Key Truth: Jesus is the all-satisfying and sufficient bread of eternal life given to us according to the sovereign love and grace of God and applied to us in newness of life by the Holy Spirit.  

Introduction:

What do you hunger and thirst for in life?

“This crowd has witnessed the divine revealer at work, but only their curiosity, appetites, and political ambitions have been aroused, not their faith.”

D.A. Carson, The Gospel According to John

Jesus, the All-Satisfying and Sufficient Bread of Eternal Life:

John 6:35-40 

“Our Lord would have us know that He himself is the appointed food of man’s soul. The soul of every man is naturally starving and famishing through sin. Christ is given by God the Father, to be the Satisfier, the Reliever, and the Physician of (humanity’s) spiritual need. In Him and His mediatorial office,—in Him alone will empty souls find their wants supplied. In Him there is life. He is ‘the bread of life.’”

J.C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on the Gospels, Vol. 3: John 1:1-John 10:30

What are some ways in which Jesus, the Bread of Life, has satisfied your spiritual hungers and thirsts?

The Grumbling and Disputation Against the Sovereign Love and Grace of God:

John 6:41-59

“There are in the Holy Scriptures many doctrines which prove an offence and a stumbling-block to the world: but the reason of their exciting disgust and aversion, must be looked for, not so much in the doctrines themselves, as in the depravity of the human heart. To a humble and contrite spirit every truth in the Bible will appear reasonable and worthy of God: it is the pride of man that takes offence at the sacred records, and that renders him unable to receive the declarations of God. Our blessed Lord had told the Jews repeatedly, that he came down from heaven: they knowing his mother and his reputed father, could not endure that he should arrogate to himself such high honour: but he informed them, that the ground of the offence was within themselves; they were blinded by their own prejudices, and fettered by their own lusts, so that nothing but the almighty grace of God could ever draw them to him in a becoming manner.”

Charles Simeon, Horae Homileticae, Vol. 13: Luke XVII to John XII

What do you struggle most with in terms of God’s sovereign wisdom and control over salvation in Christ alone by faith alone through His grace alone?

The Hard Words of Eternal Life and the Work of the Holy Spirit:

John 6:60-71

“How does the Spirit make us alive? He does it through the Word of God. The Spirit comes with the Word. He uses the Word to pierce our hearts, to change the disposition of our souls. It was by the Word of God that the universe was brought out of nothing. It is at the Word of God that you and I are rescued from spiritual nothingness and made alive to the things of God.”

R.C. Sproul, John: St. Andrew’s Expositional Commentary

How do you address the hard sayings of Scripture?
What resources have you found most beneficial?

Application:

John 6:35-71 teaches us that:
-Jesus is the all-satisfying and sufficient bread of eternal life
-given to us according to the sovereign love and grace of God
-and applied to us in newness of life by the Holy Spirit

Communion

Benediction:

Romans 15:13