John 6:37
Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me will not hunger, and he who believes in Me will 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 the one who comes to Me I will certainly not cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me. This is the will of Him who sent Me, that of all that He has given Me I lose nothing, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.”
There is no mystery at John 6:37. There is only a mystery if you try to take the square peg of Calvinism and force it into the round hole of Scripture. Then you’ll have a problem. The message is really simple, and John 6:45 is the clincher: “Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me.” Who are those who have heard and learned from the Father? They are those who are in covenant relationship with the Father. So, those who are in covenant relationship with the Father (like Anna, Simeon, Nathanael and all who submitted to John’s baptism), comes to the Son. Essentially, then, Jesus declared that the unbelieving Jews were not in covenant relationship with the Father, and that’s why they grumbled. They didn’t like being told that they were not right with God. Where the Calvinists have gone wrong at John 6:37 and John 6:44 is that this is not the giving and drawing of UNBELIEVERS, but the giving and drawing of BELIEVERS, that is, those who were in covenant relationship with the Father, and yes, there were plenty in Israel who longed for the reconciliation of Israel, and plenty who submitted to the baptism of John the Baptist, and these rejoiced over the coming of Jesus. The concept of the Father turning His own, over to His Son, is essentially the same thing as when Jesus turned His own over to the Holy Spirit upon His ascension. (John 16:13-15) When Jesus said that He was the “Bread of Life” (John 6:35), the Jews who claimed to be right with God, but were not, were offended by these words and left (John 6:66), but those whose hearts were right with God, stayed (John 6:67), so that the prophecy of Isaiah 6:10 may be fulfilled, in that those whose hearts were not right with God, may be a trap and a snare unto themselves, and not come to the Son so that they may be healed. This is why true believers do not turn away from Jesus over these words, but receive them, while the lost simply finds yet another excuse to reject God. The Calvinists, on the other hand, insist that even if the Arminians are correct, and that this passage is about the giving and drawing of those who were in covenant relationship with the Father to His Son, it must nevertheless be a “remnant by grace,” which is a Calvinist buzz word for Irresistible Grace. But why should we assume that? The Calvinist answers, “Because that’s the only way anyone comes to the Son (Jon 6:37),” and thus the Circular Logic of the Calvinist is exposed.
John 6:37’s, “All that the Father gives Me,” is part of a dialogue between Jesus and the unbelieving Jews, spanning John chapter’s 5 through 10, where Jesus kept emphasizing the fact that His entire message was solely the Father’s, and that the reason why they were not believing in Him, was because they had rejected the Father who sent Him, despite their claims that God was their Father. (John 8:41) This is why Jesus repeatedly emphasized what the Father was doing. Jesus was pointing out that they were not right with God. In fact, Jesus told them: “I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves.” (John 5:42) If God had been their Father, then the Father would have gladly given (6:37) and drawn (6:44) them to His Son. Jesus made this clear at John 6:45: “Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me.” Those who “know” God (John 15:21), “heard and learned” of God (John 6:45), “love” God (John 5:42), have God as their “Father” (John 8:42), all come to the Son. Their persistent rejection of the Son, was solely because of their persistent rejection of the Father, who sent both He and the prophets, whom they also rejected, indicative of Luke 13:33: “It cannot be that a prophet should perish outside of Jerusalem.” So John 6:37 is not a Calvinist/Arminian issue. It’s an answer to the question of why the Jews had rejected the Son, and what they needed to do to correct it. They needed to get right with God. They first rejected the witness of the Father through the Law and the Prophets (most recently through John the Baptist), and now they’ve rejected the witness of the Son, despite all of His miracles, and next there would remain only one witness left, and that being of the Holy Spirit, illustrated at Acts 2:36-38.
John Calvin writes: “In the first place, Christ says, ‘All that the Father gives me will come to me.’ By this Christ means that faith is not dependent on man’s will, as if this man or that man may believe indiscriminately, as if by chance, because he elects those people he gives, as it were, to his Son.” (John: Calvin, The Crossway Classic Commentaries, pp.160-161, emphasis mine)
Calvinist, Erwin Lutzer, comments: “God works in the hearts of the elect so that they desire to come to Christ.” (The Doctrines That Divide, p.192, emphasis mine)
Calvinist, James White, writes: “Jesus begins where Christian salvation begins (and ends!), with the Father. The Father gives a particular people to the Son.” (Debating Calvinism, p.118, emphasis mine)
Walls and Dongell writes: “But the Calvinist reading likewise fails to account fully for the context. Jesus is locked in strenuous debate with religious leaders who claim special knowledge of and standing with God. From this privileged position, they seek to discredit Jesus completely. Their implied charge essentially involves an attempt to sever Jesus from God, affirming the latter while rejecting the former. In doing this, they wish to establish the right to claim, ‘We know God intimately, but you are utterly alien to us! We stand in right relationship to God, but we completely reject you.’ Jesus’ countercharge strikes directly at the root of their authority: the presumption that they knew God in the first place! ‘You have never heard his voice nor seen his form, nor does his word dwelling in you’ (Jn 5:37-38). Far from knowing God, then, Jesus’ opponents had already rejected not only the testimony of John the Baptist but also of Moses: ‘If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me. But since you do not believe what he wrote, how are you going to believe what I say?’ (Jn 5:46). In this question posed by Jesus we discover the key principle: rejecting God’s first offerings of truth will utterly block further illumination. God will not offer more truth or manifest his full glory (the eternal Son) while light at hand is being spurned. In other words, we can’t actively reject the Father and at the same time have any chance of accepting the Son.” (Why I am Not a Calvinist, pp.74-75, emphasis mine)
Walls and Dongell add: “Had they received Moses fully, thereby coming to know the Father to the degree possible at that time, they would have belonged to the Father’s flock, and the Father would have drawn them to the Son. But in rejecting Jesus, they demonstrated that they never surrendered to God in the first place, that they had set their faces like flint against all of his continued overtures. Since they did not belong to the Father’s own flock, they wouldn’t be part of the transfer of sheep already trusting the Father into the fold of the Son (Jn 6:37, 39).” (Why I am Not a Calvinist, p.75, emphasis mine)
Laurence Vance explains: “…we have here the separation of the Jewish sheep from the goats and the drawing of them to the Messiah. The ones given are Jewish disciples. They are said to be his sheep. (John 10:27). John baptized that Christ should be manifest to Israel (John 1:31). Although Israel as a whole received him not (John 1:11), he was known of his sheep (John 10:14), the epitome of which can be seen in Simeon, who was ‘just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel: and the Holy Ghost was upon him’ (Luke 2:25). … The error of the Calvinists on John 6:44 is two-fold. First and foremost is the misapplication of a verse with a decidedly Jewish context as a doctrinal statement on salvation in this age. And secondly, in a spiritual sense, there is the fallacy of making the drawing of God irresistible and equating it with salvation.” (The Other Side of Calvinism, pp.510, 511, emphasis mine)
Robert Shank comments: “Jesus’ words ‘no man can come to me except the Father who sent me draws him’ are especially significant in the context in which they appear. He had spoken repeatedly of God as His Father, claiming that the Father had sent Him into the world--a claim which most of His hearers rejected (vs. 41f). Affirming that ‘no man can come to me except the Father who sent me draw him’ and that ‘every man who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me,’ Jesus implied that the coming of every man who comes to Him constitutes a certification of His divine Sonship, a Sonship of which men must be persuaded before they can come to Him in the true sense of the term.” (Elect in the Son, p.177, emphasis mine)
John Goodwin (1594-1665) writes: “They are said to have been the Father’s i.e. as it were, the Father’s disciples, or persons ‘taught by the Father,’ John vi. 45, and so, after a sort, appropriable unto the Father, (as those that believe and are taught of Christ are said to be Christ’s, or to belong to Christ) before they became Christ’s apostles, or were chosen by him upon this account; and are said to have been given unto him out of the world by the Father, because they were peculiarly qualified, and as it were, characterized and marked out by the Father to be formed into apostles by his Son.” (Redemption Redeemed, p.80)
Richard Watson (1781-1833) writes: “Those who truly ‘believed’ Moses’s words, then, were under the Father’s illuminating influence, ‘heard and learned of the Father;’ were ‘drawn’ of the Father; and so, by the Father, were ‘given to Christ,’ as his disciples, to be more fully taught the mysteries of his religion, and to be made the saving partakers of its benefits for ‘this is the Father’s will which sent me, that of all which he hath given me (thus to perfect in knowledge, and to exalt in holiness,) I should lose nothing; but should raise it up again at the last day.’ Thus we have exhibited that beautiful process in the work of God in the hearts of sincere Jews, which took place in their transit from one dispensation to another, from Moses to Christ. Taught of the Father; led into the sincere belief, and general spiritual understanding of the Scriptures as to the Messiah; when Christ appeared, they were ‘drawn’ and ‘given’ to him, as the now visible and accredited Head, Teacher, Lord, and Saviour of the Church. All in this view is natural, explicit, and supported by the context; all in the Calvinistic interpretation appears forced, obscure, and inapplicable to the whole tenor of the discourse.” (An examination of certain passages of Scripture, supposed to limit the extent of Christ’s redemption, emphasis mine)
Daniel Whedon (1808-1885) writes: “So in verse 45 it is more fully explained; it is only every one that hath learned of the Father that cometh unto me. The Father, finding the willing soul, teaches by his law; attracts, convinces, and convicts by his Spirit; but when the soul has perfectly obeyed all their influences with a living faith, the Father does not himself save, but He draws and hands him over to Christ. Thither coming, and embracing Christ with a full faith, the man is not cast out but accepted and redeemed. But the Father giveth none to Christ who reject his teachings and drawings; none who do not freely consent to be given and go to his Son. Such is the great scheme of salvation.” (Wesleyan Heritage Collection CD, p.324, emphasis mine)
Robert Hamilton comments: “The crux of my argument will be that the set of individuals who are said by Jesus to ‘belong’ to God as Christ’s ‘sheep,’ to ‘listen to the Father and learn from him,’ and to be ‘given’ by the Father to the Son, refers not to a pretemporally determined set of elect persons as conceived of in the Calvinist Reformed view, but instead primarily to the faithful sons of Abraham who were God’s children under the covenant as it was revealed in the Old Testament, and who were already prepared by their voluntary faith and repentance to embrace the promised Messiah at the time of his long-awaited appearance to the nation of Israel. These included the ones whom God had nurtured to repentance under the ministry of John the Baptist, who was appointed to ‘prepare the way for the Lord’ (Isaiah 40:3; Matthew 3:3).” (The Order of Faith and Election in John's Gospel: You Do Not Believe Because You Are Not My Sheep, emphasis mine)
James McCarthy explains: “Jesus was speaking to unrepentant Jews....Had they repented, the Father would have given them as sheep to his Son. ... 1. The Spirit convicts. 2. A Sinner repents. 3. The Father enlightens. 4. The person believes and is born again. ...This explains...why Jesus taught that no one can come to him unless the Father draws him. It also clarifies what he meant when he said, ‘All that the Father gives me will come to me.’ When the Father opens a person’s heart to understand the gospel, he readily believes and is saved....” (John Calvin Goes to Berkeley, p.279, emphasis mine)
Michael Brown explains: “I see it as the fulfillment of the promise. In other words, up until now, the distinction was that there were people that were right with the God of Israel, and those who were not, and now Jesus becomes the full reflection of the God of Israel among the people, so those who were truly His, will be identified as the ones that will follow Jesus. It’s not that He now creates a whole new people, because there were those longing for His coming, like Simeon and Anna that were ready to receive Him when He came.” (James White vs. Michael Brown)
In terms of the unbelieving, Michael Brown explains: “They looked to be just like everybody else, ‘We’re devoted followers of God.’ ‘No,’ He says, ‘You’re really not, because if you believe Moses, you’d believe Me. If you were listening to the Father, then by all means you would come to Me. The proof that you’re not listening to the Father is that you won’t come to Me.’” (James White vs. Michael Brown)
Whereas Calvinism teaches that the Father was giving those of the eternal flock of the Father, that is, those who were allegedly plugged in the Father before the cross and before the foundation of the world, Arminianism teaches that these were faithful Israel, that is, those who belonged to the Father, like John the Baptist and many others, transitioning from the Father’s flock to His Son’s flock. See John 6:44. Those whom the Father gave were those who were His to give, that is, those who belonged to the Father’s flock who made Him their God (John 8:42), and who heard and learned from Him. (John 6:45) As already mentioned, however, Calvinism instead teaches that God gave, and still gives, those who were eternally in the Father:
White adds: “I just also believe the undisputed and unrefuted fact that I come to Christ daily because the Father, on the sole basis of His mercy and grace, gave me to the Son in eternity past.” (Debating Calvinism, p.306, emphasis mine)
Calvinists take the phrase, “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me,” and assume that the giving was sometime prior to Christ’s ministry, even from eternity past. Why? Where does this passage mention anything about an eternal giving? Arminianism teaches that this passage is the seamless transition of those of faithful Israel, who submitted to John the Baptist’s baptism, to the Son of God.
White concludes: “If this giving does not involve sovereign predestination, what does it involve? Jesus Himself says it results in eternal life. If that is not election unto salvation, what is?” (Debating Calvinism, p.137, emphasis mine)
We might also ask, if this giving involved sovereign predestination, why is there no mention of it?, and why is there no mention of an eternal decree? Predestination had nothing to do with it. The giving involved just what John the Baptist had stated: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:30) Why must Jesus increase? What did John the Baptist recognize as happening? The flock was changing hands (John 1:35-37), so to speak, from the Father’s hands, under the Old Covenant, to the Son’s hands, in the New Covenant, where “all” that were the Father’s were now being turned over to the Son, so that through the cross, they could belong to the Father under the New Covenant. This was seamless because the Father was in the Son (John 14:11), and hence, all who loved the Father naturally would love the Son, seeing the Father in Jesus. When these heard the Son, they recognized the Father, and hence, followed Him.
Calvinist, James White, writes: “…the Father gives a particular group of people to the Son; all who are thus given come to the Son, without fail; the giving of the Father precedes and determines that coming (not, as is so often suggested, that the coming of someone in faith determines the Father’s giving them to the Son, as if the human action determines the divine)…” (Debating Calvinism, p.120, emphasis mine)
Yes, some Arminians do take v.37, which states: “All that the Father gives Me will come to Me,” and turn it around to mean, “All that comes to Me, the Father gives Me.” Thus, they’ve inverted the order of the verse, suggesting that God gives the Son’s followers to the Son. Does that make any sense? Yet, the same person also states: “Consequently, it would make no sense for Jesus to have said, ‘All believers that the Father gives to me will believe in me.’” The irony is that that’s exactly what the verse means, when you apply v.45, which states: “Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father, comes to Me.” (John 6:45) All believers in the Father who love and are of Him (John 15:23-24), who had made Him their God (John 8:42), who had “heard and learned” from Him through the Law and the Prophets, most recently being John the Baptist, are drawn by the Father to His Son (v.44), in order that they may now believe in Him, the visible image of the invisible God, the Word made flesh. (John 1:14) However, these had not made God their Father, as per John 8:42. They rejected the Father when they rejected John the Baptist. Luke 7:30 states: “But the Pharisees and the lawyers rejected God’s purpose for themselves, not having been baptized by John.” These the Father would not give to His Son, having resisted His will for their life, like those of whom God had also written: “I have spread out My hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in the way which is not good, following their own thoughts.”
Jesus stated: “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me.” (John 8:42) “I love the Father, I do exactly as the Father commanded Me.” (John 14:31) But Jesus said of them: “I know you, that you do not have the love of God in yourselves.” (John 5:42) The Father testified of them: “They remove their hearts far from Me.” (Isaiah 29:13) This is despite the fact that God also stated: “I have spread out My hands all day long to a rebellious people, who walk in the way which is not good.” (Isaiah 65:2) Since they were not of the Father’s flock, as they had supposed that they were, neither therefore would they love His Son in order to be in His flock since Jesus stated: “I and the Father are one.” (John 10:30). If only they had come to the Father, as some had, they would have loved His Son.
Calvinist, James White, writes: “Despite seeing Him and hearing His preaching, these men stand before Christ in unbelief. They refuse to truly come to Him in faith. Why?” (Debating Calvinism, p.118, emphasis mine)
They refused to come to Jesus because they were not “of” the Father. Jesus said: “He who is of God hears the words of God; for this reason you do not hear them, because you are not of God.” (John 8:47)
Calvinist, James White, writes: “All who are given come. Not some, not most, but all. How can this be if, in fact, the coming is conditional upon human effort, desire, or choice? Obviously, it isn’t.” (Debating Calvinism, p.119, emphasis mine)
John 8:42. If they had truly loved God, as many claimed, then they would have loved His Son, too. That is not an Irresistible Grace, but a natural consequence of loving the Father. For “whoever loves the Father loves the child born of Him.” (1st John 5:1) Jesus states: “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me.” (John 8:42)
To further drive home the point of why some Israelites came to Jesus, and not the Pharisees, Jesus answered: “He who believes in Me, does not believe in Me but in Him who sent Me.” (John 12:44) By getting the Jews to see that Jesus’ words were actually the Father’s words, the Pharisees were being shown that they had ultimately rejected the Father, whom they claimed as their own. (John 8:41) Jesus states: “He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.” (John 14:24) “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works.” (John 14:10) “Truly, truly, I say to you, the Son can do nothing of Himself, unless it is something He sees the Father doing; for whatever the Father does, these things the Son also does in like manner.” (John 5:19)
Calvin writes: “For the word ‘gives’ has the same meaning as if Christ had said, ‘People whom the Father has chosen he regenerates and gives to me, so that they may obey the Gospel.’” (John: Calvin, The Crossway Classic Commentaries, p.161, emphasis mine)
Those who belonged to the Father, through the ministry of John the Baptist, having submitted to the baptism of repentance, were chosen on that account, and thus given to the Son to belong to Him. However, according to Calvinism, all who are given, come because they are preemptively regenerated and given a new heart in order to believe, such that, “coming to faith in Christ is not the result of an autonomous human decision.” (Debating Calvinism, p.119, emphasis mine) If Calvinists honestly considered John 8:42, they would realize the hole in their argument. They insist of focusing on the negative portion of that verse, without considering the positive, which ultimately undoes Calvinism.
Adrian Rogers comments: “It is God who elects us, who chooses us, who sets us apart for salvation. Did you know that God had His eye on you a long time before you had your eye on Him? Did you know that? Did you know that, if you are saved, it is because God has chosen you to be saved? You say, ‘Well, now that brings up a problem. I’m not yet saved. What if God has not chosen me? Can I be saved if I’m not one of the Elect?’ Well I’ve got wonderful news for you. In John chapter 6, Jesus says this: ‘All that the Father hath given Me will come to Me.’ That’s sovereign Election. ‘All that the Father hath given Me will come to Me.’ Hallelujah, they will come. And then He says, ‘And him that comes to Me, I will in no wise cast out.’ You want to be one of the Elect? Just come on. Isn’t that neat? Just come on. If you want to come, just come! I can stand up here and I can preach today that ‘Whosoever will may come.’ Isn’t that wonderful? So, you want to find out whether you are the Elect? You want to be saved? Just come on. Don’t let Election keep you out. Let it bring you in. But know this, that God set His heart, His mind upon you. The omniscient, all knowing God, it is sovereign grace that saves us.”
(Trophies of Grace, 1994, emphasis mine)
If Election meant that only some were created for salvation, and that all of those will come, then how can you simultaneously say not to let Election keep you out? It’s contradictory. A similar statement that Adrian Rogers once made was that if you could only be saved by Election, then here, “Let me nominate you. I nominate you for Election. Whosoever-will may come. Come on! Come on!” While I applaud the evangelism, clearly, the theology doesn’t make sense, and that being because of the polluting effects of Calvinism. The whosoever-wills are not the whosoever-that-are-Calvinisticly-Elect. Whosoever is drawn, not from a limited group of only those who will positively respond, but rather, is drawn from a pool of those who may, or may not, come. So the best solution is to go back to John 6:37 and ask this question: Who did the Father give to the Son?
Whatever Adrian Rogers’ view on Election was back then, he later went on record as rejecting it:
Adrian Rogers comments on Ezekiel 33:8: “Now if you believe that there is a kind of Predestination and Election that men are going to be saved no matter what, or lost no matter what, this verse makes no sense to me whatsoever.” (Let the Earth Hear His Voice, 2004, emphasis mine)
Question: Who is it that the Father “gives” to His Son?
Answer: Jesus referred to those whom the Father had given Him as those who were with Him, and who had believed in Him. Jesus states: “‘I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. Now they have come to know that everything You have given Me is from You; for the words which You gave Me I have given to them; and they received them and truly understood that I came forth from You, and they believed that You sent Me.’” (John 17:6-8) Do you notice how everything is past tense? Why is that? It’s because it already happened. All that the Father gave came, and now the Son is doing the drawing. (John 12:32)
They heard and learned from the Father. (John 6:45) They came to Jesus. (John 6:37) Of them, He lost not one but Judas. (John John 6:39; 17:12) They are in the Father’s hand by virtue of being in the Son’s hand. (John 10:29) He gave them eternal life. (John 17:2) While they were with Him (John 17:12), He guarded them (John 17:12), and manifested the Father’s name to them. (John 17:6) Having been given the Father’s word (John 17:8), they kept it (John 17:6), and believed that the Father sent the Son. (John 17:8) As a result, Jesus was glorified in them. (John 17:10) During the time of Jesus’ prayer, being in the world (John 17:11), Jesus asked the Father to keep them in His name in order that they may be one, as the Father and Son are one. (John 17:11)
Question: How did the Father give these people to His Son?
Answer: Since they were the Father’s, they had already made their choice, and now coming to His Son was an extension of that choice.
Question: If John 6:37 was a message in which some were eternally, secretly elect, while the rest were eternally passed by as non-elect, then why wasn’t that the center of the controversy, instead of on Jesus being the “Bread of Life”? (John 6:41-42) Charles Spurgeon stated that no doctrine is more hated by “worldlings” than the Calvinistic doctrine of the sovereignty of God. So if that’s really what Jesus was teaching at John 6:37, then why didn’t the “worldlings” make that the center of the controversy?
Answer: It seems clear that the crowd did not share the interpretation of the Calvinists, which is not proof, in and of itself, that the Calvinists are wrong, but it does go to show that yet again, the Calvinists insist upon more than what the context allows.
The coming of someone to the Son was based upon the fact that they were the Father’s to give, and that they were His by virtue of the fact that they followed Him, and submitted to John the Baptist’s baptism. The reason why many did not believe in the Son was because they did not believe in the Father either, having either rejected John the Baptist openly, or simply were causally indifferent to his baptismal ministry of repentance. God spread out His hands all day long to Israel (Isaiah 65:2), and they spurned His grace just as often. However, if they had believed in the Father, and thus belonged to Him, they would have believed in His Son, and upon beholding the Son, would have recognized that the Father was in Him, and would have naturally received Him, just like, for instance, Nathanael. (John 1:49)
Question: What was the reason for the constant emphasis on “the Father”?
Answer: To show the Jews that they had become aliented from the Father, and in fact, hated Him, evidenced by John 15:23-24: “He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well.” (John 15:23-24) Jesus stated: “If God were your Father, you would love Me, for I proceeded forth and have come from God, for I have not even come on My own initiative, but He sent Me.” (John 8:42) [i.e. you would be given, drawn and come.]
Question: What does “comes to Me” mean?
Answer: From v.35, “comes to Me” is equated with “believes in Me,” since “he who comes to Me will not hunger,” reasonably means the same thing as “believes in Me will never thirst.” Therefore, substituting v.35 into v.37’s “come to Me” results in: “All that the Father gives Me will [neither hunger, nor thirst].”
Question: Is their prior biblical precedent in the Scriptures (before John 6) that speaks of a predestined group, based on no decision or response in themselves, being “given” to the Messiah?
Question: If by “All that the Father gives Me will come Me,” meant cryptic reference to secret Election, how come no one picked up on it? We’re not just talking about the crowds and Pharisees, but the disciples didn’t even pick up on it either, nor did Jesus elaborate by suggesting that the giving and drawing was for a secret, elect group.
Answer: In order to understand this verse, you need to place yourself within the context. Jesus is speaking to the unbelieving Jews. Now if Jesus was delivering the “hard truths” of God, intended only for the “spiritually mature” among God’s people, then why would He be saying this to unbelievers? Would it be to point out their hopeless condition, apart from special Election? Strange, though, isn’t it, that not a single person picked up on that, that is, not the crowds, not the Pharisees and not even any of the disciples, and moreover, Jesus didn’t say that the “giving” referenced a secret election, that is, of an elect caste vs. non-elect caste. So what should we say, that they actually did get it, but that they just didn’t care about it? How funny! Calvinistic secret Election is a raging debate within the Church, but it was absolutely of no interest to those who heard John 6:37 spoken? Therefore, I think that you, at least, must consider the possibility that the Calvinist interpretation of John 6:37 is erroneous. So instead, try to put yourself in the shoes of the audience, the unbelieving Jews, and see how they might have understood Jesus’ words: “Yeah, He keeps talking about how God is His Father. Well, guess what? God is our Father too. We’re the sons of Abraham. We’ve kept the Law from our youth. Who does He think that He is? We know God! We are of Him! And now He says that we can’t receive His witness unless God “gives” us to Him. Really! I’ll tell you what, when He talks about how God is His father, He’s making Himself out to be GOD!” Honestly, though, that wasn’t a big deal. Jesus could have declared Himself to be “God in the flesh,” and the people would have thrown their arms around Him, if only Jesus had done one thing: Tell them how good they were, and that they were already saved. But God made sure that Jesus said the opposite. He told them that they were lost. That’s why they didn’t like His message, and that’s why they wanted to poke holes in it. If Jesus had merely praised them for their goodness, then they would have been the ones to venerate the miracle-worker, and crowned Him, “King of Israel,” and would have declared Him, “God in the flesh.” But Jesus actually refused to be made king, and that was because Jesus wanted for them to understand why He came in the first place, that is, to realize their utter disconnect with God, and need for salvation. They didn’t need another king to fight off enemies (enemies, by the way, God had been sending, in order to reprove them and bring them back to God). They needed a Savior. They needed to get out of the hopeless cycle of sin and rebellion, and experience a lasting reconciliation with God, which could only be brought about through the blood of Calvary, to cleanse them of their sins, once and for all. But they were too proud to see themselves as sinners, and hence, they wanted no part of a ministry of repentance. So you see, this passage has nothing to do with Calvinism.
