Gospel of John (Study 14 of 24, Chap 6 Cont) — G.W. North

All right, brethren and sisters, let's continue. Are you enjoying this? Where is he? Under the table? There's no one else to wait for, is there? Let's go. At least I hope you're finding it wonderful. I'm really enjoying myself.

The Bread from Heaven and the Manna in the Wilderness

Now he's going to pass into the bread, of course, the manna, upon which they fed in the wilderness. But they said, after eating the manna, after a while, after excitement, after all the thrill of it, they said, I saw Moses, this light fruit.

It was angels' fruit, so we're told, by Moses. So they weren't anywhere near fit for heaven, were they? Or even to have angels serving them. Be careful when you grumble, aren't you? Be so careful that you never do, but there it is.

They wanted meat, so now we're passing on to the meat stage. The Jews, I am the living bread, 51, which came down from heaven. And actually the word bread there is solid food. That's the actual Greek word.

If any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever. And the bread, the solid food that I will give, is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, how can this man give us his flesh to eat?

Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life.

And I will raise him up at the last day, for my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me.

This is that bread which came down from heaven, or solid food. Now you see the use of the true Greek word, down from heaven. Not as your fathers did eat manna and are dead, he that eateth of this bread shall live for ever.

These things said he in the synagogues he taught in Capernaum. Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said, this is a hard thing. Who can hear it? Can you? Can you hear it? If you'd have been in Capernaum, in that synagogue, could you have heard it?

Yeah, I've got good hearing. Can you hear it? Can you really listen to this and say, ah, that's it, that's what I have, and what I want. Marvellous, isn't it? And Jesus knew in himself, so he knows in himself, about you and me, that his disciples murmured at it.

He said unto them, does this offend you? What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? Now listen, that is into the world of spirit. You can say heaven, whatever you want. Just keep that realm.

It is the spirit that quickeneth the flesh. The prophet is nothing. The words that I speak unto you are spirit and are life. But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed him not.

And who should betray him. He said, therefore, said I unto you, that no man can come unto me except it were given him of my Father. From that time many of his disciples went back, walked no more with him.

The Hard Saying and True Discipleship

He deliberately said it, if you like, knowing that it would turn them away. So many are only in Christianity, if I can put it this way, for the advantages of it. Heaven when you die, lovely place to live in, instead of the hell that you deserved.

You see, beloved, it is a tremendous thing to really get into the place where you are not only, as they were, following the Lord Jesus outwardly, but inwardly in your spirit. And your soul perfectly understanding.

And your mind attuned. And you are drinking it all in. Or eating it all up. That's the sign. The rest are signs which are no sign. You go to church, don't you? You have a church, you attend. You know positively well that there are many in that church who aren't really following the Lord.

Don't you? Are you sure you are? That's the point, you see. Because now the Lord is showing you what it's all about. He wasn't doing miracles. He's talking of the miracle person you must become. Man shall not live by bread alone.

That was the first thing that the devil tempted the Lord with in the beginning. If you are hungry after 40 days fasting, speak to these stones that they become bread. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

Every word. How about every word I've spoken to you this morning? Are you living by that? That's the thing, isn't it? For whatever you do, Joseph, just don't read the Bible as a kind of a good practice.

You don't know your way through the desert of words. You've got to be drawn by the Father. If that drawing power hasn't taken control in your life, you've got a long way to go. We all have, it's all right, don't worry.

You might have a lot of seas to cross too, but the Lord can somehow transport you there in a moment of time. It's not so terrible as it seems. Amen. Amen and amen. And that's why when the Lord taught these people, they went over the sea into the desert.

Jesus, the Disciples, and the Feeding of the Multitudes

Now, the other gospelers who write their gospels, they tell you it happened at a time, it was Passover period, that they would tell you this, that they'd come back from a mighty time. They'd been out, they'd performed miracles, they'd healed the sick, they'd brushed the dust off their feet of the places that wouldn't accept them, and they came back and they told Jesus, and he warned them really, he said, you know, I beheld Satan fall from heaven.

He could do wonderful miracles too. You see? And then he said to them, and they were tired, you think of walking all around Palestine when you can't go ten yards except you're in a car. You think of all that.

They walked. They laboured to get where they got. They did all these wonderful things. And he came home and they told him, and he says, come into a desert place and rest a while. So that was the beginning of the miracle.

When they got across the sea into the desert place, there was some grass in this place, very rare, I would think, in the desert, or the beginnings of the desert. All right. When he saw the crowds there, he got up out in a boat, he went right off and he said, uh-oh, there goes our rest.

We're not going to have a lovely holiday with Jesus. So it will show you you don't need rest when you think you do. Not physical. And when people would tell you you should have leave, time off, you know, a year out, and all this kind of business, you don't.

Jesus said, do you know what it is to rest? Do the will of God. Come on, help feed the multitudes. Oh dear. That's the kind of rest to have. That you rest in work. You rest in walking. That's the way.

Of course, bodies do get tired. I mean, I must confess that I do not. But then that's allowable, I suppose. The thing is, beloved, you've got to be consumed. You've got to eat the bread from heaven, and your spirit will never get tired.

You've got to feed on his flesh and his blood. And your soul will become rich and full and wonderful. For God. Oh, you all. I knew a person, for instance, I'm sure this is on tape, because I've illustrated it many times.

It's your fault for listening to the tapes. I knew a young lady. She went through university. And when she went home to her parents, it was, I must have eight hours sleep every night. Although I always understood students to sit up with towels around their head drinking strong coffee to keep awake.

But there it is. She came home. I'm one of these persons that must have eight hours sleep a night. Until she had a baby. Then she found she could do on six. Ah. And through her labor, she had the baby, too.

Stop it. The devil's bluffing you. The whole glorious truth is eat Jesus Christ. Eat him. Eat him. Make him your meat. Make him your bread, if you like. I don't always like the words in the English Bible such as they, it was quails they ate.

The Lord never quailed from anything. He went through. I'm not laughing at God's provision. It's just the funniness of the word. Why should we call their birth quails? You don't quail, do you? It is the big thing for us to see.

Get on with it. The Lord doesn't accept any excuses. Oh, you might have a fond mother that will say, Oh, poor dear. He's been, or she's, She'll feed your weaknesses in what she calls love. Jesus Christ challenges your womanhood and your motherhood, your manhood.

Challenges it. Wonderful. Do you like challenge? Do you like challenge? Amen and amen and amen. Well, you've probably got to stand alone, but I'm not talking along those lines at the moment. But he did talk, he addressed them like it.

We shall get to the chapter in John. I've only got, what's it, another two days after today and I've finished with you. Here then is the tremendous truth to see, beloved. As you'll gather, I'm not really concerned in your intellectual grasp.

I've given you a lot of notes. I'm concerned about you. I'm not saying the other lecturers aren't, but that's it. I believe that's why Derek gets me to come. Here is the thing, beloved, to face the challenge.

Communion, the Good Shepherd, and Feeding on Christ

They said, oh, this is a hard saying. So you drop off. Back out. Cease. They'd never eaten his flesh and drunk his blood. Of course, it wasn't available until Calvary in the way that we know it's available now.

When you next take, shall we say, communion, spare a thought, will you, for today's talk? This is a tremendous thing. All the Gospel really is built on this. For instance, when he's talking about the shepherd, we shan't get as far as there.

Perhaps I'd better finish John next time I come. If there is a next time, when we're all a year older and you'll be gone. But there it is, beloved. They'll always be available on tape whilst there's a doctor about.

But here is the thing, beloved, when he's talking about the good shepherd, you like that, don't you? Sheep, shepherd. He said, do you know why my father loves me? Because I lay down my life for the sheep.

That is to feed on. Do you know farmers talk about laying a field with grass? Did you know that's what they do? I'm going to lay down my life for the sheep. To eat. That's what he's talking about. It's so wonderful.

It's all the same, beloved. It was coming out of his mouth. To people who hadn't got one ounce of comprehension. But we, of course, are born of God, aren't we? And though you aren't born full of knowledge, you are born with some.

Unless you're not born. You and I have to go on with God. And move in this way. Amen. And so we see how this gospel is compiled. And the way he's moving. And why he talks so little about miracles that he did.

Passes over it. Miracles he did. Diseases he healed. Thousands of them. Talk about those. He gets down to this. Now my question to you is this. Have you got this life? Are you living in daily sustentation of it?

Are you eating Jesus Christ? Are you feeding on Jesus Christ? Now that's what it's to be. And the best thing that people could ever say to you. You might be handsome, pretty, slim and tall and fat and short.

You may be all kinds of things. But the main thing is this. When did you last eat Christ? When did you have such a meal? And you say, ooh, that was wonderful. I want some more of that. I often get asked that.

Would you like any more, Mr. North? If it's ice cream mixture, yes. That kind of thing. But I eat what's put before me. Don't misunderstand. You've got to see, beloved, what it's all about. It isn't sufficient to say, yes, I believe on Jesus.

Belief, Judgment, and the Reality of Salvation

Yesterday morning I said there won't be one unbeliever in hell. They'll all be believers there. They will have seen Jesus Christ, bowed their knee to him and then be sent to hell. So don't think anything other than that, will you?

No atheists in hell. They'll go there, but they'll believe when they have to kneel before Jesus and confess that he is Lord. Won't that take them to heaven? No, it will not take them to heaven. All the devils in hell know that he is the Lord.

What you and I have to know, beloved, is that we are feeding on the Lord. May I just confirm this before we have to wind up this morning? Go to John's first epistle. Turn over and read these tremendous truths for yourself.

You will know that this epistle is John's own commentary on his gospel. You will notice, among other things, that the word believe, of which his gospel has quite a lot to talk, does not occur above once or twice in the epistle.

Instead of believe, you have the word we know. Not we believe. We know. The same as I know, you can eat beef and live instead of dying. Like, for instance, if we eat beef, we'll die. I know, because I've had some.

Oh, it might kill you in ten years time. Ah, but I shan't live to that age, I don't suppose. Oh, I might. But here, beloved, is the great truth of it. John says, we know. Now turn to the fourth chapter of his first epistle.

In the fourth chapter, he says this. Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits. Whether they are of God. Do you know, there is that in you which will test every spirit that you'll confront, if you're born again.

You needn't get enmeshed with others, except you have desires that way. Keep it clear. You will know. I do bless God for that. For nobody walks about with a big placard on, I am a Christian. Unite the spirits, whether they are of God.

Because many false prophets have gone out into the world. They're teaching falsity about Christianity. Now the next verse. Hereby know ye the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is, not did come.

He came in his own flesh, through Mary. Every spirit that knows Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God. And every spirit, whether they call themselves Christians or not. That confesseth not, Jesus Christ come.

The word isn't even there. Jesus Christ come in flesh. The flesh is not of God. Can you confess that Jesus Christ is come in your flesh? Are you an embodiment of Jesus Christ? Is he the one that's really living and loading in your body?

In your mind? Or your faculties? I'm calling on your faculties now to hear. To write, if you want to. To think the things I cannot see. You see, is Jesus Christ in your flesh? When I meet you, am I meeting Jesus Christ?

Now that's what John's taught me. He is come. Present tense. Not did come. Past tense. And you're thinking about what is called the Advent. Christmas. And the 33 years afterwards. Marvellous. The truth.

He's in me. He's in me. In me. I can scarcely believe it. You see, the Father feeds on this bread from heaven. Marvellous. I feed on it. Can I tell you one of my most favourite stories? True. Perhaps all of you know that we were associated, well I was, let's put it that way, with Cliff.

The Testimony of a Life That Shows Christ

You all know about the Cliff Conferences. They had a man named Wood as one of their presidents. He was a man who trained the students there to go out with the Gospel. And he himself used to go out every weekend.

He used to assign to his students, they went to one church. And he used to do the same. They all went out preaching on the Sunday. In a certain town, which shall be nameless, there was a vicar, a godly vicar, and his wife.

And they had a godless maid. It was her duty every, let me get this right, Friday, to go to the local butchers. Never had any of these sort of things called supermarkets. They had to have butchers or bakers or all these other things.

We're so nursed now that we can sit at home and do our shopping, I believe, by telephone. They might as well take our legs away unless we want them for dancing or kicking a football. The great truth, beloved, lies here.

Alright. She used to go to the butchers and order the meat for the coming weekend. And she ordered the meat. And this particular man, the leader of Cliff College at the time, was in the village. So she ordered a fairly large joint.

She said, in the butchers said, why you got something slimy this week? Oh yes, she said, another one of them. Another one of them, she said. Alright. And the weekend went through. And on the Tuesday she went down to pay for the joint.

And he said to her, this butcher, who did you say was staying with you this weekend? Last weekend? He said, she said, we had Jesus Christ staying with us this weekend. Would somebody say that about you?

That burned its way into my soul. Let it burn its way into you. We had Jesus Christ. He was in the man's flesh. Inside his flesh. He wasn't just a piece of flesh in that sense. It means nothing. But we, what John is saying, look, get us out of this airy fairy in the spirit world talk.

Let me see in your body. Let me see it in you. That's what it's about. You should consult a man named Wesley. He enshrines it in all of his hymns. These things, beloved, are so real. But I'm not expanding the, sorry, the epistle.

John 6 and Gathering Every Fragment

Let's go back to the gospel. Oh, what a marvelous thing it is. That these things can be so with us. In this lovely sixth chapter. So wonderful. You will know, of course, that John is very orderly when he approaches the Lord.

Approaches writing. You will know that he's earlier dealt with what you drink. Chapter four, the woman at the well. Now he's concerned with what you eat. Simple, dear old John. Faithful to. To make us face up to it as he had to himself.

But we don't, we evade that. Nobody really, except sentimentally, in this sort of wonder, almost fairyland, of dreaming about this, that, the other Christians. Right down to earth. And you will know that after he had fed those people.

Let's have another look in chapter six. When they were filled. Verse twelve. These five thousand plus plus people. When they were filled, he said unto his disciples. Gather up the fragments that remain.

That nothing be lost. Every single crumb of it is fallen. Don't you let anything be lost. Don't you? Gather it up, he said. They filled a basket full for each one of them. How about that? Twelve baskets, twelve disciples.

A basket full of fragments. And that's how they gathered manna. In the desert. They didn't go and get a load of manna. They had to pick it up. Off the ground. Bit by bit. By bit. By bit. By bit. And they could only take as much as they could eat.

Mark you. If they said, oh, we'll take as much as we can. The Lord saw that it went bad. You can only take what you can eat. Or drink. What is your appetite? Have you measured it? How many meetings a week you can take?

Or how many this or that? Oh, we're busy people. If I was you, I'd endeavour thus to ask the Lord to take your busyness away. Or you could jettison a lot of it if you wished. If you wished. Things we must do, of course.

We all know that. They gathered them up. So you see, he's fulfilling the picture right to the very nth degree. Dealing with this basic thing in Israel's history. That event. You just pick up the fragments, that's all.

I wonder if I'd have met them in those days and said, did you have a good meal too? Well, we only had the fragments that remained. But don't you see, if you have a good solid meal, you'd have a wonderful lot.

It was only a fragment. Fancy, five loaves, two fishes. They only got a fragment of the original. That's all. One young fellow's lunch. And the Lord says, they only got a fragment. Sometimes our fragments are so large.

Beloved, you've got to see the truth of it. May God lead us all on together. Into this great marvelous truth. You've got to realize that when you were born again, you know where you came from? Onto this earth, you came from heaven.

You weren't born again on this earth, you were born in heaven. God's child. You don't take it seriously enough. You've got to see. The real, you will know the word again, is anathon in the Greek, born from above.

I died and was born again from above. That's what it means. Hallelujah, isn't that wonderful? When you really apply what little bit of grey matter, well, I only have a little bit, you may have a lot. Really do some thinking.

Union with Christ and Death to the Old Life

Don't stay in the realm of thinking. You are God's gift to this world, sent into the earth. When you've been born from heaven, do you believe that? That's why he says you've got to die with Christ on the cross.

And risen with Christ. You've got to die, man, you've got to die. You've got to die, woman. We all have. Hallelujah. Die in sin or die to it, one or the other. And know what it's all about. Amen. Because this will solve all your problems, won't it?

I mean, when people talk about you, hurt you, tell lies about you, ruin your reputation, if not your face, one way or another. That's right. You murmur. You know, I can remember where we buried my old mother.

Yeah, we buried her in a graveyard, you know. And we looked up from looking down in the grave and there was a wonderful rainbow in the sky. I'd like to talk about it some other time. But of course we sung and preached the gospel around the grave.

But they filled in the hole. Now you could go to that grave and say, you, Mrs North, you were a busybody in other people's matters, you were a wicked woman, you did this, you did that. But she wouldn't hear you, she's dead.

You're not dead enough. You hear so many things. You take offence at what somebody says. You're not dead, that's why. Jesus was completely dead to all the insults. And you said to him, you could have no power against me, except it were given to you from my father.

How about that? Have you reached that place where people have no power against you? You may ask me the question, it's valid. The whole thing for us to see is that you were dead and you were being born again from above.

Even God wouldn't cheat his own method. He'll forgive you your sins a thousand times, perhaps. But you've got to be born of his seed. You've got to be born from above. You've got to be born deliberately begotten by God.

Not accidentally, like you may have come into this world. I don't know. You've got to see what it's about. How wonderful it is. How it puts you beyond all these other things. And yet, putting you beyond them in your spirit presents you right into them in the body.

Like Jesus was. You're going to have my son. I'm giving my son. You're going to let them do what they want with your son? No, actually they may think so, but you're doing what I wanted you to do. You say, how does God work these things out?

Being so tied to the soul condition, I'm not seeing the spirit. And God is spirit. And what it is about, in your life, and in this generation, with the people with whom you live. What a thing. Yes, this is it.

This is it. Do you wonder then when he talked like he did? What if you see the Son of Man ascend up where he was before? Now listen to this. Jesus knew in himself, as his disciples murmured, what does he know about you?

Oh, well he loves me here. Isn't it wonderful? But he says he'll forgive all your sins. He says he'll wash you clean. But oh, I want to live in you, through you. So you can say, Jesus Christ is in me.

He's in me. Where? Oh, in my heart. He's got to get into your flesh as well. That'll give you a new angle on life completely. Can you confess that Jesus Christ is in your flesh? That it is tamed and cleansed, purged and suited to his?

You've got to be able to. You've got to live here a long time perhaps, or it'll seem long. Those years seem to slip away a bit quick when you're getting older. It's so wonderful, bloody. God doesn't want just your beliefs.

Of course he does want them. I said just your beliefs. Because if you don't believe, you won't even get a start in it. Belief unto birth. I want to be born again. I'm sick and tired of myself. I got born again because I got there.

Sick and tired of my fruitless self. Then I got born. I was on track. Now God wants us to get into this place. And this is the beauty of John's Gospel. It's my favourite Gospel. He comes logically through the truth.

Persevering Through the Hard Sayings of Jesus

Let's finish. Verse 66. From the time that he said these things, many of his disciples went back. You ever heard of disciples, Christians? They've gone back, you say. They've gone back. Yeah. Yeah. They walk no more with him.

You can say, well, he used to be a pastor of a church, or she used to go there. Think of your friends. The people you love. You almost get the thought of, I, even I, only am left. But there are so few that want to go through the hard sayings of the Lord Jesus.

The lovely soft saying, like when he raised Iris, his daughter, when she was dead on her bed, the actual words he used were, Little pit lamb, I say unto thee arise. Oh, we love that. I love it. Don't you?

But how about loving this? Except, except, he said, you won't see the kingdom of God if you're not born again. You won't see it. It's so marvelous to understand this work of the blessed Spirit of God in us, and that it's actually happened.

I've been given a heavenly mind. I have. Oh, I can't recount the blessings. That's what you've got to be able to say. Going through with God. Jesus said to the twelve, Will ye also go back? Can it be one?

These are my conditions. This is the truth. Do you, do you want to go back too? You say, what? Yeah, John was one of them. Do you want to go back? Well, you can't stand still. You've got to go on. And you better do it pretty rapidly too.

For who knows? The Lord may be planning to come back tonight. Beloved, Peter said, Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the word of eternal life. And we believe and assure thou art that Christ, the son of the living God.

Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you, twelve, and one of you is the devil? So Judas had said, We're sure, we believe, we're sure that Christ, son of the living God. It's a tremendous thing. I wish I could spend the whole year with you on this book.

I really do. Because, beloved, you will learn that just before the Lord prayed that marvellous prayer in the 17th chapter, he'd said something and they said, now listen, this is their exact expression.

Oh, by this we believe, we are sure. They'd never been sure to them in their own minds and they said they'd believed all the way through. So you've got to make allowance for this word believing and you've got, I invite you to trace it through the gospel.

We're sure. He said, do you now believe? Because they said they'd believed before. They'd left all and followed him. That was believing, wasn't it? What do you mean by believing? What do you mean? But our time's gone.

God bless you. This had been preached to me when I was the age of some of you. And it has saved me much grief and failure.