Commentary on the Gospel of John

                                 Chapter Six

                                                                                                                                               Verses 60-66 continued

Jesus then told these pretended disciples that He knew that some of them did not believe and that He knew who they were. Jesus knows who are the believers and the unbelievers. Jesus knows every one of His sheep, and He can never lose a single one of them. John 10:26-30. This truth can only mean that God has predestined every living human who obtains salvation by grace to be so saved, but this fact does not mean that God has annulled free will. Ephesians 1:3-7. God planned the entire history of mankind in His Mind before He ever created the material world and physical human life. God's plan was just as real as His material creation is real. God set His plan in motion in His Mind, and He let it play out according to the free will of humans and according to every attack by the Devil in his attempts to utterly destroy the living souls and spirits of humans whom God creates and loves, and ultimately, the Devil's direct attempt to murder God when Jesus was nailed to a cross. God allowed humans to choose to commit every sin and evil, but He also planned to correct some sins and ultimately to purge every sin and evil from His entire creation. II Peter 3:9-13. God will then recreate the Heaven and earth to be wholly righteous. God knew that the Devil, being finite, had only a limited number of evil moves that he could make. God also knew that Himself, being Infinite, would be able to counter every evil move that the Devil could make with only a temporary loss of effort. Jesus suffered on the cross, but He recovered His full, infinite strength. Genesis 3:15. Lucifer displayed his excessive pride and his stupidity when he imagined that a finite being could find a way to utterly destroy an Infinite God with Almighty Power. Isaiah 14:12-17. All God had to do was to wait until the Devil had exhausted his every evil move, and then He would create the material world and physical, human history. I Corinthians 2:7; Acts 15:18; II Timothy 1:9-10; Hebrews 4:2-3.

As God watched His plan unfold in His Mind, He saw that His Spirit would be able to touch the spiritual natures of some people to the extent that He could cause them to repent and believe that His Son's sacrifice for them could save them while they were still alive in the flesh. God decided to sanctify all of these believers by having His Spirit wash away all of their sins and evil with the spiritual blood and water that would flow from the body of His Son on the cross. John 5:24; Revelation 1:5; Ephesians 5:25-27. God decided to use His Spirit to bring conviction to the spiritual natures of these believers that would cause them to choose to repent and believe that Christ could save them through His sacrifice for them and His resurrection from the dead to justify them and to give them His own eternal life. John 6:65; Galatians 2:20; Romans 5:1-2. Once God gave this gift of salvation by His grace, He could never rescind it because everything He does can only be eternal. Romans 11:29. As soon as these believers saved by grace believe, the Holy Spirit will bring Jesus' blood from the cross in spiritual form to wash away all of their sins from their souls and spirits forever, and He will wash away their fleshly sins with the spiritual water that Jesus shed on the cross as they daily repent. I Corinthians 6:11; I John 1:7-9. Even though some believers saved by grace will fail to daily repent, they can never lose their salvation by grace because God will eventually cause His entire Church to repent of their daily sins, and He will wash them all in the water of His Word before the Rapture of His Church. Ephesians 5:25-27.

Once the Holy Spirit has thoroughly cleansed the souls and spirits of all believers with the spiritual blood of Christ, and He has annulled their spiritual deaths, He will take up residence in their inner beings and recreate their souls and spirits to be like Christ's. II Corinthians 5:17; Colossians 3:9-10; Galatians 2:20. The Spirit of Christ will cause these believers to be more like Christ; that is, they will have a new attitude of love and compassion and a desire to lead a clean life. Galatians 5:22-26. Nevertheless, some believers saved by grace will lose their faith and return to fleshly, sinful lives. But God will never allow these backsliders to lose their salvation by grace because He knows how to cause them all to repent and return to faith in Him so that He can cleanse all their sins by washing them in the spiritual water of His Word just prior to His Rapture of His Church. Ephesians 5:25-27; II Timothy 2:13. Every believer saved by grace actually chose to believe in God's plan of salvation that He had in His Mind before He ever created the material world. Hebrews 4:3.