This Week’s Focus Passage: John 6:44

‘No man can come to me, except the Father that sent me, draw him.’

    The sixth chapter of John’s Gospel is one of the longer chapters in the New Testament, of the Word of God. Now we hasten to point out, again, that the chapter divisions in our Bibles, are not inspired; they were added some time later. In fact, resorting to the internet, if we understand the response correctly, there are more than ten million results to the question posed, “When were the chapters and verses added to the Bible?” With that not so subtle caution, we relate the very first offering given to that question, and we read the following response: “The first English New Testament to use the verse divisions was a 1557 translation by William Whittingham (c. 1524-1579). The first Bible in English to use both chapters and verses was the Geneva Bible published shortly afterward in 1560.” We iterate, chapter six of John is one of the longer chapters in our New Testaments. 

    We are reminded as we consider verse forty-four of that chapter, of our first ‘confrontation’ with this truth, as it is in Jesus Christ. In point of fact, according to the apostle John, these words were spoken by our Lord and Savior, Jesus the Christ, as He responded to the murmuring of the Jews because he said, I am the bread which came down out of heaven. And they said, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how doth he now say, I am come down out of heaven? Jesus answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves. And it is at this point that He utters the enigmatic statement that is our Focus Passage for this week, saying, No man can come to me, except the Father that sent me, draw him: and I will raise him up in the last day. These words spoken unto this crowd of unruly Jews, that had just said, it seems in unison, after seeing the miracle of the five thousand fed, This is if a truth the prophet that cometh into the world. Followed by the amazing response of Jesus, when John informs us that, Jesus therefore perceiving that were about to come and take him by force, to make him king, withdrew again into the mountain himself alone. We confess that we don’t know how Dispensationalists react to that incident, that the Jews were about to take Jesus by force to make Him king; how does that consist with their allegation that He was refused by the Jews, and that is why God had to come up with ‘plan B’? 

    But to return to our remarkable verse, John 6:44; we see from the lips of Jesus Himself, the assertion of the sovereignty of God, put forth. This idea of the sovereignty of God in salvation was received by the Jews of Christ’s day, pretty much the same as it is received by many people in our day, even professing Christians, that are, or have been, convinced that they had a part in their salvation, that they had made some contribution in being saved from their sins. Some believers, by the amazing grace of God, have been spared exposure to this lie; some have, in God’s merciful Providence, been exposed rather to writings from men that were given a better understanding of the Sovereignty of God in the salvation of sinners, and were through those writings came to Christ, understanding the Truth that Christ set forward in this Focus Passage; they knew that there was nothing that they could do, or had done, to contribute any merit toward their salvation. Indeed, that had been convinced by God the Holy Spirit, through the Word of God, that all the merit came from the work of the Lord Jesus Christ; He has done it all. The same blessed Holy Spirit, who regenerated their hearts, according to the promise of Jeremiah 31:31-33; 

Behold, the days come, saith Jehovah, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was a husband unto them, said Jehovah. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith Jehovah: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

And then you may read, as well, the covenant expressions of Ezekiel 36, beginning at verse 22, where Jehovah has offered this little preface to His announcement for their future. He wishes for them to understand His motives in what He intends to do.

Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah: I do not this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for my holy name, which ye have profaned among the nations, whither ye went. And I will sanctify my great name, which hath been profaned among the nations, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the nations shall know that I am Jehovah, saith the Lord Jehovah, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.

And from here begins a lengthy ‘list’ of ‘I wills,’ the obvious point being that there are no ‘you wills,’ such as ‘you will ask Jesus to come into your heart,’ or, ‘you will respond to an altar call to go down the aisle to receive Jesus,’ ‘you will say this prayer after me’ and then you will know that Jesus has saved you. These things are nothing that Jehovah God calls upon people to do; He, in a wonderfully straight-forward manner, informs us of what He has done, and what He will do, to bring His chosen people unto Himself, through the blood of the Lamb of God, by the activity of God the Holy Spirit, sovereignly, regenerating the hearts of His elect sinners, making them willing in the day of His power, to come unto Him. (Psalm 110:3).

    No man can come to Him, except the Father; the Father of the Lord Jesus Christ who sent Him to the earth to make it possible for sinners to have their sins forgiven, through His blood, which He has willingly and happily come to shed upon that cross which was set upon that hill, Golgotha, in Jerusalem, many years ago. Our Lord and Savior uttered these words,, long before His incarnation, in Psalm 40:7-9.

    Then said I, Lo, I am come; In the roll of the book it is written of me: I delight to do thy will, O my God; Yea, thy law is within my heart. I have proclaimed glad tidings of righteousness in the great assembly; Lo, I will not refrain my lips, O Jehovah, thou knowest.

David Farmer, elder

Fellowship Bible Church