The Book of Hebrews 6:4-8 "Impossible!"

Good morning. It's good to be back with you here. We're going to be taking a look at this passage, Hebrews 6, 4 through 8, that Wayne has just read for us here. And I want us, as we come to the passage, to kind of understand and keep in mind the approach that the author is taking to this particular group of Hebrews, Jewish people.

And so with that in mind, the believers, and they are believers here, that this letter is written to had become dull of hearing on purpose. We saw that in chapter 5. They had intentionally kind of deafened themselves on coming to this point. And though they had been taught the Word of God, to the extent that the author says, well, you should have been teachers by now, you've been taught as much and as well. Though you should have been teachers, the reality is, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have come to need milk and not solid food. They had gotten to that point. They could only tolerate spiritual milk. I'll try to expand on that in a little bit. They were spiritual infants. They couldn't tolerate any solid food, at least spiritually speaking.

They had retrogressed. And Nancy asked me, why do you use the word retrogressed instead of regressed? It's a matter of degrees. The word retrogressed expresses a greater degree of going backwards. They had retrogressed to the place that their spiritual decline was approaching. They weren't there yet. approaching irreversibility. That's why we have the stick shift with the reverse lined out there. They were about to get to a place where they were at a point of no return. They couldn't again be restored. And so that's the reason for the severity of this warning here. But it is a warning.

These people are not there yet. They're approaching it. That's the point to keep in mind here. So Hebrews 6, 4 through 8 is a warning to these believers here About what is ahead if they continue their downward slide see that But what's ahead if they continue their downward slide? So so this is an intense warning To them so that they don't go to the place that he's talking about they aren't there yet But they're headed that direction if they continue They will not lose their salvation. That's key. Okay. This is not a passage about loss of salvation in spite of what some think and we'll talk about that.

They will not be enjoying any of the benefits of their salvation either if they continue on in the path that they're headed. They will become fully spiritually sidetracked by temple sacrifices and spiritual deafness. Temple sacrifices and spiritual deafness. They'll be completely bogged down if they continue to head that direction.

Now, this is a controversial passage. If you were to pick up various commentaries, you'll find all sorts of different interpretations. Of course, here at Holly Hills, we don't worry about controversy or anything like that. We just go straight ahead where angels fear to tread. Anyway, so this is a controversial passage. We're going to lay out why some of the different views on it have no real place and point that out to you.

The view this passage is talking about are unbelievers only professing to be real Christians. Either they are unbelievers who have come close but not actually believed, or there are those who are professing, oh yeah, I'm a Christian, when in fact they're not. That's this first view.

We don't hold to that, but just to let you know, there are those who look at this passage and draw that conclusion. The next view is that this passage is talking about people who are believers but who lose their salvation having fallen away, or you could say we're believers. They lose their salvation having fallen away from faith and therefore have lost their salvation. Well, at Holly Hills we of course don't teach that, but just to present to you, people look at this passage that way. The third view on what we will present is what it's teaching. The people this passage is talking about are believers, but the passage is presenting an impossibility, and we'll explain more about what we mean by that.

Repentance impossible is probably a good way to summarize it. Okay, the first view, to get a little more detail, those who hold this view believe that people never were saved, either because they got pretty close to believing, but never really did, or they just professed to believe. Nancy and I knew a young lady who, very close to that position, not that this view is correct, Very close to that position where she knew a number of Christians, befriended Christians, including ourselves, spent time with them, knew what the gospel was, but wouldn't step through the doorway.

So it is possible that people stand in that place. I don't believe, however, that this passage is talking about that. As we'll see, the words enlightened and tasted and partakers are words that are used in the book of Hebrews itself and elsewhere in the New Testament only of those who believe. It's used only of those who believe.

So this view that they weren't believers in the first place doesn't seem to hold water. The second view, they lost it. They believe the people were saved but have lost their salvation. They have fallen away permanently and therefore are no longer saved. That's this teaching. If that's the case, and when presented with it, this is frightening to those people who believe in loss of salvation. If that is the case, this verse says their salvation is lost forever. They've lost their salvation forever because it is impossible to renew them again to repentance. See that? If this view is correct, if you take this view of the passage, then you can never be saved again. if that's what this is saying.

I don't believe it's what it's saying, but that would be consistent with what's in the passage there. The Bible teaches that salvation cannot be lost. As a matter of fact, we're going to take next Sunday to summarize the biblical case that salvation is absolutely secure. that there is no place of losing one's salvation. So anyway, we will address that next week. So we don't believe this view is correct, that they lost their salvation, but some hold to that view. The third view, and one we'll be looking at here, these are in fact believers.

Renewing them to repentance from their dead works once more is impossible since they have retrogressed to the extreme. what Hebrews 6.1 says about repentance, Hebrews 6.1 So the exhortation to these believers is that they, from their retrogressed state, begin to grow again. Before they get to a place that he warns about in this passage, where you're not going to grow again. You're stuck. You're stuck. So that's what this warning is about.

He's talked about repentance, and it's repentance from their dead works, going back to the Jewish temple sacrifices and relying upon that instead of relying upon God's sacrifice through Christ. So it says there, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance from dead works, in this case, since they again crucified to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame. And also, while we're talking about impossible, for Christ to be crucified again is not even remotely possible. Christ said, it is finished, and He didn't say, it's finished again. That's not going to happen. He isn't going to come back and be crucified. However, going back to the temple sacrifices would say that Christ's once and final sacrifice wasn't once and final.

You see that? Alright, now let's take a look. Here is an instance in 2 Corinthians 4, 3-6. This word light, and it's out of the same family of words, refers to those who are enlightened, as we see in Hebrews 6.4. And let's read it here. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving, that they might not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ. who is the image of God. For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as bondservants for Jesus' sake. For God who said, Light shall shine out of darkness, is the one who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ."

So this is out of the same family of words as enlightened there in Hebrews 6.4.

And we could also point to later on in Hebrews 10.32 But you, remember, remember these believers, he's writing to, the former days when after being enlightened you endured a great conflict of sufferings.

This is the exact same word in the exact same verb form as in Hebrews 6.4.

These are real believers, as in Hebrews 6.4, and being enlightened has to do with the turning on of the spiritual senses among those who believe. We've covered the spiritual senses previously and I'll make brief reference to them shortly here. So that's the use of the word enlightened right in Hebrews referring to those believers. The word partakers also points to the fact that these are Christians.

Hebrews 3.1 and it reads like this, Therefore holy brethren, that sounds like Christians to me, right? Partakers of a heavenly calling. Consider Jesus the Apostle and High Priest of our confession. Yes, these are believers. It's our confession, holy brethren, partakers.

Here's another one in Hebrews 3.14. For we, and the author of Hebrews includes himself in that, have become partakers of Christ. Can you be a partaker of Christ and not be a Christian? Not so much.

Now, Hebrews 6.4, for in the case of those who have once been enlightened, and let's take note of one thing, see the word those? He's not using we and our here because this is talking about those who have declined to such a degree that they can't be renewed to repentance. For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, So partakers of a heavenly calling, partakers of Christ, partakers of the Holy Spirit. These are people who are saved.

Now there is in this passage the word once and we're not going to mention this word once just once. We're going to mention it multiple times as we go through Hebrews because it shows up in Hebrews 7, 27, 9, 7, 12, 26, 27, 28, 10, 2, and 10, and 12, 26, and 27.

So not just once, multiple times, okay? The Greek word, and we're not real Greeky-geeky here, but the Greek word, because we're going to bring it up again, is hapax, okay? Not too tough a word, hapax. It means an action that is done with finality and then is effective from then on, okay? And the author of Hebrews is going to use it again and again in order to get the point across, and this is the first passage that he uses it in in the book.

In Hebrews 10.10, for example, he's going to write this, we have been sanctified, and that's in the perfect tense, through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. So that's the kind of usage of that word, and that's the same thing here. So we're going to bring it up again as we continue through our study of Hebrews a number of times.

Now keep in mind that the believers that are reading this letter for the first time are already dull of hearing and that by their intent. They wanted to be dull of hearing. It didn't say that they just kind of got to be there, they actually intentionally became dull of hearing, spiritually speaking, though they had been under teaching that ought to have enabled them to be and equipped for being teachers themselves.

They had gone back, they had retrogressed to a place in which they could only tolerate biblical basics. That's all they could handle. Spiritual milk. That's all they were ready to take in. So Hebrews 6, 4 through 8 comes to them as a warning. You guys have been on a downward slide. You've been on a decline, he's telling them, and it's not too late to turn it around. But you're getting there. And I want to warn you, and turn this around, before you actually do get there, because that's a scary place to be.

So, Hebrews 6, 4-6 describes a worst case scenario for the believers this letter was written to. And you think about it, have there ever been believers in church history, even in New Testament times, who had a worst case scenario? How about Ananias and Sapphira? That was a worst-case scenario.

Paul writes to the believers in Corinth, 1 Corinthians chapter 11. He says, you know, you guys have your love feasts and you have the Lord's table and it's so bad that some of you have died. So it is possible for believers to get to a worst-case scenario and the Lord can even take them out.

Take them out of the picture because there's no chance of them being restored. He didn't want them to get to that place, and so he's warning them. They have repented of their dead works already, once before, but are now at a point of considering more dead works. We're going back to the dead works that we once repented of. Going back to the Jewish sacrificial system that they had previously repented of. You see, for Jews to get pulled back into that system was sin. would put them in a very bad place spiritually.

That's the possible scenario he's laying out. He says, you have already declined, you Hebrews that I'm writing to, you've already declined and become intentionally dull of hearing, and it is possible for you to get to a place where you just can't turn it around. So here's a possible scenario with hypothetical implications, is the way he puts it.

If these believers were to go back to the Jewish temple sacrificial system, that would say that Christ, God's Lamb, was not in fact the final sacrifice. Christ, God's Lamb, was not in fact the final sacrifice. That when Christ said, it is finished, you're saying it would have to be finished again, and again, and again, and done again. that he would have to die all over again, and that's what this passage spells out. To these people, Christ is going to have to go through the sacrifice all over again. It wasn't final.

So that's why in the subsequent chapters, chapters 7 and 9 and 10, he's going to be very emphatic about Christ's sacrifice being the final one. For these believers to repent of their dead works again after repenting of their dead works, would be impossible. They would get to a point of no return. For Christ to die all over again would of course be impossible. What he did was to die for us all with permanent effect. He paid the price for it all.

Now you have on page three a half page slide and I'd like us to step through it here. This is the entire passage put in somewhat of a poetic form here. And we'll like to step through the notes one is for in the case of those who so he's talking about This isn't you the the believers that he's writing to but talking about some people get to this place, okay? It's not them previously. It said we and our and us and words like that, but this is another group of believers That is possible for them to arrive at okay that but these are in fact real believers and Having once, there's that word hapax again, once been enlightened, they've been given spiritual light and sight. We talked about the five spiritual senses in the spiritual realm, and so they have had their spiritual vision turned on and put in place, they've been given spiritual sight and the lights turned on, and have tasted the heavenly gift that is salvation by grace, and by the way, tasted here, used twice, you see, tasted the heavenly gift, tasted the good word of God, tasted, sometimes those who believe that, oh, these really weren't believers, they tasted, but they didn't swallow.

Anyway, so they tasted, but they didn't swallow, and they'll say, well, then they weren't really saved. The only problem is you go earlier in Hebrews, and they said Jesus tasted death. Did Jesus sort of get close but not actually die? No, he actually did die, right? So tasted is not they almost were, but they were in fact believers.

They tasted the heavenly gift of salvation and been made partakers. We saw earlier how that word partakers means a sharer, a sharer in Christ, a sharer in the Holy Spirit, a sharer in the heavenly calling. and partakers of the Holy Spirit. They tasted the good word of God. Now, notice what he says, you have been taught of the word of God to the point where you ought to be teachers. He's told them the word of God is alive and active and powerful, but it's not working in you. You're not allowing it to. You're not hearing it. You're turning it off. So that's what he's telling them.

And the powers of the age to come, the age to come we'll talk about in just a little bit, To the Jewish way of putting things, and it uses this in that same sense, to the Jewish way of putting things there is the present evil age, the time since Adam sinned up until the time the Messiah comes is the present evil age.

And then the age to come is the age when Messiah comes and rules over the world. So that's the age to come. Now how have they tasted of the powers of the age to come? powers of the age to come, when the Messiah will be here and they will rule and reign with Him. They will rule and reign with Him. And then have fallen away. Now that falling away doesn't mean they've lost their salvation, it means they've gone off the path.

One of the key points that, at risk of repeating myself too much, I want to explain, is there is relationship and there is fellowship. Those are two separate issues. Any one of my children, I would say, that's my son, that's my daughter, and I have that relationship with them no matter what. They're my son or my daughter, no matter what.

It is possible, however, that I might do something that would break fellowship with them. If I did something that Randy thought was just terrible, He might say, Dad, we love you, but you just can't come over for a few weeks. We've got to cool off after what you said or did. So if I did something horribly offensive, that would break fellowship, but the relationship would still be there.

See the difference? And so having fallen away is not losing the relationship. It's losing fellowship. Losing fellowship. A very important difference. And it's important for Christians to get that straight in their mind. that the issue, once you have believed, is not, do I lose my relationship? The issue is, have I lost fellowship? So position is relationship. Condition is the fellowship question.

Now, let's look at, here are the five senses. Seeing here is brought up in the sense of having been enlightened. That's how it shows up in this passage. And then the tasting is in Hebrews 6, 4, and 5, tasted the heavenly gift, tasted the good word of God. So those five senses that we brought up in previous weeks show up here as seeing and tasting in this particular passage.

Okay, now the next part, if they've fallen away after having been saved, clearly having been saved, It's impossible to renew them, notice he's saying, not you, them, again to repent, since they again crucified to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame.

They had repented of their dead works, that is, of the Jewish sacrificial system as saving them. and it is those and them and they, but what happens is going back to the Jewish sacrificial system says that Christ's death was not final. Christ's death isn't final, therefore I have to continue to sacrifice these lambs and the goats and the doves and the entire system because Christ's death didn't do it.

Christ didn't get it done. Christ said it is finished, but I don't believe it. That's the problem. And so that's why he would say they crucify, again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put him back to open shame. They're saying, Christ, death didn't do it. He's got to do it again and again and again and again, because his sacrifice was not God's once and final sacrifice for us, for you and me. That's their problem. But again, it's their problem. the believers that this author is writing to are not there yet. They're not at this place yet. But he's warning them because they're getting close.

So then he has two agricultural analogies to get the point across. The first one is a positive agricultural analogy. And it goes like this. For the ground that drinks the rain which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful for those whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God. So here's the positive analogy. This is productive ground. This is productive ground.

But then comes the negative analogy, and those who believe in loss of salvation will point to this also as proof that there is loss of salvation. But if it yields thorns and thistles, it is worthless and close to being cursed, and it ends up being burned. There's the negative agricultural analogy. Close to being cursed and ends up being burned. Burned? Doesn't that mean hell? Doesn't that mean they've lost their salvation? Well, not so fast.

We'll get there in a minute here. One of the key things in this passage is keeping in mind what we presented previously, the right food for the level of maturity. These believers, though they ought to be teachers, are at a place where all they can handle is still the milk. The milk stage, they're not at the meat and solid food stage. We pointed out previously, Brephos is a newborn in 1 Peter 2. And then in Infant, there's actually three passages, including the Hebrews 5, 12, and 13 passage that we looked at previously. There is, additionally, the youth stage at which meat and solid food is appropriate. 1 Corinthians and 1 John each bring up that stage.

And finally, maturity in 1 Corinthians, Ephesians, and as we saw in Hebrews 5.14. So that's the right food for the level of maturity concept that brings us to this point here in this passage.

We talked about the age of the Messiah, the age to come, the one to come. That's illustrated here, and this is a half-page slide on page four. If you look at it, the present evil age starts at the fall, that is when Adam sinned, continues on up to the time of Christ's second coming. That's the present evil age, the age to come, The Jews always used as the reference to the time when the Messiah reigned. So Jesus speaking in Matthew 12, 32, in this age or in the age to come. So here's a principle applies to both. Ephesians 121, in this age, but also in the one to come, a principle that applies to both. And then in Galatians 1, 4, this present evil age. So that's what this language is talking about. The tasting the powers of the age to come, when we will rule and reign with him.

Now, about that last verse, it talks about burned with fire. Some people say, see, there is proof right there. Burned with fire. Here are Christians, they're going to end up in hell. But something to remember is that just because there's fire doesn't mean loss of salvation throughout scripture. And here's a case in point.

First Corinthians 3, 10 through 15. Now, according to the grace of God which was given to me like a wise master builder, I laid a foundation and another is building on it. But each man must be careful how he builds on it, for no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now, if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, and straw, each man's work will become evident, for the day will show it, because it is to be revealed with fire, and that fire itself will test the quality of each man's work.

He's talking about believers. who are to be judged. This judgment, it seems pretty clear, is going to be right after we go home to be with the Lord. The judgment is not because God just can't wait to get a hold of you and wring your neck and point the finger and say, boy, are you going to get it? He is instead looking for, how can I reward you? That's his motivation. How can I reward you? So verse 14 says, If any man's work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. That's the intent of this judgment.

If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, but he himself will be saved, yet it is through fire. So that's why we jokingly say some people are going to enter heaven naked and smoking. It is because it is possible for someone to be saved and have no reward that you have passages like this. The fire is there to test, to find out what can I reward, not to say, you're going to burn in hell, you faithless Christian. So it is quite possible for someone to go along and do very badly in their actual outliving of the Christian life, and yet still be saved and spend eternity with the Lord. Because salvation is by faith. The judgment is of works, but only to see what can I reward you for.

That's God's motivation. So that last passage about the fire is not because they're going to hell. One other thing, in the agricultural analogy, one of the things you may have seen a farmer will do in his fields is frequently he will burn the field and then till the ground again for the next year's crop. So burning isn't to ruin the field and absolutely destroy it, but rather to get it ready for what's next. OK. So what's the take-home from this passage? You may look at it and say, wow, Vern, that's not me. I'm not there. I may even look at it and say, I'm not even close to getting there. So what do you take home from that?

One of the things that we see from this passage and the passages before and after The normal Christian life is on a growth path. That's what God intends. That's what God has in mind. That's how he's designed things. The normal Christian life is on a growth path. Just like with any of our kids growing up, we expect them to be growing. If they don't, we get concerned. I just love little kids, but I do like to see that they grow up good and normal and healthy. The normal Christian life is a growth path.

That's what he wants to restore them to. He wants to put them back on that growth path. And that's why he's giving this warning. But just as a mindset, growing spiritually isn't for some special group of people in the church. It's what God intends for every believer and is designed for every believer. That's normal.

Stagnation, spiritual stagnation risks spiritual decline, which is serious, and full decline is dangerous. Full decline is dangerous. That's why he has this intense warning to them, not saying that they're there, but saying, you know, that's where you're headed. So full decline is actually spiritually and possibly even physically dangerous. just like we saw with Ananias and Sapphira, just like we saw with the people in 1 Corinthians 11, where the Lord actually took them out. And so it's certainly spiritually dangerous. It could even be physically dangerous.

The next, getting and taking in spiritual food of the right quality and quantity and appropriate for the age and stage of the believer is critical. I can hardly emphasize this enough, and this is critical for parents to consider. I think especially of the guys, because if you look at it, Ephesians 6 places the teaching and admonishing in the hands of the father. It places the spiritual leadership of the home in the hands of the husband. So being a husband and father, this is especially a place to look at and consider carefully, is what I'm getting, is what my wife is getting, is what my kids are getting of the right quality, quantity, and appropriate for the age and stage of the believer. Are they getting what they need quality-wise, quantity-wise, and appropriate to the age that they're at? Very important for parents to consider. Now, another is a little legalism or reliance on ritual goes a long way down. You can't do the, we won't do this, we don't do that, or we're going to have somebody do some little ritual and we'll be fine. None of that is going to work.

The problem these believers were having is they were taking the things that were written in the Bible, the sacrificial system in the Bible. There it is, right there in the Bible. They were taking that and saying, hey, let's go back to it. Let's go back to it. It was another application of the law. As long as we have these guys do that, You know, ritual for us, we're good, right?

No, not at all. Matter of fact, it's a problem. The normal Christian life is on a growth path, and growth has a specific direction, and it's personal. 2 Peter 3.18, but grow, and by the way, that's an imperative, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. The growth is focused on Him. The normal Christian life is a growth path. It is focused upon the person of Jesus Christ. There isn't any other way that God has in mind. There is no plan B. That's where each individual is to grow. is in Him, that's where all of us as a church body are to grow. Ephesians 4, 11-16.

That's exactly what God has in mind, because He loves us. And His intent is that we grow, being conformed, being transformed into the image of Christ, until the day we see Him face to face. Let's pray. Lord, thank you that you have laid these things out because you love us so very much. You've paid the price completely that we could never pay because you love us so very much. And you intend for us to grow step-by-step, day-by-day, moment-by-moment, being conformed, being transformed into the image of Jesus Christ until we see Him face-to-face. We thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name. Amen.