In Pastor Jerry Zepnick's sermon titled 'The True Bread Of Life,' he explores the theme of belief in Jesus as presented in John 6:28-40. The sermon begins with a note of gratitude from Monica Hoffman for the congregation's support of her ministry, underscoring the impact of faith in action. Pastor Jerry emphasizes that belief in Jesus is the core work God requires, challenging the congregation to ponder their understanding of who Jesus is. He highlights the metaphor of Jesus as the 'bread of life,' stressing that spiritual nourishment should be prioritized over physical sustenance. The sermon outlines five promises made by Jesus, including that those who come to Him will never hunger or thirst spiritually, and they will not be cast out. Pastor Jerry discusses the concept of divine election, the assurance that believers are drawn to Jesus by God's grace. He urges listeners to find their satisfaction and fulfillment in Jesus, rather than in worldly achievements or relationships. The sermon concludes with a call to embrace the patience and love of Jesus, encouraging continuous faith and trust in Him.

Music Morning church family. Morning brother. And Blessed day God has given us. I wanna start out by reading a thank you note that we have from Monica Hoffman. Some of you remember a few weeks ago, she was here and gave a report on her ministry and she gave this thank you, sent it to Bonnie and I, and I'm going to read that now.

Says, greetings, I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to share the ministry of Scandinavians for Christ with your folks at Voice of Faith Bible Church. Everyone was so friendly. My son Dan and I felt very welcome. Thank you for the generous love offering. It is much appreciated.

We both enjoyed the fish fry and all the good food. Please continue to pray for the SFC and the men revising the Bibles. Pray they will soon send me the revisions so we can get the Bibles printed. Yours for the souls of Scandinavians, Monica Hoffman." So it's neat to know that we have an effect, we have an impact, we can have something in an outreach to translate Bibles for the Scandinavians and have a piece of that. That is a true blessing.

And so, let's get started this morning. We are in the book of John chapter 6 and today we will be reading through and talking about verses 30 through 40 I'm gonna start on 28 overlaps a little bit with last week but it helps to draw it out and show us a little bit more clearly where the text takes place today. So, John chapter 6 verses 28 through 40, and it reads, Then they said to him, What shall we do that we may work the works of God. Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent. Therefore they said to Him, What sign will you perform then, that we may see it and believe you?

What work will you do? Our fathers ate the manna in the desert. As it is written, he gave them bread from heaven to eat. Then Jesus said to them, Most assuredly I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.

Then he said to him, Lord, give us this bread always. And Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who 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 the one who comes to me, I will by no means cast out.

For I have come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of Him who sent me. This is the will of the Father who sent me, that of all He has given me, I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day. And this is the will of Him who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life, and I will raise Him up at that last day." Father this morning we thank you for the power in your words, Lord God. We know that our words have no power and yours have all the power. Lord God, I thank you for these words this morning, Lord, that were written over 2, 000 years ago and yet apply directly to our lives and our hearts today, Lord.

Help us. Father God, to have faith and eyes to see and ears to hear this morning, Lord God, that our hearts can be transformed, Lord, and our lives can be transformed into your image. I just pray for your power, Lord, this morning. In Jesus' precious name, Amen. And so, as we've been going through the book of John, It all points to one thing, the deity of Christ.

But we've been in chapter 6, Pastor Rick started out with preaching about the feeding of the 5, 000. And then after that was done, the apostles went over the sea and Jesus followed later. He caught up with them walking on the sea. And then we can see through these events many things that have happened before this also, but we're given a showcase of the power of God, of the power of God in Christ, that He is God incarnate. And so there's this power over nature, this power over food, this power over demons within, demons that he's cast out, and this power that he has over our lives, in our lives, in our hearts.

That same power that is displayed in the Word of God is available to the Christian today if we believe. And this text, It starts out with believe. It says Jesus answered and said to them, this is the work of God, that you believe in Him who He sent. The very last thing it comes down on 30 says, And this is the will of Him who sent me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him. This sermon today is a sandwich, and it's got belief on both sides, top and bottom.

And in the middle is just a big pile of faith that we need to have in Jesus. And without the power that he has in our hearts, in our lives, to conquer what this world always is putting down on us, we will not have a chance. That's where belief comes in. What does belief mean? We're gonna go through a lot of that today because there's like 90% of people in this world that profess to be Christians or in America I'll say.

And they all say they believe. What if they all believed what this book tells us who Jesus is? What would our country look like? It would not look like it looks right now. And so, where does that come down to us?

Because salvation starts in the hearts of individuals and we're taught and told to seek that. So as he gives these accounts, the apostle John in this book, of the signs that Jesus performs, the signs they point to something, not calling them miracles. These signs all point right to the reality that Jesus is our Savior, that He is sent from God, that He is God incarnate. And so we see the love and the grace and the patience over the course of this. Jesus could have just walked away.

You guys are a bunch of just thick skulls and I don't have the patience and the time to explain to you any more clearly than I have. Just be gone from me. No, He shows patience and perseverance with these people that he continually does. And he shows this that they might believe. And it would be easier for me to have a critical attitude about this if it didn't happen to me.

Because it was by God's grace that he had patience with me because I rejected him how many times before finally I gave up. I surrendered to the will of Christ. If it weren't for this love and mercy and patience of God for lost souls, we would still all, every one of us be stumbling around in the dark. We would not stand a chance. We'd be tripping through the pickers.

And in His love for us, He gives us His word. He gives us the power of the Holy Spirit in our hearts and in our lives that we can read and we can understand. And God can do a work in our hearts and transform us into the image of His son to read and to understand this, that it can really change our lives. Not just where, oh I suppose I'll go to church because mama wants me to. It's not about that.

It's the ultimate goal is for the sinner to repent. The ultimate goal is for souls to be saved, that we can know those who are lost and we can pray to God in your love and grace and mercy. Just swoop down and take one more. Just save one more soul. And this is the mission of Jesus.

That He might be, that one last sinner might be freed from the grip of the world, of the sin and the darkness. And so, in Luke 4 18, Jesus is reading this from the book of Isaiah as He got up in the synagogue and He opened up the scrolls and he read this. He read this about himself. He read in Luke 4 18. By the way, the title is the true bread of life.

What will do us any good? The true bread of life. I have it in my notes right at the top. Turn on PowerPoint. And here I am, tripping around, right?

And so The first slide beyond that is Luke 4 18. It says, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind to set at liberty those who are oppressed. This is the prophecy of Jesus coming that was fulfilled. And he stood up in the synagogue and he read that.

And then he said, this is fulfilled in your sight today and he sat down. That was a mic drop moment. I was like this is me. This here, that's what he said. So this is Jesus reading from that and this is the hope that we have and this is what he's trying to tell the people there as well.

In Colossians 1 13 and 14 it says he has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love in whom we have redemption through His blood the forgiveness of sins." See this is the mission that Jesus came on that he is trying to under help these people these Jews to understand And this morning he's trying to help us to understand the same thing. Because in him we have life. Aside from him, we have no life. In 2031, it tells the mission of John writing this book that in him we might have life. And this is what he's trying to get them to see, and us as well.

He created food, and we know this from the previous text, that he created food for 5, 000 out of a boy's lunch of five little loaves and a couple of fish. And he fed 5, 000 people for free. The crowd stayed in the wilderness overnight, slept on the ground, whatever it was. They stole boats or commandeered boats or whatever it took to get on the other side because they woke up in the morning and he wasn't there. The boats that the apostles took didn't come back and Jesus wasn't there.

They come in, veered these boats, they cross the sea and they found Jesus. And last week we talked about why did they find Jesus? Because they ate the loaves that they had and the fishes and they wanted more. So last week we talked about being careful not to work for the food that perishes and that was the question we all needed to put in front of ourselves last week. Do we work for the food that perishes?

What do our days, our weeks, our months, and our years look like. If we had two containers right here, and one was filled with the things that perish, and the other one was filled with things that don't. And if we had one big one, I'll say, and we started putting stuff in it, the stuff that we work for that perishes, how much room would be left in that for work that does not perish, for eternal work? And so this crowd was so amped up for the food, They were so excited about the food, the meal that they had the day before, that they followed Him. And so what if we were, and what if they were, as excited about the spiritual food as they were the physical food.

And that was the call last week, for us to be more excited about our spiritual food than physical food. Because today, I'm excited because after service, we're gonna go out for lunch, okay, with some family. And we're gonna have an excellent time. We're gonna have really great food. But that's not the food that matters.

The food that matters is our spiritual food. What if we went after spiritual food and pondered spiritual food like we ponder physical food. So in verse 28, He tells us what to do to get that magic everlasting bread. What do I got to do to get this magic everlasting bread? And He says just believe, believe.

Tell us what to do to get this magic bread believe in me and if you were to apply that same desire to spiritual nourishment that's great believe in me Jesus said believe in me the key question is this morning, who do you believe Jesus is? Who do you believe? This is John's question throughout the book. And like I said a little while ago, in America we have what is probably between 85 and 90% of people believe in Jesus. Right?

What do they believe? What Jesus do they believe in? And so what do you believe? Who do you believe that Jesus is? That's the point of this whole book.

The question is on the forefront of our culture altogether. It's central in our society. What are you going to do? When you know who Jesus is, and who that Jesus is to you, what are you going to do with it? So it's central in society, and what people do with that question directs not only their hearts and lives, the lives of individuals, but the direction of a culture, the direction of a nation.

And we know it was different a hundred, two hundred years ago than what it is today. We can't honestly say that we're one nation under God. We were founded that way perhaps. But what are we today? And the answer is that central theme of the book of John.

And today here's something I will ask you not to do. I'm going to ask you not to do something today. And that is do not think that that question is for unbelievers only. Do not think that question of who is Jesus to you is for unbelievers only. Who do you believe Jesus is, the question today?

Because who you believe He is, it's gonna change the way you walk. It's gonna change the way you think, and it's gonna change the way that you live. Your priorities. Ephesians 1.18, Paul here is writing to believers. Okay, he's not writing to a bunch of lost people.

He's writing this text right here to believers. And he says in Ephesians 1.18, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. He wrote that to believers. We can think that we're believers and we could be true believers, but we're not there yet. That our eyes can be open more and more, sanctification, more Jesus, better understanding, less of what this world has to offer.

I want more Jesus. So here he's writing to Christians, even as a believer, you need supernatural power from God to grow and your understanding of who Jesus really is and all that He's done for you. I know people that are saved that have had miracles worked on them and you look at their walk and their testimony, you would never guess it. You would never guess. Even with the Spirit of God enlightening your heart, you will never come to the end of understanding who Jesus is.

You will never get to the backside. You will never get there. You can take all the studies and all the classes in the world, and you can think that you know who Jesus really is, you will never get to the end of it. We will spend an eternity in glory learning more about Jesus and praising Him. The glory of His honor.

And so whatever you know now, there's infinitely more to know about Jesus. And to discover, even for the most seasoned Christian, We're not there. See, in verse 28, their disillusioned to think that they can work their way to God. And that's our thing too, if you're honest with ourselves. So often we think there's things we can do to earn our way to God.

They want to know what needs to be done to meet the standard. What can I do? What do I have to do? To do something to merit God's favor. Not unlike in Matthew 19, 16, the rich young ruler who said, Now behold, one came and said to him, Good teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?

People ask the same question today. People think today yet that there's something you can do to earn eternal life. And even if you don't voice that out loud, it's something that's wired in our hearts and in our being. And in verse 29, they're told, they're told, believe. Believe.

There's nothing you can do for works. You believe. See, this is the sum of what man can do to earn salvation. Believe, believe. Easy, right?

85, 90% of Americans believe, that's great. Heaven's gonna be overflowing, right? See, this text is bookended again with belief on both sides of it. How important is that for us to understand what that really means? And so today with two basic headings, the first being one of the first of seven I ams that Jesus says in this book.

And so the I am statements that Jesus makes in verse 35, I am the bread of life. And then five promises that come after that. I wanna talk about the bread of life. And then I wanna talk about those five promises that He gives us that we can hang on to. But first I want us to ask this question and keep this on the top.

Who do you believe Jesus is? And so I can ask everybody that this morning, you might say, some might say, I don't know, he's Jesus. He's the one that I read about and that he keeps yelling about from up front at that pulpit thing. And so this is what some might say and some might have a greater understanding and some might not know at all. The focus of John is that Jesus is God.

And in verse 30, they ask him to perform. They ask him to perform. Therefore they said to him, what sign will you perform then? They're looking for a performance. And so didn't they just eat the bread and the fishes like 12 hours ago?

And now they want a sign. Now they're looking for a sign. Now I want something. Show me something. This is pompous.

This is being narrow-minded, being blind and not understanding. And I can say that at the same time that I miss his signs in my life that he's done. And I think we all do at times. So after just witnessing one of the greatest signs that the world has ever seen, they say, show me a sign. And so we do that in our prayers.

Lord, do this for me. Do that, do that, do that, do that. And save this person and heal that person. Okay, see they have already believed that he is one sent from God and that he has supernatural powers. So really what's going on here?

What they have is an incorrect, preconceived expectation of who Jesus is. These notions they have, see in the Old Testament, Moses was the great prophet in the Old Testament. And they keep lifting him up. And in Exodus 16, God provided food for His people in the wilderness, the manna. Every day it came down, except Sundays, right?

So they had to gather enough on Saturday, or I'm sorry, except for Saturday. It was a Sabbath on Saturday. And so they had to gather enough on Friday for Saturday. And if they gathered any other day of the week, it would rot before the morning, but not that day. But God provided food for His people in the wilderness.

They had manna, and it kept coming down and coming down. Every day, they had plenty of nourishment. And then they complained. And so God sent them quail flocks of hundreds of thousands of quail came in. And they just fell on the ground, and they picked them up and ringed the neck and cooked them and eat them.

That is something else. I've never had quail, but I imagine it's pretty tasty. But He gave them quail. And just like Jesus did the day before with the loaves and the fish, they believed He would do the same thing that Moses did in that they would have this perpetual supply of food as long as they followed Him. They had this incorrect notion of who he was.

And that would be, relatively speaking, a daily thing. And so they liked this fish and bread. And they were willing to follow him around to get that every day. And They wanted an easy button. They wanted that, what do I need to do to get this meal every day?

Boom, okay, believe, okay, I'll do that. The woman at the well, she wanted this living water. And that's what I think that we want sometimes too. So in verse 35, he says the first, I am, and they don't understand it. In verse 35, Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life.

He who comes to me shall never hunger, and he who believes in me shall never thirst." And they just don't get it. So he says it plainly. It's not something you get from me. And so often that's what we think as well. Okay Jesus, I'm praying about this and I want this and I need that.

See, it's not something you get from Jesus. It is Jesus. And in our minds, we have a hard time comprehending what that gift is. That gift is Jesus. It's not the things that He provides for us.

It is Him. So, You can see that you can have the greatest understanding of Scripture, of who Jesus is. You can have the deepest understanding of the doctrines and you can have great theology. And when it comes to Jesus, and believe all the fundamentals of the faith, but do you believe He is the bread of life? Is He that to you?

The driving force of your life. Is He that? Do you come to Him as the bread of life? And what does that mean? Jesus gave five promises.

And I see these promises as if you're going to scale a wall or a cliff, they're pegs that you can hang onto and use to climb in your faith, higher up to see Jesus in your faith. And so, He says, these five pegs of sound doctrine, and so the first is verse 35. If you come to Jesus, you will never be hungry. Verse 35 says, and Jesus said, I am the bread of life, he who comes to me shall never hunger. Never be hungry.

He who comes to me will never be hungry. See these people ate just 12 hours before and they're hungry again. And Jesus said, He who comes to Jesus will never be hungry. I have a 14-year-old grandson. I've raised three boys.

I know how hunger looks. I remember being young as well. Not clearly, but I can look right now at my 14-year-old grandson, and he'll come over, and I'll be like, Hey, did you have lunch yet? Well, yeah, but it was like half an hour ago. I'm ready to chow down again.

And so you make food, and then it's like, well, now it's like 1 or 1.30, and it's like, well, what time is supper? Well, that's at like six o'clock. Well, I can't do that, you know. And so at three o'clock you're making a hamburger or some pancakes or something. There's this perpetual hunger going on in that boy.

And the fact is that it's going on in all of us. It's just harder to fill with a boy like that. It's a good analogy anyhow. See, no matter how much food you eat, you're always going to be hungry again. That physical food, and that's why Jesus gives us, in His love and mercy, He gives us this analogy of food so that we can see because we're not that smart.

Well, I'm not anyway. Okay, none of us are. And so, he helps us to see by using these analogies with food and with water. But no matter how much food you eat, you're always going to be hungry again. That principle applies even more so to the soul, to the soul of a person, even more so.

Proverbs 27, 20 tells us, "'Helen's instruction are never full, "'so the eyes of man are never satisfied.'" This is a truth. It's not my opinion. This is the Word of God. It's telling us that the eyes of man are never satisfied. This is a truth.

It's not my opinion. This is the word of God. It's telling us that the eyes of man are never satisfied. Your soul is hungry. Your mind is hungry.

Humans are fueled by desire. And as a mortal, you have these basic biological needs or desires to eat, to drink, to rest, to self-preservation, to procreation. There are these basic things, but there's deeper desires to accomplish the meaningful things of life. These things people think will often bring fulfillment. And I can remember being young and thinking, I would like to do certain things with my life.

I wanna be successful. I wanna have good friends. I can remember as a youngster thinking, once I make good friends, if I can have these friends, well, it took a lot of fights to get those friends. And when I got them, I didn't want them anymore. But anyway, we think that these things will bring fulfillment.

That once I make friends with these people, or once I graduate high school, I can remember being in school and thinking, this is the worst thing in the world. I can't imagine anything worse than school. And often till today I say, no matter how bad it gets, at least I'm not back in school. And I can remember being in fourth grade and we were in the lunch line and I'm coming around in the lower level of this school. And I look at the line and the line is about 150 feet long, and then it turns this way to where you get your food.

And I was thinking, it's going to be forever before I get my food. But really, I'm only in fourth grade and I've got to go through eighth grade yet. This is terrible. I don't, but I thought once I graduate high school, it's going to be all better. Well, lo and behold, I graduated high school and I had to get a job.

But we think once I graduate high school, once I get a degree, I'll be satisfied when I get the career that I want, or the business gets going that I'm starting up. Once I get my investments in order, or once I meet the woman of my dreams, then I will be fulfilled. Then everything will be great. And then you get to this and you're not there yet. You realize it's not the wall that you were going after, that it's a wide open field yet.

And you think once I meet, fall in love, and get married, everything's gonna be great. Once I have children, maybe, maybe have children, raise a family, and get things going. Once I create my own family legacy, right? Once I get that peg in the ground, then to the end I'll be fulfilled at that point. It's once I raise the children to be successful and be financially free, then I'll be fulfilled.

Or maybe once I retire and I have more time for my hobbies, I'll be fulfilled. And lo and behold, you get there, and by that time, you're closer to the pine box, I'll call it. And what's the point then? See, there's always going to be something that you want to be fulfilled in. And all of these things are not wrong.

They're not evil, but they don't fulfill the desire of your soul. I have a wife, children, grandchildren now. They can't fill that spot. They can't fill the desire of my soul. God blessed me with a beautiful wife, a godly wife, and as much as I love her and need her, she is not meant to fill that spot in my life.

She can't fill that spot in my soul. She's not created to. Only God is. And looking for this, some fall into destructive behaviors because they look and look and look and They can't find it. They fall into drugs or alcohol or gambling or promiscuity.

And we all know someone that's afflicted by this. We all know someone that's there. But why do they do this? Why do they look for that? Because they're hungry.

That's what I did. I was hungry and I went after things that would make me happy. And they couldn't. You go after and go after and go after and it doesn't work. Cannot find satisfaction.

Instead, there's depression. There's hopelessness. They start grabbing for things that make you feel good, and it's not meant to be. C.S. Lewis wrote, If I find myself a desire of which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.

People, if you're born again, you were not made for this world. Stop looking for things in this world to satisfy your soul. You were made for another world. This is not the world. We're visitors, we're sojourners, we're pilgrims here.

We're on our way through. We're made for something else. So those that know, that have the most, those that I know, that have the most things in this world, and have the things that this world has to offer, I often find to be the most discontented people that I know. The most unhappy people. Those things cannot satisfy the soul.

Not your children, not your grandchildren, not your wife, not your friends. So when Jesus says, I am the bread of life. He keeps bringing this back around. Second point is, if you believe in Jesus, you'll never be thirsty. And I use this text, this verse last week, Psalm 42.1, As the deer pants for the water, Brooks, so pants my soul for you, O God.

See, He satisfies your soul. Like CS said a little bit ago in that quote, it's a hunger that can't be fulfilled in this world. It's a hunger that cannot be held onto. And it points to something. It points to something in a different world.

I've had friends that have gone from skydiving to scuba diving to archery to gun to just one hobby after the next, chasing it down the road, mountain biking, and it just went on and on and on. They'd sit on one, it'd get boring within a couple of years, and grab a hold of the next thing. Oh, this will satisfy me. No, it doesn't work. See, nothing in the world, nothing in our world was meant to satisfy that.

So can I ask you this morning, are you satisfied? Are you fulfilled? Do you have that bread of life? Are you satisfied? That's the question for us this morning.

Are you fulfilled? Not asking you how do you feel. How's your health? How you been sleeping at night? Or how's your marriage?

Or How are you doing with your job, your finances? How is all that stuff going? How are the kids? Is Junior talking yet? Is he walking?

Is he in school? What's going on? But the question is, are you fulfilled? See, we're made for a purpose. We're not made for our own purpose.

We're made for a purpose, something greater than yourself. You can have the right theology about Jesus and be totally thirsty and unsatisfied until you come to Him, until you trust Him. Philippians 4, 11 through 13 says, not that I speak in regard to need for I have learned in whatever state I am to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound everywhere and in all things. I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer.

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. Do you see the glue in this one? Do you see the showcase of that text? That is Christ who strengthens me. The Apostle Paul had very little, But he had Christ.

And he proclaimed that he can do all things through Christ who strengthened him. The third point in here is that Jesus, if you believe in Jesus, you will come to Him. And so that's verse 37 where it reads, All that the Father gives me will come to me. Will come to me. If Jesus is doing all these miracles, and He's teaching in their presence, and they're still rejecting Him, What hope is there for us?

What hope is there for my neighbor that I've been witnessing to? I mean, they have Jesus, God in the flesh, giving them the truth and they're rejecting it. They're not seeing it. So I'm asking what is what is the hope that we have for my neighbor, my brother, my sister, my co-worker, the community that we go to hand out gospel tracts in, and invitations. And in verse 44, it reads, No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise Him up at that last day.

That is the glory of it. If anyone is here today and is a true born-again believer, it's because God drew you. It's not because you were infinitely smart and you figured something out. It's because God in His mercy and grace and love, He looked down and He said, I'm gonna use that one too. And He reached in the pit of puke and He pulled you out and He cleaned you off and He put you up.

He said, go! You're a new creation now. And He put His Spirit in your heart. And now it's time to move. That's the hope that we have.

Verses 30 through 36, Jesus explaining God's plan of salvation and what's happening in the world from our perspective. In verse 33, it says, for the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. See, God in Christ offers eternal life to the whole world. We don't have to wonder if he's going to pick and choose this person or that person. God in Christ is going to choose what?

Just people that live in this town, or people that are over six feet tall, or He's going to choose people of this race or that color. No. To the whole world. He urges everyone, come to Jesus. This is your responsibility in it.

He draws. We still need to come to Jesus. I beg you this morning, you don't know Jesus as your Savior. Come to Him today. Come to Him.

He urges everyone, come to Jesus. And you have to make the decision. Verses 37-40 is God's plan of salvation from God's eternal perspective. With the doctrine of divine election or predestination, which should give us peace and allow us to rest. That we don't have to work for our salvation.

If you're a Christian, it's because God draws you to Himself. It's because God in His grace and love and mercy, He looked forward and He drew you to Himself from the beginning of time. He planned on you. See, it's hard to comprehend because we don't have God's mind. Isaiah 55, 8, 9 says, for my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts." See, we're bound by time and space and our finite minds. The Bible tells us that we look through a dim glass. We don't see what we want to see or what we ought to see. We're stuck in this flesh, in this body yet, and we don't get it. But one problem it solves is that it takes all the pressure off of you and me.

It doesn't depend on me or my works. Not because it's something I figured out. Because like I said, I'm not smarter than anyone else. That's not how it works. It's because God the Father drew you and He gave you to Christ.

And that text in verse 39 just blew me away. This is the will of the Father who sent me that of all He has given me, I should lose nothing. But should raise it up at that last day. You, believer, are God's gift to Jesus Christ. How about that?

We are God's gift to Jesus. How does that change your perspective? How does that change your life, your walk? The way that you see the sky. The way that you live.

The love that you have for the God who drew you and walks you and cares for you. The fourth point is Everyone that comes to Jesus will not be cast out. And that's verses 37-39. Putting faith in Jesus is not perfect on our part, but it's an enduring faith. It's an enduring faith.

True Christians do not walk away from Christ. The Bible tells us that in the book of Acts as well. This is a very strong affirmation in Scripture that that Christian cannot lose your salvation. A true believer, you're not going to lose your salvation. I'll fight that one to the end.

John 10, 28 says, "...and I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. Neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand." See, my salvation is not My work. It is God's work on me, to me. And God's not going to fail that mission. See, once God saves you, He won't lose you.

Once God forgives your sin, He's not going to bring it and dig it back up and hold it against you again. See, we're made right by the Spirit of God. We're secure. Why? Because you're perfect and you're never going to falter again?

No. It's because your reservation to eternal life is what God gave Jesus to do. And for you to walk away would mean that Jesus failed. And Jesus doesn't fail. Ephesians 1.13 In Him you also trusted after you heard the Word of Truth, the Gospel of your salvation, in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise." You're sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.

That doesn't sound like I'm going to get lost again, right? This relationship, it's unbroken. It's unbroken by sin forever, and it's unending. Once you're in Christ, you're in. The question is, are you in Christ?

That's the question. Are you in Christ? Is He your bread? And the fifth point is this, everyone who believes in Jesus has eternal life. See, when predestination comes up, it's a hot button topic.

People don't see it for what it is, and it is a mystery. There's a lot of stuff to it that is hard to put a finger on it. And to me, the biggest part of it is, why me? I don't get it. The mercy and the love and the grace in a world full of people, I don't understand it, but God has chosen me from the beginning.

People ask, why has God chosen me from the beginning? This text makes that answer easier. It's easier. Has God chosen me from the beginning? Have you come to Jesus and believed in Him?

Have you come to Jesus and believed in Him? It's got belief in the beginning and the end of this text today. Have you come to Jesus and believed in Him? It's got belief in the beginning and the end of this text today. Have you come to Jesus and believed in Him?

If you have, then God chose you. Well, if God predestined people, why am I talking to so many people? And what if there's predestined, unpredestined ones that I'm not talking to or am talking to, I'm wasting time, right? We don't know. You know what you do?

You go out and you witness to every one of them. And then you go out and you witness to more, that God can predestine more. He's a powerful God. And He will never let go. So, Verse 47, verse 47 reads, Most assuredly I say to you, He who believes in me has everlasting life.

See, when I was saved from my sin, I wasn't saved for a time. I was saved unto eternity. And so, the reason why your salvation is secure is because He gave His life in exchange for yours on the cross. He died so that I can live. He lived a perfect life so that I could live a rotten life and then trade my rotten life for His perfect life.

I have atonement for my sins. That I can come to Him. That through Him, I might have life. And that's the only way. He gave his life in exchange for yours on the cross.

He died so that we can live and in this the application is to pursue our satisfaction in Jesus. The application and understanding and knowing this isn't to sit on it, is to give your life to the one who saved you, is to have a right perspective and a right view. Psalm 107, 9, for He satisfies the longing soul and fills the hungry soul with goodness." Jonathan Edwards once said, the enjoyment of God is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. And yet, we look and we look and we think and we try and we do this and we do that. See, Jesus becomes your bread.

That's what it's all about. And so when you realize that Jesus is the bread of life and that He becomes your bread, you will never read the Bible the same again. You will never see your wife the same again. You will never see your children the same again. You will never see your job the same again.

The sky will be more blue. You will never pray the same again. You will never think of obedience the same again. The Christian life will not seem boring or stale when you understand that saving faith in Jesus is being satisfied with Him. Church service will never be long and dragged out.

It'll never be boring. It'll never be, I've got to get up and go. Why don't they change that to 11 o'clock instead of 10? It'll never be that way. He offers not just salvation from sin, but purpose in life.

Joy to the soul, never ending contentment in your life. He offers this to us. Isaiah, and you know what else he offers? Something the world does not have. Isaiah 26, 3 says, you will keep him in perfect peace.

Whose mind has stayed on you because he trusted in you. Peace, perfect peace. How many people have turmoil in life? There's always something going on, right? There's always that drama queen in life, And I say queen, but I mean guys too.

There's always that going on. And you can never seem to get away from it. But I've known professing Christians, and they're some of the most complaining, miserable people I've ever known. They don't have that perfect peace. Why?

Why? Because Jesus is not the bread. They don't trust in Him. They don't have that perfect peace. I've had peace.

And Very few times in my life have I had perfect peace. You want perfect peace. You put all your trust in Jesus. That's how you get perfect peace. Not perfect circumstances.

You're not going to have perfect circumstances. There's always going to be adversity in life. But He's with you in it. You can have this peace and this contentment in life with Jesus. He empowers you to invest in an eternal purpose with Him.

Pretty soon your earthly investments look like Pfft! Eternal investments look like there we go. That's what I'm talking about. And it matters more. But today I want to encourage you all to take this and to pray about it, to think about it, to surrender to Him.

That's what I want to encourage. Romans 10, 13 tells us, for whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. You can be saved and still call on the name of the Lord. You can come to Him for your bread. But I want to also encourage you and remind you about the patience and the love that Jesus has for these people.

Because we're all going to stumble and fail and fall. But know that the patience that He had with them and that He has that patience with you. Keep coming to Him. I want to encourage you to continually come and seek on the person and the presence, the Spirit of Christ, because He alone can save you. There's a famous song that is very old, and I hadn't heard it in many, many years until I went to one of Becca's sing-spirations.

And she's saying it, we sang it, and it is an old one. And the name of the song is He Keeps Me Singing. And I love that song. I have it etched in my soul, and I sing it at work. But it is deep within my heart's a melody.

Jesus whispers soft and low, fear not, I am with thee in all of life's ebb and flow. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, sweetest name I know. Fills my every longing. Keeps me singing as I go. That's my prayer for you guys today.

Father, I Thank you for your word today. I thank you for your truths. I pray their hearts would be moved Father God by the power of your word this morning unto change Word God, I thank you for your love and your grace toward your people Father help us Lord to have the faith that it takes to come to you always, Lord, to surrender our hearts, our lives, every aspect of it. Not that we can be happy, Father God, but to the praise of Your glory that You can be lifted up, Father. We thank you