Christ's Doctrine of Faith: A Study of "Believing" in John's Gospel (John 6:69)

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John 6:69 contains the thirty-seventh use of the concept of “believing” in John’s Gospel. It reads: “And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God” (KJV). So, at the risk of being cliché (Oh, who am I kidding? I probably crossed that line many posts ago, lol!), let’s first examine the immediate context of this passage and then talk about points about faith we can get from it.

First, what is the context? Last time, we heard Jesus telling this audience of “disciples” of His that there are some who do not believe in Him. Right after this, the text tells us that Jesus knew from the beginning who believed not and who would betray Him. Then, Jesus says to this group that therefore He said to them that no one could come to Him unless it was given to him by His Father. Next, we are informed by the text that, from that time, many of Christ’s disciples went back and walked no more with Him. After this apostasy, Jesus asks the twelve, whom He appointed as His apostles, if they also will depart. To this question, Peter answers by asking Him who else they can go to, since He has the words of eternal life. Then, Peter affirms that they believe and are sure that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. This is the context of John 6:69!

Second, what can we learn about faith from John 6:69? First off, we learn that faith believes Christ and trusts what He says no matter what. False faith or superficial faith stops believing Christ when He says something that contradicts your mind, will, emotions, etc. [1] Second, we see more clearly a point that I think we established earlier in this post: to believe that Jesus is the Christ, or Messiah, is to believe that He is who He reveals Himself to be (both in John and the other books of the Bible). [2] It is not believing Jesus to be whoever you want Him to be or assume Him to be, but what the Bible says He is and did. Third, faith involves certainty, because Peter says that he and the other apostles (minus Judas, unbeknownst to the eleven) believed AND WERE SURE that Jesus is the Christ. There is no doubt or probability here. These are some things we can learn about faith from John 6:69!

[1] This insight concerning true faith vs. false faith I get from this sermon, though I do not endorse the man’s view of limited atonement, because I once held to limited atonement but now disbelieve it: https://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=127181014421 [2] Not that one’s knowledge of the Biblical Jesus has to be comprehensive to be saving, for the disciples (minus Judas) savingly believed on Christ when they obviously didn’t have such knowledge concerning Him, but some fundamental facts about Christ must be believed (such as in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4).