To Whom Shall We Go?

Tonight we are really hoping to give the defining answer to the question that Pilate asks Jesus in John 18:38, “What is truth?” While we did answer that to an extent on Monday night, tonight is where the rubber meets the road. Tonight is the night where each of us must be confronted with truth, to see the truth not as it relates to our own personal preferences but to see it as it really is. Tonight we must preach to ourselves that we see Jesus as He really is. He either is who He says He is or He isn’t. There is no other option. Tim Keller said, “If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn't rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead.” But we aren’t here tonight to prove that the resurrection of Jesus really happened. Our goal tonight is to ask ourselves the question, “If Jesus really is who the Bible says that He is, how must my life reflect that truth?” What do I mean by this? I mean that the Gospel is not good advice that we can take or leave, it is a command to be followed. Tonight we are going to hear this Gospel straight from the lips of Christ and you might say, “I’ve heard this a million and one times, there’s nothing here for me tonight.” But let me tell you this, I have seen in my own personal ministry more people come to saving faith in Christ that thought they were Christians and were not than I have seen hard-hearted unbelievers do it. Even the most seasoned Christian never tires of hearing the Gospel because it has so captured their affections that it is like being reminded by the greatest love in the universe that it still loves you unconditionally and perfectly. As we go through tonight, we will see how the Gospel addresses the areas of identity that we have talked about over the last 3 nights. We will see how the Gospel confronts our loneliness, our future, our desire to be loved, and how it points to the ultimate authority of God alone. We will see how it addresses anxiety, depression, and worry. We will see how all are invited into the Family of God and how racial walls are torn down by the Gospel. Jesus Christ really is the answer to our deepest longings and greatest worries. Let’s pray and then I want us to open up to John 6:35-40

John 6:35–40 ESV

Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

Who is Jesus? (Verses 35-37)

The first question that we must answer is who is Jesus? In verse 35 He says, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” Now those first 6 words: I am the Bread of Life are one of 7 I Am sayings of Jesus that are recorded in the Gospel of John. This is the first of those 7 sayings. In John 8 Jesus says, “I am the light of the world. In John 10, “I am the door of the sheep” and “I am the Good Shepherd.” In John 11, “I Am the resurrection and the life.” In John 14, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” And finally in John 15, “I am the true vine.” All 7 of these sayings tell us something incredible about the Lord but we will just focus on what Jesus says in John 6:35. What does Jesus mean when He says that He is the bread of life? There are three truths that I believe we can gather from in this one title.

I Am- Christ Alone

The first truth to note is that exclusiveness of Christ’s claim. He says, “I Am.” The Bread of Life is Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone. No one else can produce the claims that this title brings forth. The I Am nature of the statement itself even tells us more than what many realize. John writes in John 8:58-59 “Jesus said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.” At first glance this might look like an overreaction on the part of the people but for Jesus to say, I Am meant that He was claiming to be very God of very God. I Am is the very name that God revealed Himself as to Moses way back in the book of Exodus. For Jesus to say this is one of the strongest statements that He could possibly make in regards to His deity. If Jesus were to not be God and to make that statement, the Jewish people had every right to stone Him because He is committing top-tier blasphemy. John Frame writes, “The I Am especially in light of other such references in John, clearly identifies Jesus with the I AM of Exodus 3:14, with Yahweh Himself. The Jews understand: in verse 59 they pick up stones to kill Him. From their point of view, this statement was blasphemy. From the Christian standpoint, it can be nothing less than a claim to deity in the fullest sense!”Jesus makes claims about Himself that we cannot ignore. For Jesus to claim that He is God in the fullest sense, if those claims are true, then all of mankind is ultimately under His authority and must respond to that reality. If Jesus is the Bread of Life that means that no one else can be and if He alone is the bread of life, that means that ultimately nothing else will bring us any sense of satisfaction, fulfillment, or abundant life like He can. Now Jesus does not make this claim without backing it up. The clearest evidence of Christ’s deity comes from the fact that He rose from the dead. If the resurrection didn’t happen; then it doesn’t matter what Christ said about Himself. If Christ really did rise from the dead; then everything that He says must also be true. The evidence for the empty tomb cannot be ignored. There is far too much going for it to just explain it away. The only thing that could alter the course of human history in the way that it was altered is if Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, came to this earth, lived a perfect life, died on the cross, rose from the dead, and ascended to the right hand of God the Father. There is not a single person in history that has had a greater impact than Jesus of Nazareth. Nothing would have changed the mind and the lives of the Apostles unless they really did believe that Jesus rose from the dead. You can’t explain the empty tomb by ignorance, you can’t explain the resurrection by hallucination, you can’t explain the life of the Church without the life of a risen Savior. Christians, understand that if Jesus was not raised from the dead, the world should feel bad for us because we are wasting our lives over something that isn’t true. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:16-19 “For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.” If the resurrection of Christ didn’t happen, any hope that we have in this world or the next is gone. Charles Hodge wrote, “All that Paul means to say is, that if you take Christ from Christians, you take their all. He is the source not only of their future, but of their present happiness. Without Him they are yet in their sins, under the curse of the Law, unreconciled to God, having no hope, and without God in the world; and yet subject to all the peculiar trials incident to a Christian profession.” For Jesus to say I Am is to say that He is God in the flesh but that is not the only claim He makes about Himself, He says that He is the bread and that brings us to the second truth that we can gather from this title.

Bread- the Sustainer

For Christ to be spiritual bread means that He is that which sustains us. Just as one needs food to remain alive, man needs Christ to live. To understand the depth of what Christ is saying, you have to understand just how greatly man relied on bread during the 1st century. Bread was one of the most important elements of the table. To lack bread was to lack what you needed to survive. To be the Bread of life means that Jesus is God for all types of men. From the richest to the poorest, every single human being relies on bread. J.C. Ryle said that Jesus Christ is just the Savior that meets the wants of every class. For Jesus to be bread, our spiritual food, means that we continually come to Him because He satisfies that which is most pressing for us. Jesus does not just save us once, He continues to save us and sustain us. For Christ to be our spiritual bread means that He meets the absolute need of our great spiritual hunger. Jesus goes on to say that he who comes to Him will not hunger and whoever believes in Him shall never thirst. When we come to Christ, the things that we long for no longer seem as satisfactory because we have come to that which we have most needed. Finally, Jesus tells us that He is the giver of eternal life.

Life- eternal

Jesus isn’t the bread of death. John 8:50-51 says, “Yet I do not seek my own glory; there is One who seeks it, and he is the judge. Truly, truly, I say to you, if anyone keeps my word, he will never see death.” Deep down we all want to feel alive don’t we? Haven’t you heard people say that? “I just want to feel alive!” We want something that gives our lives meaning, we want to feel like our lives matter and have a purpose but all lives come to a close. But Jesus gives life that is eternal. Jesus is the answer to every longing that you have ever had. Do you want purpose? It’s in Christ. Do you want love? It’s in Christ. Do you want reconciliation? It’s in Christ. The problem with the things that are fighting for your attention in this world is that they will never last! All of those things that you keep fighting for that you think will make you whole will only make you discover that the thing you wanted didn’t fix the problem. All it did was open your eyes to something else that you think you need. The treasures that we fight for on this earth, there’s only 2 things that will happen: Either you will die and they won’t matter anymore or it will die and you will be left longing for more but that does not happen when you have saving faith in Jesus Christ. That does not happen to the man or woman that has been born again because Jesus is life and life eternal. Here’s the thing, a lot of people want Heaven but they don’t want to go through Jesus to get there. They want to bypass the giver and go straight to the gift but Heaven is not Heaven if Christ is not at the center of it. If Christ is not at the center of your life, what use will He be for you? If you want to know what it means to be alive, you have to come to the giver of Eternal life.

What did Jesus Come to Do? (Verses 38-40/ 1 Tim 1:15)

So, we know who Jesus is, he is God in the flesh, the true spiritual bread, and the giver of eternal life but what did Jesus come to do? He gives the answer in verses 38-40. The Lord says in John 6:38-40 “For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” What did Jesus come to do? First off, He came to do the will of His Father.

Christ came to do the will of His Father

The will of Christ the Son and God the Father are one and the same. The entire purpose of Christ coming to Earth was so that He would do the will of His Father which was that He should lose none of the souls that His Heavenly Father gave to Him. D.A. Carson writes, “The entire purpose of the incarnation, of His coming down from heaven, was not to do his own will, but the will of the Father who sent Him, and that will was that the Son should lose none of all that the Father had given Him.” Jesus did not come to Earth to make salvation a mere possibility; Jesus came to earth to make salvation an actuality. Jesus did not leave Heaven to die for no one that would ever come to Him; He came to make salvation certain for those that come to Him. Not only did Jesus come to do the will of His Father, Christ came to save sinners.

Christ came to save sinners

Look again at verse 40. Jesus says, “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in Him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” It is the will of God the Father that whosoever should look upon His Son and believe in Him should have eternal life. This is the greatest truth in the entire world. This is something that should give us all a great reason to rejoice but if this isn’t clear enough, let’s look at one other place. Paul writes in 1 Timothy 1:15 “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.” This may be one of the most important verses in the entire Bible. Paul begins this verse by basically telling the reader to stop in his tracks. Paul never wrote anything to intentionally mislead someone so for Paul to say that a saying was trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance meant that what he was about to say was of utmost importance. The two great truths that Paul puts forth is this: Jesus Christ has come into the world, God has put on flesh and has dwelled among men, and He has come to this world to save sinners. Christ did not come to save the righteous, He did not come to save for those who thought they could pull themselves up by their boot straps, He did not come to save those with all their ducks in a row, He did not come to save those that attempted to earn their way into Heaven, He came to save sinners. Jesus Christ came to seek and save the lost. Steven Lawson said, “Salvation is not a reward for the righteous, it is a gift for the guilty.” Here’s what we need to come to terms with: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Every man and woman who have ever walked this earth have defied the everlasting and Holy God. But for this moment, it does not matter what other people have done, what matters is what you have done. You have fallen short of God’s glory, you have defied Him and sinned against Him, you have exchanged the truth for a lie, you have loved self and sin more than Savior, and unless you are born again you cannot be saved. You can know the Bible front to back and not be saved. You can know a lot of things about Jesus and not be saved. Have you been born again? Until you recognize the extent of your wickedness, you will never appreciate the sufficiency of your Savior. Do you know who you are? Apart from Christ, you are not just dying in sin, you are already dead in sin. Paul says in Ephesians 2:1-3 “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” This is horrifying but this is what mankind is. We aren’t good people that make a small mistake here and there, we are wicked to the core. We are following the Devil and we lust after earthly and fleshly desires. If God does not intervene, who can stand? You do not just need to be a polished up version of yourself. You can put a lot of Lysol on a corpse and it’ll still be dead and vile. You need a whole new heart. You need to be made new but how are we to do that? Paul tells us in Ephesians 2:4-5 “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—” Those two words, “But God” may be some of the sweetest words in the Bible. For Paul to stop at verse 3 would mean that there is no grace, no mercy, man is totally lost in sin and without hope in the world but praise be to God, who is rich in mercy that He has sent His Son to pay the debt that we owe! What’s amazing is not that God saves some, it’s that God in His mercy would choose to save anyone! Our God is a God of amazing grace and steadfast love! Now you have heard me say before that there are two absolutes in life: the first is that you are here right now because God has brought you to this point. You are hearing these words because it is God’s will that you would hear them taught to you. The second absolute is that all will stand one day before the judgment seat of God. The author of Hebrews says that it is appointed for man to die once and then comes judgment. When that day comes, who is going to stand for you? Who will be the one to make a case for you? You can either defend yourself or you can rely purely on the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ that He would save you from your sins and the wrath that is to come. You cannot save yourself, you cannot present your case with a positive spin, unless Christ pays for your sins, you will die in your sins and be removed from His good grace forever. Don’t put off until tomorrow the most important decision of your life because tomorrow may not come. For some of you the clock is closer to midnight than for others. A day is marked for each one of us where our lives on this earth will be no more and who is to say that day is not tomorrow? What are you going to do with what you’ve been told?

To Whom Shall We Go? (Verses 66-69)

There’s two options and we see what these options are in John 6:66-69 “After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”” The first option is you can turn your back and walk away and you can continue to trust your own righteousness, your own beliefs, your own works to save you. You could continue to not walk with the Lord and assume that maybe all of this talk about God, sin, and salvation is just an old wives tale and is just something that people have told themselves to make them feel better about themselves and about the suffering they see in the world but are you willing to take that chance. The second option is that we answer with the voice of Peter, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.” Guys, there are a lot of places that you could go, but only one place that has eternal life, only one place that will be able to fill the void that you have tried to fill with sin and self only to be disappointed when there is never enough to fill it. You can look in a million and one places but there’s only One Savior, One source of eternal life, and One God over all. Why did Jesus come? He came to save sinners like you and I. B.B. Warfield said, “He did not come to induce us to save ourselves, or to help us to save ourselves, or to enable us to save ourselves. He came to save us. And it is therefore that His name was called Jesus—because He should save His people from their sins. The glory of our Lord, surpassing all His other glories to usward, is just that He is our actual and complete Saviour; our Saviour to the uttermost.” You might be thinking, “I’ve done far too much to be worthy of salvation. I’ve sinned too much, I’ve lied too much, I’ve cursed God too much, how could God save someone like me.” Paul anticipated a response like this and that is why he uses himself as an example in 1 Timothy 1:15-16 “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.” If a man like Paul can be saved, a man that put Christians to death, who blasphemed Christ, and who was the chief of sinners, then someone like you can certainly be saved. You have not yet outsinned the cross of Jesus Christ. Richard Sibbes wrote, "We have this for a foundation truth, that there is more mercy in Christ than sin in us." So, I must ask, “To whom shall you go?” Will you come to the cross of Christ and say, “Have mercy on me a sinner?” Or will you go the way of the world? But no that every sin must be punished and our God is a just God and He will not allow sin to have the last word so if you have not truly placed your faith in Christ, if you have not repented of your sin and asked Him for a mercy that only He can provide, I implore you this day to go to the Lord in prayer. You are still here today which means that there is still time but time is running short. Go to Christ and finally know what it means to come to life. Come to Christ and find that which you have been searching for all your life only now you will find it in something truly good. Come and pick up your cross knowing that His burden is easy and His yoke is life. Being a Christian does not mean that you will have everything you want in life but it does mean that you will finally possess that which you truly need. You all know I’m not one to do altar calls. I don’t like the idea of you having to walk to the front of the church to make a decision because you have been confronted by the Living God and remember an injured animal doesn’t run to the hunter, it runs to the back of the woods to lick its wounds. I don’t believe that if you sign a card or simply repeat after a preacher a prayer that you are automatically saved because I have seen so many people pray a prayer and then go and live their lives in the same exact way. But I do want to push for a decision tonight. I’m going to pray for a couple of different things and if you feel the Lord has put it on your heart, raise your hand for me. No one else will know, it is between you and God. I’m going to pray for 6 things and if one or several of those describe you, raise your hand. The leaders will be near by if you need someone to talk to or pray with you but don’t hesitate to make a decision that will stretch into eternity. Let’s pray and then we will have an extended time of worship because that is the greatest response, really the only response, to what we have talked about tonight and throughout this week.

Salvation for the first time

Recommit to Christ

Desire to be baptized

Desire for discipleship and to go deeper

Call into ministry

You just need prayer for anything