For the 121th Sunday after Pentecost, the Series B lectionary offers these three readings: Proverbs 9:1-10 or Joshua 24:1-2a, 14-18; Ephesians 5:6-21 and John 6:51-69. We will examine the text of John 6:66, “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.”
Isn’t it interesting that the 666 passage of John (6:66) is indeed a work of the devil himself? For anytime that anyone makes a decision to walk no longer with the LORD Jesus Christ, that is following the footsteps of Satan himself. The goal of this sermon would be to help the listeners determine how they also have refused to walk with Jesus and what causes such a decision to be made.
This text is primarily about Jesus speaking of Himself as the living bread from heaven and that whoever eats of the “flesh of the Son of Man and drinks My blood has eternal life.” (verse 54) Now while this saying of Jesus was a hard saying for many of His disciples, it appears that it was not the statement that “broke the camel’s back” so to speak. Just before verse 66 which indicates that many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more, we have verse 65, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.”
From a Law and Gospel perspective this is a harder statement to swallow than the one about eating His flesh and drinking His blood. How so? Because while the eating and drinking statement appears to go against the ceremonial prohibitions in regard to cannabalism, the statement that no one can come to Jesus unless it has been granted to him by the Father hits the old Adam where he lives.
This statement is not Gospel; it is Law as it attacks the old Adam of every disciple that desires to be given some credit for either contributing or cooperating with one’s own salvation. In fact, this statement rightly understood can be seen as the key element of the 16th century Reformation. For the theologians of self-glory taught that the natural fallen man was able to make some small decision in turning to God that would result in blessings of gracious power and appreciation from God Himself.
The Reformers, on the other hand, considered the ability of the unbeliever to cooperate in his salvation by an act of his fallen will as impossible. The unbelieving natural man is dead in sin and as 1 Corinthians 1:14 reveals, “the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” It is not that Lazarus was having a hard time in making the decision to rise from the dead until he heard the invitation of Jesus to come out of the grave! No, Lazarus was dead and apart from the Word of the Christ, his body would still be dead in the grave!
What may be surprising to members of the congregation, is that everytime they sin by thought, word or deed, they join with those who now walk away from Jesus to do their own thing by their own will and decision. Sin can be understood as “me first” theology or “theologian of self-glory” theology simply by spelling it and finding that the center of “sin” is “I”.
The theologian of self-glory turns aside from the path of Jesus while the theologian of the cross walks with Him because He has the “words of eternal life.” (verse 68) The sermon would first show how every member of the congregation is in the head a theologian of self-glory followed by the Gospel revelation that such is precisely the kind of sin for which Christ died. Through repentance (contrition over sin and faith in Jesus Christ) the theologian of self-glory dies to his sinful self and becomes a theologian of the cross not by following his head of reason by his heart of faith which clings to the only hope Who is “the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (verse 69)
Name:Tom Baker