John 6

Many of his disciples—not only hostile “Jews”—call it a hard saying: who can listen? Wesley: hard to the children of the world, sweet to the children of God. Scarce ever did he speak more sublimely, even to the apostles in private. Who can hear—endure it?

They heard and found it intolerable. The hardness is in refusing spiritual eating of the crucified Son. Disciples can still walk away; the saying is not softened to keep a crowd. Their question is a decision forming, not a request for a glossary only.

Calvin: the harshness lay in their hearts, not in the saying. The reprobate form stones out of the word to dash themselves upon. Whoever submits with true humility finds nothing harsh; to unbelievers it is a hammer that breaks the rock.

“Who can listen?” already excuses the self and indicts the Son. Many who wore the name disciple now show what they were. The hard saying is the same gospel that is life to the teachable.

He knows in himself they are grumbling—no spy needed—and asks if they take offense. The question is an opening: they may still drop the scandal and stay.

Omniscience of their murmur does not annul the pastoral appeal. He names the offense so they can repent of it. Grumbling disciples are still being addressed as people who might listen.

Calvin: he knew in himself because they had not yet declared openly; they murmured secretly and so shut the way to instruction. The question means they have no reason to be offended, or at least that the ground of offense is not in the doctrine.

He tries whether any offended hearer is not yet beyond cure, and stops the mouths of the rest. Knowledge of hearts is his divinity; the question still sifts.

What if you see the Son of Man ascending where he was before? Wesley: how much more incredible will it then appear that he should give you his flesh to eat? If descent and flesh offend, ascent will not be easier for a carnal ear.

Shared high Christology: he was before—preexistence—and will ascend. The question presses them to interpret flesh-eating in light of a returning-to-heaven Son, not a cannibal meal. They can still learn this; many will not.

Calvin: the mean condition of the flesh prevented them from submitting to his divine power; he calls them to behold heavenly glory. Resurrection and ascension display that he is the Son of God. “Where he was before” does not apply strictly to the human nature alone; the two natures are one person.

Offense at incarnation will not be cured by shrinking Christ. Ascension confirms the descent. The flesh they must eat is the flesh of One who returns to glory—faith-union, not a corpse-meal.

The Spirit gives life; the flesh is no help. Wesley: the spiritual meaning by which God gives life; the bare carnal literal meaning profits nothing. The words are spirit—to be taken spiritually—and when so understood are life, a means of spiritual life to the hearers.

Shared with Reformed: this kills crude cannibalism. Eating flesh is not chewing tissue. The words are a means of life to those who receive them spiritually. Hearers may still take them grossly and die in the hearing. The Spirit’s life-giving does not erase the call to understand and believe the words.

Calvin: if the flesh is separated from the Spirit it is useless—not because Christ’s flesh cannot quicken, but because its power is spiritual. We must bring the spiritual mouth of faith. He then calls his words spirit and life: spiritual, calling us upward to seek Christ in heavenly glory by faith, not carnal perception; life to those who receive them spiritually, death to others.

Spirit-given life is why faith is not native sagacity (v. 65). The same verse that denies flesh-help affirms that the crucified flesh, taken spiritually, is food. No help from unaided flesh; all help from the Spirit in the words.

Some of you do not believe—and so receive no life, Wesley says, because they take the words in a gross literal sense. Jesus knew from the beginning of his ministry who would not believe and who would betray him. Wesley: therefore God does foresee future contingencies; “but his foreknowledge causes not the fault, which had no less proved certain unforeknown.”

Foreknowledge is not in doubt; it does not author their unbelief. Judas and the unbelieving disciples remain guilty. The warning is still a place to repent. Knowing from the beginning is Christ’s (and the Father’s) knowledge, not a cause that makes their refusal a puppet show.

Calvin: he imputes blame—being destitute of the Spirit they corrupt the doctrine. The Evangelist adds that Jesus knew from the beginning, lest anyone think he judged at random. Many professed his flock; sudden apostasy exposed hypocrisy; their treachery was well known to Christ while unknown to others.

This knowledge is peculiar to his divinity. The leaving of v. 66 and the betrayer of vv. 70–71 are not surprises that thwart the mission. Unbelief was known from the beginning; those who do not believe were not given (v. 65). John also teaches us not to judge hearts until fruit shows—our knowledge is not his.

This cause I have said to you: no one can come unless it is granted by the Father. Wesley’s actual reading: “Unless it be given—and it is given to those only who will receive it on God’s own terms.”

Coming is impossible unaided—again, not Pelagian. The grant is the Father’s enabling (drawing, teaching, v. 45). It is given to those who will receive it on God’s terms: faith-union with the crucified Son, not loaf-politics or carnal eating. The crowd about to leave proves the grant is not an irresistible seizure; they had light, signs, words of spirit and life, and they will refuse. “This cause” explains unbelief without making the invitation insincere. Grace is given that can be received or refused.

Calvin’s actual reading: faith is an uncommon gift of the Spirit. We must not think more meanly of the gospel because the whole world does not assent. Why are there so few believers? No one, however acute, arrives at faith by his own sagacity; all are blind until illuminated; only those the Father deigns partake. If this grace were bestowed on all without exception, it would have been unseasonable to mention it here.

He now uses give instead of draw: God draws because out of free grace he loves us; what we obtain by gift, no one procures by industry. “This cause” points at the unbelievers of v. 64: they do not come because it has not been granted. The leaving crowd were not given. Effectual grant, not a resistible voucher waiting on independent consent, is why some remain and many will not.

After this many disciples went back and walked no more with him. Do not skip this. Wesley: from this time he began to purge his floor; the proud and careless were driven away; those remained who were meet for the Master’s use.

Classical Arminians treat this as the exhibit of resistible grace in John 6. They had been disciples in some sense—followers, eaters of loaves, hearers. They then quit. Drawing, teaching, and granting were not irresistible in their case. The hard saying did not mechanically eject them; they turned back. Walking with Jesus can be begun and abandoned. The tragedy is theirs.

Calvin: a dreadful, monstrous thing that so kind an invitation alienated many who had professed to belong to him. Some would say the sermon should never have been preached; we ought to think otherwise—Christ is the stone of stumbling. We must not offend by our fault, yet the doctrine will offend many; the reprobate suck venom from wholesome food.

“Walked no more with him” is not a harmless cooling of acquaintance; John condemns them as apostates. We cannot go back a foot without danger of denying the Master. Their leaving does not mean they were given and then dropped; it confirms vv. 64–65: they did not believe, and coming had not been granted. Preach it anyway.

He asks the twelve if they want to go away, do you. The question is sincere: they could walk. Remaining is a response under pressure, not a trance.

He does not chain the twelve to the boat. The very Lord who will not cast out a comer (v. 37) lets them feel the cost of staying. The question is grace, not a taunt—an opening to confess and remain.

Calvin: as the apostles’ faith might be shaken by seeing so small a remnant, he directs the question to them to confirm them—exhibiting himself that they may remain, exhorting them not to become companions of apostates. Faith founded on Christ will not depend on men.

Deprived of nearly all disciples he retains the twelve (as Isaiah sealed the law among the disciples). Each believer is taught to follow God even without a companion. The question steadies; it does not imply that the given will in fact desert.

Peter answers for the group: Lord, to whom would we go? You have the words of eternal life. Wesley: thou, and thou alone, speakest the words which show the way to life everlasting.

This is a confession under the option of leaving. They stay because they have found life-words in him, not because they cannot imagine their legs working. The contrast with v. 66 is voluntary remaining enabled by grace.

Calvin: Peter speaks for all (Judas excepted in sincerity). Two clauses: they feel his doctrine wholesome and quickening; and if they leave Christ, only death remains. “Words of life” means quickening—the gospel the power of God for salvation. The Law also contains life but kills transgressors; here life is offered by free grace, not imputing sins.

He ascribes the words of eternal life to Christ as belonging to him alone. Certain destruction awaits all who, not satisfied with this Teacher, fly to human inventions.

We have believed and come to believe and know that you are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Wesley: we who have been with you from the beginning, whatever others do, have known—are absolutely assured—that you are the Christ.

Believing and knowing are their acts, grace-enabled, in contrast to the crowd. The Holy One title is high Christology shared with the Reformed. They remain by a living confession, not by being unable to leave.

Calvin: a brief summary of faith. The twelve did not at once comprehend all he had taught; it is enough that according to the capacity of their faith they acknowledge him as Author of salvation and submit in all things. Believe is put first—faith the eye of understanding—then knowledge, which distinguishes faith from false opinion.

We believe and know. The Christ, the Son of the living God is the confession that holds when flesh-eating language offended others. Faith here comes from remaining under the Father’s grant, sealed in knowledge.

Didn’t I choose you, the twelve, and one of you is a devil. Wesley: even you have not all acted suitable to this knowledge. Have I not chosen or elected you twelve?—but they might fall even from that election. On this gracious warning Judas ought to have repented; he is now influenced by a devil.

Do not skip Judas. The choice of the twelve is not a fiction, and one of the chosen is a devil. The warning is grace Judas should have received. Election-language here is not an unlosable inner circle; a chosen apostle can be a devil. Remaining in the confession of vv. 68–69 is still required.

Calvin: Christ replies to all, so all spoke by Peter’s mouth. He fortifies the eleven against the coming offense of Judas. “Have not I chosen you twelve?” does not refer to the eternal purpose—it is impossible that any predestinated to life shall fall away—but to the apostolic office, in which they ought to have surpassed others in piety.

“One of you is a devil”: the name holds Judas up to detestation. God allows Satan more power over wicked ministers. The honored rank is not despised because one occupant is diabolical; the profanation is fearfully punished. Judas does not overturn the giving of v. 37; office-choice is not life-election.

John names him: Judas, son of Simon Iscariot, one of the twelve, going to betray him. The tragedy is specific, historical, inside the circle.

Betrayal is Judas’s act. He had the warning (v. 70), the words of life, the same loaves and sea. Foreknowledge (v. 64) did not force his hand. He ought to have repented; he is going to betray. The chapter that began with five thousand ends with a chosen apostle on the path of ruin—and with Peter’s confession still standing for those who will receive the grant on God’s terms.

Calvin: though Judas had a bad conscience, we do not read that he was moved. Hypocrites are so stupid they do not feel their sores, and in the presence of men have hardened effrontery.

John will not let the reader miss it—one of the twelve, going to betray. Jesus knew from the beginning (v. 64). The devil-disciple does not nullify the bread of life, the Father’s giving, or the keeping of those truly given. The Holy One remains; betrayal is underway; the passion that makes his flesh true food is already in view.