SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 4/4/2016 9:45 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
PT-2 The Subsequent Response
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 6:25-29
Message of the verses: “25 When they found Him on the other side of
the sea, they said to Him, "Rabbi, when did You get here?" 26 Jesus
answered them and said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not
because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled. 27 “Do not work for the food which
perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son
of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal." 28 Therefore they said to Him, "What
shall we do, so that we may work the works of God?" 29 Jesus answered and
said to them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He
has sent."”
I would
like to compare these verses with some verses from the fourth chapter of John
where Jesus was talking to the woman at the well. I have searched out the word water and as you
look at these verses look at the sequence of how that word is used to bring
about spiritual truth and we can then compare it with the idea of bread as we
continue to look at John chapter six.
John 4:7 There came a woman of Samaria to draw
water. Jesus *said to her, "Give Me a drink."
John 4:10
Jesus answered and said to her, "If you knew the gift of God, and
who it is who says to you, ’Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He
would have given you living water."
John 4:11 She said to Him, "Sir, You have
nothing to draw with and the well is deep; where then do You get that living
water?
John 4:13 Jesus answered and said to her,
"Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again;
John 4:14
but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst;
but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing
up to eternal life."
John 4:15 The woman said to Him, "Sir, give
me this water, so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to
draw."
What we are
seeing here is that Jesus is using common terms to give the people spiritual
truths, which surely makes things more understandable.
The people
respond to Jesus’ command in verse 27 “Do not work for the food which perishes, but for
the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you,
for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal."” They answer with “What shall we do, so that
we may work the works of God?” Now to
better understand this let’s look at three verses in Ephesians chapter two: “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.” Notice the sequence in
these three verses as the first two speak of salvation by grace through faith
and then verse ten then speaks of the “works” we can do after we are saved,
works that God had prepared for us to do from eternity past. These people wanted to work for their
salvation, something they thought they were doing and were proud of it too. One more verse from Titus 3:5 “He saved us,
not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to
His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.”
John
MacArthur writes “Salvation is a gift of God (John 4:10; Rom. 5:15; 6:23; Eph.
2:8). Jesus called faith a ‘work,’ since
‘on the one hand, a person cannot earn acceptability with God by working for
it. On the other hand, acceptability
with God cannot be on the basis of ‘belief’ in a mere theological formulation
about God…Acceptability with God is a relationship God gives ([Rom.] 6:27),
therefore, and both believing and obeying are parallel was on acknowledges
dependence on God.’” (Gerald L.
Borchert, John 1-11, The New American Commentary).
Now I will
also quote the last paragraph from this 19th chapter of MacArthur’s
commentary which will give us a preview of what we will be looking at as we
continue in this sixth chapter of John.
“The rest
of John chapter 6 develops Jesus’ teaching regarding the food which endures to
eternal life. Pointing to Himself as the
Bread of Life, Jesus offered Himself to His listeners as their eternal
deliverer. The crowd, however, was
ultimately not interested. They had been
intrigued by His earlier healings, and they had been temporarily satisfied by
His miraculous meal. But their initially
enthusiastic response to those supernatural signs (v. 15) quickly faded when
their superficial expectations went unmet.
Unlike the Twelve, who responded to Jesus’ power with praise, the crowd
responded first with curiosity, but unwilling to abandon their false righteousness
and repent, they were left finally with rejection. Although they followed Christ for a little
while, even sailing across the Sea of Galilee to find Him, they eventually
demonstrated that they were not true followers at all.”
Just like
people today who fall into the false “health and wealth gospel” these people
were looking for a temporary fix and not eternal life.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: I wish to trust the Lord to continue to show
me the works that He wants me to do that will be a part of His plan for my life
and bring glory to His name.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Trust the Lord to continue to
help me get to know Him better, and to love Him more.
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “Jesus” (Mark 6:10).
Today’s Bible question:
“The laws of what country could not be changed?”
Answer in our next SD.
4/4/2016 10:30 AM
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