In the sixth chapter of
John's Gospel, we have a running controversy between the Lord Jesus Christ and
the religious leaders of the Jewish people. After the marvelous miracle of the
feeding of the five thousand, our Lord begins to teach the people who followed
Him in great numbers at this time, and here his teaching was very offensive and
became a stumbling stone to the leaders of the people of His day. This morning I want to take out of this sixth chapter of John a few
things that my Lord taught that were offensive to people then — and also very
offensive to people today.
As a text, let's read John
6:59-61:
"These things said
He in the synagogue, as He taught in
Does this offend you? Everything my Lord Jesus did when
He was here in this world offended somebody — and you know He is still
offensive today. He is the rock of offense (Romans
And here in our text we
find that His preaching greatly offended people of His day. On many occasions
when our Lord would speak, the people became so angry that they'd take up
stones to stone Him. How then does the modern-day preacher hope to get along
with the world and please the unsaved crowd, when they hated the Lord Jesus
with such fury that they nailed Him to a cross? My dear friends, the world
loves it own — it hates God's people — it always has and it always will. Listen
to John 15:19, "If ye were of the world, the world would love its own,
but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world,
therefore the world hateth you."
In verse 26, our Lord began
preaching to the people. And after He brought this message, the people said as
I read in our text, "This is a hard saying, who can hear it?" This
is just too much for us! Our Lord met that quibble by asking, "Does
this offend you?" And then He brought some more blessed truth (verses
62-65), and then the crowd of about five thousand men, plus women and children,
walked off and left Him. And then my Lord turned to the twelve and said, "Will
ye also go away?" The crowd was offended by His Gospel — they stumbled
at His Gospel. Everything they clung to was being attacked by His teaching on
this occasion. And my friends, the Gospel of God's sovereign grace — the Gospel
of God acting in sovereignty offends people today just as much as it did here
in John six. Yes, it offended people then, and it offends people now. It will
either drive people to the Saviour, or it will drive them away from Him. The Gospel will either save or it will condemn. But,
blessed be God, the preaching of God acting in
sovereign grace will always accomplish the purpose whereunto God Almighty has
sent it!
Now may we look into this
message and see three great foundation truths that our Lord preached at the
height of His ministry — and lost His crowd. As you follow me with your open
Bible, I call your attention to these truths. Note, first of all:
1. Our Lord Jesus Christ
Preached the Sovereignty of God
Listen to John 6:37-38, "All
that the Father giveth Me shall come to Me, and him
that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out. For I came down from Heaven, not
to do mine own will, but the will of Him that sent Me."
My friends, there is sovereignty. There is God's will being done. There is
Christ coming down here appointed and delegated and set apart to accomplish the
will of a sovereign God, Who must do and will do that which seemeth good in His
own sight! (See Matthew 11:25-27)
Yes, when our Lord was here
as God's Prophet, there is one thing certain: He put God Almighty on the throne
in His preaching. It made those people angry, and it does so today. Any time on
earth that any preacher anywhere enthrones God Almighty in his preaching, proclaiming
the sovereignty which belongs to Him in all things, it will certainly offend
the pride of old sinful unregenerated man — I do not care whether he is a
church member, or not. Religious or not, if he is unregenerated, the
sovereignty of God (just the mention of it!) will offend him. And when a
preacher in this modern day dares to stand for the great teaching of God acting
as seemeth good in His sight — the Gospel of the glory of God, which is the
Gospel of the sovereign grace of God (Exodus 33:19; Romans 9:15-16) — it will
be offensive! And today, when we take the crown off the head of sinful man, and
put it on the head of a sovereign, holy God, the fur begins to fly, and all
hell will break loose!
Men today hate the
sovereignty of God and it is offensive to their old proud hearts because it
leaves them as paupers before a God Who does as He pleases, when He pleases,
and to whom He pleases! But, my friends, God's will is going to be done in all
matters, whether in heaven or in the earth. The Apostle Paul says that God
"worketh all things after the counsel of His own will" (Ephesians
My friends, you and I need
desperately to be conformed to the will of God in all things — but the people
in my Lord's time grew angry and were offended because the Lord Jesus demanded
that they be conformed to the will of God. They openly rebelled against these
demands, exactly as men do today. But, dear ones, God Almighty never has saved a man on man's terms. God always saves sinners on
His own terms! Does this offend you?
There are many within reach
of our radio broadcasts who are greatly offended. We hear on every hand that
so-called Christian schools are coming out flatly to say that the great
doctrines of grace will not be taught in their classrooms! And so such schools
are manufacturing young preachers to go out and deny the very things that the
Lord Jesus Christ solemnly set His stamp upon when He was here. And one of
these truths is that the will of God is done — that man must bow to the will of
God — that God does not take man into His counsel as to what He has decided to
do — that God is very God, on the throne, and man must bow at His footstool!
Does this offend you? The sovereignty of God was very offensive in the days of
my Lord here on earth — and it is very offensive now.
Let's look in this chapter
at a second great foundation truth that our Lord preached that day and lost His
crowd.
2. Our Lord Jesus Christ
Preached the Total Depravity of Man and Man's Inability
My Lord said in John 6:44, "No
man can come to Me." Strange language, but
that's what He said. "No man can come to Me,
except the Father which hath sent Me draw him." The Scriptures say a
little later in this chapter, "Many therefore of his disciples, when
they had heard this, said, This is a hard saying, who
can hear it?"
You know, my Lord put man
down in the gutter of his total depravity, dead in trespasses and sin, depraved
and corrupt — and this sort of preaching greatly offended men. My Lord put man
in a spiritual grave unable to rise in his own strength. My Lord put man on a
cripple's bed unable to walk. In His preaching, my Lord put man on a blind
man's stool unable to see. And the people of His day were greatly offended —
and people today are likewise greatly offended.
I tell you, dear ones, this
is no time to be denying these great truths. My Lord taught them and I do not
care if every preacher in the country says, "Well, Brother Barnard, they
just can't be preached today." My Lord preached these truths.
"Well," you say, "Brother Barnard, they offend people." I
know, but my Lord preached them, and surely we would not be ashamed of any
great truth that my Lord Jesus Christ preached when He was down here in controversy
with religious leaders. HE dared to preach these things.
And I say to you that
instead of this being a time to deny these great truths and skirt around them,
it's time we preachers today deserted the modern high-pressure methods of
trying to get men into the
Thousands of children are
being sinned against in our modern-day decision services held in the so-called
revival meetings. The Sunday School teacher sits by
the little child (I'm describing how it goes on in your church, sister!) — and when the preacher asks who wants to go to Heaven, the
Sunday School teacher pushes the little fellow out of the pew and down the
aisle. And I say to you, it is a sin against that child who has experienced no Holy Spirit conviction nor repentance, without which
there is no salvation.
Let me say it and say it
again, that man is a dead depraved child and can no more save himself than a demon in Hell could! The Holy Spirit must
quicken him and awaken him and bring him to see his lost condition. Then the
Holy Spirit reveals the Lord Jesus to that sinner as his Lord and Saviour. And
when this takes place, bless God, you won't have to
pull him down an aisle. He'll confess openly the Lord Jesus as his Lord and
Saviour.
My dear preacher brother,
you have never convicted and you have never saved a single sinner and you never
will! The Lord God of Heaven is the only Author and the only Executor of
salvation. "Salvation is of the Lord!" (Jonah 2:9)
Oh how men do need to hear
the truth about themselves today! The Lord told these
people the truth about themselves and it greatly offended them — but the Lord
told them! — and they left Him — but the Lord told
them! — and they wouldn't listen to Him anymore — but
the Lord told them about their awful condition. So helplessly
bound by the cords of their own love of self and their own sinful practices
that they couldn't come to the Lord except the Lord draw them with the cords of
His eternal love. Does this offend you? Does this offend you?
And now in John six we come
to another great truth that our Lord preached, and when the people heard it
they said, "We just can't take any such teaching as this!" Therefore,
"From that time, many of His disciples went back and walked no more
with Him." How sad that is! But the Lord didn't pull His punches. The
Lord was telling them the truth and being true to their souls. The Lord was pointing
them to the kind of God He really is and the kind of people they were — and now
He points them to the true way of salvation. For in the sixth chapter, when
people left Him in such numbers,
3. Our Lord Jesus Christ
Preached the Blood Atonement
In verse 54, "Whosoever
eateth My flesh and drinketh My blood hath eternal
life; and I will raise him up at the last day." Now, my dear ones,
that was an offensive truth then and it is still offensive today. The people in
the days of our Lord resented what our modernists refer to as a
"slaughterhouse gospel." These religious people had read in the old
Scriptures how that the Christ, the Messiah, was to live and reign forever, how
His was a kingdom that could never end, so they could not go along with this
idea of the death of the cross and the atoning blood.
How offensive the
proclamation of the cross is today! Preach works and people will applaud you.
Preach baptism and you can form your own denomination. Preach church membership
and you'll get along fine. Preach the social religion — or most anything you
want to preach — and people will applaud, but God will be offended. But, my
brother, if you preach the cross — proclaim the death of death on that cross —
preach it in all of its offense and shame — preach it in its humiliation —
preach it in its goriness, its bloodiness — and then preach the cross in its
victory. I say to you, then God will applaud, but the people will be offended.
But the Apostle Paul said
what we must say, "I'd rather please God than men," and this is one
time we want to say, "Move over, Paul, and let me join you!"
The Lord Jesus Christ
proclaimed blood atonement. He said the blood has been shed. It was God's blood
— holy blood — precious blood — it was Divinely sent
blood — saving blood — redeeming blood. The blood atonement means the life laid
down, it means the offering up of the Lord of glory! And He said this was the
only basis on which a Holy God could deal with sinful men. Not upon your
goodness, but upon the basis of His life laid down — that's how God deals with
sinners.
My sinner friend, may God
speak to your heart today. Don't join the church members and preachers all over
this country who get fighting mad at the Word of God and these great truths
we've mentioned to you today. How they do scoff at anyone who
dares to preach that God Almighty is very God — the God of absolute
sovereignty. How they do make fun of anybody who dares to talk about the
desperate condition of lostness under which sinners are bound today. And how
they do skirt around the awful implications of the death on the cross of the
Lord Jesus Christ!
Oh, my sinner friend, don't
join this religious crowd the record of whom is given here in John chapter six.
When they heard our Lord preach these blessed truths, they took it out on Him!
They said, "We won't listen to that! We'll skee-daddle away from here!
We'll go and get us a preacher who will prophesy unto us smooth things!"
Don't you be offended, sinner friend. No, sir! Don't you do it! It'll cost you
your soul! I tell you the cost of being offended at the truth as it flows from
the lips of Christ is to go to Hell. Don't be offended
at the proclamation of the Gospel of God's sovereign grace! I say to you, there
is no other way for a sinner to be saved. I say to you that man is lost, that,
man is corrupt, man is vile without one thing to offer
God. And, like dear Brother Spurgeon, we like to quote that hymn very often:
"In my hand no price I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling."
That's your only hope,
sinner! You have nothing to offer. But Christ died, yea,
rather Christ is risen again and sitteth on the right hand of God. If you could
but believe that He died for you and paid your sin debt and satisfied the
Holiness of God for you, you would come to Him in utter surrender. I pray that
you can. That old song,
"What can wash away my sins?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus!
That song is still true —
eternally true! And I pray that you won't be offended at the truth as it is in
Christ Jesus, but humble yourself in the sight of God, and cry unto Him for
mercy. That is my prayer in the name of Him Who loved us and bought us with His
own precious blood, even the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen and Amen.