Read
Hebrews 6
Imagine waking up each day to
incredible pain. You treated the pain yesterday but you have to deal with it
again today.
Some of you don’t have to imagine
that. It’s a daily deal.
Imagine having beaten cancer only to
find out it’s back. That stinks. Here we go again.
Imagine having been brutally attacked
by thugs. You have broken bones. Your body nearly bled out. Your vision was
blurry for a long time, but you finally got better.
Now here come those thugs again and
this time they have knives and tire irons.
Once was enough.
Some of you are thinking, M1911, .45 caliber
will take care of them, but you remember that you loaned out your trusty weapon
yesterday and don’t have a backup on you.
You don’t want to go through another beatdown,
but you do.
A month later, it’s the same thing all
over again. Not all your breaks and bruises have fully healed.
You might be wondering if I have taken
a job writing for Netflix or Prime or one of those that produce some binge-worthy
series, but that’s not the case. It’s
just analogy.
For what?
For crucifying Jesus again and again
and again. Who would do that?
Pray it’s not you. The counsel for those who would reject the
salvation of the Lord having tasted God’s Kingdom is not something of which we
want to have any part.
Just as the rebellious will not enter
God’s rest, neither will one who falls away from God’s salvation be allowed
back in. Ouch! That’s some mean stuff right there.
What happened to once saved, always
saved?
This part is a might prickly. Some
refer to it as the Devil’s favorite scripture. Can a believer fall away? Sin, yes, we get that. We still sin but are
we still sinners or a new creation?
If we are going to try out best to
understand this scripture, you have to set aside your doctrine and view it
through the lens of Jesus. Remember in the
first chapter, I challenged you to read this entire book looking through the
lens of Jesus?
Messiah.
Savior.
Lord.
King.
Priest.
Intercessor.
Promise Keeper.
Way Maker.
Miracle Worker.
God who is in his very essence Love.
We have instructions about confessing
when we sin, so God knows that we will sin even in our redeemed state. There
is an eye has not seen and ear has not heard state where sin won’t be a factor,
but for now, it is.
But can we lose our salvation?
It appears that the author might have
used some hyperbole to get the attention of the Hebrew readers who would not
fall away to paganism or atheism but to the rote rituals of Judaism.
We should consider this verse
literally and as hyperbole as we seek to understand what is a stern message in
any case. Here’s the thing about when Jesus used hyperbole. The truth even in hyperbolic form is still
the truth.
What?
If
your eye offends you, then pluck it out. The same for your hand. Cut it
off. Now, here’s the bottom-line truth part. It is better to get into heaven
missing one eye than to miss the boat altogether.
It is better to come into the kingdom
of heaven with the nickname Stumpy than not to get in at all. It’s hyperbole, but it’s truth nonetheless.
The message over these past few
chapters has been about moving forward. Christ surpassed Moses and the Law
given through him. We must move forward in Christ.
The foundation has been set in
repentance and baptism and the laying on of hands. It is time to move from the
salvation that we received to the fullness of that salvation.
We must build upon the foundation
instead of laying the foundation again
and again. That’s like crucifying Christ time and time and time again.
Look
forward. Move
forward. Quit looking
back. Here are some words that are coming soon. Keep your eyes
fixed on Jesus.
You have repented
of
your sins.
You have received Jesus
as Lord.
You believe that God
raised him from the dead.
You believe that his
death took away your sin.
The righteousness of the Lamb
of God who takes away the sin of the world has been imputed to you.
You believe that in the resurrection
of
the Lord is the promise of your resurrection.
You have this fantastic
foundation. Stop rebuilding it and start building upon it.
If you have tasted
the goodness of the Lord, how could you go back to the law for your
salvation?
The apostasy addressed here is not
going over to Baal or some other false god, but returning to a life of
recurring sacrifices required by the law.
How do you build upon this foundation that we
know in Christ Jesus?
In the practice
of your faith.
By living a life
governed by love.
By not
growing lazy in your
salvation.
This part will sound very familiar.
How do we build upon the foundation that we have in Christ Jesus?
By taking
his yoke and learning from him.
By putting his
words into practice.
By trusting
the promises
of God. A promise
can have no greater assurance than to be from
God.
There comes a point where every infant
needs more
than milk.
They need meat.
The writer here is challenging his
readers telling them that they have been on formula for long enough. It’s time
to chew on something solid. It’s time to take
your faith and build upon your salvation. It’s time to move forward.
Image an infant that never matures enough
to eat solid food.
Imagine an infant that never learns to
walk.
Imagine an infant that never learns to
talk.
Imagine having to take care of this
person even though God designed them to grow and learn and build and produce
good fruit.
Imagine being that person.
What’s the point of Jesus dying on the
cross to atone for your sins if you keep desiring the sinful life? What’s the
point?
I have offered this provocation before
in different contexts, but here it is in the realm of Hebrews.
Why do we want to go to heaven if we keep
wanting to do things our way instead of God’s way? Why do we want to live forever if we are not interested
in what God has in store for us?
What’s the point?
Is it once saved, always saved? I am
confident that it is.
Is discipleship a challenge?
Absolutely! It is a challenge and then
some, and it comes with stern, sometimes impossible warnings.
So when we sin, transgress, or somehow
just miss the mark, we are not called to repent and seek salvation again. We
are called to confess with the Spirit of God pointing us in that direction.
We are called to confess because
the word of God judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. That’s not
just on our way to salvation. That’s throughout our salvation.
We may sin and confess so much that we
wonder if we are saved, but as long as God’s Spirit is working in us, an we
confess our sin, we should never doubt our salvation and we should respond with
great passion in our discipleship.
We get back in our race with more
gusto than before we missed the mark. We are still growing in God’s grace. We
are being sanctified, and that is a process.
And having tasted God’s goodness, we
might be tempted to throw in the towel but we are not able to fall away from
the God who loves us so much.
I am sure that this account is not
politically correct in our modern world, but once upon a time on an operation
called Bold Guard in Europe, I led a company of Marines for an exercise that
lasted a couple of weeks.
It was time to backload on the ships
and we were staged waiting for our turn. A young, black Marine dropped his
rifle. He was close enough that I had to say something.
He smarted off. If you didn’t know, you don’t get to be
disrespectful to officers.
My gunnery sergeant started for this
young Marine and I could tell that this was not going to be pretty.
I grabbed the gunny and held him back.
I said, “We will sort this out aboard the ship.”
That would give the young Marine a
little time to think about what he had done, and it would keep my gunnery
sergeant out of the brig for thrashing a young Marine.
So, the day came and this young black
Marine was standing in front of me in the small company office space we had on
the ship.
You might wonder why I keep mentioning
that the Marine was black. That’s
simple. I turned him white, at least for a minute.
When the Marine had dropped his rifle
and smarted off to me, he—like the rest of us—was tired. I didn’t want to take
his money or his rank or his liberty.
C’mon, we just finished an exercise in
Denmark and Germany. It was time to pull into port and turn the Marines loose
on Europeans somewhere. I think Rotterdam was scheduled as our next port.
I just wanted to make a point with
this young man. Master your weapon and your attitude if you want to make it in
the Corps.
So, after talking about what the
gunnery wanted to do to him, I said, “Maybe, I should just do that myself.”
I can forcefully project my voice when
needed. I did.
I did not realize until just then,
just how scared the young Marine was. He went flush. His color was gone. He was
pale and about to pass out.
He didn’t. I say that I turned him
white, but he was colorless.
I didn’t take rank or pay or liberty,
but I had him carry his rifle with him everywhere he went for the next two days
until we got to port.
He was a Marine. He messed up but he
was still a Marine and needed to stay that way.
I just wanted to let him know that he
didn’t want to forsake the calling that had been entrusted to him as a Marine.
I might have pushed the limits of what was acceptable, but sometimes you push
those limits when you don’t want to see someone you care about go down the
tubes.
We get a similar warning in this part
of Hebrews. But we are not lost. We have not fallen away. We have not forsaken
the calling
that we have as Christians.
God’s Spirit is irresistible to us. We
can fall short but we can’t fall away.
We are a new
creation. The old creature wants his job back, but we have been made new.
There is no going back.
We can miss the mark again and again,
but we don’t go back to Square One. We confess
and get back into our race
of faith.
God’s goodness is too powerful. His grace
has reached beyond our sins and God is not kicking us to the curb.
God disciplines
those
whom he loves, but once he
has claimed us, we will not be lost to him.
Amen.
