Heb No.13 Apostasy 6v1-12

Now, if you'd kindly open your Bibles at Hebrews chapter 6, let me read together with you from the fourth verse, and this time we'll use the Bible the Apostle Paul used, King James version, Hebrews chapter 6 and verse 4, and incidentally I wasn't being serious. For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh and put Him to an open shame. Well, as I indicated on Sunday last in our news handout with its invitation to this Bible study, these verses of Scripture have constituted a great problem for many Christian people.

It would be difficult to find another few verses which have created so many anxieties on the part of sensitive believers. Indeed, I quote again in the notes published for this evening, what I brought to your attention last Sunday, and that is a testimony from the ministry of that great expositor, Martin Lloyd-Jones. I can definitely say, after some 35 years of pastoral ministry, that there are no passages in the whole of Scripture which have more frequently troubled people and caused them sole agony than the passage in Hebrews 6, 4-8 and the corresponding passage in chapter 10.

Large numbers of Christians are held in bondage by Satan owing to a misunderstanding of these particular statements. Well, what is it that our author has in mind basically when he's writing these particular warnings to these Hebrew people? He's concerned that their own Christian testimony might in the end prove to be defective. He has said earlier on in the twelfth verse of the third chapter that he's worried, lest any of the brothers in the company of those to whom he addresses these remarks have in them an evil heart of unbelief and might depart from the living God.

And you will find that worry on the part of the writer throughout the whole of this epistle. He's concerned that there may be some in that community who really in the long run will be proved to have been defective disciples, pseudo-disciples, not true Christians at all. And so he writes these terrible warnings and he gives this dreadful piece of advice and instruction.

It is impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, if they fall away, to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they are crucified to themselves the Son of God afresh and put in to an open shame. Now this particular statement seems to fly in the face of those who feel convinced that there is such a thing as eternal security. That is to say that having put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, having confessed him as Savior, having been born again, having received the infilling of the Holy Spirit, you can never be lost.

And on first reading it would appear that these verses and some in chapter 10 oppose that particular notion. But it's not really just to cross swords with people who doubt the doctrine of eternal security that I'm bringing this study to your attention tonight. Quite frankly, I'm not concerned about winning some theological argument on some aspect of doctrine.

What I am concerned to do, my friend, is to deal with that problem that often crops up in pastoral work when somebody comes along and they say, you know brother, I have done such and such. It was a terrible sin. I committed adultery.

I went into a period in my life and I acted like a fool. And I think I have gone so far in my transgressions, in my backsliding, that God cannot receive me to himself again. And they point me to this particular verse of Scripture.

I was once enlightened. I've fallen away. It's impossible therefore for me to get back to God.

I've known this problem come as far as young people are concerned. Teenagers, folks in their twenties have come along and they said, pastor, I've sinned. Does it mean to say that I can't be a Christian anymore? Have I gone beyond the frontier where God's salvation no longer operates? Well, as I say, I want to try and help people who've got that particular problem this evening.

So I'm not academically just arguing for what Puritans would call the doctrines of grace, though I acknowledge those doctrines myself. I'm not trying to in any way unhorse someone who's got a different view from myself in the whole area of eternal security. But I am desperately concerned to show people who feel that these Scriptures suggest that they are beyond the reach of God because of their backsliding.

I'm concerned to show them that that's not what these Scriptures teach at all. When you have a problem in an understanding Scripture, what do you do? Well, the old Puritans used to talk about something they called the regulative principle. What did they mean by this? Well, you interpret what is unclear by what is clear.

That's a scientific principle too. You start from the known and then you examine things that you're not too sure about. So when the Lord Jesus Christ makes an announcement, a sheep know me, none of them have I lost.

When in the high priestly prayer he says to his father, speaking of you and me who've trusted him as Savior, thine they were and you gave them to me and I haven't let one of them slip through my fingers save Judas Iscariot. He means precisely that. Now that is a principle that is clear.

You can't qualify it at all. It's easy to be understood. So if you've got a problem in other areas of Scripture where the meaning seems to be a little cloudy, you take what can be understood to that Scripture and you look from what is known to that which is unknown and you will find some help.

There's something else that we need to say before we come to these verses and that is that we are to study the whole of Scripture. One of the reasons why there are many sects today, each teaching different things, is that some people have a sort of lucky dip approach to Scripture. They bring out one verse in the Old Testament, probably in a very obscure passage in the Old Testament, and they wind around it some doctrine that couldn't be supported from the rest of Scripture.

The Jehovah's Witnesses are aces at doing exactly that. But you see, we're not just to dip into one passage of Scripture, we're to consider the whole sweep of Scripture as we try to come to some conclusion with regard to difficult matters. And the third thing that I feel that we need to realize before we come to these particular verses is that God never promised there wouldn't be difficulties in understanding His teaching.

Indeed, we read in the book of Deuteronomy, one of the first books of the Old Testament, how the Lord God says that He has only revealed to us that which we need to know. There are certain things that the Lord has not shown to us. The end of the 29th chapter of Deuteronomy 30, the secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.

So what have I been saying in the way of introduction? When you get something difficult in Scripture to understand, you start from what is known. You take what is known to the difficult passages of Scripture and you begin to explore them on that basis. Also, you have to have in mind the whole sweep of Scripture.

You don't build some very important doctrine on some obscure text in the Old Testament. Excuse me as I help my friend a moment. I don't know what they'll make of that in the tape, but I've just given someone a drink of water, which is a very scriptural thing to do.

We take the whole sweep of Scripture as we make our decision on these rather difficult verses and we must interpret Scripture in context. All right then, let's come once again and look very closely at these verses. Let me read them again to ensure that we've got them in our mind.

It is impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, jumping to verse 6 now, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame. How do you interpret that? Well, some of the early Christians in their writings in the second and third century, they suggested that the whole thing was hypothetical. That means, that really means that there wasn't any possibility of this happening at all.

It was a sort of bogeyman. Like you might discipline a young child by suggesting that if he doesn't behave himself, you'll send for a policeman. You don't intend to do that.

You don't generally ring up Scotland Yard if your four-year-old son is making a noise at home and being disobedient. But you might, I'm not suggesting it will be a good thing, you might use the policeman as a sort of bogeyman to frighten the little lad into submission. And it's suggested that this is what our writer is here doing.

Here's a very hypothetical case. It could never happen, could never be the case that anyone would fall away and not be able to return to the Lord. So it's just hypothesis, just a supposition, using God in the area of a bogus policeman.

Well, I don't think that we need to deal with that way out. It doesn't seem to me to solve any problems at all. Indeed, it gets us locked into very serious ones, because this bogus argument, if it were only bogus, seems to come up time and time again in the epistle to the Hebrews.

And then there are some who say this, well, it's impossible for men to deal with this situation. This is what the writer is saying. It's impossible for men to deal with this situation.

Here are people who have sinned on conversion, after conversion, they've sinned terribly, and it would appear that their plight is irremediable. It cannot be, they cannot be forgiven, they cannot be helped at all. But that's just on the human level.

What here is indicated is that though no human agency can come to their help, the Lord God Almighty He can help them. Because what is impossible for man to do, we're told in Mark's Gospel, it is possible for the Lord. What is impossible for man to do, it's possible for God to do.

Well again, we'll not spend much time dealing with this, because it seems, if you analyze it very carefully, again, it's just a get-out. It would appear that the writer is here saying, definitely, that if these people have sinned in the way that he suggests, even Almighty God can't come to their help, cannot bring them relief. And then, and this is a very subtle way of trying to get around the difficulty.

There are those who say, you shouldn't really translate the word impossible, as it is here in the authorized version. You should translate it, it is difficult. And of course, if something's difficult, well, it's not impossible.

You can get round it, you can get over it. Well, I reject all these three way-outs of our dilemma. What I suggest we do, is to take these verses, as we find them, and see just what they are saying.

So, we're going to go through these verses, from the fourth to the sixth verse, and just discuss what is being described about the people whose circumstances are mentioned here. And the first thing to notice, from the fourth verse, is that they were once enlightened. They were once enlightened.

And by this, you are to understand that something of the light of the gospel had been grasped by them. Something of the light of the gospel had been grasped by them. Now, the old commentators in the third and fourth century, used to say that that word, enlightened, was a synonym, was a word which stood for the term, baptism.

And therefore, we're told that these people, to whom reference has been made, were people who have been baptized. They've grasped something of the gospel, and they have been immersed in water. But let's just pause there for a moment, and make this observation.

People can come to an understanding of the gospel and not be saved. I could tell you a score of people, without thinking any length of time at all, who could be described as having been enlightened, having understood something of the essence of the gospel. I could tell you to my shame, because it indicates pastoral lack of discernment, of people in this town who have been baptized, two in particular, by me.

And I thought that they were Christian. But future experience, after the time of their baptism, indicated that this was not the case. One can be enlightened, one can be baptized, yet not saved.

What else do we hear about these people who cannot, apparently, renew themselves again unto repentance? Not only were they once enlightened, but we are informed they had tasted of the heavenly gift. They tasted of the heavenly gift. Again, some of the older commentators suggest that this really refers to the communion service.

They had, therefore, experienced both sacraments. They'd been baptized in water, they'd been admitted to the table, they'd taken of the bread and wine. And the notion certainly seems to be that they'd had some experience or some grasp of the essence of salvation.

Now that's very difficult, isn't it? Can you taste of the heavenly gift? Forget the bread and the wine for a moment. Let's think of it spiritually. Perhaps it doesn't mean specifically bread and wine, but it certainly indicates something that the bread and wine denote the salvation of the Lord Jesus.

Can you taste to some extent of this and yet not be saved? That's what John Owen was trying to argue in a commentary that he wrote on Hebrews. And he pointed out that though they tasted the heavenly gift, they didn't masticate it. They didn't swallow it.

They simply sipped. They had it in their mouth, but it never became part and parcel of their body. Well, that's very subtle reasoning, but I think we have to dismiss it on the basis that we're told of our Lord Jesus Christ, that He tasted death for every man.

In chapter 2 and verse 9 of this epistle, we're also enjoined by the psalmist in Psalm 34 and verse 8, a reference I don't give you in your notes. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Well, you don't taste and see that the Lord is good by just sipping.

You drink it all in, and you appreciate something of the greatness of God's love. Well, what do we make of this business that these people had tasted of the heavenly gift? Again, come back to John Owen in a quotation that I actually set down for you in my handout. Owen, more realistically now, argues that a person may taste of the word of truth, but not of its power.

He may taste of the worship of the church in its outward order, but not in its inward beauty. He may taste of the gifts of the church, but not of its graces. What I am arguing for is this.

These people, though they'd been enlightened in degree, though they had been acquainted to some extent with the notion of salvation, they are not fully fledged Christians. Let's move on and come to a further part of the description of these people which our writer gives. It's impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost.

And here we've really got a problem. Could you be a partaker of the Holy Ghost and not be a Christian? Now, if you just glanced at this expression and were asked to give your opinion outside of the detailed context of these verses, you'd probably say it's impossible. If you have partaken of the Holy Ghost, it's impossible to say that you were never a Christian.

But is that really the case? Let's just think through a moment one or two scriptural instances where men seem to be really borne along by the Holy Spirit, and yet their own spiritual standing before God really is in balance. Take, for example, the illustration of Saul. Do you remember how it said, Saul is amongst the prophets? And there was an experience in his life when he was in the company of some Hebrew prophets and he himself prophesied? Yet Saul later on was to be possessed by an evil spirit.

What do you make of the case of King Saul? What about when the Lord Jesus Christ sent out 70 odd disciples and it seemed as though included amongst their number was Judas Iscariot? And when they came back and they reported what had attended their ministry, they testified to supernatural activity. The Lord had clothed them with power. They had been able to proclaim the good news of the kingdom.

They had been able to cast out devils and Judas was amongst their number. Was he not therefore a partaker of the Holy Ghost? But the classic example for those who feel that such an expression as this must imply genuine conversion, the classic example against that conclusion would be in Matthew's gospel. Shall we turn to it? And the seventh chapter.

Here the Lord Jesus is envisaging what will happen on the day of his return. Matthew chapter seven. And he says in the 21st verse, not everyone that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.

Now that's an interesting thing, isn't it? Just for starters, here were people who were acknowledging the lordship of Jesus. Lord, Lord, they cry, no says Jesus. Not everyone who speaks my name shall enter into the kingdom.

But if that astonishes you, what do you make of the next verse? Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name and in thy name have cast out devils and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you. Depart from me ye that work iniquity. He doesn't deny their supernatural activity, but he does deny that they had ever been in a direct relationship with him that could be described as having had an experience of regeneration.

You know, it's a terrifying thought, as I indicate in my handout, that a man can partake of the Holy Ghost in degree and yet not be fully converted. I remember a missionary telling me years ago, reporting of work in India of a most remarkable European who started off as a Presbyterian ministry and got so hot in his gospel preaching that he could only be absorbed by the Pentecostals and some remarkable things attended that man as he preached and as he prayed for the sick. But he finished up in a position of absolute apostasy, denying the very gospel that he proclaimed and mocking the name of Jesus Christ.

Does such an illustration as that shock you? Does it throw you out on sixes and sevens? You can't grasp how that sort of thing can happen? Well then, what happened to your reading of Matthew 7? Did you not believe Jesus when he said, in that day there shall be those who say, Lord, Lord, have we not done this? Have we not done that in your name? And Jesus said, yes, but I'll still say it apart from me, for I never knew you. Some of the great anomalies, some of the great problems in the history of the Christian church, I think, must be resolved in the context that is touched upon here in Hebrews 6 verse 4. The possibility of making acquaintance to degree, of going along with, to some extent, the Holy Ghost and yet still not being born again. We proceed a little further.

They have tasted the good word of God. What does that mean? Well, what is the good word of God? The revelation of God through Scripture. Can a man taste the good word of God and not be converted? Indeed he can.

Was there any group of people more skillful in Old Testament truth than the Pharisees? These were men who poured hours and hours of time into the study of the good word of God. They tasted, but the Lord Jesus rebuked them and questioned their spiritual genuineness. They have tasted the good word of God and finally were told, and the powers of the world to come.

What is meant by that? Well, in the advent of the gospel, of the gospel age, as the initial message of salvation was proclaimed, there was phenomena, spiritual phenomena, to which reference is made in the second chapter of this particular epistle. God also, verse 4, God also bearing them witness both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost according to his will. Here you see again is reference to charismatic demonstrations of power.

These people have witnessed this. To some extent they have participated in it, and yet they're not Christian. I was speaking to someone only a little while ago who could come here if I invited her and tell you something of a spiritual experience just of a year or so back in which she spoke in terms in which she had confessed the Lord Jesus prior to that as her Savior, but today she would not consider herself to be a Christian at all.

You see, what I am arguing for is when you take this description and you analyze it carefully, it does not fit the description of a born-again person. It is possible to know something of the influences of the Holy Spirit and yet not to be regenerated. Again, quoting from Martin Lloyd-Jones, and that quotation actually is in your notes under the heading Assessment.

Nowhere are we told that these people were born again, that they were regenerate. Nowhere are we told that they have been justified, that they have been sanctified. Nowhere are we told that they have been sealed by the Spirit.

Nowhere are we told that they have been adopted into God's family. You can be touched by the Holy Spirit and yet not be born again. There are many instances of this in the emerging churches.

The story is told in the New Testament books. You take the case of Demas, this man referred to by the apostle Paul. He defected.

He went back. He was not a genuine disciple. What do you think of Simon Magus, whose story is retold in Acts chapter 8, this man who had been baptized, this man who had watched such supernatural phenomena occur in his hometown and seemed so impressed to the extent that the early Christians, when they were preaching, they believed that he was a genuine convert or else they'd not have immersed him in water.

Yet we're told that Peter was able to say of Simon Magus as discernment came to him, you have neither part nor lot in this matter. A man touched by the influence of the Holy Spirit, a man who had spectated if not participated in something of the charismatic phenomenon at Philippi and yet he was not a genuine Christian. Enlightened, tasted of the heavenly gift, went along with the Holy Spirit to some extent, tasted the good word of God, tasted the power of the world to come.

All this it would have fitted as a description of Simon Magus and if we'd have been present at the time before Peter with his remarkable discernment came along, we too may have been fooled and said yes that man is a genuine born-again believer but he wasn't and it's not unlikely. Indeed we would expect that as the story of church history unfurls, you'll get other people in the same situation as this man Simon and Demas and others who you could quote from the New Testament record. John in the first epistle that bears his name, the second chapter and the 19th verse speaks of those who seemed to be others but they went out from us and we realized ultimately that they were not Christian at all, they were apostates.

Now it's this type of person, this pseudo-Christian that is being described in these verses. These are the people who crucify to themselves, verse 6, the Son of God afresh and put him to an open shame. There was a period of flirtation with Christian things.

It seemed to the onlooker that they were real in their commitment but they were not and ultimately, callously, carelessly, they move over into the ranks of the high priests and some of the Romans and others of the crowd who were present when Jesus was was pinned to a cross and they hurl up their shafts of abuse and they put Jesus to an open shame. This, I say, is possible. This is what we would expect as a result of the teaching of our Lord Jesus.

Why did he set down the parable of the sower? The seed falls on four different types of ground, you remember? But it was only on ground where there was soil and where there was root that the illustration indicated genuine conversion. There was activity in other soil. Some sprung up and seemed to show fruit, it seemed to be the right thing but the farmer, the sower, realized that this was not proper growth.

It was eccentric growth. It added up to a nothing, to a zero. So in proclaiming the gospel, there will be those who seem to be activated.

They go along for a little while. Maybe they seem even to possess spiritual gifts and abilities but time proves so many things and indicates ultimately that they were not genuine disciples. Isn't this what the writer here is referring to in the seventh verse when he speaks of Mother Earth who drinks in the good rain that the Lord sends? Now Mother Earth, she will send up diverse crops.

There will be good herbs. There will also be thorns and briars. The same soil, the same rain, the same sun but the harvest is different.

So in the proclamation of the gospel, there will be those who will come to true repentance and there will be those who do not openly reject immediately. They go along for a little while. They fool many temporarily but ultimately they are demonstrated to be not real Christians at all.

Now why is it important, my friend, that you grasp this exposition of Scripture and I could deal with other difficult passages in the same area and show you that what is being described is not real Christianity? Why is it important? Well, because of this problem that I referred to half an hour or so ago. The person who having committed his life to the Lord Jesus, having been born again, regenerated and now he feels that he has surrendered his faith because of some period of backsliding. What about the man who is an adulterer? What about the man who though a Christian has gone off on some drunken orgy and has let down the name of Jesus Christ? Does it mean to say that he's in this category? Not a bit.

Look at David in Psalm 51. What had David done? He was a murderer. He was a covetous man.

He was an adulterer. He'd broken several of the commandments and yet did God take his spirit from him? Not a bit. You see, the point is this.

The people who are here referred to are not those who have engaged in some sinful act in itself, like adultery or stealing or any other computation of sin. The crime of these people is that they have had some acquaintance with the realities of the gospel and they seem to embrace them and then the lack of genuineness in their conversion became apparent and they moved over from the ranks of those who seem to be Christian to those who are enemies of the cross, who crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, who mock Him, who scorn the whole notion of biblical Christianity. What I'm saying in a word is this.

If you're troubled that you have sinned to the extent that you cannot be renewed again unto repentance, you can take it from the clear teaching of Scripture that the people that are here referred to could not take you in their company. What do I mean by that? These people are never troubled. They mock, they scoff, they're not concerned about spiritual things at all.

They laugh at the notion of the Christ and the gospel of the New Testament. If you're not like that and you say to me, no, that's not the case. My problem is some form, some bout of sinfulness.

I still recognize who Jesus Christ is. I still have some realization that I belong to Him despite the enormity of my sin. Now if that is your case, then in no way do you stand with these people.

These are those who never in the initial process were converted at all. So why does the writer make reference to the Hebrews and warn them of this state? Well you see, it is possible that amongst the ranks of the Hebrews there could be this sort of person. How do I know that I'm not like this? How do others know that I'm not like this? Why, by my enduring to the end, by maintaining a good profession, by constantly analyzing my own spiritual development and ensuring that I'm walking closely by the Lord Jesus Christ.

You see, the teaching of Scripture, although it tells us that our names are written on the palms of God's hands, will not allow us in any way to become slap happy in our Christian profession. It is possible in the way the gospel is sometimes preached these days for folks to think, well it doesn't really matter if I sin again, God will forgive me. No, no.

If you're saying this, if you're arguing like this, then you must examine again your own understanding of the doctrine of salvation. When you realize just what Jesus Christ has done for you, then you abhor sin, you hate sin and sometimes you hate yourself when you fall into sinfulness. Now this is what the writer wants these Hebrews to do, constantly to be examining themselves to ensure that there could not be the case, it could not possibly be the case that their conversion was a pseudo-conversion all the way along.

Indeed, as I shall show you next week, he's pretty sure that they don't come under that category, but he has to warn them, because there are those who do. As I have to warn you today, that there are those who may be with us, but are not of us. Those who in the day when Jesus returns, may cry, Lord, Lord, haven't we done this? And haven't we done the other? And Jesus will say, depart from me.

I never knew you. These were people who were never converted in the first instance. Well, praise God that his word, when you analyze it, comes through even clearly in this difficult passage of scripture, when you carefully link together all the statements that are made.

Father, we thank you both for the somber warning within your word and also its consolation. You make it so clear that the unpardonable sin is one of unbelief, and the irrecoverable situation is that of hearing the gospel and then slighting it, and pouring scorn, pouring sarcasm on the whole concept of the Lord Jesus and his death on the cross. Father God, we would not be here this night if that was our state of mind, neither would we be troubled by any thought of having committed such a damnable sin.

We praise you for those of us who have trusted the Lord Jesus as Savior, who have been born again by his Spirit, that we know his divine embrace, and that all our misdemeanors subsequently will be forgiven.