Exposing the Pretenders

John: Know and Believe  •  Sermon  •  Submitted
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Halloween Costume Challenge

Notes
Transcript
Welcome to Hype.

Introduction

Pronounce winner of Costume Challenge.
Every year on Halloween people dress up as someone who they are not. Every year people change their outward appearance to pretend that they are someone they are not.
Tonight Amber and I pretended to be Devon and Ellie from the TV Show Chuck.
Show picture of Devon and Ellie from Church.
In the end, even though we can dress up and pretend, the reality is we are not the actual characters from the TV show.
Just like how we pretend to be other people on Halloween, there were some people who pretended to be disciples of Jesus. They may have appeared to be followers of Jesus but in the end they were exposed as pretenders. We will read about those people in our passage today and see why they ended up turning away from Jesus.
So if you have your scripture notebooks with you, please meet in John 6:22. John 6:22. I will start reading from v. 22.

22 The next day, the crowd that had stayed on the other side of the sea saw there had been only one boat., They also saw that Jesus had not boarded the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone off alone. 23 Some boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. 24 When the crowd saw that neither Jesus nor his disciples were there, they got into the boats and went to Capernaum looking for Jesus. 25 When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”

26 Jesus answered, “Truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled. 27 Don’t work for the food that perishes but for the food that lasts for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you, because God the Father has set his seal of approval on him.”

Context of this story

Remember last week. What were the two miracles that Jesus preformed earlier in John 6?
Feeding of the five thousand with 5 loaves of bread and two fish
Jesus walking on the water.
When we read this passage we need to remember those two things.
Here in the beginning of our passage, we people from the same crowd that Jesus fed the day before are looking for him, understandably so. If you saw someone feed thousands of people from 5 loaves and 2 fish, wouldn’t you too want to see this person again? They wanted to find Jesus so bad that they found boats and rowed across the see to Capernaum. When they found Jesus, they were given an unexpected response. Jesus discerns that these people came to him not because they believed that He was the Son of God but rather because they never want to go hungry again. They want access to an everlasting source of food. Because Jesus knows this, he tells them don’t work for food that won’t keep you satisfied but rather work for God to have eternal life. Let’s keep reading to see how the people take Jesus’ response.
Read v. 28-40

28 “What can we do to perform the works of God?” they asked.

29 Jesus replied, “This is the work of God—that you believe in the one he has sent.”

30 “What sign, then, are you going to do so that we may see and believe you?” they asked. “What are you going to perform? 31 Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, just as it is written: He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”,

32 Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, Moses didn’t give you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. 33 For the bread of God is the one who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

34 Then they said, “Sir, give us this bread always.”

35 “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again. 36 But as I told you, you’ve seen me, and yet you do not believe. 37 Everyone the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. 39 This is the will of him who sent me: that I should lose none of those he has given me but should raise them up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”

Let’s pause here and explain what we just read.
First we see the people asked Jesus what they work they must do that are of God to have eternal life. Jesus responds with v. 29 that the work of God is that you believe in the one he has sent. (Circle this) Or in other words believe in Jesus. Then the most absurd (wildly unreasonable) question is asked by the people to Jesus.
Read v. 30-31.
What is so absurd about this question? Remember the context of this passage?
Because Jesus literally just preformed for them a sign. Jesus fed thousands with 5 loaves and 2 fish with leftovers and these people are asking for a sign. That was their sign! They completely missed it. Then even though they missed it we see Jesus having patience with the crowd as he plainly tells them that He is source of eternal life that they are looking for.
Read v. 33. Jesus is the one who gives life to this world. Not only has He given physical life as he heals the sick, but also he gives us spiritual life as He is the one who can save us from our sins.
You would think that from this the people would get it and believe in Jesus right then and there. But if we keep reading we will find something vastly different.
Read v. 41-59

41 Therefore the Jews started grumbling about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42 They were saying, “Isn’t this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”

43 Jesus answered them, “Stop grumbling among yourselves. 44 No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets: And they will all be taught by God., Everyone who has listened to and learned from the Father comes to me—46 not that anyone has seen the Father except the one who is from God. He has seen the Father.

47 “Truly I tell you, anyone who believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50 This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that anyone may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

52 At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

53 So Jesus said to them, “Truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, 55 because my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. 56 The one who eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna your ancestors ate—and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.”

59 He said these things while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.

Let’s pause again and take note of a couple of things. Jesus words can seem confusing. Even the people He was teaching had questions of what He meant. So let’s try to make sense of what Jesus just said. First we must ask ourselves what is Jesus not saying here.

What is Jesus not saying here.

He is not saying...
1. Become cannibals
1. Jesus is not saying become cannibals. Why do we know this?
Read v. 53
As Jesus continues this imagery of eating the flesh or body of himself, He does not mean it literally.
Let’s look at v. 35 in chapter 6 that we read earlier.

35 “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again.

In this verse Jesus talks with this same image of referring to himself as bread. But notice that he spiritualizes the thirst aspect. He doesn’t say whoever drinks of my body will never be thirsty. He says no one who believes in me will ever be thirsty again. (Circle this verse). This is important to note because this shows that when Jesus is talking about eating the his flesh or drinking his blood, he is referring to simply believing in Him as your savior from your sins. As a result, we will live forever with Him in Heaven after our earthly lives are over.
But understandably if you are hearing something like this for the first time, it would be hard to understand. So let’s finish up John 6 and see how the people respond to this teaching.
Read v. 60-71

60 Therefore, when many of his disciples heard this, they said, “This teaching is hard. Who can accept it?”

61 Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, asked them, “Does this offend you? 62 Then what if you were to observe the Son of Man ascending to where he was before? 63 The Spirit is the one who gives life. The flesh doesn’t help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. 64 But there are some among you who don’t believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning those who did not believe and the one who would betray him.) 65 He said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted to him by the Father.”

66 From that moment many of his disciples turned back and no longer accompanied him. 67 So Jesus said to the Twelve, “You don’t want to go away too, do you?”

68 Simon Peter answered, “Lord, to whom will we go? You have the words of eternal life. 69 We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”,

70 Jesus replied to them, “Didn’t I choose you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil.” 71 He was referring to Judas, Simon Iscariot’s son, one of the Twelve, because he was going to betray him.

So in the end we see some of the people who were following Jesus turn away because they could not understand some of the things that Jesus was teaching. We see that they have been exposed as pretenders. But we see the twelve disciples stay because they have come to know and believe that Jesus is God the Son, the Savior of the world.
So what is the big takeaway from a passage like this?
I think we can learn something from Peter, in how He answers Jesus.
Re-read v. 67-69
Even though the teaching that Jesus had just told the people was hard to understand and confusing, Peter says with confidence that they will still follow Jesus. How can this be? Because of everything that they have witnessed while they had been with Jesus. People being healed, miracles are being performed, truths of scriptures are being revealed. They hold on to know what is true as a foundation for their beliefs so that in the confusing or hard to understand moments in life, they don’t lose faith.
This is a very important lesson for us. We will face hard to understand moments. We will go through times that seem confusing.
Wether it’s an injury, maybe a family member dying, broken relationships with parents, or other hard moments in life. It can be easy to doubt God’s existence because life is not how we think it ought to be. In doing so, we can easily forget truths, things that we know to be fact, and instead we only see our current situations, what’s right in front of us. So like Peter, we must keep in mind the truths and facts that we know about Jesus when we go through confusing situations.
Let’s take math for example. Just because some things you learn in math may be confusing, doesn’t mean that you should give up on math or that whatever you have learned previously in that year is somehow not true. You don’t do that, right? You remind yourself of truths that you’ve learned and apply them to the current math problem that you are trying to solve.
We need to do the same with our lives when we go through hard and confusing moments in life.
We need to remind ourselves of truths such as...
1 Peter 5:6–7 CSB
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your cares on him, because he cares about you.
Reminding ourselves that God cares for us.
John 16:33 CSB
I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. You will have suffering in this world. Be courageous! I have conquered the world.”
Reminding ourselves that Jesus promised that we will have hard times but Jesus has overcame the world so that we could have eternal life with Him.
Revelation 21:1–4 CSB
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I also saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband. Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: Look, God’s dwelling is with humanity, and he will live with them. They will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and will be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, crying, and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away.
We must remind ourselves that for those of us who have put our trust and hope in Jesus, in the end, when we are united with Jesus, we will have no more pain, no more crying but rather rejoicing always with Jesus.
In conclusion, we must go back to verse 29 of John 6.

29 Jesus replied, “This is the work of God—that you believe in the one he has sent.”

It all comes back to believing in Jesus. But I must ask, are you pretending to be a Jesus follower? Do you only concern yourself with Jesus just on Sundays, do you try to be a good person on your own efforts? Or are do you actually believe that Jesus is God’s son, do you believe that he can save you from your sin? Do you obey God’s commands and follow the example of how to live on earth that was lived by Jesus Christ?
I pray that we would be genuine, authentic, real Jesus followers. Let’s pray.
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