[2026. 2. 22.] You do not want to leave too, do you? | John 6:60-71

[2026. 2. 22.] You do not want to leave too, do you? | John 6:60-71

Sermon by Rev. Jinkook (Danny) Sohn (Hope of Heaven Baptist Chuch) 

 

2026. 2. 22. 주일예배 설교- 요한복음 강해 21
본문: 요한복음 6:60-71
제목: 너희도 가려느냐

설교자: 손진국 목사 (하늘소망교회)

 

In today’s passage, we see that among the many people who followed Jesus, they were divided into two groups. One group was those who left, and the other group was those who remained. Looking at verse 66 today, it says, [Verse 66] From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.
It says that many among the disciples left. The many disciples who left here were not the twelve disciples. At that time, among the many people who followed Jesus, there were many who were called Jesus’ disciples by others. A representative group among them is the seventy disciples. In Luke chapter 10, we see the scene where Jesus appointed seventy and sent them out two by two. This is usually called the sending of the seventy disciples.
Today, as we see the scene where many among Jesus’ disciples who followed Him leave Jesus, I hope this will be a time for us to examine our own relationship with Jesus.

 

1. (Those who leave) “This teaching is hard”

Then why did many disciples leave Jesus? The reason appears in verse 60. [Verse 60] On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?”
Here it says, “This teaching is hard. Who can accept it?” The word “hard” means it is difficult to understand. It also includes the meaning that it is offensive to the heart, uncomfortable, and difficult to accept.
Jesus says about this in verse 61, “Does this offend you?” [Verse 61] Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you?”
I hope that the word of God we share today will not become a stumbling block to us.
What was the word of Jesus that became a stumbling block, something offensive, uncomfortable, and hard to accept for the many disciples and the crowd who left Jesus? It is the message we shared last Sunday.
It is the teaching about the bread of life that Jesus spoke after performing the miracle of the five loaves and two fish. Jesus said that He is the bread of life and the life that came down from heaven, so whoever eats His flesh and drinks His blood will have eternal life, and He will raise them up at the last day. He was saying that Jesus who died on the cross is the Savior. What is this? It is the gospel.
The reason many people left Jesus was because of the gospel. Do you believe the gospel?
Do you perhaps think that the gospel will solve the problems of our reality and help us live a better life? If you believe in Jesus in order to achieve such a life, then you are believing wrongly and do not properly know the gospel. A gospel that says we should believe in Jesus for the prosperity of our lives is a false gospel.
Only the gospel can give us true life, Zoe, and true freedom and peace.
When I prepare sermons, there is something I pay the most attention to and continually examine. It is whether I am preaching the true gospel.
The church is the place that must proclaim and deliver true life, eternal life. The church is not a place that teaches how to succeed and live more comfortably in the world. I am not a person who can teach or speak about such things. I lived working hard in the world to succeed and tried to gain true joy and peace in the world, but I could not obtain them in the world.
But now I have received eternal life, and I have true freedom, joy, and peace that cannot be obtained from the world.
That is because I met Jesus who came to find me. It is because that Jesus has come to dwell in me by the Spirit. I said that many people left Jesus because of the influence of the gospel. Do you know what that influence is? It is that it divides people.
[Matthew 10:34] Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.
Even people who got along well in the world often become divided and distant when they begin to talk about Jesus. The reason is that the difference between those who live according to the flesh and those who live according to the Spirit becomes evident.
The worship we offer now is worship in spirit and truth. The word we preach is also the word of the Spirit, not the word of the flesh.
[Verse 63] The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you—they are full of the Spirit and life.
The word of God is the word of life and the word of the Spirit. If one does not have the Spirit of Jesus Christ, one cannot know the spiritual things that belong to heaven and lives according to the values of this world that belong to the earth. Therefore, even when spiritual things are proclaimed, they cannot understand them, and they become uncomfortable.

[Application] Is the word that proclaims Jesus Christ uncomfortable and hard for you to accept? Or does it become simply “Amen” to you?

 

2. (Those who remain) “We have come to believe and to know”

When many among the disciples who followed Jesus left, Jesus asked the twelve disciples,
[Verse 67] “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve.
Then Simon Peter answered,
[Verse 68] Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”
I hope this becomes our confession as well. It would also be good to memorize these words.
And in verse 69 it says, [Verse 69] We have come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.
Here it says, “believe and know.” This is the characteristic of those who remain and do not leave. But many people try to do the opposite, trying to know first and then believe. Knowing and then believing is not Christianity; it is religion.
Christianity is not knowing and then believing, but believing and then coming to know.

Before I believed in Jesus, when I was running a business in the South Island, I once attended a church. A worker in my shop told me that a young lady from Korea had come to her church and asked me to visit once, so I went.
When I went, the young lady was much taller than me and not my style, so I was not interested. But the church I attended was very small, and when I went, they were so happy and treated me like family, so out of loyalty I kept going. I attended for about four weeks. When the pastor preached, I thought, “If I understand this, then I will try to believe.” But it did not enter my ears at all. I did not fall asleep and tried to listen carefully, but the more I listened, the more I thought, “Does that make sense?” And I thought, “I really cannot understand what he is saying.” I had studied enough and was once told that I was smart, but when I went to church and listened to the message, I could not understand it.

In John chapter 3, we saw that Nicodemus came to Jesus at night and heard Jesus’ teaching about being born again, but he could not understand at all and interpreted it in a fleshly way.
The word of God cannot be known by the knowledge, experience, or understanding we gain in this world. As Jesus said in verse 63, the words He spoke are spirit and life. We try to know and understand the things of the Spirit with fleshly ways, but they cannot be known or understood like that.
[1 Corinthians 2:14] The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them, because they are discerned only through the Spirit.
The word of God reveals God’s will and the works of the Holy Spirit, and how do we come to know them? We come to know them through the Spirit of God. [1 Corinthians 2:10-11] These are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit. The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who knows a person’s thoughts except their own spirit within them? In the same way no one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.

If I say, “I will believe in God after I first know and understand,” then the standard of believing or not believing in God depends on my understanding.
How foolish this is! Our understanding has limits, but God is infinite. If I say I will believe God only within the limit of my understanding, it means that if I cannot understand, I will not believe in God. It is like a first-grade elementary school child seeing a math problem solved by a university student and saying, “I cannot understand it, so it must be wrong.” The child says, “If you make me understand, then I will believe,” but can you really make the child fully understand? The level is already completely different.
And understanding spiritual things with fleshly ways is a difference far greater than that.

Put down the thought that you will believe only after you understand and know. First believe and accept the greatness of God, His faithfulness, His goodness, and His love shown on the cross. Then you will come to know.
Before I believed, I thought the creation of heaven and earth by God was an absurd and false story. But after I believed in Jesus and read Genesis, the account of creation in Genesis chapter 1 was fully believed and accepted in my heart.
This was an amazing change for me. But this was not the result of my effort to understand. When I believed and accepted Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of God, came into me, and by the work of the Spirit, the word just entered into me.

There is one thing we must always acknowledge: the world of God and the world of the Spirit go beyond our understanding. After we believe in Jesus, we will come to know more and more. Then will we know everything? No, we will not know everything. If God could be fully understood and known, I would not believe. A God who exists only within my understanding is not God. Even if we do not know, we will stay with the Lord until the end by faith, because the Holy Spirit who is in us will lead us in that way.

[Application] Do you have the thought that you will believe only after you fully know and understand? Are there things you came to know after you believed?

 

3. (Jesus) “One of you is a devil”

Regarding Simon Peter’s amazing confession, Jesus says this in verse 70:
[Verse 70] Then Jesus replied, “Have I not chosen you, the Twelve? Yet one of you is a devil!”
As we know, the one mentioned here is Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus.
I hope we do not think of Jesus’ words in an overly fatalistic way. Rather than thinking that Judas Iscariot was like a devil or that he was born with the destiny to betray Jesus, it is better to see these words as Jesus urging Judas Iscariot to repent, turn back, and make a decision of faith.

Peter confessed that he believed and knew, but here faith must first be given by God.
Then I think those who do not believe fall into two cases. First, when God has not given faith; second, when God has given faith but they do not recognize it.
Why does this happen? Because Satan blocks it. Satan gives us thoughts of doubt, and through those doubts he prevents us from making a decision.

If you have ever felt that you want to believe the Word, or that this Word may be true, but at the same time a doubt arises saying, “That makes no sense,” then I earnestly urge you: despite such doubtful thoughts, make a decision and proclaim. Say, “I believe that the Word of God is true and will be fulfilled just as it is,” and say Amen. This is the decision of faith. What we need is a decision of faith, not a decision of understanding after we fully comprehend.
Regarding this decision of faith, God will never say, “I never chose you,” or “I do not know you.” Because the very desire to believe the Word of God means that God has already given that person faith.

God is the One who knows all our needs and also desires to give us all things. In the Garden of Eden, God allowed everything to humans. [Genesis 2:9] The LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Trees pleasing to the eye (our emotional needs, the needs of the soul), trees good for food (the needs of the body), the tree of life (the needs of the spirit), and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (so that Satan could be resisted) were all given. But Satan deceives: “Not all of this is yours. God is trying to keep it all for Himself. If you eat, you will know good and evil and become like God.” If Eve had trusted God, decided to follow His Word, and resisted Satan’s words, humanity would be living in unimaginable glory and blessing of God.

In the movie “The Passion of the Christ,” there is a scene where Jesus earnestly prays to God the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane about bearing the cross. At that time, Satan appears and whispers to Jesus, “Do you really believe that by your death alone you can save the world? Do you believe you alone can bear all sin?”
Such voices of Satan are always heard by us as well. The voice that makes us doubt God’s goodness, deny God’s power and love, and whisper that we should trust and rely more on our own ability and effort rather than on God. At that time, we must decide and proclaim by faith:
“Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

Beloved saints, let us remember that our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but a spiritual battle against evil spirits.

[Application] Have you ever doubted the Word? What is the decision you must make and proclaim today to follow the Lord by faith?

There is a saying: above the one who crawls is the one who walks; above the one who walks is the one who runs; above the one who runs is the one who flies. But do you know who is above the one who flies? It is the one who clings.
Beloved saints, may you and I be those who cling to the Lord by faith until the end. Confessing that the words of eternal life are with Jesus Christ, may we be those who remain, those who cling firmly to the Lord, and true disciples who always follow Him. I bless you in the name of Jesus Christ.

 

하늘소망교회(담임 손진국 목사)는 뉴질랜드 오클랜드 북부 실버데일에 세워진 한인교회로 '하나님의 마음으로 사람을 살리는 교회'입니다.

Hope of Heaven Baptist Church (Senior Pastor: Rev. Jinkook Sohn) is a Korean church established in Silverdale, Auckland, New Zealand. It is a church that saves people with the heart of God.