SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/12/2016 10:28 AM
My Worship Time Focus: The Complaint PT -2
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 6:41-50
Message of the verses: “41 Therefore the Jews were grumbling about
Him, because He said, "I am the bread that came down out of heaven." 42
They were saying, "Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and
mother we know? How does He now say, ’I have come down out of heaven’?" 43
Jesus answered and said to them, "Do not grumble among yourselves. 44 “No
one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise
him up on the last day. 45 “It is written in the prophets, ’AND THEY SHALL ALL
BE TAUGHT OF GOD.’ Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to
Me. 46 “Not that anyone has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He
has seen the Father. 47 “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has
eternal life. 48 “I am the bread of life. 49 “Your fathers ate the manna in the
wilderness, and they died. 50 “This is the bread which comes down out of
heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die.”
I want to
begin with what John MacArthur wrote about verse 45: “In verse 45 the Lord paraphrased Isaiah
54:13 to emphasize that His teaching was consistent with the Old
Testament. What was ‘written in the
prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught of God,’ restates the truth of verse 44
in different terms. Those who came to
saving faith do so because they are supernaturally instructed by God. Drawing and teaching are merely different
aspects of God’s sovereign call to salvation; it is through the truth of His
Word that God draws people to embrace His Son (Rom. 10:14, 17; cf. 1 Peter
1:23-25). As a result, ‘everyone who has
heard and learned from the Father, comes to’ Christ. Jesus’ statement was also a subtle rebuke of
His Jewish opponents, who prided themselves on their knowledge of
Scripture. But had they truly understood
the Old Testament, they would have eagerly embraced Him (5:39).”
In verse 46
we see that Jesus states that no one has seen the Father except Jesus Christ
who came down from heaven to do the work of the Father. In John 14:6 we see that Jesus tells His
disciples “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except
through Me.” Hebrews 1:2 says “in these
last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through
whom also He made the world.” Jesus
speaks to us the things about God, for Jesus said that He who has seen me has
seen the Father, so Jesus is God’s spokesmen, but that does not take away from
the fact that He is God who came in the flesh.
Jesus then goes on to once again use the words “Truly, truly,” and then
goes on to say “I say to you, he who believes has eternal life.” MacArthur states that this eternal life
begins at the moment one believes on the Lord Jesus Christ for their salvation: “Those who believe in Jesus not only have the
hope of eternal life in the future, but also enjoy the possession of that life
even now, as the present tense of piseuo
(believes) indicates.”
Now the
rest of this SD I wish to quote some things from Warren Wiersbe on the last two
verses which speaks of Jesus again stating that He is the bread of Life and
then talks about Him being the true bread that comes down from heaven. Remember that the Jewish people spoke to
Jesus about the great miracle that Moses did in giving them manna from heaven,
but missed the fact that it was God who had given the manna to them, and not
Moses. Dr. Wiersbe gives us some
wonderful lessons on this manna that Jesus spoke of in verse 49.
When Jesus
called Himself ‘the Living Bread,’ He was not claiming to be exactly like the
manna. He was claiming to be even greater! The manna only sustained life for the Jews but Jesus gives life to the whole world. The Jews ate the daily manna and eventually
died; but when you receive Jesus Christ within, you life forever. When God gave the manna, He gave only a gift;
but when Jesus came, He gave Himself.
There was no cost to God in sending the manna each day, but He gave His
son at great cost. The Jews had to eat
the manna every day, but the sinner who trusts Christ once is given eternal life.
“It is not
difficult to see in the manna a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ. The manna was a mysterious thing to the Jews;
in fact, the word manna means ‘What is it?’
(See Exodus 16:15) Jesus was a mystery to those who saw Him. The manna came at night from heaven, and
Jesus came to this earth when sinners were in moral and spiritual darkness. The manna was small (His humility), round (His
eternality), and white (His purity). It
was sweet to the taste (Psalm 34:8) and it met the needs of the people
adequately.
“The manna
was given to a rebellious people; it was a gracious gift of God. All they had to do was stoop and pick it
up. If they failed to pick it up, they walked on it. The Lord is not far from any sinner. All the sinner has to do is humble himself
and take the gift that God offers.”
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I am thankful that God sent His Son to be the
bread of life, and that unlike the manna this Bread has given me eternal life.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: To love the Lord more, to
know Him better, and to trust Him more in my daily walk with Him.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Sea of Tiberias (or Galilee) (John 21:1-3).
Today’s Bible question:
“Identify the woman whom Jesus asked ‘Give me a drink.’”
Answer in our next SD.
4/12/2016 11:18 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment