet when God came into
this world, the people he identified with, the people he sat down
with, sinners. I mean, the ones that was the
most hated in town. The most. Well, I'm going to have to, I'm going to go ahead and close
this. I got too much material here. How do you find the gospel? How
do you find the gospel message? Good news or offensive? I'm convinced,
though, that everyone here finds it. You either find it as good
news or you just... It doesn't really matter. You're
just lost as to the day you were born. It doesn't really matter. Because I've been there. I've
been there. I wouldn't wish you to hurry up and shut up so we
can go home. No interest whatsoever. I know there's a group here that's...
You rejoice in this message. But not always. Not always. Not always. Do I embrace Him? Or do I walk
away? Do I embrace Him, the sovereign
God of heaven and earth? Who does as He will, when He
will, with whom He will? Do I embrace the Lord Jesus Christ
as my all in all? As my meat and my bread, my water,
my drink, my life, my occupation? He's everything. Everything. Does this offend you? That's
what he said. If it does, you just wait till
it's over and you see Him sitting on the throne. You wait till
you see the Son of Man ascend to heaven where He was before.
If the message offends you, you wait till reality gets you. I thank God. I thank God. I do. It offends me no more. I'm thankful
for it. That's the only way it can be.
Only way it can be.