SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/19/2016 9:42 AM
My Worship Time Focus: Introduction to John 6:60-71
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 6:60-71
Message of the verses: “60 Therefore many of His disciples, when
they heard this said, "This is a difficult statement; who can listen to
it?" 61 But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to
them, "Does this cause you to stumble? 62 “What then if you see the Son of
Man ascending to where He was before? 63 “It is the Spirit who gives life; the
flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are
life. 64 “But there are some of you who do not believe." For Jesus knew
from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would
betray Him. 65 And He was saying, "For this reason I have said to you,
that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the
Father." 66 As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew and were
not walking with Him anymore. 67 So Jesus said to the twelve, "You do not
want to go away also, do you?" 68 Simon Peter answered Him, "Lord, to
whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. 69 “We have believed and have
come to know that You are the Holy One of God." 70 Jesus answered them,
"Did I Myself not choose you, the twelve, and yet one of you is a
devil?" 71 Now He meant Judas the son of Simon Iscariot, for he, one of
the twelve, was going to betray Him.”
I believe
it was on the 22nd of March that we began to look at the sixth chapter
of John’s gospel and we have had quite a journey as we looked at the feeding of
the 5000, and then the disciples out on the lake as Jesus came walking on the
water to stop the great storm that was going on, and then we began to look at
the sermon which resulted in the feeding of those people and that took place in
the Synagogue at Capernaum which ended in verse 58. Not only did this sermon end in verse 58 but
as we will look at later the ministry of Jesus ended in Galilee also, and it
had been a very long ministry as you look at the other gospels which go more
into the details of it. Once again I
want to remind everyone what John’s reason for writing this gospel was all
about as we have looked at so many times in John 20:30-31 “30 Therefore many other signs Jesus also
performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book;
31 but these have been written so that
you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing
you may have life in His name.”
John
MacArthur writes the following as he begins his introduction to this last
section of chapter six, which he entitles “PT-3 Responding to the Bread of
Life.” “Gospel preaching that fails to
convey God’s Word accurately, and to command obedience, falls short of the
biblical standard. Both John the Baptist
(Matt. 3:2) and Jesus (4:17) charged their audience to act on the truth they
were given, exhorting them to ‘repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,’
and then demonstrate the fruit of true repentance (3:8).”
I can’t
help but think of some many people around the world today who have fallen prey
to the health and wealth gospel, which as Paul writes to the Galatians is not a
gospel at all. The true gospel involves
understanding that Jesus Christ, the 2nd person of the godhead, came
to earth as a man, in order to fulfill the plan that God had for Him to
fulfill, that is living on earth for 33 years, preaching and teaching for three
years and then dying on a cruel cross in order to take the place of sinners so
that they would not have to face eternal death.
In those three hours of darkness when Jesus was on the cross He paid the
penalty of eternal punishment in hell for all of those who truly believed in
Him for their salvation. One has to have
an effectual call from the Holy Spirit and then respond to that call with
repentance of sin, and faith that what Jesus Christ did for you on the cross
paid for your sins and then trust Him as your Savior and Lord, and by doing
this you will do as Paul writes to the Ephesians in 2:8-10 which says “8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of
yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not
as a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good
works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” We are saved to do good works, and saved by
our good works.
John
MacArthur writes in this introduction that there are three responses to hearing
the truth of the gospel which Jesus gave in the sermon He preached that
day. The first way a person can respond
is like the way the Pharisees responded, and that is totally reject the
message. They were so tied up in their
works gospel that they did not want to hear about the gospel that had no works
to be saved in. It got so bad that in the
12th chapter of Matthew they accused Jesus of doing His works by the
power of Satan. That was the last straw
for Jesus as He then began to teach in parables.
The next
way people respond is with a temporary or shallow faith. Jesus spoke of this type of faith in one of
His parables, the parable of the different seeds that fell. MacArthur says “these false disciples are the
curiosity seekers who are superficially attracted to Christ. But when He makes demands of them, or there
is a cost to be paid for following Him, they disappear, desiring neither to let
go of the world, nor to deny themselves (cf. Luke 9:23-25).” Let’s look at 1 John 2:19 “They went out from
us, but they were not
really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with
us; but they went out,
so that it would be shown that they all are not of us.”
We saved
the best to the last and that is the response to the gospel with true
faith. As we study this portion of
Scripture we will see who that was.
Now we will
quote the last short paragraph from MacArthur to show us where we are heading as
we study these last verses in the sixth chapter of John. “As Jesus concluded His words, the outright
rejecters left, leaving only those who claimed to be His disciples—some of whom
possessed genuine faith and some of whom did not. Verses 60-71 describe the reactions of those
two groups (the false disciples and the true disciples) to the Bread of Life Discourse.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I desire to produce the fruit that God
planned for me to produce as spoken of in Ephesians 2:10.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Love the Lord more, as I get
to know Him better.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Moab” (Ruth 1:1).
Today’s Bible question:
“What was the name of the son for whom Hannah prayed?”
Answer in our next SD.
4/19/2016 11:01 AM
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