Listen:  94 Question 4

Let’s read John 12:24.  It says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”  The Lord often used the phrase ‘verily, verily’.  It literally means ‘truly, truly’.  The Lord is emphasizing his point and is assuring us that what He is saying is the truth.

For anyone that has ever planted a garden, or even studied agriculture to any degree, we can easily understand the truth of what the Lord is saying.  If you have a corn, or grain, of wheat and you lay that corn aside, it will never grow and produce more wheat.  If you plant the corn, it will grow and produce much more wheat.  So, the death of this seed has the beneficial effect of yielding much wheat.

The Lord is just not teaching about farming here.  He is using the grain of wheat to illustrate the benefit of his own death.  If He did not die, we would have no benefit from Him.  But, if He died, He would bring forth much fruit.  Let’s listen to the words of the Lord in John 3:14-15, “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.”  Here, the Lord is explaining how that He must be lifted up on the cross and die, so that through faith in Him, we might have eternal life.  He makes this very clear in John 12:32-33 which says, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.  This he said, signifying what death he should die.”

John 12:24 is a very important verse showing the necessity of the death of the Lord Jesus so that we might be saved.  Without His death, burial, and resurrection, there would be no salvation.  (94.4)