No U-Turns Allowed

Grace, mercy, and peace be unto you from God, our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

How many of you have a GPS device in your vehicle? Do you like your GPS? Pretty useful much of the time. I have one. And the most annoying thing is when I know where I'm going, and the GPS has a different route. Maybe you've done that, too. And you're driving, you're out, but you still have the one programmed into the GPS. And it keeps telling you "Recalculating" and then tells you where next to make a U-turn. The one on my phone doesn't do that, but the Garmin does do that. Which I find a little - well, a lot annoying.

Now, I haven't tried it on the interstate, where it might tell me at the next, you know, median crossing, where's that sign: No U-turn allowed, to stay, drive up to there and make a U-turn. I'm guessing it isn't going to tell me drive up to exit such-and-such, which may be a few miles away, maybe many miles away and say take a U-turn there. It'll always go to the shortest point. Sometimes, there are just no U-turns allowed.

And if we get caught doing a U-turn, we can be ticketed. Jesus, in our Gospel - now this is the third week we've been in John chapter 6. And I don't mind if you're feeling a little tired of being in John chapter 6, cuz I'll be honest. I'm tired of being in John chapter 6.

Jesus' words in the 6th chapter of John, they are hard words to hear, aren't they? They're hard words to wrap our minds around, they're hard words to understand.

And I'm speaking as the pastor. They're probably difficult for you, too. What is Jesus been driving at these last 3 weeks? He's been talking about bread, and I shared how bread is kind of a basic food of life. And each week, how believing on Jesus, we have eternal life. Last week, He said to us, no one can come to me unless the Father draws him. And explained how God draws us. He draws us to Jesus through His word, His word that is spoken, His word that is read. His word that is at work in the lives of other people. Sunday, we had a baptism here, little Rosalie was baptized. And she needed somebody to bring her, to draw her to the font. She couldn't crawl up there by herself. Well, she could have probably crawled. But she certainly wouldn't have said, oh, by the way, Pastor Ader, can you baptize me this morning? No, she was brought by her parents, and chances are pretty good that her parents were brought by their parents. And in a similar way, I was drawn to Jesus as my Savior as my parents brought me to the baptismal font, and I imagine the same was true for you, as well. Or some people, maybe as an adult they hear the word of God maybe for the first time, and it begins working in them. Or they begin reading the word for the first time, and the Holy Spirit works for that, and they come to believe that Jesus is the Son of God and He is the Savior. And so, they too begin to come to Jesus, have eternal life and salvation. That's Jesus' whole point. That He alone is the one that gives Eternal Life.

Several years after I had come to St. John, I was giving a sermon. I don't know exactly what it was on, but it was about eternal life, and it was a how eternal life is something that we are living right now. It's just we're living that portion of eternal life in this world, of time and space, this sinful, fallen world. And then at some point, we live the remainder of that eternal life in the bliss of heaven with our Lord. But that Eternal Life, God gave to us in our baptism along with the forgiveness of sins, and the victory over death and the victory over the devil.

And so, Jesus is speaking to these people, and they're having a hard time. John tells us He's teaching in the synagogue. And the people are grumbling. "Who does He think He is? How can He say He came down from heaven?"

And Jesus knows the grumbling. And even more important, Jesus knows who will believe and who will not believe.

Among his disciples, John tells us He knew who would betray Him. He knew Judas would betray Him. He knew those who would not believe in Him. Does Judas not believe in Him? That's a question mark right now, at least in my mind, but He does know he's going to betray Him. But there are people sitting in that synagogue, who do not believe that Jesus is the Son of God.

I would be remiss if I took it for granted that everyone sitting in this sanctuary or St. John's sanctuary, or any sanctuary fully believes that Jesus is the Son of God. Becuase the moment I take that for granted, well, then I slack off. Oh they all know Jesus as their Savior. I don't need to remind them they're lost and sinful. I don't really need to remind them that they're leading a dead man's life. But I do.

And even if it doesn't benefit anyone else, it certainly benefits me, cuz I sure need to know that I'm a sinful, lost, condemned creature who constantly needs that regeneration that the Holy Spirit continues to work in me. But now, the people who'd been following Jesus, these a large crowds - some of you, I'm sure, remember the Billy Graham Crusades and how they would feel stadiums, large stadiums. Maybe you personally went to one, or you saw it on TV. Imagine if Billy Graham said something that was a hard statement, then people began falling away from Billy Graham. And suddenly there's this huge stadium and all that's there is, well, let's say George Beverly Shea and Cliff Barrows.

Why were the people following Jesus? Well earlier, He says they're following after Him because they eat their fill of bread. They may have been healed. Some were only following Jesus for what they could get out of Him. And sadly, there are people in our world today that will follow Jesus, only for what they can get from Him in this world. They have no concern about that after life. All they're concerned about is the Here and Now, and what Jesus can provide for them. And when Jesus comes along with something hard and difficult, something that really requires faith to believe, it's a hard statement, and they begin to walk away. They make a U-turn. Now, there are times when maybe a U-turn is necessary. And when we talk about repentance, in a sense, that's kind of a U-turn, we're turning our back away from the direction of sin that we've been going in, and we turn our back on it and walk toward God. That's an acceptable U-turn.

But these people, and people in our world today, people in the generations yet to come, they'll walk away. They'll turn away. They'll do a U-turn from Jesus because it's just too hard. The things of the world. The things that they think satisfy them. The pull is just too strong. Too strong.

I purchased some magnets not too long ago. For a project. I thought, well instead of gluing something down, I'll fix magnets, and then I can take the top off or put it back on, and the magnets will hold it in place. I tell you, those magnets are so strong. It's like - they're still in the package. I'm afraid if I try to pry them apart that they're going to knock my fingers together. Maybe I'm exaggerating. But they're strong.

And Jesus wants to be that type of magnet to you and I and to the world. So strong that nothing can draw us away from Him. But for these who walk away, the draw, the things of the world is stronger than the things, the truth of Jesus. So they begin walking away. Many of his disciples turned back, and they no longer walked with Him. So Jesus said to the 12, do you want to go away as well? Now, how would you answer that question? If Jesus were in the midst of us this evening, and He said, do you want to walk away as well? How would you answer the Lord?

Maybe you've already walked away and you don't have to answer. But Simon Peter, for as much as he often times speaks without thinking, here again, speaks words that we need to hang onto. Peter answered Him: Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of Eternal Life. And we have believed and have come to know You. That You are the Holy One of God. You are the Holy One of God. We have believed and have come to know.

What makes Peter, and by extension, the other disciples - we'll include Judas in there for sake of convenience - what is different in their life from those that are walking away? Those that are walking away?

It's simply this: the disciples - Peter and Company - have been drawn to Jesus by the Father. They believe. They believe His word. His word is life. His word is life. And because they have believed, they have come to know that He is the Holy one of God. The Holy One of God.

When Mr. Volker was talking with the children up here, I was going to raise my hand and say tying my shoes was the hardest thing (to learn how to do), but I'd have to agree with the math thing too. I can tie my shoes, but math still sometimes is a trial.

But think of how you came to know Jesus. There wasn't any real difficult thinking on your part. Maybe parents, grandparents read you the garden book of Bible stories. You began to hear about Jesus. You began to believe in Him. But at some point, there was a crossroads in your life where suddenly, that faith in Jesus, that belief became very personal, didn't it? It wasn't just because those are the stories I heard, or that's the kind of family I grew up in. But faith really grabbed hold of you, and you believed. And you came to know that Jesus is the Holy One of God.

There was a time in my youth, high school youth. No, I take that back. I was in college. You go off to college, and you think you know everything. And I'm sitting in church, and I'm listening to the pastor give his sermon that day. And for whatever reason, his voice sounded like Miss Offmore in the Peanuts. And it wasn't that in my head, I was saying this is a hard saying, who can believe it? But it was more like how do I know that what Pastor is saying there is real, and it isn't just something that he's been taught to say to us?

Maybe that's where God got me to go to the seminary. You go, and you find out what they teach you, and you'll know that isn't what they just teach you. But I struggled for a couple weeks, and thanks be to God that at the end of that struggle, I too, like Peter, had come to know and believe that Jesus is the Holy One of God.

Now, I certainly could have allowed the world and the prince of this world to draw me down another road. And who knows what my life would have been like that way?

But thanks be to God that not only did He send His Son into the world to be the one to draw us to. But that He's given us people in our lives: parents, grandparents, friends, pastors and teachers who have shown us that yes, following Jesus isn't an easy road. That not everything that Jesus says is easy to understand. That there are things that we don't need to wrestle with and grapple with as believers, but that in the most siplest of ways, God reminds us that we are His people. We are the sheep of His pasture, and on the last day, He will raise us up.

Simple as "I am Jesus Little Lamb." Or "Jesus Loves Me, This I Know." Or "This Little Gospel Light."

Know, dear friend in Christ. Believe me, making a U-turn like so many of those that day in Capernaum, would not be a wise move. It would not be a wise move. It would lead, could lead to eternal destruction.

But the most basic things to assure us of Eternal Life, God makes clear, plain and simple. And He assures us that He is the one who draws us to His Son. He is the one who began this good work in us. He is the one who will bring that work to completion in the day of our Lord, Jesus Christ. When indeed, He shall raise us up to Eternal Life. May God continue to grant us steadfastness in faith, that we may abide in this confession until our life's end. Not only for God's glory, but for our comfort and for the comfort of those we encounter upon life's way. Amen. And now, may the peace of God, which surpasses our understanding, keep our hearts and our minds in faith in Christ Jesus, unto life everlasting. Amen.