04/13/2025 – Day 287 – Hebrews – Chapters 6 – 10 / 6: 4 – 6 – “Warning Against Regression”
We have three prior cycle posts on this reading well worth noting and perhaps commenting upon so that we can help each other: 1). 02/2021 – 6 foundational principles noted by Matthew Henry in his commentary.; 2) 12/22/2022 – 1 of 2 – Verses 6: 1 – 12 – What is the unforgivable sin?; 3) 12/22/2022 – Who was Melchizedek.
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“For it is impossible to renew to repentance those who were once enlightened, who tasted the heavenly gift, became companions of the Holy Spirit, tasted God’s good word and the powers of the coming age, and who have fallen away, because, to their own harm, they are recrucifying the Son of God and holding Him up to contempt.” (Hebrews 6: 4-6)
The following commentary is from “The Apologetics Study Bible”:
“6: 4-6 This passage, with its warning, is controversial and difficult. Some persons believe this text teaches that it is possible to fall out of salvation. Though a cursory look at this text might lead one to think that Christians can lose their salvation, that idea is not the issue. These verses instead speak of the need for believers to persevere in the Christian faith. The verbs ‘enlightened (v. 4), ‘tasted’ (vv. 4-5) , and ‘became companions’ (v.4) describe persons who have professed Christ and claim to be believers. To ‘have fallen aay’ (v. 6) means to commit apostasy. The writer of Hebrews admonished his readers not to be back to the OT sacrificial system because Jesus is superior to it in every way. If they were to turn away from Christ, repentance would be impossible because it cannot be found anywhere else once Jesus is rejected (10: 26-27). By their actions, such persons disgrace Christ openly and try to re-crucify Him. If they forsake faith in Christ after having professed it and go back (i.e., do not persevere), they never were actually saved to begin with (see Matthew 10;22; Mark 13:13).”
Note – I am bringing in William Barclay’s commentary on these verses as well, covering pages 55 through 59 in his book , expanded in his case to verses : 4-8. He takes a different view so all the more so to include it. So, I will complete this current void nlt e.o.d. tomorrow – 04/14/2025.
Ok, let’s take a look at this:
“10: 6: 4-8. This is one of the most terrible passages in scripture. It begins with a kind of list of the privileges of the Christian life.
The Christian has been enlightened. This is a avourite New Testament idea. No doubt it goes back to the picture of Jesus as the Light of the World, the Light that enlightens every man who comes into the world (John 1:9; 9:5). As Bilney, the martyr said, ‘When I heard the words, ‘Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,’ it was as if day suddenly broke in the midst of a dark night.’ The light of knowledge and joy and guidance breaks in upon a man with Christ. So entwined with this idea did Christianity become that enlightenment (photismos) became a synonym for to be baptism, and to be enlightened (photizesthai) became a synonym to be baptized. That is, in fact, the way many people have read this word here; and they have taken this passage to mean that there is no possibility of forgiveness for sins committed after baptism, and there have been times and places in the Church when baptism has been postponed to the moment of death in order to be safe. That idea we shall discuss later.
The Christian has tasted the free gift that comes from heaven. It is only in Christ that a man can be at peace with God. Forgiveness is not something he can ever win; it is a free gift. It is only when he comes to the Cross that his burden is rolled away. The Christian is a man who knows the immeasurable relief of experiencing the free gift of the forgiveness of God.
The Christian is a sharer in the Holy Spirit. He has in his life a new directive and a new power. He has discovered the presence of a power that can both tell him what to do and enable him to do it.
The Christian has tasted the fair word of God. That is another way of saying that he has discovered the truth. It is characteristic of men that instinctively that follow truth as blind men long for light; it is part of the penalty and the privilege of being a man that we can never rest content until we have learned the meaning of life. In God’s word we find the truth and the meaning of life.
The Christian has tasted the powers of the world to come. Jew and Christian alike divided time into two ages. There was the present age (ho nun anon), which would be wholly good. Some day God would intervene; there would come the shattering destruction and the terrible judgment of the Day of the Lord and then this present age would end and the age to come would begin. But the Christian is a man who here and now is tasting the blessedness of the age which is God’s. Even in time he has a foretaste of eternity.
“Heaven above is softer blue, Earth around is sweeter green; Something lives in every hue, Christless eyes have never seen; Birds with gladder songs overflow, Flowers with deeper beauties shine, Since I know, as now I know, I am his, and is mine.”
So the writer to the Hebrews sets out the shining catagogue of Christian blessedness; and then at the end of it there comes like a sudden knell, who then became apostates.
What does he mean when he says that it is impossible that those who have become apostates can ever be renewed to repentance! Many thinkers have tried to find a way round this word impossible (adulation). Esrasmus held that is was to be taken in the sense of difficult almost to the point of impossibility. Bengel held that what was impossible for man was possible for God, and that we must leave those who have fallen away to the mercy of God’s singular love. But when we read this passage we must remember that — it was written in an age of persecution: and in any such age apostasy is the supreme sin. In any age of persecution a man can save his life by denying Christ; but every person who does so aims a body-blow at the church, for it means that he has counted his life and comfort dearer to him that Jesus Christ.
This particular way of putting things has always emerged during and after persecutions. Two hundred years after this came the terrible persecution of the Emperor Diocletian. When peace came after the storm, the one test some wished to apply to every surviving member of the Church was: ‘Did you deny Christ and so save your life?’ And if he had denied his Lord they would have shut the door on him once and for all. Kermit Eby tells of a French churchman who, when asked what he did during the French Revolution, whispered: ‘I survived.’
This is the condemnation of the man who loved his life more than he loved Christ. It was never meant to be erected into a doctrine that there is no forgiveness for post-baptismal sin. Who is any man to say that any other man is beyond the forgiveness of God? What it is meant to show is the terrible seriousness of choosing existence instead of loyalty to Christ.
The writer to the Hebrews goes on to say a tremendous thing. Those who fall away crucify Christ again. This is the point of the great Quo vadis legend. It tells how in the Neronic persecution Peter was caught in Rome and his courage failed. Down the Appian Way he fled for his life. Suddenly there was a figure standing in his path. It was Jesus himself. “Domine,” said Peter, “quo vadis? Lord, where are you going?” “I am going back to Rome to be crucified again, this time in your stead.” And Peter, shamed into heroism, turned back to Rome and died a martyr’s death.
Late in Roman history there was an Emperor who tried to put back the clock. Julian wished to destroy Christianity and bring back the old gods. His attempt ended in defeat. Ibsen makes him say: “Where is he now? Has he been at work elsewhere since that happened at Golgotha?… Where is he now? What if that, at Golgotha, near Jerusalem, was but a wayside matter, a thing done, as it were, in the passing? What if he goes on and on, suffers and dies and conquers again and again, from world to world?
There is a certain truth there. At the back of the thought of the writer to the Hebrews there is a tremendous conception. He was the Cross as an event which opened a window into the heart of the God. he was it as showing in a moment of time the suffering love which is for ever in that heart. The Cross said to men: ‘That is how I have always loved you and always will love you. This is what your sin does to me and always will do to me. This is the only way I can ever redeem you.’
In God’s heart there is always, so long as there is sin, this agony of suffering and redeeming love. Sin does not only break God’s laws; it breaks his heart. It is true that when we fall away, we crucify Christ again.
Further, the writer to the Hebrews says that when we fall away we make a mocking show of Christ. How is that? When we sin the world will say: “So that is all that Christianity is worth. so that is all this Christ can coo. So that is all the Cross achieved.’ It is bad enough that when a Church member falls into sin he brings shame to himself and discredit on his Church; but what is worse is that he draws men’s taunts and jeers on Christ.
We may note a final thing. It has been pointed out that in the letter to the Hebrews there are four impossible things. There is the impossibility of this passage. The other three are: (i). It is impossible for God to lie (6:18). (ii). It is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sin (10:4). (iii). Without faith it is impossible to please God (11:6).”
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“It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins (10:4). “Now every priest stands day after day ministering an offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.” (10:11)
“From “The Apologetics Study Bible” verse commentary:
“10: 4,11. Some skeptics charge that, if these verses are true, then much of the Old Testament is false. They need to remember, however, that the Old Testament sacrifices, which prefigured Christ’s sacrifice, could ‘sanctify’ and ‘purify’ (9: 13, 23), but they could never remove sin and its guilt; otherwise, they would not have been repeated. The Old Testament sacrifices were able to make worshipers externally, ceremonially clean, but they could never perpetually and effectively cleanse from sin so as to establish right standing before God. Christ’s sacrifice, however, is better — it really does cleanse from sin; it takes away sin and its guilt; it is decisive and does not need to be repeated. Jesus is the perfect sacrifice who appeases God’s wrath toward our sin. He atones for our sin, taking it upon Himself so that we might be saved by this wonderful grace of God through faith.”
Soli Deo Gloria!
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Questions for fellowship generation, the lifelong sanctification process:
- What does the text reveal about God’s character?
- How has this reading generated prayer for you and/or us?
- What themes stand out to you in this bible study?
- How does our reading fit into the bigger picture (creation, the fall, restoration, etc.)?
- What verse(s) jumped out at you like never before? Is it explainable at this point?
- Do you have any questions you would like to put before the group as to how to interpret any particular verse(s) in our reading. Let scripture testify to scripture: Share with us where you sense contradiction between passages elsewhere.
- What did you find convicting and inspiring at the same time? Share with us how the Spirit of God is working within you as a messenger, both within and outside of our fellowship group.
- Share with the group how our study is calling or confirming to you a new mission to glorify God in our times.