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This sermon was preached on Sunday 30/09/2001 Am, by Kevin Matthews.
In our last study in John 6 we considered what at first glance appears to be a contradiction within the Scriptures. On the one hand it seemed that God had chosen a fixed number of people unto salvation and then gave these people who were to be saved to His Son, while on the other hand it was the sinner who was choosing to go to Jesus by faith in order to be saved. Surely that’s got to be a contradiction you might think.
What we actually considered last week was the fact of the Father giving to Jesus a people, that is a group of individuals chosen from before the foundation of the world by the Father and given to the Son as the object of Christ’s mission of salvation. The Lord Jesus’ purpose in coming to earth therefore, was the salvation of the elect, a group of people that were given to Him by the Father. Not one of these is to be lost or to be missed in this work of salvation, for all must be saved, for that is the mission given to Jesus by the Father.
Yet we also saw that any person desiring salvation may have it by simply coming to Jesus by faith, for all such people will be saved without exception. Any sinner who exercises true faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is assured of salvation in the gospel. There is no need for an unbeliever to first find out whether he is one of God’s elect or not, for he may freely come to Christ if he wishes, and if he does so he will indeed be saved. Indeed God has commanded all unbelievers to go to Jesus for salvation.
Yet for some this appears to be a contradiction, and why is that? Well usually it is because they are not able to reason within their own minds how such a thing can be, and because they cannot fathom how these two seemingly contradictly teachings of the Bible are to be reconciled, the whole teaching is therefore to be thrown out, with the result being that only one side of the equation is usually held to. These people either choose to accept a human view of salvation that is dependent upon man, or a wholly divine view of salvation that greatly reduces human responsibility.
Generally speaking most people favour the human side, and so you get people who will say that anybody at all can come to Jesus and be saved, for the way is open to all people without any regard to the great depth of sin in which man is enslaved and without thought to man’s inability to go to Christ for salvation. What eventually becomes blurred in this approach is that salvation is only available to those who exercise faith in Christ. What is completely lost in this approach is the Father’s role in election, the Spirit’s work in bringing the lost to spiritual life and understanding, and so on. Now it is a much more complex issue than that, and much more is blurred, twisted and put aside in order to suit a system that leaves out the determining and sovereign purpose of God in salvation. The end result of such a system of belief is a weakened God, a weakened Christ and a weakened salvation, even to the point were some people do not even believe that a person can be completely assured of salvation. Now that is the logical progression of thought for this school of thought, for if salvation depends on sinful men and not on the sovereign God of the universe, then of course people who have believed will be lost, for man is constantly changing his affections and mind.
On the other side of the debate you have people (who though admittedly are of a lesser number than those on the other side) that claim the divine side of salvation only. What you then get is a salvation that cannot be taken to lost sinners, for if God does all the work alone, what are we trying to do it for? God will save His people, so He doesn’t need us to evangelise an unsaved world. He doesn’t need us to tell people the way of salvation, and so on. Indeed it is viewed as a sin, by some, to preach the gospel to lost sinners.
Now on what side does the truth lie? Do we go to man’s side or do we go to God’s side? The answer is actually neither, but both. Now that is what I tried to get across to you last week, for Scripture holds to both truths and therefore, so must we. So this morning we are again going to consider both sides of salvation, from both the divine perspective and from the human perspective.
You may not be able to fully reconcile this doctrine of salvation in your mind, but you had better not dismiss it, for it is the way of salvation that God has revealed to man. Herein lies the only way of salvation for a lost world and for individual sinners, and without it there is no salvation. You see salvation is not based on man’s ideas, or your ideas, but is based upon the plan of God as He has revealed it in His Word. Man doesn’t have the liberty to make up the rules for his return to God from sin, for that is God’s right and His alone. We as members of a sin fallen race are at His mercy, and so we must gratefully accept what mercy He decides to send our way.
Yes, each one of us here gathered this morning has no right to argue the point with God. What He has revealed in His Word as the way of salvation we are gratefully to accept. You may not like it, you may not want it, and you may not wish to hear it, but let me tell you there that there is no other salvation on offer. If you want to be saved then this is the way to go, and if you are already saved, then this is the way it happened. So it is to this way of salvation that God has opened to us that we now turn our attention. This morning we look at the Scriptures and not to man in order to see what the Father’s will in salvation is.
‘For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me (Jn 6:38).’
As you would expect, even the Son of God holds to this same truth that you may be finding hard to accept or to grasp. He didn’t come to earth in order to pursue His own independent idea of salvation, but to fulfil His Father’s purpose of salvation. This was His mission, to fulfil the Father’s purpose in salvation. He didn’t come against His own will mind you, for His is the same as the Father’s, as John 5:19ff tells us. The Father and the Son are at One in the Trinity (Triunity), therefore the will of the Father is the will of the Son, and the will of the Son is the will of the Father. What Jesus is assuring us of here is that He did not act independently of His Father’s will, but acted in total accordance with His Father’s will, for ‘My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work (Jn 4:34).’
This work of salvation was one that the Father began by choosing the elect in eternity, and Jesus has now come in time and space to finish that work. That is why, when at the cross Jesus says, ‘it is finished (Jn 19:30).’ He had finished the work that the Father had given Him here on earth to do, for the salvation of the elect has been accomplished and now only needs to be applied, and that is the work of the Holy Spirit today.
Clearly this means that Jesus did not come to do our will either, for He came to do the Father’s will in salvation. What you believe to be the way of salvation needs to measure up to what God says in His Word, for the Word of God is the standard. If your opinion doesn’t measure up to that, then your opinion counts for nothing and is to be discarded by all Bible believing Christians. We want the truth of the matter, not the appeals of fallen human wisdom.
Fallen human wisdom tells us that Jesus came in order to give everyone the same crack at salvation, but God’s will as revealed in His Word tells us that Jesus came only to save the elect, for that was His Father’s will. He didn’t try to save everyone, but only those given to Him by the Father and for these He gave His life. He didn’t come in order to enlist Himself on the side of all your theories of the way salvation is to be accomplished or ought to be accomplished, but He came to actually fulfil the way that the Father had decreed in eternity for salvation to be accomplished.
Man in no way determines salvation. God threw man out of Eden, and the only One that can open the way up for a return to God is God Himself. He doesn’t need the input of man to solve this question, and He doesn’t need the approval of man for His way of salvation. He is the Almighty and sovereign God, and you are the condemned fallen sinner. Remember that whenever you come to argue the perceived rights and wrongs of salvation.
Now the implication of all of this is surely clear, and this is exactly what Jesus was telling the Jews who were questioning Him. ‘If you don’t like what I’m about in salvation, then you also don’t like what God is about in salvation, for I am here doing what He has told me to do in total accordance with His plan of salvation and Word.’ You see your argument is not with me this morning but with God, and that is what Jesus told the Jews.
So when you want to find out what the true way of salvation is, don’t go to men for their opinions, go to the Scriptures. Sure, Christians should point you to God’s way and in the right direction, but you must ‘prove all things, hold fast that which is good.’ Don’t continue to hold dear those teachings of men that fly in the face of such clear expressions of God’s sovereign purpose in salvation, for you do God no honour by continuing to try and wrest the glory that is due Him away from Him. You need to search the Scriptures and see if these things are so, and if they then you are to hold to them with unyielding resolve.
Continuing to cling to the doctrines of men in the face of such overwhelming Biblical evidence is sin, for it is rebellion against God and a rejection of the salvation He has provided in Jesus Christ. Remember that this is what the Pharisees did with God’s way of salvation. It is grievous error brethren to hold to anything else but the teaching of Scripture, and hundreds of years of the traditions of men does not change what it is, and certainly your holding onto it for just a few years is no less sin. Search ‘the scriptures daily, whether those things were so (Acts 17:11).’ I don’t ask you to accept the teachings known as Calvinism because I hold to them, but because these are the teachings of Scripture.
God doesn’t work according to the dictates of your mind or your will, but in accordance with His own eternal counsel and purpose. So what is His counsel and purpose in the area of salvation?
‘And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day (Jn 6:39).’
We have already begun to consider the will of the Father in salvation last week when we considered how people are to come to Christ, for those given to the Son by the Father are to come to Jesus by faith in Jesus. Today we want to think more along the lines of the final perseverance of the elect in salvation.
Now having determined from our passage last week that the elect come to Jesus by faith in Jesus, and that none of these will ever be cast off, we want to briefly consider the perseverance of believers. If these sinners who believe are not to be ever cast off, then it surely follows that they continue in Christ for all time. You see the actual election of individuals unto salvation in Christ includes all that is necessary for full salvation. Not only does election predetermine your destiny, but it also determines the means whereby the believer continues until the full realisation of that destiny in glory is reached.
You see Jesus Christ came to get the elect and to bring them into the Kingdom of God. This was not just for that initial entrance into the Kingdom, but to bring them all the way home. Nothing will therefore keep you from realising the Kingdom of Heaven.
Now think about that for a moment, think about the encouragement in this for you believer, for when Jesus came to this earth with the determined purpose of saving His people from their sins, He did so with the determined purpose to save you as an individual known to Him at the time. He came deliberately and purposefully to get you and to bring you back home. Do you see why the gospel is such good news? He came to get you Christian, and to make sure that you get home without being lost along the way.
Think about that for a moment. He came in order to pay the price of your sin and to suffer in your stead, so that all your sin would be covered. He came in order to clothe you in a robe of righteousness, so that when you go to the great wedding feast of the Lamb you will have the necessary garment on to get in and to actually be the bride of Christ in glory.
But more than that, for He has come in such a way that will determine your continued perseverance in Him all the way home. He has come in such a way that will guarantee that nothing will prevent you from getting to your mansion that has been prepared for you in glory. There will be no affliction too painful to endure, there will be no trial to difficult to advance through, there will be no sin committed that is not covered by the blood of the Lamb, and there is no enemy too powerful to snatch you out of the hand of Jesus, not even death itself. Hear the Scriptures Christian, and rejoice in Christ your Saviour.
‘And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand (10:28).’ ‘Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ (Philip 1:6).’
Oh Christian, here is your blessed assurance! It is not in your own ability to continue to exercise faith in Christ, but in Jesus Himself who has wrought a salvation for you that is full and free. Your salvation is sure, for the Father’s will is that Jesus ‘should raise you up at the last day.’
‘But what about my continuing struggle with sin, surely I sin too much still for me to be finally accepted into glory?’ Did not Jesus say that the work of salvation was finished - therefore He has paid your debt in full believer, so why do you doubt?
‘But this trial is so difficult, and I don’t think that I can hold out much longer.’ But Christian, does not the Scriptures teach that He will not cause the elect to suffer more than they can bare, and that you cast all your cares upon Him for he cares for you?
There is nothing that can prevent you from continuing your pilgrimage toward the Celestial City, and nothing that can prevent you from finally entering the Celestial City at the end of your pilgrimage. If you are a Christian then this is your lot.
‘And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day (6:40).’
In this verse we see the other side of the coin, the place of human responsibility in salvation. This verse in no way establishes salvation as a possibility for everyone, not at all, for if this were the case everyone would have to have the ability to exercise faith in Christ, and that is simply not the case. Verse 65 says that ‘ no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father,’ and that is a gift that is only given to the elect.
Nevertheless I can assure you of this, that if anyone recognizes Jesus for who He really is, as God’s salvation for a sinful world and then goes to Him by faith, then that person will have everlasting life. Now is that a contradiction? No it is not, for even John 3:16 says that ‘whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’ Salvation from sin is only received by those who actually exercise faith in Jesus. Remember, only those to whom the Father has granted faith can go to Jesus by faith, and ‘All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out (Jn 6:37).’
Though the command goes out to all men to repent and believe the gospel, it is only those who respond to that gospel by faith that are saved. What the Gospel of John is making crystal clear is that the only ones who will ever do this are God’s elect, for He gives this ability to no sinner but those whom He has chosen.
Yet sinner, if you believe in Jesus Christ for salvation, you will be raised up by Jesus at the last day and you will take your place in heaven. The responsibility lies on you to believe the gospel, and if you do you will most certainly be raised up at the last day. Here is the hope of the gospel to the unsaved, for if they believe then this salvation is theirs without distinction or exception. All who come this way will be saved, and will be raised up at the last day. The way is open to all that will come by faith, so won’t you come this way this morning?
Though your body dies and will lie in a grave somewhere someday, be assured that at the last great day of the Lord, when Jesus will judge the living and the dead, your body will be raised up, ‘In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord (1 Cor 15:52-58).’
This way of salvation is not for hypocrites, but only for those who actually see Jesus for what He truly is and exercise true faith in Him. Outside of Christ there is no salvation, so I plead with you this morning to come to Jesus. Will you live and not die; will you come to Jesus in order to be raised up by Him at the last day? The go to Jesus by faith, forsake all else and take Him as your salvation from sin. Amen.
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