Is God Defeated? #2

Q: What does the Bible say about God's sovereignty?

The Bible teaches that God is absolutely sovereign and reigns over all creation. The Bible is clear that God exercises sovereignty over the entire universe. Romans 3:3 poses a rhetorical question about God's purpose being thwarted by human unbelief. Job 42:2 underscores this, indicating that God's purposes cannot be hindered, and that He does what He wills in the heavens and the earth. This sovereignty is foundational to understanding God's nature and His authority over all situations, including creation, providence, and salvation. God's sovereign control assures believers that nothing can happen that goes against His divine plan.

Q: How do we know God accepts us?

God accepts us based on His grace and the work of Christ, not our own acceptance. God's acceptance of us is demonstrated through Scripture, especially in Job 42, where God mentions Job's acceptance after Job's repentance. Similarly, in Ephesians 1:6, we read that believers are made accepted in the beloved, pointing to Christ's redemptive work as the basis for our acceptance before God. Acceptance is not a matter of us choosing God but rather His grace and will in choosing us and making us fit for His presence. This profound truth is central to the assurance of one’s salvation and relationship with God.

Q: Why is understanding man's depravity important for Christians?

Understanding man's depravity highlights the necessity of God's grace for salvation. The depravity of man is a core doctrine in Reformed theology, emphasizing that all humans are born in sin and are incapable of seeking God without divine intervention. Romans 3 states that no one seeks after God and that we are spiritually dead without Christ. This underscores the need for a Savior. Recognizing our depraved state leads to acknowledging our total reliance on God's grace for salvation. It's through understanding our lost condition that we can appreciate the magnitude of God's mercy and the work of Christ on the cross, which redeems us from this state.

Q: How does Christ's redemptive work show God's love?

Christ's redemptive work exemplifies God's love by reconciling sinners to Himself. In the Reformed perspective, Christ was sent to accomplish the work of redemption for those whom the Father had given Him. This act of sacrificial love fulfills God's promise to forgive sins and restore a broken relationship with humanity. As seen in John 6:39, Christ declares that the will of the Father is for Him to lose none of those given to Him. The cross stands as the ultimate demonstration of God's love, showcasing His justice in dealing with sin and His mercy in providing salvation through the blood of Christ. This work is effective and guarantees the salvation of His chosen people, emphasizing the depth of God's love.

I want to begin the message tonight
where I left off this morning. So if you'll turn with me to
Job chapter 42. Job 42. Now the title of this
message is part two of the message, Is God Defeated? Is God Disappointed? Is the living
God of heaven and earth frustrated as we hear indicated and suggested
by most preaching that's taken place today? I read your passage
this morning from the book of Romans that asked this question,
is God defeated? Paul said this, he said, what
if some did not believe? What if the Jews did not believe? What if the Gentiles did not
believe? What if the princes and rulers
and religionists do not believe? Does that make the purpose of
God, the covenant of God, without effect? If they do not believe,
is God defeated? I can't vouch for the truthfulness
of this because I've never seen the sign, but I am told that
there is a sign, or was, several years ago in front of a preacher's
school down south which read like this, God said it, line
two, I believe it, line three, that settles it. What's wrong
with that? Well, if God set it, that settles
it, whether you believe it or not, or whether I believe it
or not. My believing God has nothing
to do with the character of God. My believing the Bible has nothing
to do with the truthfulness of the Bible. Now, we are proud
creatures, and we think it shakes heaven and earth when we say,
well, I don't believe that. Well, I don't believe that. Well,
I don't believe that. Well, what difference does it
make? It has no effect upon it. It
will never change it. And over here in Job chapter
42, beginning with verse 7. I hope you'll go back this week
and read those chapters I read this morning, Job 38, 39, 40,
and 41. We ought to read those chapters
frequently, those 70 some odd questions that God asked Job. And he just kept pressing that
man down, down, down, down. Until finally Job said, well,
I know you can do everything, and I know no purpose and thought
of yours can be hindered. And I know I'm the one you were
talking about when you said, who is he that hath counsel without
knowledge? I have spoken things that I did
not understand. Do you see that in verse 3? I
have uttered that which I did not understand." Have you ever
been guilty of that? Of popping off about something
you didn't know anything about? It ought to be embarrassing.
Boy, I have. Things too wonderful for me. Just too wonderful. Verse 5,
I've heard of thee by the hearing of the ear, now mine eye seeth
thee. You hear what Cecil read while
ago in verse 36? The Lord said, you've seen me,
and you haven't believed, you believe not. Job said, I've seen
you, I do believe. You've seen me, Christ said,
in my authority and power, and you haven't believed. Job said,
I do. I've heard about you, and now
mine eye seeth thee, and I believe." I repent. I repent. And this is the will of Him that
sent me. You read this verse also, that
everyone that seeth the Son as He is, not this other Jesus that
men are preaching, not this weak, impotent, frustrated, defeated,
disappointed Jesus who cries His eyes out. wrings his hands
because men won't let him have his way. That's not the one.
But you've seen me. And wait till you see him ascend
up where he was before. If this offends you, if the authority
vested in Jesus Christ offends you now, wait till you see him
where he was before. Glorify me with the glory which
I had with thee before the world was. Now you talk about offensive. But we've seen him in his authority,
and he that believeth, he that seeth the Son and believeth,
I'll raise him up at the last day." Well, verse 7, And it was
so that after the Lord had spoken these words unto Job, that the Lord said to Eliphas
the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against you. and against your
two friends. And what's God angry about? Now
this is another thing that I'm told that God's not angry with
anybody. That God is like a silly old
granddaddy, that he just loves everybody and everything and
nothing riles him or disturbs him or makes him angry. But he's
angry with these fellas He said, my wrath is kindled against you
and your two friends. And why? What had they done?
You have not spoken of me, the thing that's right. You hadn't
told the truth on me, God said. I tell you, these were very pious
gentlemen. These three fellows, Bildad and
Zophar and Eliphas, they were very Diligent and moral and religious
men. But God said, I'm angry with
you, fellas. And He said it twice. He said, you haven't spoken of
Me the thing that's right as My servant Job hath. Verse 8,
Therefore take unto you now seven bullocks and seven rams, and
go to My servant Job, and offer up for yourselves a burnt offering.
And My servant Job will pray for you, For him will I accept,
lest I deal with you after you folly, in that you have not spoken
of me the thing that's right. You hadn't told the truth on
me." Well, I'll tell you, Job did,
after God revealed himself to him. Job showed the right attitude
towards the living God. He said, I hate myself, I put
my hands on my mouth. I've uttered things too wonderful,
I've spoken once, twice, I'll never speak again, I repent in
dust and ashes, I despise myself." Wherefore it said God accepted
him. God accepted him. See that in
verse 8? He said, for him will I accept. And then down here in verse 9,
so Eliphas, the Temanite, Bildad, the Shuhite, and Zophar, that
they Amorthite, went and did according to the Lord commanded
them, the Lord also accepted Job. The word accept and accepted
is used a great deal in connection with our relationship with God
in this day. Is it not what I have heard and am hearing
preached is the appeal to the sinner to accept Jesus, accept
Jesus, accept Jesus as your personal Savior. People say, I've been
saved in 1951 or 1975, I accepted Jesus as my personal Savior.
Well, I did a little research in the concordance, and I can't,
to save my life, find that in God's Word, where sinners accept
Jesus. But I do find God accepting sinners. I find it twice here. God said
of Job, I have accepted him. I have accepted Job. God's not
up for acceptance or rejection on the part of the sinner. Paul
wrote this in 2 Corinthians. He said we labor, whether present
or absent, that we may be what? Accepted of him. I want to be
accepted of Him. It's not a matter of my accepting
God. He's the King, He's the Sovereign,
He's the Holy One, He's the One who lives forever. I'm the sinner on the dunghill. I want
Him to come where I am and wash me and cleanse me, redeem me,
make me holy and accept me. It says in Ephesians that we
are accepted. He hath made us accepted. He hath made us accepted in the
beloved. God accepts us. You see, we got
everything backwards. I don't know whether there's
any hope for us or not. I don't know whether there's
any hope for my generation or not. I really don't. I don't
think there's any hope for my generation unless we come to
the place where God brought Job right here. Somebody's going to have to stand
up and be counted and declared without compromise who God is. We're going to have to be introduced
like Job was to the living God. And this is the whole issue. This was the issue here in this
episode, who is God? This is the issue right here,
with all of this discussion, conflict, rhetoric, oratory,
everything, who is God? Who is God? And I do say this,
and I say it with all confidence, that when men find out who God
is, when they find out who God is, they're going to find out
who they are. That's when they're going to
find out who they are. When they find out who God is, what God
is, then they're going to find out who they are and what they
are. Isaiah did. He said, in the year that King
Uzziah died, I saw the Lord. High and lifted up in His train,
His glory filled the temple. And the cherubims and seraphims
cried, Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God Almighty. And he said, and I cried, woe
is me. I am a man of unclean lips and
I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. Saul, on the
road to Damascus, in his pride, in his religion, in his arrogance,
in his self-esteem, in his blameless righteousness, riding on that
white charger with orders in his hand Straighten out the religious
world, discipline these people of that way, and Almighty God
shined a light. This was during the daytime too.
He shined a light that put the sun to shame. He shined a light
from heaven that blinded this man, literally blinded this man,
and knocked him off his horse in the dust. God displayed His
power to Saul of Tarsus. And he lifted those sightless
eyes to heaven and he said, Who are you, Lord? Who are you? Who are you, Lord? I'll tell
you, he's the one that can put a man in the dust. He's the one
that can break the back of the proudest rebel. He's the one
who can save whom he will, when he will, by his power. That's right. He said, I'm Jesus
of Nazareth, that's who I am. Well, he said, Lord, what would
you have me do? What would you have me do? And that's what happened
here. I don't know when Job was saved.
I wouldn't try to answer that question for anything in the
world. I know way back yonder, God said
he was a righteous man. God called him my servant. God
said he hated evil. love righteousness. But I do
know here that he saw some things he hadn't seen before. I know he saw some things here
that had a profound effect. And I know this, when a man finds
out who God is, it'll determine his attitude, his conduct, and
his eternal destiny, when he finds out who God is. And most
people have not. I told my Sunday school class
this morning there's a word, there's a word that we've taken
out of the churches and taken out of the, it was in one of
our hymns tonight, but we've taken it largely out of the hymn
book, we've taken it out of our conversation. You never hear
it mentioned on the religious broadcast. It's a word that we've
just about excluded. You know what the word is? F-E-A-R,
fear. The fear of the Lord. And do
you know this? That in the Old Testament, the
fear of the Lord was synonymous with the worship of God. It talked about Abraham who feared
the Lord. Jacob who feared the Lord. Isaac
who feared the Lord. One who feared the Lord with
all his house. And David said, Come, my children,
and let me teach you." What? The fear of the Lord. And another
one said, the beginning of wisdom is what? The fear of God. And the charge against people
in Romans 3, no fear of God before their eyes. Well, I know this,
and you write this down, and the worship, the so-called worship
of churches, and I know that's just Let it all hang out tonight,
but all of this hand-waving and hand-clapping and preachers dancing
and all this jive and rock-and-roll religious singing and these quartets
with their pinecones stuck up their noses, you know, singing,
all of them got a microphone. It's a degeneration even of depravity,
to call that worship. It's not worship. I tell you
when a man worships God, it's when he falls on his face in
humility and reverence and fears God. And nobody's going to worship
God until he fears God. He's going to fear the Lord.
John, the beloved John who leaned on his breast at the Last Supper
on the Isle of Patmos heard his voice and turned to see who spoke
and did what? jumped up and danced a holy jig. No, sir, he fell on his face
like a dead man." Daniel said, when I saw the Lord, my comeliness
literally melted. He said his joints just didn't
have any more strength. It just all melted, his strength
and comeliness just melted into corruption. I saw the Lord. I know this. When men find out
who God is, when they find out who God is, in all of His majesty
and His holiness and His glory, the awesome, awful presence of
God, they'll fear the Lord. And that's when they'll worship
God, and that's when they'll find salvation, and that's when they'll have
peace. That's when they'll have peace. That's when, like you
say, things will be all right. They'll be all right because
He's on the throne. That's the only way everything
can be all right, is for God to be on the throne. But I will
give you five or six things here now, and you listen to me. And
these are things of which I am absolutely confident. I'm as
certain of these six or seven things I'm going to give you
as this Bible is the Word of God. The first one is this, our
God, our God, literally, unchangeably reigns in heaven and earth. He
is sovereign. I mean He is absolutely sovereign. He doeth according to His will
in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of this earth.
God is sovereign in creation. He made everything as it pleases
Him. We read that in the book of Job
today. God is sovereign in providence. Even, and I know that the preachers
today are talking about Satan did this and Satan did that.
Satan and all the demons of the universe can't do anything that
God doesn't let them do. Now you read the first chapter
of Job and see if that's not true. When the sons of God appeared
before the Lord, Job appeared with them and he asked permission
to touch Job. God gave him permission. Christ
gave Satan permission to sip Peter. And when he cast the demons
out of the man to the gatherings, they asked permission to go into
the pigs. And when our Lord When those
demons were cast out, they said, we know who you are. You're the
Holy One of Israel. You're the Holy One of God. Have
you come to torment us before our time? Isn't that what they
said? And God is omnipotent and sovereign in salvation. He'll
save whom He will. He'll call Abraham. He'll show
mercy to Noah. He'll say, Jacob have I loved,
and Esau have I hated. Don't stutter and fumble and
falter when you express those things. That's so. God's sovereign. Aren't you glad He is? I love
that hymn. My times are in thy hands. My
God, I want them there. I'm glad salvation's of the Lord. Election is not a door that shuts
men out of the kingdom of God who otherwise would have been
saved. Election is the door that includes men who otherwise would
have been damned. And I'll tell you the second
thing that I'm as confident of and sure of as I'm standing here,
and these are things that separate friends and separate families
And divide, Christ said, I didn't come to send peace, I came to
bring a sword. I've come to set a man at variance
against his father, and a woman against her mother. The second thing I'm confident
of is men and women are fallen, depraved, defiled, dead creatures. Your sins have separated you
and your God. People by nature do not know
God. They do not seek God. God dwells in a life to which
no man can approach. The natural man receiveth not
the things of God. You say, why do you believe these
things? God has revealed them to me. That's the only reason
I believe them. If God leaves a man to himself, he will perish. Christ didn't come into the world
to condemn the world. The world was already condemned. You neither know me nor my Father,
he said. No man knoweth the Father but
the Son, and he to whom the Son will reveal him. Sinners are
dead. You have to quicken who were dead, dead in trespasses
and sin. The third thing I know is this.
Without apology, I declare openly, publicly, wherever God gives
me an opportunity to preach it, Almighty God has, out of this
sinful race, Out of this world, out of every tribe, kindred,
nation, and tongue unto heaven, Jew and Gentile, old and young,
rich and poor, white and black, God has chosen a people. He calls them His elect, He calls
them His sheep, He calls them His jewels. He has chosen a people
to be saved. He has given them to His Son. God chose them. You didn't choose
me. He said, I chose you. I chose
you. He chose them before the world
began. He chose them because He would,
according to the good pleasure of His own will. He chose His
people. Everybody whom He chose will
be saved, and everybody whom He says He has chosen. The Apostle
Paul preached in Acts 13 and verse 48 said, and everyone that
was ordained to eternal life believed. That's so. And the fourth thing I know that
is true is this. Jesus Christ, our substitute,
our Redeemer, our surety, our Savior, came to this earth to
accomplish a work that was laid on Him and given to Him and entrusted
to Him before the foundation of the world. And that is to
suffer for and to bleed for and to die for those people whom
the Father gave. to face the law in the flesh
as a man tested, tried, tempted in all points, and to fulfill
for them before God and before his law and impute unto them
an absolutely perfect righteousness called the righteousness of God,
and to justify them before God Almighty's throne, to enable
a holy God to be just and justified. And that death of Christ and
that life of Christ is effectual. It's sufficient. It cannot be
defeated. He shall see the travail of his
soul be satisfied. By his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many. And there's not one single soul
in heaven for whom Christ suffered and died. And there's not one
single soul in heaven for whom he did not suffer and die. The difference between heaven
and hell is not my decision, nor my faith, nor my faithfulness. The difference between heaven
and hell is the grace of God in Christ Jesus. That's so. There's no use fumbling around
with that. There's no use apologizing. It's either so or it's not so
now. It can't be both. What I'm talking
about here, there is no neutral ground. I know people have to
get in here and compromise some things and get along. Everything's
not this white and black, this cut and dry. I know there's some
areas where we kind of give and take a little bit. But Paul said,
if any man preach any other gospel, let him be damned. You know what
he said? And this is gospel. The character
of God can't be compromised. There's no neutral ground. I
can't get in the middle. It's not a live and let live
proposition. If God does not live, none of
us live. He's sovereign or he's not. Men are dead or they're not.
There's no neutrality there. God elected, chose a people,
or He didn't choose anybody. Now which is it? Christ redeemed
us effectually, sufficiently, absolutely, didn't leave one
thing missing. Or He redeemed nobody. Now which
is it? And I know this, the Spirit of
God will call them. He'll call them. The Spirit of
God will find them. The Spirit of God will awaken
them. The Spirit of God will bring them to faith. You see,
the Blessed Trinity is not in disarray. It's in perfect harmony. The Lord our God is one God,
one God, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, one purpose, one plan, one covenant,
one God, one salvation, and whom the Father chose The Son redeemed,
and the Spirit will call. Whom he foreknew, he predestinated
to be conformed to the image of his Son. Whom he predestinated,
he called. Whom he called, he justified.
Whom he justified, he glorified. The Spirit of God will call them. He'll call them by the gospel.
He'll call them to faith. He'll call them to believe God.
He'll call them to obedience. He'll call them to love what
they once hated, and to hate what they once loved. The Spirit
of God regenerates. You see, now watch this. Paul
made two statements in 2 Corinthians 5 that have to be thought out. One, he said this, God was in
Christ, reconciling the world to himself. And then he turned
right around and said, I beseech you, and Christ said, Be ye reconciled
to God. All right, let me help you with
that. God's angry. Now whether these
little preachers of today want to admit it or not, the flood
was not an act of love, it was an act of wrath. The destruction
of Sodom and Gomorrah was not an act of love. That's not God
expressing His love for everybody. That's wrath. And when the end
of this world comes and God says, bind them hand and foot and cast
them into hell, there'll be weeping and gnashing of teeth. That's
not love. That's not love. That's anger.
That's wrath. And God's angry. God hateth the
workers of iniquity. God's angry with the wicked.
He said, I'll wet my sword and take it to hand. God's angry. And we're angry with God. Well,
he came down here and we spit on him. People say, well, everybody
loves Jesus. They do? I can't get this, I
hear all this stuff, I can't put it together. I hear God loves
everybody, and then they'll turn around and say, you're going
to hell. Now wait a minute, hold on here. And they say, we all love Jesus,
we love Jesus, and yet Christ came down here and we spit in
His face. And took Him outside the city walls of Jerusalem,
and we didn't just give Him a quick injection of some merciful way
to die, we nailed Him to our cross and laughed at Him while
He died. Men hate God. They hate God. Oh, they love their God just
like the hot-and-tot loves his God. But they hate the living
God. Alright, Christ came down here,
the Son of God. God was in Christ. And by His
obedience and by His death, He reconciled God to us. See that? God's not angry with me anymore,
Mike, because I've obeyed God in Christ. God's not angry with
me because in Christ I fulfilled His law and died under His judgment,
and He loves me. I'm in Christ, you see. Christ
reconciled me to God. Christ literally came down here
and took all His sheep, all His elect, all His redeemed, and
reconciled them to God. God was in Christ reconciling
the world. God's not angry. He loves his
people. He loves them with an unchanging
love. He said, I've drawn you with an everlasting love. The
love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. None can separate
me from the love of God which is in Christ. But here I am. What Christ did
in his life and death wasn't toward me, it was toward the
Father to reconcile me to God. And I'm still mad at God. I've
been saved all my life in one sense. Was Saul of Tarsus a child
of God when he was walking that road to Damascus? Just as much
he was a child of God after he left Damascus. Yes, he was. God loved him. But he didn't
love God. And that's the work of the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Spirit takes the Word and regenerates us and
gives us a new heart and a new nature and we love God. You see
that? We are reconciled to God and
not mad at God anymore. Because the Holy Spirit has given
me an eye to see the living God and to hear his word and shed
abroad his love in my heart. He's taken out that old stony
heart and given me a heart of flesh to love God. Do you understand
what I'm saying? Christ Jesus reconciled us to
God. The Holy Spirit in his regenerating
work through the gospel, through the truth, reconciles us. or God who reconciles God to
us. We're no longer angry. We love
the Lord. I love God. All right, the last
thing is this, and I'm as certain of this as I'm standing here,
these people are all going to persevere. They'll all endure
to the end. Our God's not defeated. Now turn
to John 6. They're all going to continue,
every one of them, And as I say, and many of you have experienced
this, that when you stand for those six or seven things, now
it, it chews up and takes sides. The religious world, those are
the things they despise. Those are the things they hate.
And those are the things that deal with the very character
of God. The character of God, the character of sinners, the
person and work of Christ, and the work of the Holy Spirit.
And so in verse 36, look at John 6, that scripture Cecil read
a moment ago. And verse 36, but I said unto
you that you also have seen me and believe not. Where have we seen God? Well,
we've seen God in the heavens. The heavens declare the glory
of God. The heavens declare a sovereign God. We've seen God in creation. The creation declares a sovereign
God. There's no cooperation in creation.
Isn't it? Hands off, God said. We've seen
God in his law. The God of law is a holy, sovereign
God. There's no cooperation in that.
There's no man in that. We've seen God in his judgments.
With whom did he take counsel? We've seen God in the types and
pictures of the Old Testament. And those are all sovereignly
given. We've seen God in Jesus Christ, and this generation does
not believe that God. But look at verse 37. He's not
defeated. He said, You've seen me and you
don't believe, but all that my Father giveth me shall come to
me. They're going to come to me.
They're going to come to that sovereign God. They're going
to come to that omnipotent God. Out to the gracious King approach.
whose scepter mercy gives. Perhaps he will receive my touch
and the sinner can live. I can but perish if I go. I am
resolved to try. For if I stay away, I know I
shall forever die. We come, we're not afraid to
come to a sovereign in Christ. All that my Father giveth me
will come to me, and him that cometh I'll in no wise cast out. Is God defeated? Verse 38, For
I came down from heaven, not to do my own will. This is Christ
speaking as the Christ, as the Messiah, as the elect, as the
messenger, as the servant of God. You see, the messenger,
the servant, the Messiah, does not come down here and do what
he thinks is best, or say what he thinks is best. or compromise
the issues. He said, it didn't come to do
my will. I came to do the will of him that sent me. Understand
that? That's the reason I say the Trinity
is in perfect harmony. Christ came to do the unchanging
will of God. He said, lo, I come to do thy
will. In the volume of the book, it's
written of me. Not just this book, but his book
of purpose. And it's written of me, the surety,
of me the substitute. And I came to do your will, by
the which will we are sanctified. See what I'm saying, Hebrews
10. Not by our wills, by his will. And this, verse 39, is
my Father's will. This is the will, this is the
purpose of him that sent me. This is the Father's will, that
of all which he hath given me. I'll lose nothing but raise it
up again at the last day." That's his will. That's what I came
to accomplish. And this is the will of him that
sent me, and these two things go together. You see, the hardshells
want verse 39, but they don't want verse 40. The fundamentalist wants verse
40, but they don't want verse 39. The heart shall want a part
of verse 37, all that my Father gives me shall come to me, but
it doesn't want this hymn that cometh to me, I don't know why
it's cast out. But you see, whom the Father chose, the Son redeemed,
the Spirit calls, and they will willingly, lovingly, personally,
come to Christ. They will. They'll see Him in
the gospel preached. They'll hear Him in the word
proclaimed. They'll love Him with a new heart
and they will come to Him. Verse 40, and this is the will
of Him that sent me, goes right along with verse 39, that everyone
that seeth the Son in His glory, in His power, in His majesty,
in His humiliation and believes on Him may have everlasting life
and I'll raise Him up at the last day. Is that clear what
I'm saying, Cesar? It's clear to me, I hope it's
clear to you. It's clear in the Word. He said to this bunch of religionists,
you've seen me and you don't believe, but all that my Father
giveth me will come to me. And I won't cast the one I'm
after. You see, I came down from heaven to do a prescribed, purposed
will. I came down not to do my own
will. I didn't come to survey the situation and see what I
could talk people into. I came to do His will who sent
me. And this is His will that sent
me. It's twofold. That all which He had given me,
I'll lose nothing, and everyone He gave me, they're going to
see me, believe on me, and I'm not going to lose them either.
It's twofold. Well, what's the reaction? Verse
41. They murmured. And that's what you get. And
a lot of fellas say, well, you know, it just makes people mad.
Don't preach it. I mean, after all, you're just
going to stir people up? I know. These fellas murmured
because he said, I'm the bread that came down from heaven. And
they said, well, this is Jesus. This is a man. This is the son
of Joseph. We know his father. We know his
mother. We know his brothers and sisters. How in the world
can he say I came down from heaven? I'm God. And I'm the father of
one. It's blessed to me." And he said, listen to this,
no need to murmur. No need to murmur. It's not going
to change this situation. Your murmuring is not. You're
a rebellion. No man, whatever, and John Flavel's got a whole
book on this. No man can, has the ability or
the desire to come to me. except the Father which sent
me draw him. And I'll raise him up at the
last day." It's written in the Prophets. This is what the Old
Testament is all about. They shall be taught of God.
What does God teach men? Who He is, who they are, who
Christ is, what Christ did, why He did it, where He is now, what
salvation is. You see, and this is something
you know that's going on today. There's no teaching like this.
There's the hallelujah gang. There's the inspiration and the
stirring people up, you know. Make me happy. Make me feel good. Send me out of here, you know,
with all this sort of thing. We've got to be taught, taught
of God, line upon line, precept upon precept, truth upon truth,
teach men God's Word. Because they've got to be taught
of God, and listen, every man therefore that hears and has
learned of the Father, he comes to me, he runs to me. There's
nowhere else to go. And then look at the last few
words, and I'll quit in John 6, the last few words. Verse 60, John 6, 60, Many therefore
of his disciples, When they heard this, they said, this is a hard
saying, who can hear it? When Jesus knew in himself, his
disciples murmured at it, these are followers, not the twelve.
He said, does this offend you? If this offends you, what and
if you shall see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before?
It's the Spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing.
The words that I speak unto you, they're spirit and they're life,
but there's some of you that believe not, for our Lord knew
from the beginning from the beginning who they were that believed not,
and who would betray him. And he said, Therefore said I
unto you, that no man can come to me, except it were given him
of the Father.

Is God Defeated? #2

What does the Bible say about God's sovereignty?

How do we know God accepts us?

Why is understanding man's depravity important for Christians?

How does Christ's redemptive work show God's love?

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Is God Defeated? #2

What does the Bible say about God's sovereignty?

How do we know God accepts us?

Why is understanding man's depravity important for Christians?

How does Christ's redemptive work show God's love?

Sermon Transcript

About Henry Mahan

Comments

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