If so please EMail us with your question to jonpartin@tiscali.co.uk and we will do our best to give you a satisfactory answer. EMailus.

What Do Hebrews 6.4 etc and 10.26 etc Teach Us?

There are differences of opinion among Christians on this question with many good Christians holding each position. See on the subject our article on eternal security. There we express our concern that such glib phrases as 'once saved, always saved' give false confidence to some who may not genuinely be saved. That is not to say that it is not true, for if salvation is genuine then it continues to the end, because the saving is done by One Who cannot fail, but it must be revealed by its fruits. There will probably be hiccups. But in the end the work will be accomplished if it is His work, and that will finally be revealed in a godly life and continuation in the faith.

Hebrews 6.4 is a case in point. The early church had seen a steady stream of Jews enter the Christian church. They were different from other converts because they came from a God-given religion and enjoyed belief in a God-given word. Up to this time their faith had been the true faith, and Christ-approved. But now they had entered into a new understanding and had been baptised as Christians showing they were testifying that they had found something even better, a more full faith, a better sacrifice, a fulfilment of all the Old Testament promises. There was no way back for they now knew that what they had trusted in had not only been temporary and replaced but had been fulfilled into something better. The old was now finished except as illustrating the new. For them it was no longer valid.

Now some were slipping back to Judaism, and while claiming to believe in the same God and to believe in the same Scriptures (the Old Testament), they were openly rejecting Christ and His cross and therefore God’s final revelation of Himself. It was a crucial moment for the early church. The uniqueness of Christ Himself was at stake. These Jews who had joined the Christian church were now reverting back to Judaism and putting Christ and His truth to shame. The question was, was this a genuine option from God’s viewpoint? And would others now follow? This is what the writer is guarding against.

Notice first the illustration (6.7-8). The rain came down and watered the ground. Some ground was filled with seeds, but some ground was filled only with weeds. It is the nature of the ground that is prominent. Some seed-bearing, some weed-bearing. The grain did not become weeds, the weeds had always been weeds, for the ground that bore them was barren ground. Only time however revealed the difference between the quality of the ground.

The writer and his readers were all aware of the parable of the sower (Mark 4.3-20). Some seed was sown on good ground, and because the ground was good it finally prospered. Others fell on bad ground and as a result either did not grow or finally withered. And the seed was the word of God. The same idea is in mind here.

Note that all the ground is depicted as receiving 'the blessing of God', the rain. Whether good or bad ground, the blessing fell on it. However some of the ground, which 'received the blessing of God', the rain, did not prosper like the other - the rain produced grain in some because it was grain-bearing ground, but other ground, receiving the same blessing, produced weeds because it was weed-bearing ground. Had it been good ground it would have produced grain. What was in it was bad because of the nature of the ground, so that its fruit was bad, despite the blessing of God.

This demonstrated the nature of the ground. It was bad ground. It would never become fruit bearing. It did not later become false, it was always so. It might appear promising, but it could only produce weeds. It was barren ground and had always been so. This is true both here and in the parable of the sower (Mark 4.3-20).

So it was with those of whom the writer speaks. Outwardly they had had the benefits of 'rain'. All received 'the blessing of God'. They enjoyed the outward influences which would finally determine what kind of ground they were. They were enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift and shared in the Holy Spirit, experienced the goodness of God's word and the powers of the coming age, but they then permanently ‘fell away’. They were proved to be bad ground. The question is as to whether they had ever become genuine Christians.

Some would argue that the descriptions are so strong that they can only refer to a genuine Christian experience. This then leads them to argue against eternal security. But it is difficult to see how a genuine Christian whose life has truly been renewed by the Spirit of God can be thought of as ground that has always been bad.

Others would however say that, in the light of other Scriptures, and of the illustration both here and in the parable of the sower, this must be interpreted as a picture of men being brought under the strongest influence of Christian power and teaching without actually ever becoming grain-bearing, but rather remaining as weed-bearing because of what by nature they were and always would be.

In those early days when the presence of the Spirit was so strongly felt among believers and the contrast between Christians, and non-Christian pagans and Jews, was so strong, the church may well have described the effects of seekers coming under the influence of the Spirit-filled church in this way. They are enlightened as they hear the new teaching, their eyes are in a sense opened. The word of God is pressed home on their hearts. Intellectually they become aware of the new truth. Furthermore they enjoy being part of the Spirit-filled group of believers, sharing in the result of His influence and the wonder of accompanying miracles, enjoy the goodness of God's word and feel its powerful influences, the ‘power of the age to come’, outwardly rejoicing in their 'experiences'. Indeed they are baptised because outwardly they have aligned themselves with Christ and His church, and all they have shared.

But because their hearts are hard (bad ground) their response is not genuine, and so they finally fall away. They fail to respond because they are weed-bearing and not grain-bearing. They are like those of whom Jesus spoke when He described the seed that fell on stony ground. They flourish for a while and then wither away.

The writer then gives a solemn warning. When men who have known such a vivid awareness of the truth deliberately turn back from it because they cannot stand the heat of persecution (not the same thing as struggling with doubts and not being sure of their position), and go deliberately back to the old ways, openly rejecting Christ and bringing deliberate shame on His name in spite of what they, in their hearts, know to be the truth, they harden their own hearts. They are in danger of what Jesus described as the ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’. And by doing so they reveal what they are.

Note that this ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’ was spoken of in a context where Jesus was, by His power and authority over evil spirits, revealing that He was there in the power of God. Those to whom He spoke were faced with undeniable truth which their own teaching witnessed to, but there was a danger that they were rejecting it, not because they were in doubt or could not understand, but because they were hardening their hearts through unwillingness to believe the truth. It was not that they could not accept Jesus, it was that they would not. They realised that if they did much of what they believed and did would have to change. This reluctance, Jesus pointed out, was dangerous. They were in danger of hardening their own hearts to such an extent that they could not repent. (He says they are in danger of it, He does not say that they had actually at that point done so).

The writer here pictures this vividly. These people he was speaking to were from a people (the Jews) who had chosen to crucify Jesus. By being baptised they had declared against that verdict. Now by returning to Judaism they were aligning themselves with that verdict and crucifying Jesus again and submitting Him to shame and humiliation. And these were not just people struggling mentally between two sets of belief, an old and a new, vacillating and not sure as to which was true, but a people who were deliberately turning their backs on what they knew to be true because they could not face the consequences of their belief. They were deliberately hardening their own hearts and closing their minds because of their fear of the consequences. They were deliberately testifying against Jesus and setting their minds against Him in order to save themselves.

And notice the final consequence. ‘It is impossible to renew them again to repentance’. It is not saying that God will not receive them if they repent. Whoever repents and calls on the name of Christ will be saved. No, these men can never be brought to repentance. They are in danger of hardening their hearts to such an extent that the thought of returning to Christ will never come to them. He will have been shut out completely. (Thus if there are those who are fearful that they have committed a similar apostasy and yet long to return to Christ, they are not in this position for they are clearly ‘repenting’. Thus their hearts are not so hardened that they cannot repent).

This hardening of the heart is illustrated elsewhere. In Exodus we read that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart. And he did this so that Pharaoh and his people might learn a lesson. But it was not irrevocable. There was always for him, up to a certain point of time, a way of repentance. However there came the day when he began to ‘harden his own heart’. He had been faced with unquestioned, miraculous proof of the power of God but he was deliberately closing his mind and heart against it. Gradually the way that had been open ceased to be open. His heart became hardened beyond repentance by his own action.

As mentioned above the Pharisees had been in the same danger. They had seen unquestioned, miraculous proof of the power of God. There was a stirring within them. In their hearts they knew what it must mean. The One Whom they were facing was here in God’s power with God’s authority. But some did not want to believe it. They hardened their hearts. They did not want their old ways to be disturbed. They did not want their own failures to be shown up. They were in danger of doing what Pharaoh had done, hardening themselves to such an extent that change was impossible. It was not doubt that was in mind, it was deliberate rejection of what they knew to be the truth. That, warned Jesus, could make their position irreversible.

So it is, the writer says, with these people he is speaking to (he has already warned them against hardening their hearts - Hebrews 4.5-11). They are faced with the truth. They have beheld wonderful things. They have seen and understood God’s good news. They have witnessed the miraculous power of God amongst them in a very vivid way. And now they are in the same danger as Pharaoh was and the Pharisees were, of rejecting what they know to be true, not because they have doubts but because they do not now want the light because of its consequences, it will result in persecution and hardship. They are in danger of hardening their hearts against truth revealed in such a way that it is undoubted.

In a sense this is hypothetical, as it was in the case of Jesus’ words to the Pharisees. He is warning of what might happen not of what has happened. But what happened to Pharaoh warns that the hypothetical can become real. Some Pharisees did choose to harden their hearts so that eventually they became unable to repent. Men can so harden their own hearts so that they can no longer repent (have a change of mind and heart). Thus he wants his readers to know that this is what they are in danger of. If they do so finally harden their hearts there will be no way back, not because God will not accept their repentance, but because they will not be able to repent. They will be totally hardened.

That is why the writer finishes up by saying that he expects better of his readers, 'things that accompany salvation', i.e. perseverance. He expects them to show that they are grain-bearing ground not weed-bearing ground. That is what ‘accompanies salvation’, for 'by their fruits you will know them'. Those who irrevocably turn back do but prove that they were never ‘good ground’ after all. They were never true Christians. For had they been so their ground would have been made ‘good’ and would finally produce fruit.

The case is similar in Hebrews 10.26. When these people were committed Jews, and members of the old revealed religion, they could go to the Temple whenever they wilfully sinned and offer sacrifices. There was a God-provided sacrifice for sin available. But once they had come to the place where they had been faced with the one sacrifice for all, Jesus Christ, Whose death had replaced the old sacrifices, they could no longer return to the old sacrifices. They now no longer had any sacrifice for wilful sin available other than Christ. They were now enlightened. There was no going back to the old ways. It was now Christ or judgment.

So by seeking to go back they now trample Christ underfoot and shame Him. Seemingly they had outwardly entered under the new covenant in His blood by baptism, thus their turning back was an outward profaning of the blood of the covenant (the blood of Christ). In the eyes of all they had been ‘sanctified’, set apart as Christ’s, by the blood of the covenant. Like the vessels and accoutrements in the Temple they were proclaimed to belong only to God for His use. But now they were turning their backs on their commitment and thus bringing shame on Christ.

This was especially important at this juncture when the church was still in its infancy. It was important for it to be seen that whereas the old God-given faith had been perfectly satisfactory in its provision, it no longer provided an alternative for those who were aware of something better. It was now Christ or judgment.

There was now no other sacrifice for sin that sufficed, ‘there remains no longer a sacrifice for sins’ (although it had once sufficed). No other sacrifice for sin now remained. They could not safely go back to the old ways. They could not return to the blood of the old covenant, and find it sufficient. They went back to their doom, for by doing so they were rejecting the blood of the New Covenant to which their old faith had pointed, the faith which the New Covenant had done away with by fulfilling it.

Fully enlightened they could now not go back to the way which had sufficed when they were not enlightened. For them that could no longer work. It was to blaspheme the very God that they claimed to worship, and there was the grave danger that by doing so they would harden their hearts beyond repentance.

But the writer was convinced that his readers were not of this kind. They had genuine faith, the faith that persevered. They were 'good ground', and so they would produce genuine fruit and go on. For them there could be no final going back.

We do not know whether any did go back, but if they did so it demonstrated that they were not, and had never been, good ground. They were the stony ground of which Jesus Himself had warned.

IS THERE SOMETHING IN THE BIBLE THAT PUZZLES YOU?

If so please EMail us with your question and we will do our best to give you a satisfactory answer.EMailus.

FREE Scholarly verse by verse commentaries on the Bible.

THE PENTATEUCH

GENESIS ---EXODUS--- LEVITICUS 1.1-7.38 --- 8.1-11.47 --- 12.1-16.34--- 17.1-27.34--- NUMBERS 1-10--- 11-19--- 20-36--- DEUTERONOMY 1.1-4.44 --- 4.45-11.32 --- 12.1-29.1--- 29.2-34.12 --- THE BOOK OF JOSHUA --- THE BOOK OF JUDGES --- PSALMS 1-17--- ECCLESIASTES --- ISAIAH 1-5 --- 6-12 --- 13-23 --- 24-27 --- 28-35 --- 36-39 --- 40-48 --- 49-55--- 56-66--- EZEKIEL --- DANIEL 1-7 ---DANIEL 8-12 ---

NAHUM--- HABAKKUK---ZEPHANIAH ---ZECHARIAH --- THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW ---THE GOSPEL OF MARK--- THE GOSPEL OF LUKE --- THE GOSPEL OF JOHN --- THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES --- 1 CORINTHIANS 1-7 --- 8-16 --- 2 CORINTHIANS 1-7 --- 8-13 -- -GALATIANS --- EPHESIANS --- COLOSSIANS --- 1 THESSALONIANS --- 2 THESSALONIANS --- 1 TIMOTHY --- 2 TIMOTHY --- TITUS --- HEBREWS 1-6 --- 7-10 --- 11-13 --- JAMES --- JOHN'S LETTERS --- REVELATION

--- THE GOSPELS

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