John 6:35-40 - Irresistible Gospel

Chad Werkhoven
Jul 31
4 min read

You're not forced to believe, but you can't resist it.

Pastor addresses a congregation in a church. Attendees are seated on wooden pews, showing varied emotions. Large windows and an arched door frame the serene setting. Some visibly reject the gospel, while for others God's grace is irresistible. — People hear the same gospel. Some reject it, but for those who've experienced God's grace, it's irresistible.

John 6:35–40 (NIV)

CONTEXT: Jesus' incredulous audience demanded that He show them a sign, just as God had validated Moses by sending bread (manna) when Israel was in the wilderness...

³⁵Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. ³⁶But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. ³⁷All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. ³⁸For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. ³⁹And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. ⁴⁰For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”

⁴¹At this the Jews there began to grumble about him...

Canons of Dordt

Point 1 - God's Unconditional Election

Point 2 - Limited Atonement

Point 3 - Total Depravity

Point 4 - Irresistible Grace

Article 8: The Earnest Call of the Gospel

Nevertheless, all who are called through the gospel are called earnestly.
1. For urgently and most genuinely God makes known in the Word what is pleasing to him:
  1. that those who are called
  2. should come to God.
2. God also earnestly promises rest for their souls and eternal life to all who do come and believe.

Summary

They missed it.

Like an outfielder blinded by the sun try to catch a routine fly ball or a husband who comes home and fails to notice a new decoration hanging on the wall, those who first listened to Jesus speak these words completely missed what it was that He told them.

Surely, you might be tempted to think, if they just gotten to know Jesus a little better, then sooner or later they too would accept Him as the bread of life. The value of what Jesus offers them is so significant that once they realize it, they too would want in. It just seems like at this point they don't see the full picture.

But that's not the case. They certainly did miss out on what Jesus said, and the significance of their flub had far more consequence than simply dropping a ball or missing out on a subtle addition to the home's decor. But their miss wasn't the result of not yet having really gotten to know Jesus.

Jesus told them you've seen me. He didn't mean they just got a quick glance, the way you might see something out of the corner of your eye but not really understand what just happened without getting a better look. The word seen is in the perfect tense, meaning that it's full and complete. They'd seen Jesus; that is, they evaluated His claims and came to a conclusion: they did not believe.

Dig Deeper

The failure of those listening to believe into Jesus leads Him into making a significant theological statement: all those the Father gives me will come to me. On one hand, Jesus condemns those listening to Him. Since they had seen but had not come, clearly they were not those who'd been given to Jesus by our Father.

Some choose to read Jesus' words here fatalistically, in that those whom the Father had predestined don't really have a free choice, and they're made - even forced - to come to Jesus. But this conclusion doesn't harmonize well with the rest of scripture. Man is never regarded in the Bible as a powerless pawn who just runs a preprogrammed course through life.

The best way to understand what Jesus means here is this doctrine that we call irresistible grace. What we mean by it is that God has made plain to all people the good news of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. It's not a secret shared only with the elect; quite the opposite: the Church goes to great lengths to announce the gospel to all people (an effort you're to be part of!).

Those who persist in their sin hear this good news, understand it in its fullness and yet want nothing to do with it. On the other hand, those whom the Father has given to Christ hear and see this same gospel message, but because our hearts and minds have been made new by the Holy Spirit, we can not resist the offer made to us. We freely - albeit irresistibly - choose to believe in Jesus and thereby gain eternal life, since He will raise us up at the last day.

AAA Prayer (About)

ACKNOWLEDGE WHO GOD IS: Our Father, who gave us to Jesus, who will never drive us away;
ALIGN YOUR LIFE WITH GOD'S WILL: Thank God for your renewed heart and mind that has made the gospel irresistible to you, and pray that you will be an effective messenger of it so that all will hear;
ASK GOD FOR WHAT YOU NEED: