Wednesday, April 2, 2014

"Words of LIFE" ...

One of my favorite chapters in the Bible I'll post here.  John Chapter 6 beginning on verse 22-69.
So much teaching can come from these verses spoken here by The Lord.  A commentary too long for me to start now but all I can say is ...

"He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying...".  
Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice and they follow me".  
Let us humble ourselves and pray that God's grace will allow us to hear so that we can then see; as Christ said "I have come to give sight to the blind". 

Romans 10:17 - "So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ".

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JOHN CHAPT. 6: 22-

On the next day the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea saw that there had been only one boat there, and that Jesus had not entered the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone away alone.  Other boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks.  So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum, seeking Jesus.    When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?”  Jesus answered them,  “Truly, truly, I say to you,  you are seeking me, not because you saw  signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves.    Do not work for the food that perishes, but for  the food that endures to eternal life, which  the Son of Man will give to you. For on  him God the Father has  set his seal.”   

Then they said to him, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?”  Jesus answered them,  “This is the work of God,  that you believe in him whom  he has sent.”    So they said to him, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform?  Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”  Jesus then said to them,  “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.    For the bread of God is  he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”    They said to him, “Sir, give us this bread always.”    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 said to you that you have seen me and yet 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 not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say,  ‘I have come down from heaven’ ?”  Jesus answered them,  “Do not grumble among yourselves.    No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me  draws him. And  I will raise him up on the last day.    It is written in the Prophets,  ‘And they will all be  taught by God.’  Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me—    not that anyone 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.”   

The Jews then disputed among themselves, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”  So Jesus said to them,  “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of  the Son of Man and drink his blood, you  have no life in you.    Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood  has eternal life, and  I will raise him up on the last day.    For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.    Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood  abides in me, and I in him.    As  the living Father  sent me, and  I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me.    This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”    Jesus said these things in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.    

When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”  But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them,  “Do you take offense at this?    Then what if you were to see  the Son of Man  ascending to  where he was before?    It is the Spirit who gives life;  the flesh is no help at all.  The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.    But  there are some of you who do not believe.”  (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)  And he said,  “This is why I told you  that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”    

After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.  So Jesus said to the Twelve,  “Do you want to go away as well?”    Simon 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, that you are the Holy One of God.”...
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The Apostle Paul quoted the Prophet Isaiah in The Book of Acts:

"... From morning till evening he (Paul) expounded to them, testifying to the kingdom of God and trying to convince them about Jesus both from the Law of Moses and from the Prophets.  And some were convinced by what he said, but others disbelieved.  And disagreeing among themselves, they departed after Paul had made one statement:

“The Holy Spirit was right in saying to your fathers through Isaiah the prophet:  

 “‘Go to this people, and say, 
“You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.”     For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed; lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’