A solemn warning: you could fall away
Session 14 – August 20, 2020 – Men’s Morning Hebrews Haverim
Our Men’s Haverim group is reading through and discussing the book of Hebrews during the months of August and September. For more information, see this blog post.
4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age 6 and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.
Hebrews 6:4-6 New International Version
Summary:
- The author continues his exhortation with this warning: you could fall away.
- It’s impossible to return to repentance for those who’ve once been enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift of salvation and who have shared in the Holy Spirit, since they are crucifying Jesus again. Jesus only sacrificed for their sins once, but they rejected that by falling away.
- Verses 7 and 8 of this section use an analogy of land that is either well-watered and fruitful or full of thorns and thistles and is useless, destined to be burned.
Other Thoughts:
- We often talk of someone who has left our fellowship as “fallen away”, but this is a serious judgment to make. Hebrews 6:4 says that once fallen away, it’s “impossible” for someone to return to repentance. It’s for God to judge this, so our response to someone leaving the fellowship should be to ask God to grant them repentance. In our church culture, we would likely consider the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32 ) to have “fallen away”, but the father, who represents God in that parable, certainly didn’t consider it impossible for him to repent and return!
- Falling away is the result of continual and deliberate sin, so we should not fear being in a fallen away state for our sin whether intentional or unintentional. Our response to our sin is what will lead us either to repentance or falling away.
- We should examine the result of our response to sin: if we’re repentant and producing fruit for God, then it’s not likely we’ve fallen away. However, a life with results of “thorns and thistles”, of worthless pursuits and outcomes, should be a warning and an indicator that one may have fallen away.
- The analogy of the fruitful vs thorn-filled land is similar to Jesus’ parables of the sower (Matthew 13:1-9) and of the weeds (Matthew 13:24-30). The parable of the weeds points out that the weeds and wheat will grow together, and that our fellowship will include both the saved and lost, including the fallen away. The parable of the sower teaches that the good soil or heart is one that produces fruit for God, and the others, including the shallow-rocky, path-hardened and weed-choked soils that show different ways believers can lose their faith, possibly ending in falling away.
- Is your faith in Christ transforming you, or are you letting continual or deliberate sin lead you toward falling away?