Gospel of John 6:60-66
Therefore many of His disciples, when they heard this, said, “This is a hard saying; who can understand it?”
61 When Jesus knew in Himself that His disciples complained about this, He said to them, “Does this offend you? 62 What then if you should see the Son of Man ascend where He was before? 63 It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life. 64 But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who would betray Him. 65 And He said, “Therefore I have said to you that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.”
66 From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more.
Let us take a stroll to the past in the times of our Lord Jesus Christ and examine the context of these selected verses . Jesus was known among many as great healer , a Rabbi , a Prophet and a divine teacher and there was a split of opinion about Him in the synagogue . He preached at different gatherings but notably at the the synagogue and among religious leaders very frequently and there were different topics but one thing was common , His message was not very pleasing and comforting to His audience , just not His divine claims of being I AM but His constant rebuke of the self imposed righteousness of people around Him to the point that his many disciples left Him because His words were very hard and showed them their original sinful nature and they left Him .They left Him despite being witness of miracles , raising of the dead, feeding to thousands with little boy's lunch and actually listening to the Lord Himself because His words were hard and not catering their needs .
Now this incident has its echoes even in present day modern church and modern christians . What we want from the Church and our Pastors and our brethren : A convenient gospel . A gospel which tells us how kind the love of God is , we , despite a fish in water unaware of our sins like the gospel which nurtures our needs but not show us the sinful nature and darkness of our hearts.We like to listen to the word of God which makes us feel good.As a medical student I almost always prayed to God only during my exams and it was like a bribe to the Lord that you pass my exams and I will come to your worship house and / or fast as a thanksgiving and in my heart I was very contended as I did the right thing and this trade game continued on and on . We like the preachers who tell us how much possibilities we have in our life ,our career , our relations and God loves us so much so He wants us to be successful , rich and famous and God loves us so much that He exalt us and makes us the in-charge of things in our life . We all are much like those disciples who left Him despite the witness of such great miracles and divine glimpse because its ME in our hearts and catering to MY NEEDS and in search of god who pleases our desires and fulfill our needs and most importantly tells us how good we are .
Dear ones , always remember Jesus always knew what was in heart of men , at different occasions He before people saying things knew it and told them what they were thinking yet He never preached them what soothed their hearts , His preaching was hard and harsh and showed the true nature of Man . This leads to another logical question , does the nature of man has been changed over few millennia , a simple answer : NO . Man as he was still plunged in the darkest shadows of evil and sin and Man needs the same harsh gospel which tells how sinful he is so it may leads to his repentance and deliverance . convenient gospel has encroached many minds and lives and is about to knock our doors I would like to conclude this post by a picture which explains the modern day church .
