Hello everyone,
I've been really struggling with the meaning of
Hebrews 6:4-6 lately. I became a Christian in my late teens, leaving behind a very rough life. I was completely renewed as a person, and had a beautiful mystical experience that really solidified my faith. I was even on the path to becoming a Priest.
However, in my early 20s serious personal turmoil drove me away from my faith. I went beyond disbelief, and into literal blasphemy... I scorned Christ in every way, dabbled in occultism, and even read books on Satanism/Luciferianism. I also destroyed old rosaries, threw images of Christ in the garbage, etc.
Around this time, I had an experience which I now think of as revealing that I was leading myself to condemnation... I was listening to music and there was a lyric mocking Christ. The instant the lyric was sung, my hand carved crucifix fell and landed on my Buddha statue, this caused the Crucifix's head to come off. I kept the head, and considered using it to upset others.
A couple of years have passed, and I am now seeing the errors of my ways... I have realized that a godless life is one not worth living, and I want to return to my faith. However, I came across
Hebrews 6:4-6 and felt terrified... I have experienced the love, mercy and forgiveness of God, I even brought others to Christ! Despite this, I turned my back on Him and openly mocked him. What do I do? Is salvation possible?
That you are asking these questions illustrates that you aren't the person described in
Hebrews 6:4-6.
Hebrews 6:1-9 (NASB)
1 Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,
2 of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment.
3 And this we will do, if God permits.
4 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,
5 and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come,
6 and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame.
7 For ground that drinks the rain which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God;
8 but if it yields thorns and thistles, it is worthless and close to being cursed, and it ends up being burned.
9 But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that accompany salvation, though we are speaking in this way.
Who is the writer of Hebrews speaking to in verses 1-3? The spiritually-immature believers he had criticized right at the end of
chapter 5:
Hebrews 5:11-14 (NASB)
11 Concerning him we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing.
12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food.
13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant.
14 But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.
So, the writer of Hebrews has in view in his comments here believers who are "dull of hearing," partaking in spiritual "milk" when they should have moved on to spiritual "meat." He urges these spiritually-childish believers to "press on to maturity" (
6:1), in the process moving on from the basics of the faith - repentance from dead works, trusting in Christ, "laying on of hands" in healing, the Second Coming - to deeper, "meatier" spiritual truth that they should not only know, but be teaching to other believers (
5:12).
"Been enlightened":
In
verse 4 of
chapter 6, the writer of Hebrews begins to speak of others who are not merely childish in the faith, but have "fallen away" from it. He uses terms to describe these people that strongly suggest, not genuine salvation, but only a superficial, nominal participation in the faith. One can be "enlightened" (
6:4) to the Christian faith in varying degrees, as the spiritually-immature believers criticized by the writer of Hebrews at the end of
chapter 5 demonstrate. That these "enlightened" people "fall away" suggests that their "illumination" to God's truth was even more "milky" than the childish believers described in
Hebrews 5:11-14, a mere academic enlightenment that never touched their heart and character of living (which is why they ultimately "fall away"). (See
James 2:14-26; 1 John 2:19)
"tasted of the heavenly gift":
The word "tasted" suggests a cursory, light experience of the "heavenly gift" which is supported by the fact that these people who have only "tasted" of the heavenly gift eventually "fall away" from the Church. Those who have "put on Christ" (
Romans 13:14), who have been given a totally new spiritual nature in him (
2 Corinthians 5:17), who have become "temples of the Holy Spirit" (
1 Corinthians 6:19-20), reflect their "second birth" (
John 3:3-6) in a markedly changed perspective on life and in the general character of their living. Being truly saved, having had more than a mere "taste" of "the heavenly gift" (Christ/the Holy Spirit), they don't "fall away," though they can carry on in a spiritually-juvenile way.
How does one "taste of the heavenly gift" without being transformed by it? The many nominal "Christians" in the modern Church - Christ called them "tares" (
Matthew 13:24-30) and Paul called them "false brethren" (
2 Corinthians 11:26) - demonstrate how: They participate in the life and work of the Church in a second-hand way, associating with the truly born-again, working alongside them in ministries of the Church, sharing in worship of God, sitting under the teaching of the God's word, while not themselves having any real spiritual life of their own, no genuine relationship with God through Christ. In these ways, "tares" constantly "taste" of the work of the Spirit in and through the Church. But because these "tares" aren't themselves truly born-again, only "tasters" of the heavenly gift, they "fall away," if not overtly by departing from the Church, secretly, in their hearts, far from God (
Matthew 15:8).
"partakers of the Holy Spirit":
This is, I believe, just another way of describing "tasting of the heavenly gift," expressing the same idea of a superficial, second-hand experience of the Spirit by participation in the life and work, the Christian "culture," of the Church.
It is this nominal association with the Church and with the work of the Spirit in and through it, without ever coming to a genuine personal relationship with God through Christ, without ever being truly born-again, brought alive spiritually by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit (
Titus 3:5; Romans 8:9-14), that results in a person being unable finally to repent and come to a saving, life-transforming faith in Jesus. Every time a person sits under the sound of God's truth but goes away unmoved, refusing any sense of conviction of sin, any notion of the need of personal repentance, perennially doubting the truth of the Gospel, content to have just a "religious dimension" to life, that person is hardened more and more thoroughly into a habit of reacting this way to God's truth such that, in time, they are utterly unable to respond in any other way, barred from true repentance by their own consistent choice to reject it. Indeed, such a person doesn't think they are in need of repentance but is a member of the faith by doing religious things, rather than being a sinner redeemed by Christ.
Alternatively, the nominal Christian, the "tare" in the Church, finally leaves the Church entirely, overtly departing from it. But they do so "inoculated" to the faith by their prolonged superficial contact with it, believing they have experienced all the religion (for that is all it has ever been to them) has to offer and found it entirely dissatisfying and impotent. Like the first sort of person who "falls away" from the faith, a hardening has occurred that cannot be undone nor resisted. Those described in
Hebrews 6:4-6 who "fall away" do not think ever to return to the faith, either because they don't realize they aren't in it, or believe they've found it to be a fraud.
Your questions don't come from a heart hardened to the faith. You aren't yet the person of
Hebrews 6:4-6, totally hardened to the only way of escape from the wrath of God and into reconciliation to Him. But you can be. Time and continued resistance to God will lead you to a condition of hardness toward Him from which there is no return.
