Charles Spurgeon examines John 5:40 in this sermon on free will, explaining that the text is “one of the great guns of the Arminians,” but he intends to turn the gun back on them, for “it was never theirs.” He goes on to elaborate on four points—men are by nature dead, in Christ Jesus there is life, eternal life is given to all who come for it, and—the final, crucial point—by nature no man will come to Christ. So it follows that any man who does come will know by his very coming that he has been chosen and enabled by God’s saving grace. Spurgeon winds up his sermon as follows: “This morning I have not preached human nature up, but I have preached it down.” And when man is humbled, God is glorified!
