GOD'S PROMISES #10

' ... whoever comes to me I will never drive away.'

Here is another promise of great assurance from the mouth of Jesus Christ.

Firstly, there is the open-ended 'whoever'. Whoever comes to Jesus Christ ... whoever out of all the sceptics and the doubters and the unbelievers ... comes to Jesus, is the recipient of this promise. This 'whoever' is you, it you want it to be.

Secondly, is the central issue, the qualifier, which separates those who receive this promise from those who don't: whoever 'comes to me'.

We need to understand what 'coming to' is, and who Jesus is, for many, to human observation, seem to come to Jesus, yet the passing of time sees them deny him one way or another.

Coming to Jesus is the same as believing in him, receiving him. It is acknowledging that he is exactly who he claimed to be - the Son of God, to whom is due the same honour as is due to God, the Father; and, in that acknowledgement, confessing that he is indeed the Lord, who demands both our trust and our obedience.

Coming to Jesus is thus coming to him because he is who he is. It is not coming to him for what we can get. Nor is it coming to him for what we can escape from. Those who really come to Jesus, come to him because they have seen that he is the one true God.

To those who so acknowledge him this promise is given: that he will never drive them away. Neither their sin nor their guilt nor their failures will ever cause him to drive away those who truly come to him, because his kingdom is a kingdom where grace reigns, where the law of sin and death no longer has the power to condemn the guilty sinner, where reconciliation and peace with God have replaced enmity and wrath, where the present possession of eternal life has replaced the death of separation from God.

Scriptures: John 6:37; Matthew 7:21-27; 13:18-23; John 2: 23-25; 6:66-70; 1:12; 5:23; Romans 10:9; 1 John 4:15; 5:1-5, 20; Romans 5:21; 8:1-2; 5:1-11; John 3:16; 5:24.