Commentary on the Gospel of John

                                Chapter Six

                                                                                                                                      Verses 45-51 continued

Jesus returned to preaching about Himself as being the "bread of life." Jesus tried again to awaken the spiritual faith that He had put into these unbelievers so that they would come to faith that if they would spiritually eat the spiritual food that was His body, they would obtain everlasting life while they were still alive in the flesh. John 5:24. Jesus made quite a distinction between physical death and spiritual death. Jesus told them that God had given their fathers physical food in the wilderness, but they all had physically died. By contrast, Jesus preached to them that if they would partake of His spiritual food, which was His body from Heaven, then they would never die, by which He meant that they would never suffer an eternal spiritual death.

But Jesus never preached to them that if they persisted in unbelief until their physical deaths, then they would suffer an eternal spiritual death. God has a plan to save all humans not saved by grace with a lesser form of salvation after their physical deaths. Luke 3:6; Luke 20:38; I Corinthians 15:22. Jesus had previously prophesied that "every man" will be "taught of God" and that every man so taught will come to Him in faith. Jesus could only have meant that He would have to make "every man" alive again in order for them all to be "taught of God." Since Jesus also prophesied about the end of the world, "Behold, I make all things new," then He must bring all living humans confined to the regions of death back to faith in Him so that He can resurrect them and recreate them to enjoy everlasting life on His new earth. Revelation 5:11-14; Revelation 20:5; Revelation 21:1-5; John 5:28-29; Numbers 23:19.

When any living human not saved by grace physically dies, their souls and spirits become subject to a potential, eternal spiritual death within the lake of fire. The Devil has put this claim on them because of the spiritual death that he has injected into them and the sins that spiritual death causes. Romans 5:12. The Devil desires to utterly destroy a part of God's creations to prove that God's Love cannot be Almighty. Satan believed that if he could succeed in this attempt, then he could prove that God has a weakness which would give him an opportunity to find a way to murder God and take His place. Job 2:9; Isaiah 14:12-15.

When Jesus died on the cross, He commended His Spirit to His Father. Luke 23:46. By doing this, Jesus meant that His Spirit would finish His work that He had begun by His suffering and death on the cross. His Father sent His Spirit to the regions of death to leave behind there all of the evil and sins of all living humans not saved by grace whose evil and sins Jesus had borne on the cross. Hebrews 2:9. Having accomplished His task, the Holy Spirit reanimated the perfect body of Jesus and raised Him from the dead triumphant over all sins and evil. Psalm 16:10; Acts 2:25-28; Acts 13:30-35; Revelation 1:17-18. Just as God does not wash believers saved by grace with the spiritual blood of Christ until they repent and believe while still alive in the flesh, so God does not dissolve the systems of all living humans confined to the regions of death to separate their living natures from their evil, dead natures until they all repent and believe in the Lamb in a great worship service near the end of the world. Revelation 5:11-14; Psalm 75:3; I Corinthians 3:11-15; II Peter 3:9-13; Matthew 13:36-43. All of the Old Testament burnt offerings symbolized this work of the Holy Spirit to save all living humans confined to the regions of death with a lesser form of salvation. Genesis 8:20-21.