Okay, we're reading from John chapter 6, verse 35 to 51.
Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life.
Whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.
But I say to you that you have seen me, and yet you do not believe.
All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.
For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me.
And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me,
but raise it up on the last day.
For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life.
And I will raise him up on the last day.
So the Jews grumbled about him, because he said, I am the bread that came down from heaven.
They said, is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?
How does he now say, I have come down from heaven?
He has seen the father, except he who is from God.
He has seen the father.
Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life.
I am the bread of life.
Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died.
this is the bread that comes down from heaven so that one may eat of it and not die i am the living
bread that came down from heaven if anyone eats of this bread he will live forever and the bread
that i will give for the life of the world is my flesh folks we're exploring started this in this
teaching series exploring how we experience god's sovereignty and grace in our salvation and we're
thinking we know we experience it we're trying to dig into some of the practicalities the process
last sunday we established our starting point in ephesians chapter 2 and there was two simple
points come out of ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 to 10 the first one is that by nature people are in a
state of spiritual deadness
when they're born in in our natural born state our spiritual dna if you wanted to call it that
has us hardwired to rebel against god
it's pretty pretty confronting sort of teaching isn't it from the bible
and then we saw the state of sin that we're born in inevitably gives rise to acts of sin or rebellion
rebellion because we're born in a state of sin and rebellion then we give expression to that in acts of
sin and rebellion and though a person may not realize it by nature says the bible we're so radically affected
by sin at every point of their being that we're totally unwilling and unable to respond to god as he intends us to
a terrible plight
but then we also saw last week into that very plight
god acts severally
ephesians 2 4 says and god made you alive
that's what god does with spiritually dead people in the act of salvation
he makes them alive
purely and completely as an act of his grace nobody deserves it nobody can earn it nobody can command it
it is purely and completely as an act of god's grace that god takes dead spiritual people
spiritually dead people and makes them alive
in other words he does for people what they could never ever do for themselves
changes their spiritual dna creating new desire new ability to be the image bearers
he created us to be and intended us to be
this morning i want to dig into how this process of being made alive actually works
in in our experience so here's a question and a scenario to get you thinking about how this
process of being made alive actually works
the question is this why does any given person become a christian
why does any given person become a christian well you might say well that's that's an easy question
they make they become a christian because they hear the message of salvation in jesus
and against that they decide they want to be a christian they make a decision in response to what they hear
so here's the scenario then at two friends fred and barney
they get go to hear a talk about jesus as a guest of another friend so fred and barney are there
each hears the same message each hears that they are rebels before god and without hope and without god in this world
each hear that christ's death was to rescue them was to save them from the the the guilt and the consequence of their sin
and each hears the urgent plea of the preacher to turn to jesus and find life
and each of fred and barney responds
fred becomes a christian he recognizes suddenly his desperate need for christ
his plight before god and his desperate need of salvation that could only come from god
and he expresses a sudden new determination to give up autonomy and to live life under the lordship of jesus christ
and in the same instant barney also makes a decision he thinks that's the biggest lot of rubbish he'd ever
heard and he was really annoyed at his friend for wasting a whole evening
now clearly each response involves a real choice driven by conscious desires
but here's the question behind the question where did fred get his desire from
why did he recognize his desperate need while his long-time friend barney standing beside him
simply got offended
it seems to me there's only two real alternatives to explain it either fred's desire came from within
himself that is fred was more intelligent fred listened better fred understood better and so
he used his native native abilities better and come to a better conclusion than barney
at first glance you might think well that that's that's obviously what did happen but
when you dig into that and look at barney then you think well actually no it doesn't work because
barney also heard barney also understood enough to be offended
to reject
so barney's response was equally as strong
but totally different
barney's rejection was also on the basis of intelligent understanding
barney barney
barney wouldn't accept that god had a problem with him nor would he accept that he had a problem with god
the only other alternative my friends is
at least i believe the only other alternative is what the bible teachers the bible's answer that is
is fred's desire the thing that made fred a christian brought him to be in a christian was
something that came from outside of himself as the bible says it came as a sovereign work of god
in fred's life
and that's what the bible teaches the bible teaches that a person
becomes a christian when god acts decisively in them creating both desire and ability
to respond to the message of jesus
now the biblical terminology for this in terms of classic theology terms is the effectual call of god
and if you're following through on the notes you'll see that term written down there the word
effectual is something we don't use much these days but it's the same word as effective so you
could just read the effect of call of god in other words when god calls people it's always effective
it always works it's irresistible in terms of historic theology the effective or irresistible
call of god and it's another key aspect of god's absolute sovereignty and salvation
and ultimately explains why and how a person becomes a christian and that's what i want to
jump into a little bit this morning making two points firstly is the bible teaches that both the fact
and necessity of god's effectual call in short the bible teaches that god saves sinners
now the fact of god's powerful calling is established throughout the bible
and every time you see god's calling or it's described or you or you or you see it in action
in somebody's life it's a practical display of god's intervention in a person's life in an absolutely
sovereign way and it results every time in renewing renewing and reorientating a person's life and
relationship with god and so if you track through the old testament you can see it in lots of places
abraham was called by god while he was just away off in the distance getting on with his own life
man in his own business he was called by god uh disciples were called by god while they were um
ill-educated uneducated illiterate fishermen and they were transformed as a result of that call
paul was particularly called by god when he was actively rebelling against jesus and trying to
destroy anything to do with jesus in the church he was called by god radically renewed and reoriented
to the things of god into relationship with god so each of those was a display of god's sovereign
creative power love and purpose
god intervenes in the lives of individuals he establishes new relationship with them
and he radically changes their orientation of these individuals towards himself
how does he do that because he renews their hearts he renews their attitudes he renews their desires
he gives them both the ability and the desire
from the inside out that's the fact of god's effect of call the necessity of god's effective call
is all we also taught in john chapter 6 so we're going to jump into a few verses and i'm not going
to spend lots of time in these uh this passage i just want to lift out some verses uh that's that say
the things i want i want you to hear this morning so the context of john chapter 6 and we're picking
the story up at the verse 35 is that jesus has fed miraculously this huge crowd
and he's speaking to the crowd afterwards and what he does is he bluntly jesus bluntly accuses
the crowd of being interested in him but not true disciples
he says effectively he says you guys are following me for opportunistic reasons
you're not really following me because you see who i am and you see your need to be engaged with me
as god and savior they didn't see him as the source of spiritual life
and if you look at verse 36 and verse 37 jesus responds fairly harshly to them but i said to you
that you have seen me and yet you do not believe in other words you can see me physically with your eyes
but you can't really see me spiritually with through your hearts you can't see my significance
all that the father gives me will come to me and whoever comes to me i will never cast out
the fact that this whole crowd are is not really believing him is not really seeing him as he truly
is doesn't faze jesus at all in fact in these verses he responds quite positively he said there will be some
who believe this crowd the vast majority aren't those people but there will be some who believe
and they are guaranteed life and salvation
how are they described here how is this group who will believe they're described as all that the father gives me
will believe
now the story continues and jesus response initially offends the crowd even further
there are religious people and they're deeply offended
but jesus would suggest they don't have a living vibrant relationship with god
and so jesus speaks even more bluntly to them in response verse 43 and 44
so the idea of the verse 41 the jews grumbling about and that's the idea of being really deeply
offended and angry how dare jesus speak to us like that we are religious people we are jews
and that's the idea of being the truth verse 43 jesus answered them do not grumble among yourselves no one can
come to me unless the father who sent me draws him that word is also calls me calls him and i will raise him up at the last day
no one is able to says jesus no one has within themselves the power to
come to jesus or respond to jesus as god and savior unless
jesus powerfully and sovereignly in their lives give them that ability give them that desire
drawing them or calling them to himself
now romans 8 28 to 30 makes the same point and we're told there those who are first loved by god
and called according to his purpose and salvation
there you go that word call again god's work of salvation from start to finish
first loved then called ultimately saved
so the fact of god's call is
simply and easily discerned in scripture
how do we respond to it well can i suggest you this morning that this is a wonderful truth to discover
there's nothing to fear
in understanding and discovering how god works in a person's life how god has worked in your life if
you're a christian
see because what it means is that god speaks of god's character and that god pursues
is sinless
is sinless lifeless people
by definition if you're dead in your sins you you can't do a thing you're just lying there you're just
immobile that's the whole picture of a corpse
well against that bleakness we have a picture of god pursuing
his sin his um
spiritually deadened people
pursuing them until
he's made them alive
it's a wonderful picture
he knows god knows that unless he moved towards us
we would never of our own abilities have moved towards him
by definition we're dead we're corpses spiritually unresponsive
we would not move towards god we could not move towards god because we're not
we were by nature spiritually dead towards him
and so likewise
god knew that it would never be enough simply to send jesus into this world to atone to pay for
the penalty for our sin to redeem us from the power of sin it would never
be enough for jesus just to do that and as it were set up on the table and say okay it's over
here guys come and come and help yourselves when you want to
god knew it would never be enough why because we wouldn't want to help ourselves we wouldn't be
able to help ourselves no god knew that he had to bring salvation to us and not only that but he had
to make it effective in us
by his sovereign power he brings jesus to us and he calls us to jesus
what a beautiful picture what a beautiful picture
god actually and effectively applies the benefits of the death of christ
the individuals like you and me by working powerfully inside us
this is not a truth to fear my friends
this is a truth that should prompt us to say all glory be to god
all glory be to god
what's manner of love is this that god should move towards us pursue us even while we're so busy rejecting him
second point i want to make this morning is is the mechanics or the process of god's effective call
that is how does god make people alive
well put simply god's call in its entirety is the process that we call conversion
and the bible uses various terms in this
zone of conversion terms like the new birth
regeneration
adoption
conversion or union with christ now there's a number of terms and others
that are inseparably linked but not altogether identical realities
there are shades of difference between each of those terms but essentially
they come together to describe what we would call conversion
each describes a spiritual fresh start each describes a radical new creation a resurrection from
spiritual deadness to spiritual liveness
new relationship with god
and each of those things is a one-off event that we experience in our innermost being
this is something god does and as a result of these one-off things we are new in christ
and together they deliver us into this new life which is an ongoing reality so one-off events there
ongoing reality which is the life we live as christians and that life is expressed in another
conglomerate of terms that we come across in in the bible at repentance faith being sanctified or growing
more like jesus as we continue in the life of of service discipleship loving the brethren and so on and so forth
there's a whole heap of terms there that come together to describe the struggle of living as christians
having been once off made alive
so focusing on this part how does god's call actually work or happen in a person's life
well to that to do that i just want to illustrate through john chapter 3 remember that famous
interaction between nicodemus and jesus and you remember the context jesus came nicodemus came to jesus
by night nicodemus came as a religious professor he was a guy who taught others about the detail of god's
word and god's salvation plan in history he came as a very educated man he came as a man who was deeply
religious and deeply interested in jesus
he came to learn more about jesus
he loved god and he assumed that because of all the religious things he had been doing over his lifetime
that god would love him
but jesus king hits him not just once but twice
in verse 3 and verse 6 i'm not going to get into the text you can look at it for yourself later
jesus king hits him by saying this and this is a man who spent his whole life serving god
jesus says nicodemus
you need to be born again you need to be reborn you need to be regenerated if you're to be saved
his religious life spent teaching about god and serving him did not mean acceptance
before god or by god he needed as jesus said to be born of water and the spirit now there's lots
could be said about that i'm just going to give a very quick summary water and spirit you know
they're both pictures from the old testament of renewal and purity purification
nicodemus this is what you're like on the outside a religious man but on the inside you still need
something a refreshment you need a renewal you need something reborn you need regenerated on the inside
what's on the outside won't get in in the way that you need it you need something new on the inside
which will flow out in a new way
and so the new birth is a picture or metaphor
in nicodemus's life for the radical renewal that god must effect if a spiritually dead person is to be
saved
they don't come any more pure and religious from a human point of view than did nicodemus
but jesus said no on the inside you need renewing
desires attitude and heart
in verse 8 jesus declares that to be the work of the holy spirit and again uses picture language
the work of the holy spirit says jesus in verse 8 of john chapter 3 it's a bit like the wind
you know the wind is real but you can't actually see it
jesus saying when i'm talking to you nicodemus about this need for a rebirth this something on the
inside refreshment purification on the inside then it's the work of the holy spirit which like the
wind is real but unseen
so in summary then how does it all work well firstly there's an outward call of the gospel
that is what you and i experience we hear somebody speak or we read about the work of jesus we're
confronted at some point in some form or other by the work of jesus by the fact that we need to be
saved by the fact that we're up in a spiritually desperate situation before god by the fact that
jesus came into the world particularly to solve the problem to rescue us to give us new life
if only we will trust in him that's the outward call of the gospel
fred and barney heard the outward call of the gospel
but there's also an inward call of god it also is real but unseen because it happens in our
innermost being and historically this has been called the quickening of the spirit now the quickening
is an old-fashioned word again it was the word it used to be used to describe the moment a mom felt
her baby kicking in the womb it was the first signs of life in those days when they didn't have
um all the scans and stuff they they now have
the quickening of the spirit used to describe the first time we sense that god has touched our lives
and brought life to us previously spiritually dead people
in other words it's the time when god acts sovereignly to change our heart to change our
attitudes to change our desires to change a person giving them what they need to engage with jesus
and to embrace jesus as a savior he says he is
so the quickening of the spirit is god's sovereign activity in the life of a person
giving them a level of understanding a spiritual living level of understanding that previously they
they'd heard the words but they didn't grasp the deep significance for them personally
and when they grasped that deep significance then suddenly all the pieces of the jigsaw fall into place
and fred collapses in tears on the one hand so aware of his plight before god on the other hand tears of
joy that god would would presume to save him and lift him out of that and barney he's just what an idiot
both heard the outward call of the gospel only fred experienced the inward call of the spirit
giving them eyes to see and ears to hear in a way it hadn't previously done
and when god's spirit acts in this way in this real internal unseen way then the result is always life
always renewal in the person
the bible is clear that god's effect of calling by definition is effective god's spirit cannot
and will not be rejected or resisted
why can he because he's affecting the purpose and command of god
to bring his dead people to life to bring them into the kingdom so they might be safe with them forever
now when we talk about this effect you'll call this sovereign work in of the spirit in a person's life
we shouldn't think of a a brutality like the work of a rapist
now that's not what the bible describes it it's the gentle wooing it's the drawing of a lover
that so changes the attitudes and desires that when a person becomes a christian at that particular moment
in their in their outside form that's precisely what they want to do in fact there's nothing else
they can think of they would like to do and i know that many of you out there have experienced that moment in your own lives
that's how it was for lydia in acts chapter 16 verse 14 i've always well not always but for the last
30 40 years i've always loved this little phrase when that when the lord describes how lydia was converted
converted it it says the lord opened her heart to believe that which you'd heard lord opened her heart
it's such a beautiful tender yet strong concept
the first desiring the first stirring of desire to find salvation in jesus for lydia
was the result of the spirit's work unseen work within her she also was part of a crowd
and that stirring the spirit that quickening of the spirit resulted in her external response of trust
repentance and faith
and we can see the contrast in lydia's life go go and read it for yourself in acts chapter 16
just as when dead in sin her natural choice would have been to hear god's word and reject it
a la barney
so now for lydia with the gentle powerful work of the spirit she acts on a new desire she finds within
herself
a desire to respond a desire to love and serve jesus a desire to go to him for the forgiveness she now
realizes she needs
and this new orientation
this new orientation to jesus these new desires these new attitudes
are foolproof evidence
of the new birth by the power of the holy spirit at work within her
and with fred and with
so many here this morning
now friends the last couple of minutes let me let me just mention three
wonderful assurances which come which flow from this truth
first one is this
in our personal daily struggle to serve jesus now when you become a christian you realize
that life actually gets a whole lot harder
before you're a christian you didn't really care
about what you did and the consequence of what you did unless you might think well i'll try and not
not run file of the law
but wherever you see a person responding to the word of god that is trusting jesus for the new life
they desperately need we see them struggling to master their sin and trust in god where they become more
and more aware of their sin and more and more desperate to be free from sin and live the life of obedience and purity that they want to live under the lord jesus
when you say that
then you can be sure that you're saying and experiencing
a person who's been regenerated
by the work of the holy spirit
because those desires
are the reflection of the evidence of
the spirit's work within you
we often get it the other way around we often think that because we struggle in the christian life that that's evidence that we're not
we're not right with god that's quite the opposite
you go and look at your non-christian friends and tell me how many of them are actually so concerned about their state before god in the in the way they're living it just doesn't happen
yet christians are sometimes crippled by that concern
why such a profound awareness of their sin because of the spirit's renewing power
the things of the spirit rums it give rise
sorry the spirit gives rise to the things of the spirit
secondly we can be relaxed in in in terms of evangelism we can be relaxed and confident
as we speak about jesus and long to see them saved as we ourselves have been saved
very practical truth at this point
and here's how evangelism work god calls us to do
what we can do and that is issue the outward call of the gospel
god calls us to speak about jesus we don't have to make it up we just
transmit it we just we're the conduit of telling people about jesus
that's the outward call of the gospel and then we can relax
knowing that god will do what only he can do and that is issue the inward call of changing
somebody's hearts and desires and attitudes
i can't change somebody's attitudes
so i can in evangelism be confident to do what god asked me to do
simply speak about jesus
and relax and let god do what only he can do and that is take those words
with the power of the holy spirit and make them into life in a person's soul
boy that takes a lot of pressure off
it takes a lot of pressure off i just have to concentrate and tell on people and that's not hard to do
i'm excited about that and let god do what only he can do
and thirdly we can luxuriate in the sweetness of god's glory and grace
it's just lovely to know as we struggle with sin on a daily basis
that god's sovereign purpose will have the last word in our world and in our life not sin
when c.s lewis was converted he wrote of how he fought a tooth and nail against god and against any
idea of becoming a christian
he tried to be rid of all that god stuff but he says that all that god stuff just wouldn't go away
it just pestered him and in a sense he felt himself being worn down
until one night he says it all came to a crunch for him and he kneeled in prayer in his room at oxford
and simply confessed that god was god and in that moment he then wrote later that he thinks he might
have been the most reluctant christian in all of history not that he saying that god was in a sense
twisting his arm and dragging him in the kingdom against his will but just
expressed how much he fought against god's pursuit of him
and he writes the words he writes that the words of jesus and one of jesus well-known parables go out and compel them to come in
he meditated in those words compel them to come in and he said they were so sweet to him
because that was how he experienced god's grace
he says there was a beautiful
gentle
irresistibility
about god's grace
that was quite necessary to bring him to life and repentance and faith and life
a life lived in service of the lord jesus christ from that point forward
he knows that had he been left to his own devices he would simply have rejected anything he heard
he even tried to do that but that gentle compelling irresistibility
were sweet words of grace in c.s lewis's mind that the lord pursued him all the way into the kingdom
he had to live in the kingdom of the kingdom of the kingdom of the kingdom of the kingdom of the kingdom
friends very very simply i'm just going to divide you now into two groups if you're not
yet a christian here this morning and i'm sad to say there's some here in that category
at least as far as i can discern humanly if you're not yet a believer
pray for this gentle irresistible experience of god's grace
god's pursuing you
god loves you
if you are a christian here this morning there's many of us thank thank thank the lord for that
then savor
this sweetness
of god's grace
and glory
savor it daily
and from that point
ask the question how then do you want me to live
as one who shows deep and consistent appreciation for your love and your grace in my life
let me pray
lord it's a strange thing that sometimes
we fear studying your character
lest it be overwhelming and too confronting for us and yet on every page of your bible lord we see you
repeating over and over again that your first desire is to bless
your people your first desire to give life to your people
your last resort is to bring condemnation and judgment to people
lord i pray that we might see your character for all its positivity for all its love first grace
and that we might truly savor
that truth of your sovereign intervention in our lives that's sweet
but compelling and irresistible move of your spirit within us
to move us from death to life first of all and then move us from that new life
to a lifetime of growing
consistency and serving you
help us in our daily struggle lord because sometimes it doesn't feel like that
on a day-to-day basis help us to
be aware of our sin help us to lament our sin help us to be determined to move away from our sin
but lord help us also not to get caught up by our sin as though somehow or other an awareness for
sin and a sense of failing is evidence that we're not saved help us lord to see that that this also
is evidence of your spiritual renewal within us i pray these things in jesus name amen
it wasn't an early mark but hopefully it might have been profitable thank you