Unbelief and Belief: Displayed and Explained

All right, good morning. Open your Bibles to John chapter 6, please. John chapter 6. if you remember Jesus just last week he just finished or we finished going through his bread of life discourse or sermon and now we see the aftermath of that sermon. We see who believed, who did not, and we see his teaching on that. So let us read together the text, the aftermath of his sermon that he preached in Capernaum about being the bread of life.

We'll read from verses 60 to 71. so John chapter 6 verse 60 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 those 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 so after this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him so jesus said to the 12 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 and jesus answered them did i not choose you the 12 and yet one of you is a devil and he spoke of Judas the son of Simon Iscariot for he one of the twelve was going to betray him let us pray well father we we praise you and thank you for your word opened up before us we thank you God for the teaching of Christ for his word to be near us and close to us we consider those around the world who are far from your word, either in print or in faithful preaching.

We're so blessed to live where we are here, to where the word of God is near to us constantly, to where even faithful churches are around that call on us to repent of our sins and look to Jesus truly for salvation. Lord, we thank you for your word. And I pray, God, that our hearts and minds would be open. And as we're going to learn even today, that this is only possible by the powerful work of the Spirit.

So I ask, Lord, that he would dwell in us now, that he would take care of any distraction, that he would take care of any fleshly desire that we have within ourselves to grumble against your word, to not pay attention, and that he would help us, Lord, to not only hear your word, understand your word, but to respond to your word. Lord, we thank you for your work of salvation. God, we rely upon that now.

In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Well, I met Sarah, my wife, when we were freshmen in high school. so we had many classes together over that period and especially our freshman year and one thing that she learned not to do was to try to help me with homework or to understand schoolwork the problem is is I wasn't a good student I didn't take school seriously until college until after high school and so I wouldn't pay attention during class and then afterward I would tell Sarah that I don't understand especially math because math I would actually really have to pay attention to get it.

And she would try to explain it to me, but it just would never stick. And it might stick for a moment, and then a few minutes later, it just seemed like I just forgot whatever she said. My heart wasn't really into it, but nevertheless, she would get frustrated with me. And the problem is, it's not that what was being taught, or more specifically math, was against my reason.

It was just over my reason. What I mean by that, it wasn't against any kind of proper reasoning. It wasn't like it didn't make any sense objectively. It just didn't make any sense to me. It went over my head. It was over my reasoning.

And there's a difference with something that's over your reasoning versus something that is against your reasoning. When something is against your reasoning, that is, it literally doesn't make any sense objectively or subjectively. It doesn't make any sense. So in today's culture, when you're told that a man can be a woman and a woman can be man or a man can have a baby and all this nonsense, the reason why that's so offensive is because it literally goes against your reasoning.

It's not over your reasoning. It's not like, well, I just can't comprehend it or understand it. It makes sense objectively. I just can't. It actually goes against your reasoning. There's a difference between something going over your reasoning and something going against your reasoning.

The reason why I highlight that here is I think it's going to help us as we unpack these verses before us. You see, again, we're in the aftermath of this sermon that Jesus gave this bread of life discourse that he gave in which he told the crowd that they must believe upon him for salvation And we going to see now a response to this bread of life discourse a real life example before us in scripture of those who believed and those who did not believe. And what we're going to see is a display of belief and unbelief. and then we're going to see the explanation behind that display of belief and unbelief and what we're going to see is that when the belief or unbelief is displayed before us when we see it it's going to emphasize human responsibility that we're going to be challenged as we see it displayed that we must believe and we must not be like the crowd who did not believe and we're going to be challenged within us a very hard and and focused human responsibility is going to be highlighted by John in this gospel as belief and unbelief is displayed before us but then with both the display of belief and unbelief we're going to be see an explanation from Jesus of why someone believes or doesn't believe and in that explanation we're going to see a heavy God's sovereignty and God's ability to allow true belief to begin with.

And in our minds, we're going to have a hard time bringing both of those things to bear. How can man be totally responsible and how can God be totally sovereign over the process? If I am totally responsible to have true belief, as we're going to see, and those who have unbelief, they are totally responsible for it. How can then, as Jesus explains what's going on behind the scenes and says, this is why this is happening, and it is totally God's sovereignty, how can both of those things come together?

And what we're going to see is these things go over our reasoning. It doesn't go against our reasoning. It's stuff that we can't quite understand because we are finite creatures. But as we let it lie where it lays, we'll see that it encourages us to act, but to act in a way in which we rely upon the power of God and his sovereignty to allow belief. So let us see this kind of display or go before us as we look at the text together.

Again, we're going to see unbelief and belief displayed, and then we're going to see Jesus explain it. And together, as we understand it, it's going to encourage us to rely upon the work, upon the powerful work of God to allow, to enable true belief in our souls. So let us first look at unbelief displayed. Let us first look at unbelief displayed. Look at your text again at verses 60 to 62.

John writes, when many of the 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 where he was before? You see, this is unbelief displayed before us right here. if you look again at verse 60, when many of his disciples, it says, heard it.

Now, we got to see that this is a display of unbelief and it's coming from his disciples. Now, the reason why that's important to highlight is before we saw the Jews grumbled against them and didn't believe. And the Jews were the religious leaders that hated Jesus. And there was no hope, really. There was no real, there was no expectation that they were ever going to believe Jesus.

They had a hardened heart to him immediately. But yet here, now all of a sudden, John says his disciples heard this, and we're going to see them display unbelief. So now it's not the Jewish leaders who hate Jesus. These are the mass crowd of disciples that were following Jesus for a while, that were following him, wanting him, wanted to believe, wanted to follow him, but all of a sudden, something changed.

And really, what's a helpful way to look at this is think about the parable of the soils, right? You have the seeds that fall on the path in which the birds come and eat the seeds immediately. There is no plant. And that represents the Jewish leaders who the gospel, the bread of life discourse is preached and doesn't even come close to registering. These people are not believers.

But then there's the other soils in which the plant rises up. And it looks like a plant. In fact, that plant looks like any plant that would produce fruit eventually. But then something happens to that plant in which it doesn't produce fruit. And the reason why this can be kind of scary for us is because these guys kind of look like us. It's easy for us to look at the people who hate Christ and have no display of love for them or belief in him at all.

Right? And say, those are the bad guys or how dare they. But here what we're talking about is a display of unbelief of disciples who look like a plant. That look like it's going to produce fruit. that look like it is the real deal, but something happens. And what happens? Well, they heard it, it says in the text.

When many of the disciples heard it, now what did they hear? They heard Jesus preach. They heard the bread of life discourse. They were fed by Jesus' literal food, and then they were preached spiritual food, and when they heard that sermon, they displayed unbelief. Now, heard it, that sermon, we could really summarize it in two major ways. They heard Jesus preach that he was the word made flesh, and they heard Jesus preach that he is the word of life.

The word made flesh means that he is true God who has taken on true flesh. And they heard Jesus proclaim that he is the word of life. That is, you are to eat and consume him in order to have life. so they heard both of those things he says i am the bread who came down from heaven for the life of the world and those are the two major things that they heard and so when they heard it the text says they said in your in verse 60 this is a hard saying who can listen to it you see when you see in the text this is a hard saying It not saying man we just can understand this This is hard to understand What hard means it offensive.

What they're saying in the text is, this is deeply offensive, is what they're saying. So not only were the Jewish grumbling in which they said, how can he give us his flesh to eat? But now, all of a sudden, these disciples are saying, this is a hard teaching. This is offensive. You see, they probably took offense. It doesn't say exactly what they're offended over, but we can surmise.

We could guess. I think I have a pretty calculated guess. They probably did not like the fact that Jesus claimed to be God. They probably didn't like the fact that here's this man, it looks like any other man, who says that he is a bread who came down from heaven, that he is God. You ever been around someone who's very braggadocious? It is not easy to be around, is it?

Someone who just brags about himself and just overly, just over the top. It is not easy to sit through. In fact, you could say it's offensive. But the problem here is that Jesus truly is God. In fact, this is like, you know, if someone cries out in an airplane when there's a medical emergency, we need a doctor. And can you imagine a doctor being like, well, I don't want to brag. so I'm not going to say anything.

No, like you need to say, I'm a doctor and I can help. Jesus is that one who says, I am God who came down to help. And the people who saw him as no God at all, they're offended by what he says. So these disciples, plants that look like they would produce fruit, they are going to. Instead, they hear this teaching that he is God and they say, this is offensive.

And they also heard the teaching that he is the word, not just made flesh, but he's the word of life to be eaten, to be consumed. Now, maybe they got offended by the fact, just like the Jewish grumblers, the Jewish leaders who said, how can we eat his flesh, right? The idea of eating someone's flesh is offensive. So maybe they got offended by that. So this is hard.

That's a very real possibility. They just couldn't grapple with what Jesus was teaching. And so they're offended by the idea of eating flesh. But let me even say this let's let's say that they understood a little bit that jesus is not saying eat my literal flesh he's saying that you need to believe upon me with all your heart soul and being this is offensive to tell someone that jesus commands everything from you to consume him wholly is an offensive doctrine so even if they got through the physical part okay he's not really saying eat him but he is saying that we need to completely consume him, that is in itself offensive and hard to hear as well.

This is like when Jesus says in Matthew 10, 37, whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. He's not saying to literally hate your parents, but he is saying that when your parents say you cannot follow Jesus. You say, I love Jesus more than you. And so the point is that Jesus didn't walk this earth saying, hey, you can have some of me, some of other things.

He says, the only way you're going to be my disciple is if you have all of me and I have all of you. That's it. And so the spiritual point of consuming the word of life is an offensive point indeed. And so again, these disciples here in this teaching, preaching from Jesus that he's the word made flesh and the word of life, they hear it and they say, this is a hard saying.

This is an offensive saying. In fact, so offensive is it to them that they say, who can listen to it? So it's one thing to say, this isn't really for me, but it might be for you. Here, the offense is so great that they say, I don't, I'm offended by it. And anyone who would even believe this, it's offensive to me. How can anyone stomach this?

This is so offensive. And if you notice in our culture, that's not to get It's too sidetracked here, but that's kind of, you see how that we got there? You know, like when I was in high school, when I was a kid, it was more like, hey, that's not really for me, but if it's for you, great. But we're kind of in this like new world where now it's like, no, if you believe that, that is so offensive that we cannot put up with that.

And so this is like a deep level of offense to these once disciples in which they say we're offended by this word. I mean, we got to look at the tragedy here. is that this is the word of life. This is the word that came down. He is the truth. He is everything. He embodies the truth.

He is everything about it. And here they hear it, and they are offended by it. So offended that they ask, who can even stomach this? You know, it's like a child who first tries to eat food, and instead of swallowing it, they spit it out in disgust. And this is exactly what these disciples have done with the preaching of the word from Christ. Instead of consuming it to their life, they spit it out in disgust.

And then Jesus adds one more layer of this display of unbelief before us. He says, well, I'm jumping ahead. Look at verse 61. But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this, said to them. And before we get to what he says, there's a couple things we want to lay out with that, with this display of unbelief. Notice Jesus calls it grumbling.

Notice what these people are doing is they are grumbling against him. That word grumbling is used on purpose because it denotes not just an intellectual disagreement. It denotes not just simply, this is their opinion, it's a solid one, and Jesus has his opinion, and it's a solid one. but grumbling denotes utter sin. That this problem of the disciples not believing is a sin problem.

Grumbling denotes a sinful heart and motive. It an important detail that refers back to the wilderness period when the Israelites grumbled against Moses and God in sin And so by using the word grumbling, Jesus is highlighting this is a sin problem. Unbelief is a sin problem. It's fascinating, it's worth looking at. It's littered throughout the wilderness wandering period.

But in Exodus 16, 1-3, let's look at that real quick. Open your scriptures to Exodus 16, 1-3. If you remember in chapter 15 of Exodus, it's the song of Moses. And what's the song of Moses about? Well, it's about the fact that God just protected them. God did everything good for them.

There's no reason why they ever should have gotten out of Egypt, but yet because God is powerful and good, he brought them out. And then literally, you can still hear the echoes of that song going on in the hills around, and then it's no later than that that they start to grumble. And we see in Exodus 16, 1 through 3, they set out from Elam, and all the congregation of the people of Israel came to the wilderness of sin, which is between Elam and Sinai on the 15th day of the second month after they had departed from the land of Egypt.

And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the people of Israel said to them, Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full. For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.

Is that a legitimate opinion? No. This is rank and unbelievable unbelief. This is sinful unbelief. This is not trusting the God, God above unbelief. This is against all proper reasoning.

They are not believing. In fact, 1 Corinthians 10, 9-10, Paul says, We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by the serpents, nor grumbled as some of them did and were destroyed by the destroyer. The word grumble here in John 6 is used intentionally to denote that just as the Israelites grumbled in unbelief and sin, so now Jesus' disciples were doing the same.

Grumbling denotes a sinful heart problem. Thus, they were offended at Jesus' teaching because they had a sin problem in their souls. But notice how in verse 61, as we kind of start finishing off the display of unbelief here, Jesus said, knowing in himself, in verse 61, that his disciples were grumbling in him. It's ironic that the people, one of their major issues was that this man just claimed to be God and that's offensive.

And then here, a display of his godness is revealed and that he knows that they're doing this without them expressing that they're doing it. As a display of him being the true God from heaven, he knows that they are grumbling without even them having said that to him. In fact, grumbling denotes kind of a low murmur. Another point here is that Jesus is never taken by surprise by unbelief.

Even whenever it's a plant that looked like a disciple or a follower. And that will be an important point in a moment. and then notice now he says and this is the final thing that's going to be said about the display of unbelief notice what he says to them whenever he knows that they're grumbling he says do you take offense at this in verse 61 then what if you were to see the son of man ascending where he was before and this is what jesus is saying now there's various ways that people interpret this what does he mean by this? And what I think is clear is that Jesus is saying, if you're grumbling about this, if your heart's attitude is unbelief about these words that I'm preaching here, what will you do with the greater revelation when I die for sinners and rise again for the dead and go back to be with the Father?

And the answer is, is the same heart that's grumbling now in sin will grumble against the very act of salvation that I'm going to display before you. That no matter what revelation you get, because your heart is in sin, because you are grumbling with a sinful heart, you will not believe anything that you see. You know, there's a common belief amongst unbelievers that if they just receive a certain revelation from God, they would believe. if God would just play the dance this way or that way I would believe if he would reveal himself in a certain way then I'll believe him but Jesus I think is making a point here is that if you have a hard heart a sinful heart against my words here you will not believe when you see if you were to see me rise die for sinners rise from the dead and go back to be with the father So in other words, a sinful heart receives revelation in a sinful way and does not respond in a way that's for life ever.

He says, if you take offense at this, then what would you do if you were to see the Son of Man ascending where he was before? It's a rhetorical question, and the answer is they would grumble and disbelieve some more. it's like what we read today in luke 16 19 through 31 in the new testament reading you remember you had the rich man and lazarus remember that and the rich man of lazarus you had the rich man go down to hades you had the lazarus go up to heaven and lazarus says i just need something to drink and he doesn't get that because there's a chasm jesus says and so or abraham says and so he says It's just at least send someone to my brothers to warn them, right? Or send Abraham, I should say, or get it all mixed up.

Send Lazarus, who is up at Abraham's side in heaven, just send him to my brother to tell him that, hey, you need to repent. You need to turn away from sin or you're going to end up down here. And he says, if someone raised from the dead, surely they would believe that. And what does Abraham say? They have the words of Moses. That's enough.

And if they don't believe that, they're not going to believe even if someone raises from the dead. And I think Jesus is making the same point. You unbelievers now, you disciples who once were following me, but now have an unbelieving heart, this is a sinful problem in which no matter what you see, you will not believe because of this sinful problem in your heart.

So, as we see unbelief displayed before us, we can sum it up in this way. unbelief in the word of Christ is always connected to a sin problem. Always, always, always. And it cannot be hidden from Jesus. And it cannot be overcome by a more and greater revelation if God would just reveal himself this way or that way. God has revealed himself to you in exactly the way he has determined necessary.

And it is vital that you take what he has given you with a heart of belief and not grumbling and complaining. So are you consuming Jesus as the word of life or are you sinfully grumbling against him? Grumbling takes on different forms. Now there's active rejection as we are going to see here. They don't walk with Christ anymore. But there's other forms of grumbling that I think is helpful and there is for us to see.

There's a passive form of grumbling or rejection. We do not reject with our words perhaps but our lack of consuming Christ reveals a rejection of him, a subtle grumbling. That there are opportunities for us to consume Jesus, his word and his truth, but we do not partake of those things and that is a form of grumbling against him. That the word of God is preached yet we don't put our hearts and minds to it, we are so easily distracted instead.

That the word of God is in our homes collecting dust and we do not spend time in his word. This is in like a passive form of grumbling. When we do not take hold of his word and delight in it. So notice how the display of unbelief here calls on us to proper action. Do not grumble, but consume Christ's words. It is heavy on the emphasis that you must do.

But next, Jesus provides an explanation of this crowd of this disciples unbelief that highlights the need for God to enable proper belief so we go from the display in which Jesus says you're grumbling you're not going to do well with further revelation but then he explains why it's happening and as he explains why it's happening all of a sudden the emphasis goes on God's power or ability to provide proper belief so we go from heavy man's responsibility to now heavy emphasis on God's sovereignty and power. Look at what he says as now Jesus explains their unbelief. He says in verse 63, he says, can't find it, it is the spirit who gives life.

The flesh is no help at all. The words that I've spoken to you are spirit and life. So notice how Jesus says it is the spirit who gives life. It says Jesus's words are full of spirit and life since the spirit is the one who is one who enables belief and proper belief in life and the flesh is no help at all they are not able to believe. The spirit is always the agent or the medium for life to happen.

If you look at creation If you notice in Genesis 1, you look at the, in fact, it's worth going there. Look at Genesis 1. We'll see that the Spirit was there to give, to allow, to enable physical life. And we see in Genesis 1, verse 1, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. the earth was without form and void and darkness was over the face of the deep and the spirit of god was hovering over the face of the waters and god said let there be light and there was light so you see that god created all things and it was all just one big mesh of kind of chaos right that what we see in verse one god created the heavens and the earth right he created it all right there and it was just like a big thing of messiness right Of chaos Not sinful messiness just chaos right The earth was out form and void and darkness was over the face of the deep, and so there it is, just a big chaos blob.

But then all of a sudden we see, and the spirit of God was hovering over the face of the water. So who was there? The spirit of life was there, hovering like a chicken brooding over her chicks, right? And then all of a sudden, with that kind of thing, dichotomy, or that thing happening, chaosness, the spirit hovering over, all of a sudden then the word is declared, let there be light.

And then life starts to happen over and over and over and over again. And the point that is being made here, that's a physical reality, and there's a spiritual reality too. That in the sinful soul, the flesh, who is no help at all, Jesus says, there is just chaos and mess. There's no life there. but what needs to happen is the spirit then needs to brood over that soul that when the word of god is declared all sudden there's life there's light there's action and so jesus is just making a very simple point the reason why you don't believe is because you don't have the spirit that enables belief and life in you.

It's like a big chaos mess until the spirit hovers over you like a chick over or a chicken over her brood in which then the word of God is effectual for life. So the explanation Jesus gives, the reason why they don't believe is because they do not have the spirit who enables belief and we we read through this last week as we looked at the similar subject that Paul has this in mind when it comes to the need for the spirit for the word of God to be effectual and powerful for salvation and it's worth looking at it again look at first Corinthians chapter 1 look at verse 18 for the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing but to us who are being saved it is the power of god and then he explains what that is further in chapter 2 verses 10 through 16 when he says these things that is the power of god the cross the gospel the word of god these things god has revealed to us through the spirit for the spirit searches everything even the depths of god for who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person which is in him so also no one comprehends the thoughts of god except the spirit of god now we have received not the spirit of the world not the flesh but the spirit who is from god that we might understand the things freely given us by god and we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the spirit interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual the natural person does not accept the things of the spirit of god for they So all unbelief in Christ is sin, and it is a result of the Holy Spirit not being in the person. this is what Jesus is teaching. As much as we just heavily emphasize our need to have proper belief, we must equally emphasize the fact that if we have not proper belief, it's because the Spirit is not working His miraculous work of life within our souls.

And Jesus goes on to say in verse 64, as He explains unbelief, He says in John 6, 64, For, but there are some of you who do not believe, he says. He says, the flesh is no help at all. There's a spirit that gives life. And my words are spirit and life. And he says, and there are some of you who do not believe. For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe.

And we'll see in a moment and who it was who would betray him. So the point here is that Jesus knows exactly who has the spirit within them. And we've seen this already, that Jesus didn't entrust himself to man, for he knew what was in man. and he knew who had the spirit within them to enable the truth to hit its mark jesus could see what we couldn't see as mere men he could see the spirit brooding over the individuals to receive the truth and he's saying i know who those are that do not have that spirit working in them i know there are those of you who do not believe who will walk away so jesus isn surprised by unbelief He not surprised by what going on before them because he knew the reason for it And that is they did not have the spirit and he could see that they did not have the spirit So he's not surprised by anything.

And then he finishes off with explaining unbelief in verse 65. He says, this is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted to him by the Father. Remember in his teaching, in the bread of life discourse, he made that clear. He says, no one can come to me unless it's first granted by the Father. Remember in verse 37, he says, all that the Father gives me will come to me.

And whoever comes to me, I will never cast out. In verse 43 and 44, 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 on the last day. And here Jesus is saying, what I was saying is that the Father needs to draw them by the Spirit in order to understand. So Jesus isn't surprised by this.

He knows those who had the Spirit and who did not. And he says, this is why I told you that you must be chosen or drawn out by the Father because he must give you the Spirit in order for you to truly believe. So the Bible commands you to believe Jesus' words and not grumble in unbelief. Yet, the Bible also makes clear that without the Father giving you the Spirit, you will never receive Christ's words in a way that's for life.

Both things are taught in Scripture. You must believe with a true belief and not grumble. And yet, it is only by the ability of the Spirit that you're able to do that. And it could seem like the relationship of these two things go against our reasoning, right? but instead it goes above it beyond our reasoning in baptist history we've fallen into two extremes there is one point in baptist history in like the 18th century where we'll cut off the the man's responsibility component right and they did all sorts of wonky things in that period right don't even preach to the unbeliever until there's some kind of visible reaction that perhaps the spirit is doing, then you can preach to them, kind of this hyper-Calvinism error, in which, in order to try to grapple with this kind of teaching, just cut off God's sovereignty, or man's responsibility part.

But we live in an age in which what the Baptists, you know, have done, is you cut off God's total sovereignty, and you say that God's just waiting on man, that man, he's just, I just wish so bad, I wish so bad, I wish I could do something about this, that I could save him so bad. And the fact is that the Bible does not teach that. God knows who are his, and he sends his spirit into their hearts to cause them to understand truly for true belief and not to grumble.

Yet, you need to believe. You must not grumble. It's important that we see that these things work together and the way they interact is really above our reasoning. But where does that lead us? Where does that bring us? What does this bring us to?

The revealing and the teaching of unbelief? What does this mean for us? Well, if you are experiencing a grumbling heart today in light of the truth of Christ, you need to be like, I don't know if this is going to work, but whatever, I'll say it anyways. You need to be like a rabbit who realizes that they're being hunted. Have you ever seen a rabbit realize it?

They freak out. They just, boom, they bolt. I have a couple rabbits in my yard, and I take my 22 out to hunt down raccoons, and they're the only ones I see. But when they see me, they bolt, man. You can tell their eyes get wide, and they run. Except for this, the other day, one just thought, like, if I just lay really low, he won't see me.

But usually they just run off, right? So if you're, right now, you're considering, man, I have a grumbling heart, right? I have a grumbling heart against the teaching of the word. There's something that just doesn't jive well within my spirit, and I just want to ignore it. Or I just want to not read the scriptures today. Or I just want to just sit through without really thinking about the sermon today.

If you are experiencing a grumbling heart within you, you need to be like a rabbit who realizes they're being hunted. You need to act. but where is your action going to be focused at? It cannot be, well, I will just try really hard to enjoy God's word now. I'll listen to four sermons this week. That'll do. I read an extra chapter each day of the scripture this week It be hard but I get through No it must begin with a cry of help to the Father who grants the Spirit to enable life to your souls It must begin with a cry to the One who is powerful enough to crush your unbelief and your grumbling spirits.

And the Spirit will direct you to the Christ who says, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. The person relying on their fleshly power will respond to this doctrine saying, it is hopeless. Someone who is directed by their flesh, who hears this doctrine of God's total sovereignty, yet man's responsibility, will say, it is hopeless, what's the point?

Since God is the one who grants and chooses and it's his power alone. But the person who has the spirit working in them will cry to God for help, who is faithful and promises to give it. And so when these things are working together, you might not be able to understand exactly how they interact. We won't. Spurgeon says it's like a railroad tracks, right?

You see the two tracks and you don't see how they ever come together. But as you look into eternity, they kind of start going like this. It's exactly how man's sovereignty, God's sovereignty, and man's responsibility works. We don't know exactly how they come together, but they do. and it drives us to proper action. I'm a sinner. I need help.

I need to act. I must go to God who is powerful enough to do the work. Because the fact is that Jesus Christ died for sinners. And the fact is that Jesus Christ died for sins, including the sin of unbelief. I like the hymn, Christ the sure and steady anchor. Christ the sure and steady anchor through the floods of unbelief.

Hopeless somehow, oh my soul now, lift your eyes to Calvary. This my ballast of assurance, see his love forever proved. I will hold fast to the anchor, it will never be removed. Our hearts and minds go to Calvary and his work. and to his powerful promise that he sends the Spirit to enable belief. And so when we struggle with unbelief, we don't look to ourselves, we don't look to a power within, we look to the powerful work of the Spirit that Christ has promised to his beloved children.

I'm out of time to look at the display of belief. We will cover that next week. Let us pray to our God. Oh Lord, thank you for Jesus Christ. God I thank you that as you show disbelief for us here in the scriptures we see disciples once following Jesus yet then they hear his word and they're offended and they leave Lord I hope that everyone can see some of that in their own hearts right now Lord we may be saved by Christ now praise God but we know that that unbelief germ or that unbelief way of thinking just kind of hangs on.

So I pray, God, that as we see it displayed before us, we would see that in our own souls whenever we find ourselves lazy and dull and not wanting to hear the word of Christ, not wanting to respond in faith, not wanting to believe the full totality of what it means that Jesus is truly God and he has given us life by his very body, what it means to truly believe that and live that out. Lord, I pray that as we struggle with that as Christians, we see that we're struggling with unbelief and we're struggling with a grumbling spirit. And I ask, Lord, that as we also look at the explanation of Jesus, that it is because the Spirit's not in those people to believe, that we recognize that, oh, our only hope is that the Spirit would work powerfully within our hearts.

And so let us all cry to you for help. Let us not rely upon our own ability or strength, but let us cry out for the power that you have promised to put within, that is, the Spirit, to be renewed afresh in our hearts to respond to the gospel, to respond to the word of Christ, to hear and to believe. Lord let that be what we do this morning it may show itself in a changed life where we abhor sin and we grab hold of the righteousness that we can have in Christ Jesus our Lord because of his good and awesome work that he has done we thank you and we praise you in his name, Amen