Gooding, David: 1 - The Source and Meaning of Life

And now for our meditation this evening, shall we begin by reading in John five twenty one: For as the Father raiseth the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son also quickeneth whom he will. Verse twenty six: For as the Father has life in himself, even so gave he to the Son also to have life in himself. Verse thirty nine: you search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, and these are they which bear witness of me. Then a verse in chapter six and verse fifty seven: As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he that eateth me, he also shall live because of me. And may God give us good understanding of his word. And now, my brothers and sisters, it is on my heart to talk to you this evening about our blessed Lord Jesus Christ as the source of life and as the means of life. And therefore, I suppose I ought to begin by explaining what I mean by my terms, the source of life and the means of life. And particularly, perhaps, that last phrase will need special explanation. What do I mean by the means of life, and how is it different from the source of life? So let's take an analogy, shall we, with ordinary physical human life, and allow me to ask you, ladies and gentlemen, how did you get your physical life? Did you get it by eating bread and butter? To say. Uh, of course you didn't, did you? Well, I knew that. No, you got your physical life by altogether a different means, not by eating bread and butter. You got your physical life from your parents. They were its source. Of course, I know in the ultimate sense, your parents even weren't the source of your physical life. They were but channels of that life. The source lay in God. But within the limits of our narrow horizon, yes, you could say your parents were the source of your physical life. They gave it to you, and you had nothing to do but receive it from them. They were its source. Well, let me then put a second question to you. Since now you have physical life that you got as a gift from your parents, and you didn't have to eat bread and butter to get it, so nowadays you don't eat bread and butter, I suppose, at all. You say, I've got physical life, so why should I bother eating bread and butter? Silly question again, isn't it? Because as well as having life from your parents as its source, you have to have the means of maintaining life, do you not? And therefore you do have to eat your bread and butter, do you see? And, uh, whatever else it is you eat from day to day. And the simple fact is that when it comes to physical life, we need both a source of life, and we need a means of maintaining life. And one is as important as the other. As then it is in physical life, so it is in spiritual life. And here tonight in chapters five and six, the blessed evangelist presents our blessed Lord Jesus to us in these two capacities. First of all, in chapter five, he is the source of life, and then in chapter six, he is the means of life. And we shall need our blessed Lord Jesus in both those capacities. We need him both as the source of life, and then we need him as the means of life. And you'll say, let's think of him first of all as the source of life. He says to us here in chapter five of the Gospel of John, as the Father has life in himself, so has he given to the Son to have life in himself. Mark that phrase, if you will. God has life in himself. That is to say, God doesn't have to go outside of himself to get life. No one gave life to God. God is the great self-existent source of life. And just as the Father has life in himself, so has the Son of God life in himself. Of course, in that sense of the term, we don't have life in ourselves, do we? We had to get life from a source. But God didn't. And I remind you of that wonderful verse talking of the word of God, our blessed Lord Jesus Christ, in his pre-incarnate days, in the first chapter of this Gospel of John, it says, in him, notice the preposition again, in him was life, and that life was the light of men. What does it mean, and what's the point of saying in him was life? Well, the previous verse puts it this way: all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that has been made. Oh, that sets my heart agog, that does, as I think of the marvels of God's creation. Oh, I have added a tremendous wealth to my education since I've been in Australia, you'll see. Seeing the marvels of your flowers, the flora and the fauna. Not so quite sure about the fauna. I thought the dingoes were good, but this, this afternoon, as we crawled over, walked over in our elderly fashion, the coral flats out on the island there, what strange looking creatures, what forbidding objects we did see and kept a respectable distance from them, you'll see. But what endless variety, what marvels in creation, from the giraffe to the kangaroo to the butterfly to the angel to the beetle, and if I may say so to you, sir, uh, you'll see. And when you think of the variety of it, the staggering, the almost uncountable variety of life, and you say, where did the Lord Jesus, where did the word of God get all the life from to make archangels and kangaroos and alligators and cows and human beings? Where did he get the life from? And the answer is he didn't get it from anywhere. In him was life. He is the source of all life, the vast myriad life that fills the universe. He is the source of it all. In him was life. And as he's about to tell us in John chapter five, and as he told the Jerusalem crowd to their utter amazement and bewilderment, as the Father has life in himself and is the source of life, so also has he given to the Son to have life in himself, both physical and spiritual. And so we're going to think about him tonight as the source of life, who can give us spiritual life instantaneously. Then when we've done that, we shall spend a few moments thinking of our Lord as the means of life. And listen to him saying as follows: As, uh, the Father, as the Father, uh, has, sorry, as the living Father has sent me, and I live by the Father, even so he that eateth me, he also shall live because of me. So while on the one hand the Lord Jesus has life in himself and is a source of life, yet on the other hand he can tell us, I live by the Father. So he that eats me shall live because of me. Our blessed Lord, the means of life. So now let's come back and think of our Lord in the first place as the source of life. You'll see these two lessons are exceedingly important, because very often people make a mistake precisely here. There are many religious people that try to use our Lord as a means of life, and they haven't first come to the Lord Jesus as the source of life. They have never yet been born again. They have never yet received eternal life. So they're trying to live a Christian life without having first received the life of God. They're trying to use the Lord Jesus as the means of life, without having come across him as the source of life. And then there are other people around, you know, and they know about the Lord Jesus as the source of life. Years ago, they came to the Lord Jesus and received from him the gift of eternal life, were born again instantaneously. But they now have it in their head that that's enough. And so long as they once received the gift of life, they don't have to be too careful about constantly eating the bread of life and maintaining their spiritual life. And we need both, don't we? We need the Lord Jesus as the source of life when we first come to him to be born again. And then we need the Lord Jesus constantly, hour by hour and day by day, and shall need him until we get home to glory as the means of life that maintains us in spiritual life. We need both, and it would be a mistake to take him as the source of life and to neglect him as the means of life, wouldn't it? So let's hear the first lesson then, our blessed Lord Jesus as the source of life. And in his gracious way, he made his point first by an object lesson, by a miracle, and came to the pool of Bethesda, so we're told, where there was a multitude of weak people of one kind and another, sitting or lying by that pool and waiting for the troubling of the water. I don't know that anybody knows exactly what happened. Some manuscripts tell us that from time to time an angel came down and disturbed the water, and whoever stepped in first after the disturbing of the water was made whole. Perhaps it was come some kind of spar, do you think, some kind of angelic spar or something? Why the water lost its efficacy so soon after the first person was healed, I don't know. But there it is. It was a gracious means of healing that the gracious creator had put for the ill folks of Jerusalem in their city. How lovely God is, isn't he? What a merciful God God is. He not only provides food for our stomach, but having in mind of many illnesses and weaknesses and frailties, he has put all kinds of things into his creation, hasn't he, as to be means of healing. And of course, he means us to use those means of healing, from the humble rhubarb that has its practical, uh, uh, uh, benefits, hasn't it, in certain cases, to your herbs that can help your heart, to the chemicals that the doctors and biologists and biochemists make out of the herbs, the drugs to help your brain and legs and circulation and goodness, or what have you. All the multitudinous means of healing that the gracious Creator has put into life. Here was another one of them, you'll see. And that is important for us to get the point, because as ordinary creatures, as human beings, we have to use, don't we, the means that God has given to us. Some Christian dear folks, you know, imagine that it is very super spiritual not to call in a doctor when they're ill, and simply to claim healing by faith. And they think it is more spiritual to do it that way than to use the means that God has provided for us. But that is not so, my dear fellow believer. That is for us to get out of our place as creatures of God. Take the ordinary, common, everyday means of feeding us. God could keep us alive without food, couldn't he, if he wanted to, for he's a God who can do miracles. He could keep us alive without our daily bread and butter if he wanted to, but he doesn't want to. We have to learn as God's creatures that if we want to live, we shall have to use the means that God has provided for us, and we all have to go to work and earn the money to buy our cornflakes, don't we, to feed ourselves. That is how God has arranged it. Normally, believers have to use the means that God has put there. And of course, we are not to despise our way. The means of healing that God has put into nature and the skills he has given the medical doctors and so forth. We're not to despise it. It isn't a special spirituality, but an unwise enthusiasm that would, uh, refuse the means of healing and think we're going to have a miracle every day of the week. That's not true. So here then, in this pool of Jerusalem, there was a God-given means of healing. But this day, when our Lord Jesus came, he saw one particular man who for thirty eight years had tried to use that means of healing and had failed. Oh, what a sorry story it was. As he must day after day, perhaps year after year, hoped against hope, and when the water was troubled, tried to maneuver himself as best he could into the pool. But to no avail, someone stepped down before him. The means was all right in itself. He was too weak to use the means. And our Lord saw him with a heart full of compassion. And going to him, the Lord said to him, would you like to be made whole? And the man wasn't really listening, was he? He had so got this fixation that the only way to get whole was to, uh, get into this pool. But when the Lord Jesus said to him, wilt thou be made whole? He didn't say, yes, of course, Lord, I would like to be. He said, Lord, but sir, he said, I've nobody to help me into the pool. And I mustn't say our Lord exploded with impatience, but of course, of course he didn't, but I should have done, had I have been him. Pool! I don't need a pool, my man, said Christ, in effect. You may need means of healing, I don't need them. I can make you well, my good man, this very moment. Get up. Carry your bed. And in that moment, the blessed Lord Jesus demonstrated himself to be the Son of God he is. Listen to his word, as the Father has life in himself, so has he given to the Son to have life in himself. As the Father quickens and makes people alive, so has he given to the Son the power to give people life. And without any means, no pool, he just spoke the word, and the man was instantaneously made whole. Oh, what a delightful story that is. Well, many a gospel preacher has reminded us, has he not? That is a figure of us in our sinfulness. We were weak and without strength. The law of Moses told us that if we would be saved, we must do this and that and the other, and the law was good and holy and just, but it was no good for us. It was unable to help us because we were not strong enough to use the means of salvation. Well, we know. As Paul puts it, what the law couldn't do in that it was weak through our flesh. Try how we might, we always came short. We were not strong enough to use the law as a means of salvation. And then the blessed Lord Jesus came our way, did he not? And surely we have found him thus. Many of you will remember the very day, some of you will remember the hour, maybe, and most of you the month or year. When the Son of God walked into your life and said to you, would you be made whole? Would you like the gift of eternal life? No, no, no, when you replied, but I'm doing the best I can and I've so far failed. He said, but that's nothing to do with it. I don't need your works. I can give you the gift of eternal life here and now and instantaneously. And you believed, didn't you? You found the power to believe as he spoke his divine creative word to your heart. And you proved him the source of life, the instantaneous source of life. Our Lord further e- e- e- emphasized that, didn't he, by doing this miracle on the Sabbath day. He was down at Jerusalem, so John tells us in chapter five, uh, at a great Jewish religious festival. And many theologians have spilt a lot of ink trying to determine which festival it was. Was it another Passover? Was it perhaps the Feast of Pentecost, or what was it? And it's a little bit perverse, because if the Holy Spirit had wanted us to know which festival it was, he would have told us, wouldn't he? The fact the Holy Spirit hasn't told us means it isn't important that we should know. What the Holy Spirit has told us is this, whatever festival it was, our Lord did this miracle on the Sabbath day, thereby caused a storm of trouble. As the Pharisees and others came round and said, who is this man that has broken the Sabbath by working on the Sabbath, curing a fellow, and then telling the fellow to carry his bed on the Sabbath day? Who is this man? And that was precisely the question the Lord Jesus wanted to provoke, wasn't it? Who is this man that did this thing deliberately on a Sabbath day? I mean, after all, the man had been there for thirty eight years, hadn't he? And if he'd been there for thirty eight years, well, one day longer wouldn't have mattered much, surely. He could have filled in the next day, or better still, the day before. Why choose a Sabbath when he knew it would create such a commotion? Because he wanted to promote, uh, to promote a commotion. For see what the Sabbath was about, after all. The Old Testament tells us there were two reasons for the Sabbath, doesn't it? Exodus chapter twenty, God tells Israel they are to keep the Sabbath one day in seven, to remember this glorious fact that in six days God made heaven and earth and all that is therein, and he rested the Sabbath day. So man was asked one day in seven to sit back, to cease his own little works, and to contemplate the great creator, source of all life, source of the universe. And a kindly thing it was of God to do, wasn't it? We could do worse, couldn't we? And once a week to sit back and cease from all our little strivings and our work, to contemplate the Creator and find God. You see, we have our work to do day in and day out, don't we? Sometimes our daily tasks seem oppressive. Sometimes we get so careworn and burdened that you would think it were we who were carrying the world and keep it going. And truth to tell, it isn't us, you know, is it? Certainly isn't me that keeps the world going. And my dear brother, my sister, it isn't you that uphold the world, is it? By your frantic work, uh, you'll see twenty hours and twenty four? It isn't us, is it? Our little work is only a secondary thing. The first big thing was God's work. He is the creator. It is He that has made us and not we ourselves. And what a lovely thing it is to rest back and for a while cease our little work and regain mental stability and poise of spirit and rest for weary fiber and bone as we contemplate the Creator himself. Oh, what a magnificent Creator. Listen to him speaking to the babies as to the septuagenarians. I have made, I will carry. The difference between the true God Creator and all idols is this. You have to carry your idol. The true God, by contrast, he carries you. Finding God the Creator can be a health-giving thing in our daily routine, can it not? That we learn to rest upon him. He carries the ultimate weight of our existence. But in Deuteronomy, God, uh, gives Israel another reason for celebrating, uh, uh, a Sabbath. It was that they should remember that once they were slaves in Egypt, and God himself broke the tyranny and set them free. Gave them a tremendous experience, not merely of God as creator, but as God as redeemer, and set them free from the tyranny of that evil despot Pharaoh. And we too, we have known it, haven't we? The discovery of God, not only as creator who daily bears our burdens, but God the redeemer. We have known redemption, Lord, from bondage worse than theirs by far, sin held us by a mighty cord, and by thy grace redeemed we are. The discovery of God, both as creator and redeemer. And on this day, when our Lord Jesus came to the pool, he didn't come to give the man a little helping hand to get into the pool. He came to demonstrate his deity, God of creation, God of redemption, able to redeem, to quicken, and give life to the repentant sinner. It was a magnificent thing. And said he, you see what things the Son seeth the Father doing, these the Son also does in like manner. Let us lift up our sights and consider the blessed Lord Jesus. Whatever the Son sees the Father doing, the Son does in like manner. Does the Father cause the sun to rise? Then the Son causes the, the, the sun in the sky to rise. If it was the Father who flung the great galaxies into space, it was likewise the Son of God who flung the great galaxies into space. Our blessed Lord Jesus is not just the carpenter of Nazareth, is he? He is the source of life, of all created life. The myriad galaxies that float in space down to the tiniest insect is the source of it all. What is more, says our Lord Jesus, just as the Father quickens the dead and gives new life, so has he given to the Son to have that power to quicken people into new life. And, moreover, the Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son, that all honor the Son as they honor the Father. Thus saying, our Lord Jesus joins two things, the giving of life and judgment. We must ponder those two things for a moment. You'll see the life he's talking about that he gives us is eternal life. What does that mean? Well, let me fasten your attention a moment on that august scene that our Lord Jesus paints for us in the parable of the sheep and the goats, when he comes again, and the just and the unjust are gathered before him, and he separates them. The unrighteous shall go away into eternal punishment. That will be the sentence of the judge. It's a final sentence. It's not a temporary dismissal of the defendant to the police cells for custody until the final judgment. No, this will be a final judgment. That's the last word on it. They go away into eternal punishment. That's not a temporary decision, that is a final decision. It is an awesome and wonderful thing, isn't it, that our blessed Lord Jesus is the judge who pronounces the final sentence. There is no appeal from it. And now listen to the gospel. What a lovely message we have heard ten million times, and we hear it again always freshly. Listen, says our Lord, the Father has given all judgment to me, and this is my word to you right now. He that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me has everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life. What kind of life? Why, eternal life, of course. For here is the Lord Jesus, and because he is the judge, and because he is able to give eternal life to anyone he pleases, he can give you the life of the ages now. And when he gives it to you, it is the final decision from the final judge, that is his word. That's the glory of it, isn't it? You don't have to wait for some future final judgment. Meet Jesus Christ today. Hear his sentence delivered. He that hears my word and believes on him that sent me has eternal life and shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life. Hear him now. He has the authority to say it. He has life within himself, and he can give you the life right now. And the authority to tell you that you will never subsequently come into judgment. You have already passed from death to life. Christ is final. He is the final judgment. And blessed are they that have discovered himself and have passed from death to life and have received from him the gift of life, instantaneously, from the source of life, and know they shall never perish and shall not come into condemnation. Jesus, Son of God, source of life. And oh, how wonderful. Not only has he given us already eternal life, but the hour is coming when the dead that are in the grave shall hear his voice, and they shall come forth, some to the resurrection of life, some to the resurrection of damnation. Not at the same time, of course, but that's not to the point for us to consider this evening. The wonder is that because he is the source of life and able to quicken whom he will, one day the Lord shall come and with commanding voice bid his dead saints arise, and they shall come forth to meet him. Jesus, the source of life. But then why do we need him as the means of life? If we already have it, that we're never going to come into judgment. He's already given us eternal life. What do we need more? Why do we need any means of life? Well, to help us understand it, John tells us that just as our Lord did this first miracle at a feast, a festival of the Jews, so our Lord did the next miracle at a time of year when the Passover was at hand. John chapter six verse four. And you remember on that occasion, as the crowds came, the Lord Jesus came down the mountain to meet them, and there he fed them by the miraculous multiplication of loaves and fishes. It was Passover time. Why, suppose you, did John stop to tell us it was Passover time? Why? For the very good reason that in the ensuing discussion between our Lord and the Jews, whom he had just fed miraculously, he likened himself to the manna which God showered down from heaven upon the Israelites as they were going from Egypt to Canaan on their way to their inheritance. So just as God used manna with which to maintain the Israelites on their journey from Egypt to their inheritance, so our blessed Lord is saying, isn't he, that he is the bread of life come down from heaven to maintain us on our journey. You see, if the Lord Jesus is our Passover, then eating the Passover implies a journey, doesn't it? You couldn't eat the Passover in Israel, could you? Without being willing to journey? For the regulation said that you shall eat of it roast with fire, your staff in your hand, your loins gird about, and your shoes on your feet. Because the whole point of eating the Passover was this, that you were now going to be delivered from Egypt, and that very night you began your journey from your place of bondage to your glorious inheritance. And if Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us, and we have partaken of that sacrifice, the implication is that we too have a journey. We are on the way from this world to the next. And here in this chapter, our blessed Lord Jesus reminds his disciples of the journey he was on. Like the manna, he says, I have come down from heaven for your sake. Presently, said he, I shall suffer and give my body and flesh for the life of the world, that is Calvary. And then at the end of his discourse he said, and what if you shall see the Son of Man ascend where he was before? They did eventually, didn't they? You think of the wonder of it. The story that we celebrate here in John six of the marvelous journey that our blessed Lord took from the very height of the glory of the uncreated deity, down into our world, down into death at Calvary, and then back again, and now he's risen, proclaim the joyful story, the Lord's on high, and he's gone back where he was before. And the point of the journey, that he might redeem us, and that we might follow him that selfsame journey to the glory where he has gone. That is the Christian life, after all, isn't it? We are on a journey. Shall we not need sustenance to maintain us? The Israelites shall now have to have the manna sent down from heaven to maintain them on the journey. We shall need the true bread of life, the living bread come down from heaven to maintain us on the journey. And you know, there is a solemn warning for us in that Old Testament story. When the Israelites got a month or two out onto the journey, you know, they began to get tired of the manna, didn't they? So says the book of Numbers. And they came to Moses and they said, look here, sir, we're getting fed up with this old manna stuff, you know. There's manna morning, noon, and night every day of the week, every month of the year. Moses, man, you'll have to change the diet because we're not going to stick it much longer, you know. Not this manna, not this same stuff every day of the week. This is getting very boring, Moses. We don't like this manna anyway. Tasteless old stuff. Why can't we have a few leeks and onions like we did in Egypt? They were really tasty and unattractive. Anyway, you'll have to change the diet, they said to Moses. That was ominous, wasn't it? Because the historian tells us an interesting little thing about the manna. It tasted like honey. And they didn't like it, and they got bored with it. Well, come now, that was, that was, that was awkward. Because the inheritance they were going to, so said God in his word, was flowing with milk and honey. And if they didn't like honey on the journey a little bit every day, that was really silly to go off to an inheritance that was flowing with the stuff, don't you think? You're not surprised, are you, that when they got to the inheritance at last and had put their noses over the border and had a look at it, they came back and said to Moses, oh no, Moses, Moses, my dear good man Moses, if we had had known that the inheritance was going to be like that, we wouldn't have come. No, you could have found that out on the way there, couldn't you? If they didn't like honey on the journey, how would they like a land that was flowing with milk and honey? And we are on a journey, aren't we? Home to meet the blessed Lord Jesus, who is the living manna. If it ever were, but God forbid it to ever be. If it ever were that we found the manna distasteful now and boring, so that we weren't really interested in it. What sense would there be in our claim that we're looking forward to going to heaven? But here then the wonder of this heavenly manner and its superiority, as our Lord described it, over the literal manna that came down from heaven. The literal manna meant to bring Israel through the wilderness to the promised inheritance. And our Lord points out now how vastly superior is the bread that has come down from heaven. For he said, you see, I have come down from heaven. The manna was an impersonal substance, wasn't it? As the manna fell quietly morning by morning, it had no thought in its head. It was only so much stuff sent mindlessly to do the work of maintaining them physically. But our blessed Lord, when he came down from heaven, came with all the deliberation of Godhead. I have come down, he said, from heaven to do the will of my Father. And what is the will of my Father? That of everyone that beholdeth the Son and believeth on him should have everlasting life, and I will raise him again at the last day, for it is my Father's will that I shall lose nothing. Oh, marvelously sustaining manner, isn't it? The blessed Lord come down from heaven to do his Father's will. And it comforts my heart, I freely confess to you, for I have a very naive and childish way of looking at things, but then sometimes it's good to be a child, isn't it? Christ come down from heaven to do his Father's will, and what is his Father's will? That of all the Father has given him, he should lose nothing. And I picture myself that glorious day soon to come, when the blessed Lord Jesus shall gather the redeemed around him and present them to his Father. Oh, I, I sometimes allow my mind to dwell on it, you know, and the Lord saying now, Father, this is Paul. This is Peter, Father, do you see? This is Mary here, and this is Martha. These are the two ladies, you know, where I used to be entertained in their home, you see? Good old Martha, do you see? This is Martha, and this is the other Mary, Lord, and and this is Philip the Evangelist, do you see? And all through the saints he shall present them before the presence of God's glory with exceeding joy. And when at last he's got to the last one, it'll take some time, won't it? Suppose it could be that the father said, is that all? Yes, Lord. Yes, Father. Well, where's that fellow David Gooding? Oh, well, he's not here. Not here? What do you mean not here? Well, he's not here. He's a funny kind of a fellow, you see, and he got lost on the way. And the father said, but did he, did he believe you? Oh yes, he was a believer. And you mean to say you haven't brought him here? You've lost him? Well, if that were possible, then heaven would grow dark, wouldn't it? For in that instance, Christ would have failed to do God's will, and that would ruin everything. For it is God's will that everyone who beholdeth the Son and believeth on him should have eternal life. That Christ should not lose them, but raise them up at the last day. Oh, wonderful thing. The bread of life come down from heaven to maintain us through to glory. How can we be so sure? Well, our Lord is not only better than the manna because he consciously came down from heaven to do the Father's will, but because he is the living bread. He not only says, I am the bread of life, he is the living bread, and therein he's different from the manna, isn't he? The manna wasn't alive, you see. It was very good stuff, very nourishing food, but it wasn't itself alive. Our blessed Lord Jesus is not only the bread of life, he is the living bread. He's alive. And when we eat his flesh and drink his blood, the blessed Lord Jesus comes into us and lives within us. He lives. Your daily bread, your Kellogg's cornflakes don't live inside you, do they? They're dead as you eat them. Blessed Lord Jesus is alive within us. Thus he shall maintain us home to glory. You know, in the story of the feeding of the five thousand, there's a very interesting little detail. When it was all over, and the crumbs and broken bread and bits of fish lay all over the grass, the Lord Jesus said to his disciples, take your baskets, gentlemen, and gather up the pieces that nothing be lost. And if I had been there, I would have said to the Lord Jesus, but come on, Lord, what you bother about a few scraps like that for, you'll see? You could multiply another ten thousand fish if you wanted to. Why are you bothering about the scraps? What does it matter whether the scraps are lost or not? Ah, but you'll see, the thing was part of the sign, wasn't it? Well, that bread which the Lord had blessed with his divine grace and power, not any of that was to be lost. And if he was so careful about that literal bread and fish, which after all was only a picture of himself, shall he not be rightly careful about that bread which is himself? You sir, and you're a believer, and you have eaten of the bread of life, and Christ, who is the living bread, lives in you. It's impossible that that bit of the living bread be lost either, isn't it? None of the living bread shall ever be lost. Wonderful bread. It will bring us home to glory at last. And we have our Lord's word upon it. The ancient Israelite, he was redeemed out of Egypt, covered by the blood of the lamb, delivered by the power of God, brought on the way through the desert. But he never got in at last. Your fathers died in the wilderness. But this is the bread that came down from heaven, says our Lord Jesus, not as your fathers ate and died. If anyone eats this bread, he shall live forever. Magnificent bread, the means of life will bring us home to glory. And then said the Lord Jesus, what if you should see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh profiteth nothing. Our Lord is not talking about eating his literal body and blood, like some say. The whole thing was but a metaphor, and what he's really at is this: the words I speak to you, says he, they are spirit, and they are life. And then his words to us, as he ministers to our very hearts, day after day, day after day. The very words he speaks are life-giving words. They live. They are spirit, says our Lord, and they are preparing us to enter that great spirit world above. Oh, one day we must leave this world of sense and time, mustn't we? Go out into the great spirit world beyond. And our Lord who knows it and has gone before, constantly ministers his word to us, which is life and spirit, to maintain us on the journey and bring us to our goal. Therefore, I cannot resist the temptation to mention one small thing to you before I, uh, cease. There's another journey in this John chapter six, isn't there? For you will remember that when our blessed Lord Jesus had fed the multitude and sent them away, he went up a mountain while his apostles took boat to cross to the other side. He had sent them away. They were now going at his bidding to cross the sea to the other side. And how should they get across the sea? Well, they had a boat, of course, and they had to row. Now, our Lord Jesus subsequently followed them that night. He didn't need a boat. He didn't need to row. He was the very source of the universe. He made the water. He could walk on it. He didn't need a boat like men needed a boat to cross a sea. He didn't need to row as they needed to row. But he had gone up a mountain, and they were rowing, going across the sea to the destination he had commanded. And the rowing was tough because the winds were contrary. Can you see them on their journey? Presently he came to them in the middle of the night. We're on a journey like that too, aren't we? Not merely across a desert, but across the ocean, home to glory. And sometimes the winds are contrary, are they not? The storm howls around our ears and threatens to split the rigging from stem to stern, and the waves are high, and the progress is difficult. Why does the Lord let us row? Why does he allow the winds and the rain to beat on us? Why does he allow the going to be so tough sometimes that it seems we're going more backwards than forwards? Well, I suppose, my good brothers and sisters, he wants to teach us to row. Rowing is good, isn't it? Make- brings up the old muscles, you'll see, and it develops a certain sense of determination, and I'm not going to give up, and I'm going to persevere, and I'm going to keep on keeping on keeping on, keeping on. You see, yes. We are to use the means, aren't we? We're not home to glory yet, we're on this world, and God has given us certain means of making progress. And just as the apostles had to use the boat and had to use the oars and had to work hard at it, so if we want to make progress towards glory, we too have got to row, haven't we? We have to pray and keep at it. We have the means of grace, the Lord's Supper, and we need constantly to come to it. We have God's holy word, and we need to study it. We've got to work, my dear brethren, haven't we? We've got to row. Got the commission to preach the gospel. We must keep at it. Oh, when the winds blow and the storm rises and we seem to make such little progress, then of course the, uh, trial is just that, isn't it, to see whether we'll give up and go back or whether we'll keep on rowing, because it is the rowing that actually produces the spiritual muscle. You don't want to arrive home at heaven, do you, as an old pygmy, couldn't row a stroke. We want to be fully spiritually developed, don't we, by the time we get home to glory, and therefore the blessed Lord allows us to keep pegging away at the rowing. Good, isn't it? And yet, and yet, when the rowing got so desperately difficult, and they were nearly worn out, they saw the Lord Jesus coming up. You see, they were rowing, and they were back to where they were going, and they could see this figure coming to overtake them. And at first they were afraid, and then when they realized it was the Lord, they asked the Lord into the boat, and he got into the boat, and immediately, says John, they were at the land whither they went. My brother, my sister, have you not known occasions like that? When you were at the end of your tether, rowing hard, and life was difficult, and you seemed to make such little progress, you were tempted to give up. And the Lord came. You saw no great vision. You heard no audible voice, but in the darkness of the night and above the whistling of the wind, you saw the Lord. You heard his word. And you said, Lord, come again into my boat, Lord. I'm not getting on too well. Come into my boat, Lord. It was as if he came in again, wasn't it? And perhaps it is that lovely word in Romans eight that he spoke again into your ears. Them he called. Them he justified, and them he justified, then he glorified, and it became so real to you that in that moment you felt as if you were already at home, you were there, seated in Christ in heavenly places. And you got new strength, a new vigor, a new certainty that you would be at the goal at last. Thus he does still, my brothers. God bless you this very evening, that perhaps tonight, as you kneel in your devotions before you sleep, in the midst of life's difficult days, the Lord may draw near and make himself known to you afresh, and you invite him into the boat. Then and then, sense that wonderful reality that you're bound for eternity, and in the counsels of God, you are already there. So may the Lord bless his word to us tonight and reveal himself afresh in our ears, Christ, the source of life and the means of life and the bringer of his people home to glory.