Hebrews 6: 1 – 20
Terrifying Questions
1 Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, 2 of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. 3 And this we will do if God permits. 4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame. 7 For the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it, and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessing from God; 8 but if it bears thorns and briers, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned. 9 But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner. 10 For God is not unjust to forget your work and labor of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister. 11 And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, 12 that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. 13 For when God made a promise to Abraham, because He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, 14 saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.” 15 And so, after he had patiently endured, he obtained the promise. 16 For men indeed swear by the greater, and an oath for confirmation is for them an end of all dispute. 17 Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, 18 that by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us. 19 This hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which enters the Presence behind the veil, 20 where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become High Priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.
If you have served in a leadership position in your church, I am 100% certain you have had to deal with some people who are quite troubled by some particular statements in the Bible. You have been asked, ‘Can someone lose their salvation?’ or ‘Have I committed the unpardonable sin?’ Today we are going to speak about this point along with some other great truths.
6.1-2 ‘Wherefore having left the doctrine of the first principles of Christ, let us press on to perfection, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, of the teaching of washings (baptisms), and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.’
When I was in high school I wanted to learn Spanish. In 10th grade I chose this as an elective course. The teacher started us out with numbers and then through the year helped us with some basic terms that would help us interact in an all Spanish setting.
I loved the comment to me about what do you call a person who speaks three languages – Trilingual. How about one who speaks two languages – Bilingual. And finally what do you call a person who speaks one language – American.
I love Spanish people. They have such great cultures and beauty. They come from all parts of the world –South America, Spain, and some of our US territories such as Puerto Rico.
Now there was a major problem at my school. Although it was in a very small town, it was a very rough place for any teacher, so much so that we wound up having new teachers every year. So how did this become such a problem? Well, we started over each year from the beginning -again, with the numbers – Uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, etc.
When I first arrived as a freshman in college they noticed that I had three years of Spanish so they put me in an intermediate Spanish class where all they spoke was Spanish. Can you believe that? Again, as my life would display I was humiliated beyond explanation. All the other students wondered how this moron every got accepted.
To repeat over and over the simple principles of any subject, in truth, does not allow one to grow intellectually. Would you agree?
We see this understanding from our author. He intends not to deal with simpler ideas, ‘the first principles of Christ’, the foundation ideas of Christ, but to move on to more mature teaching. He will not deal with the question of repentance from dead works or of faith towards God. He has indeed already dealt with them in principle back in chapter 3.7-4.13. Nor will he deal with questions about baptisms (washings), the laying on of hands, and resurrection from the dead or eternal judgment. All these teachings were basic and could equally be taught by the Pharisees were they so minded. They were simply basic Old Testament teaching.
‘Repent and believe in the Good News’ (Mark 1.15) was the Lord Jesus Christ’s opening cry, and He went on to point men and women to the need for true faith in God. Repentance and faith in God were the Old Testament foundation laid down in preparation for the coming of the Messiah, which The Lord Jesus re-emphasized and expanded on, and on which the new teaching would be built. That is not to diminish their importance, but to stress the fact that they did not include the more advanced teachings which resulted from His death and resurrection. Repentance and faith in God are essential. External ordinances may be useful. The resurrection of the dead and the eternal sentence on man’s state are important teaching. But in their basic significance they come short of expressing the full Gospel. They are merely a beginning.
Thus his readers are to recognize that there is a need to go on from the basic teachings of Judaism.
We are a group of mixed believers. There are many who are mature both physically and spiritually and have walked with The Lord Jesus for many years. They are familiar with these elementary principles. But in our group there are also new believers who need to understand what some of the listed points are, such as ‘Dead works.’ These are either works which are lifeless because done for the wrong reasons (not revealing ‘life’) or because done in a desultory manner (lifeless) or works which are dead because proceeding from one dead in spirit (Ephesians 2.1). Or they may indicate works seeking merit which only result in death. All reflect works done either for the purpose of meriting favor with God, or from a rebellious heart, and not from a loving and faithful heart in response to the covenant.
It was the sin of the majority of Israel and of certain types of Pharisee that they observed the letter of the law but ignored its spirit. They were not so much concerned with pleasing the God Who loved them and had mercy on them, as with bribing the God Who might otherwise get in the way, or might make life difficult for them, or even judge them and reject them. Their thoughts were not on the true doing of good and a wholehearted and joyous response to the covenant. They treated God as though He was impersonal. They drew near with their mouths but their hearts were far from Him.
They saw the Law not as a means by which those who were truly God’s could live a full and rich spiritual life because they were His covenant people secure in His forgiveness (the Law was intended to enable men to live truly - Leviticus 18.5), but as a standard to be grudgingly attained with the hope of a pass mark. In high school I managed an ‘A’ all three years that I took the Spanish classes but as I stated I was not even close of understanding the language.
They hoped ‘to live by them’. The laws thus brought death on men because they failed to fulfill them all. Such attitudes and sins rightly needed to be repented of, but he has earlier made that clear. To repent of such means in order to turn from them into God’s rest provided through partaking in Christ was part of his message (4.1-11).
Stop and think how you would answer how one has ‘Faith towards God.’? This probably has in mind a general belief in God as the One God, a turning from idols to the true God. It was essential that men knew the One God. But of this James 2.19 says, ‘well done, the devils also believe and tremble’. Coming to the One God was initially important, but it missed out on the deeper truths about Christ. That was why The Son of God, our Lord Jesus began to point men to Himself, and why the message after the resurrection centered on Christ. Men had to move on to Christ, the outshining of the One God.
Having referred to some basic responses of believers he now turns to outward rites. These were Old Testament rites which had possibly been reinterpreted and Christianized and put into practice by this group to whom he is writing. (He clearly knows them well). We see now both ordinances ‘Of the teaching of washings (baptisms) and the laying on of hands’ were well known from the Old Testament. They represented outward forms to which the teachings about Christ could provide the inner meaning.
The word ‘baptismos’ refers to washings of various kinds. The plural form and the word used both confirm that it means other than just Christian baptism. It was such washings that The Lord Jesus had in mind when He turned water into wine (John 2) to signify that something better had come, and when He spoke to His disciples of those who, having bathed, needed only to wash their feet (John 13.10).
In view of the fact that he is writing to people in danger of being caught up in Judaism again the idea of purifying by washing, and suchlike, may well be in mind, as having been taken up into Jewish-Christian practice. Such washings continued in certain parts of the church in which Jewish Christians predominated.
The ‘Laying on of hands’ has in mind the laying on of hands in blessing and identification, regular Old Testament practices. It was taken up by The Holy Lord Jesus and the early church, with the laying of hands being used for healing, and being seen as an indication of identification, which eventually came through into a means of setting aside men for ministry of various kinds
The ‘resurrection of the dead and of eternal judgment’ was basic Jewish teaching and did not involve any specific reference to our Master The Lord Jesus Christ. Resurrection from the dead and eternal judgment while important doctrines, were both in their basic form teachings of the Pharisees as taught in the synagogues. What the writer is seeking to do is point out that it is necessary to leave behind these basics, important though they may be, and move on to specific Christian teaching, which would amplify them and give them solidity, bringing out the lesson that the teaching of Judaism was but basic and lacked the essential added ingredients provided in Christ.
6.3 ‘And this will we do, if God permit.’
This sentence comes like a hammer blow. He acknowledges that for some it may be too late to deal with these matters. Their hearts may have become too hardened. Only if God permits will it be possible to broach the true teachings of Christ. And to some it might not be permitted. But for all of us dear friends it is not so because we are now moving on in our advanced learning.
6.4-4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame.
He now describes here in detail those for whom his message might have come too late, although claiming to be confident that they are not of them like us which I just mentioned and we will see again shortly in verses 9-10.
There are few verses which have caused more controversy.
The question at issue is as to whether these verses necessarily refer to men who have been true Christians, who are then thought of as repudiating it all and being finally lost, or whether they can refer to outwardly professing Christians who gave all the appearance of being true Christians, and participated fully in God’s activity by His Spirit through the churches, but whose hearts were not truly won, and who were therefore never truly His.
We should note, as we see in the later illustration, that our author illustrates the situation by speaking about two types of land, good land and bad land, the one which produces fruit the other, which produces thorns and thistles. Both received the ‘rain’. But while one was fruitful the other was not. It only produced ‘thorns’ and ‘thistles’ as in Genesis 3.18. That being so we may see these people described here as being like those in Jesus’ parable who proved to be unsuitable ground for the seed. It seems likely to us that in that example at least, people who were such bad ground were not true Christians. But that should not make us diminish the seriousness of the warning, for in the end the Scripture makes clear that men are known by their fruits. Those who are unfruitful can have no confidence in their Christian standing (Galatians 5.16-21).
Our Lord Jesus and later on Paul spoke of people whose outward lives seemed to demonstrate gifts and activities of the Holy Spirit, when they were not in fact genuine (Matthew 7.15, 22-23; 24.24; 1 Corinthians 12.3; 13.1-3; 1 John 4.1-3). Judas no doubt performed miracles and cast out evil spirits, even though The Lord Jesus knew the truth about him from the beginning. And the others would see him as a partaker of the Holy Spirit, which in a sense he was.
I want to consider each phrase in some detail in order to lay a foundation.
First of all he speaks of those who were ‘once enlightened’. They were ‘enlightened’ at one particular time in what seemed like a once for all experience as they heard the new teaching, their eyes were in a sense opened. The word of God was pressed home on their hearts. Outwardly at least they turned from their old ways; they had become ‘converted’. Intellectually at least they became aware of the new truth. The Greek word for "enlightened" here signifies "to give light or knowledge by teaching". The apostle Paul uses it for "to make manifest", or "bring to light" in 1 Corinthians 4.5, 2 Timothy 1.10.
It could mean that they were enlightened and ‘persuaded’, or enlightened but not necessarily finally persuaded. It could mean that they ‘saw’ the truth in their minds but did not necessarily respond fully from the heart. Or it could mean that they were saving enlightenment. But the main point is that they had known a good level of enlightenment.
We also read ‘And tasted of the heavenly gift.’ To ‘taste of’ something is to fully savor a part of it. It signifies taking enough of it so as sufficiently to appreciate what it is. All you who enjoy cooking see this fact take place when you take a little taste of what you are putting together to make sure it is good. There would be a case for suggesting that often it described a deliberate intention of testing out adequately, without actually partaking of the whole, before making a final decision, or a partaking of it without partaking fully and finally. Here the idea is of a partaking in some significant way of part of ‘the heavenly gift’.
It is therefore linked with the next phrase, with the two ideas being combined, in which case it would be the Holy Spirit Who Is seen as the heavenly gift (see Acts 2.38; 10.45) in which they have had a part through His work on them. They had entered into the heavenly community and at least outwardly experienced their blessings.
We also need to consider its connection to the Old Testament that the writer has generally looked to when giving his exhortations. It may therefore be from the Old Testament that he took the idea of the heavenly gift. Such a gift is spoken of in Ecclesiastes 3.13 where we read, ‘And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all his labor, is the gift of God.’ In other words God’s gift to His own is a life of quiet confidence and rest in faith. This would tie in with the idea of the Christian’s rest in 4.1-11, and could have been spoken of as ‘tasting the heavenly gift’, that is, tasting the good life of being in the heavenly community. They gave the impression of enjoying the heavenly rest. And that would be possible even to one whose commitment was not total.
Whichever gift we select our writer is saying that these people in mind have participated in such things to the extent that they can be said to have ‘tasted’ of them, to have had such experience of them as to say that they should now be in a position to really appreciate them. Men may appreciate Christ and honor Him and be affected by Him and even follow His teaching, and thereby obtain much benefit, without being converted, they may experience the power of the Holy Spirit without being converted as the Holy Spirit powerfully works in the church which is their environment and even convicts them within. They may become involved in the Gospel and Christian teaching without being converted. They may even live a life of apparent rest and faith in God’s goodness without truly being His. The point here is that they have been involved with ‘the heavenly gift’, whatever that is seen as being, sufficiently for others to have been convinced that they were Christians, because that was what they professed. And that leaves them without excuse.
‘And were made partakers of (sharers in) the Holy Spirit.’ They were outwardly partakers. They saw themselves as partaking of Christ but that would be finally proved by their perseverance. The same might therefore be true here. They appear to have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, but were they? In one sense yes in that they were involved, at least externally, in the working of His power in the church. They ‘partook’ or ‘shared in’ along with the whole church. But how real it was individually, as with the partaking in Christ, only time would tell.
For there are probably good grounds for suggesting that ‘partaking of (or ‘sharing in’) the Holy Spirit’ may simply have signified experiencing His working along with the whole church. Their very presence in the church necessitated contact with the power of the Spirit’s working, and being in a Spirit charged atmosphere. They were surrounded by the Spirit’s wondrous activity. And this view is supported by the following illustration where both the good and the bad land received the rain. Each type of land receives the benefit and influence of the rain, both the good and the bad (verses 7-8). Thus while these described here were in some way looked on as ‘partaking (or sharing) in the Holy Spirit’, it may be that their final apostasy revealed that such partaking, such sharing, was mainly external, and had not reached to the heart. For they had in the end produced thorns and thistles, in a similar way to those who pleaded with Christ that they had prophesied and done miracles in His name, but were rejected, not as having once been His but now rejected, who were described as those whom He had ‘never known’ (Matthew 7.21-23.
Not only had they benefited by being in a place where the Holy Spirit was powerfully at work, they had also feasted on the good word of God. They had absorbed much teaching which came from God through a word of teaching or a word of prophecy in the church. It had spoken to their hearts. But sadly it had not found a true response that lasted. Their hearts had proved to be unreceptive ground. And their failure was the greater in that it was a ‘good’ word of God.
We can compare Herod who listened to John the Baptist and ‘feared John, knowing that he was a just man and a holy one, and observed him. And when he heard him, he did many things, and heard him gladly’ Up to a point his heart responded to John’s teaching until it began to encroach too much on his own life (Mark 6.20).
As we have seen earlier the ‘age to come’ is what we call this present age, seen from the point of view of the Old Testament prophets.
Here were the ‘powers of the age to come’ manifested among His people and all had tasted of them in one way or another. Furthermore it may well have been that in those churches were those of whom The Lord Jesus warned, those who would manifest such wonders that they might deceive even the elect. They prophesied in His name, they did wonders in His name, they cast out devils in His name, but He did not know them. Thus did they manifest the powers of the age to come without really being His.
Therefore, a careful examination of these descriptions indicates the real possibility that these people were professing Christians but without a genuine life transforming experience. Please take special note that the whole emphasis is on that which comes from without (enlightenment, heavenly gift, Holy Spirit, prophetic word, powers, and not on inward fruit such as love, joy, peace, etc. (He will later use love as the evidence that his readers probably are genuine believers - verse 10). Like many in the church today they professed a kind of faith, they convinced others of the genuineness of their faith, they even convinced themselves, but it was not faith in Christ. It was rather faith in a church which revealed certain powerful experiences and a belief in that church and its leaders, and possibly a faith in baptism and certain basic teaching, but a faith which had not penetrated the heart. They had been members of these living churches for a long time. They had been enlightened, had partaken of the Lord’s Supper, had experienced the heavenly gift of blessing and rest and peace in the church, had experienced the power of the Spirit’s working and had indeed convinced their fellow church members that they had the Holy Spirit within them, had fed on the words of prophecy and had enjoyed the powerful working of the Holy Spirit in the signs and wonders performed in the church, perhaps even spoken in tongues and prophesied themselves. And yet they turned away because of persecution. Thus was it demonstrated that although they had given every impression of being so, they were not true partakers of Christ.
Here are the words that separate the chaff from the wheat - ‘And then fell away.’ These dreadful words express so succinctly the dreadful possibility. They had enjoyed experience of all this and they then ‘fell away’ from the right path, from the profession that they had made. So what excuse had they? Thus do all need to ‘test yourselves out whether you be in the faith’. And the test is as to whether Jesus Christ Is genuinely in them (2 Corinthians 13.5). If He Is and the commitment is real then their fruit will reveal the fact, and there will be no danger of their finally turning back. When push comes to shove them remain planted and committed to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, no matter what!
6.6b ‘It is impossible to renew them again to repentance, seeing that they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.’
Their action of apostasy in the light of all the blessing that had been theirs would be a considered denial of all that they had seen and experienced. This was not just a falling into sin. That could be repented of. Their apostasy would reveal that their hearts were totally hardened. That while they had outwardly ‘repented’, turning to some extent from their old ways, it had not resulted in saving faith, and it had thus only hardened them. They had not truly known Christ, for had they done so they could not turn away. And after such a turning away there could be no way of repentance open to them for they would have received, and deliberately and knowingly rejected, the light shining fully on them over a long period of time, and the testimony of the Holy Spirit, which had included the evidence of the casting out of evil spirits, and they would have declared it all false. They would have blasphemed the Holy Spirit.
Having themselves professed to serve the crucified One over a long period of time, if they now publicly rejected Him, they would thereby be declaring that His crucifixion was what He deserved, and that He had not been fit to live. By their attitudes they would in their own minds, by having fallen away, be crucifying Him afresh, and that continually putting Him to open shame in the eyes of the world. In the light of such determined rejection and hardening of heart, they would be like Israel in their murmuring in the wilderness, continually disobedient after so many wonders. God would say of them ‘they shall not enter into my rest’.
Please also take note here the title used, not ‘Jesus’ but ‘the Son of God’. Their crime is worse than that of the Jewish leaders and Pilate, for they know with Whom they have to do. They have for a long time declared Him to be the Son of God. But now they will be declaring Him fit only to be crucified again. In their minds they take up a continuing position in their minds that it was right that He should be crucified. They pass the same verdict as their predecessors, and continue to maintain it, but with even less excuse. The title also brings out the depths of their crime. In intent they will crucify not only Jesus but ‘the Son of God’.
‘It is impossible to renew them again to repentance.’ To such people there is no point in reiterating the need for repentance or to attempt to seek to enlighten them as to the Gospel. They know all about it, possibly more than the evangelist. Thus to spend time teaching them the fundamentals that they already know would be to cast pearls before swine. The evangelist would be essaying a useless task, and the writer does not intend to attempt it.
We have all experienced situations where there is no point in talking to people any longer, because we recognize that in their present state nothing will move them. But this is not necessarily saying that people that we consider to be in such a state cannot repent even if they want to, and must therefore be rejected even if they give the appearance of repenting. If they want to repent it in fact shows that they are not in such a state, and we must therefore seek to help them, trusting that it is genuine.
Nor does it state that even God could not do it, although we may certainly suggest that God will not do it without repentance on their side. It is never for us to say what God can or cannot do. What the writer is concerned basically to say is that they have gone beyond anything that we can hope to remedy, and that we may therefore decide not to waste any more of our precious time on them, but to leave them in the hands of God. (Such people can take up too much of a godly man’s time, resulting in more worthy recipients of their message losing out).
To any who fear that they might be in this sad situation we can only say that the very fact that you fear it suggests that you are not in it. So be not afraid. If you truly repent God will receive you, for by it you will have demonstrated that your repentance is not un-renewable.
6.7-8 ‘For the land which has drunk the rain that comes often upon it, and brings forth herbs meet for those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is rejected and nigh to a curse, whose end is to be burned.’
He now compares those who are truly Christ’s with such apostates. True Christians are like land which constantly experiences the rain of the Holy Spirit. They are ‘tilled’ by the Holy Spirit through God’s servants, and they produce good vegetation and herbs, they are fruitful, and such land receives the blessing of God, it is blessed and fruitful.
In contrast apostates are like land which bears thorns and thistles. They too drink of the rain that comes on them through the Holy Spirit’s working, but all they produce in the end is thorns and thistles. They are near to a curse, for it is certain shortly to come upon them, and their end is to be burned. We note here that both experience the work of the Holy Spirit, but in the latter case it is finally fruitless. They have shared in the Holy Spirit, but have chosen to receive death and not life.
They would prove themselves as being like the land which the first Adam would cultivate after he had fallen, for that land would also for him produce ‘thorns and thistles,’ and that land was cursed (Genesis 3.1-18). But those who were blessed were the children of the second man, the last Adam, who would produce fruit a hundredfold, because for Him there was blessing and no curse. He was crowned with glory and honor (2.9).
So in good Old Testament fashion there is the contrast between blessing and cursing, the choice that was regularly laid before God’s people. ‘Nigh to a curse’ could describe their present state, and refer to any considering apostasy at the present time, as not yet having taken the final step, the final renunciation, and who are therefore near to being cursed, but have not yet been so. Should they choose to do so their end will be to be destroyed, as thorn infested ground is burned, both to clear it of the weeds and stubble and possibly as a curse and judgment on it.
This comparing of what was fruit bearing and what was not is regularly used both by John the Baptist and by The Lord Jesus Christ. In the end it is by men’s fruits that what they are is really known. Fruits are regularly seen as necessary testimony to true faith (Matthew 3.8; John 15.1-6).
It is nice to talk about bearing fruit but in reality how is this evident. The statement ‘Brings forth herbs meet for those for whose sake it is also tilled’ helps us understand how this takes place. The good land is not only blessed but it provides blessing to others. Through God’s help it provides for God’s people an all-sufficiency. And he will now point to the ministry of those to whom he is writing which seemingly does this and thus gives him hope that they are truly good land.
So, we all need to do our own inventory. Is there recognizable fruit in our lives? Do we in any way bring blessings to others?
6.9 ‘But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak.’
We are assured that in spite of the way he has spoken he expects better things of them than to produce thorns and thistles because they are barren land. He is persuaded of those better things, things which go along with and accompany salvation. He looks for fruit and faithfulness, and the blessing of God on them. And he does so because he believes that he has seen genuine fruit in their lives.
6.10 ‘For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and the love which you showed towards his name, in that you ministered to the saints, and still do minister.’
Our Holy and Merciful God will not forget what they and us have done in His name. He Is not unrighteous. And therefore there is no danger that He will overlook their work, and their ministry to the saints, to His people, and the love that they show for His name in continual ministry to His people even to the present time.
We are reminded here especially of the words, ‘inasmuch as you have done it to the least of these My brothers, you have done it to Me’ (Matthew 25.40). God sees what people do for those who are His, and takes regard of it. Even a cup of cold water given in Christ’s name to a disciple will not lose its reward (Mark 9.41).
6.11 ‘And we desire that each one of you may show the same diligence unto the fullness of hope even to the end.’
His desire and longing for them is that each one of them will continue to show the same diligence as they have done in the past, with their eye on the future hope, so that they will be ready when the fullness of their hope becomes a reality in the second coming of Christ, kept faithful until the end.
6.12 ‘That you be not sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.
For his longing is that they will not be sluggish, but will faithfully imitate (behave similarly to) those who through faith and patient endurance inherit the promises. They have manifested love and hope, now he trusts that they will manifest faith and patient endurance. Others have faced persecution and have suffered or died. His longing is that if necessary they will do the same. And his hope in the end rests not on them but on the faithfulness of God.
Our hope as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ is in El Shaddai’s, Almighty God’s promises for the future life that are to be ours with Him, which we will one day inherit.
The assurance of salvation that His own can know is emphasized by the greatness of His oath to Abraham, and in respect of His oath sworn that the Messiah would be the High Priest according to Melchizedek. Our hope is established on this firmest of foundations, an oath made on His own Name, and an oath which was unchangeable. It is thus founded on two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, and is for us like an anchor of the soul, which enables us to enter into the very presence of God where our great High Priest is there to act on, as our Intercessor on our behalf, and our Forerunner as true and representative Man. His presence there is the assurance that one day all who are His will be there, for they are already there in Him.
6.13 ‘For when God made promise to Abraham, since he could swear by none greater, he swore by himself,’
When our Holy Ruler and Creator God commenced the process of salvation history, of restoration, with Abraham, He made an irreversible oath. His promise to him was sworn on Himself because He could swear on no greater (Genesis 22.16).
6.14 ‘Saying, “Surely blessing I will bless you, and multiplying I will multiply you.’
The promise was that our Great God would certainly bless him, and would certainly multiply him, so that throughout the whole world Adoni Yahweh’s own chosen ones would be brought into being, those who would become sons of Abraham, who would walk as Abraham walked, and would be blessed through him. His purpose was set and fixed and nothing could stop it. Thus those who enter into the blessing of Abraham through becoming God’s children by faith, have the assurance that they have come within the unchangeable promise of God, a promise which will never fail. When God made His oath to Abraham He made it to all who are His own.
6.15 ‘And thus, having patiently endured, he obtained the promise.’
And as a result of The Lord’s promises Abraham patiently endured, and through faith obtained the promise, an example to us all. So that we who are in Abraham should also patiently endure in order to obtain the promise.
You might be wondering exactly what was Abraham promised. He was promised numerous seed. You know that for a long period in his life no child was born to Sara his wife, until at last hope grew dim and he resorted to a number of other ways of obtaining what was promised on his own. His faith was at last rewarded and Sara bore a son. He obtained the promise, for in Isaac lay the whole future. Isaac was the guarantee of the countless seed that would look back to Abraham as their father. As a result of that remarkable birth Abraham then knew that all the other promises would be fulfilled. Thus did he have assurance that the One Who would finally bring all things together under God would also be born. He saw The Son of God, our Lord and Savior Jesus’ day and was glad.
And yet his final inheriting of the promise awaits the future. He has obtained it in faith but not in final fulfillment. That is yet to come, and we have our full part in it.
6.16 ‘For men swear by the greater and in every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation.’
The greater a man’s oath, the greater the object on which it is sworn. And when men have a dispute a most solemn oath firmly establishes the truth and confirms what a man says, and put all other considerations aside.
6.17 ‘Wherein God, being minded to show more abundantly to the heirs of the promise the immutability of his counsel, interposed with an oath,’
When our Holy God determined to show in the most certain manner to those who were the heirs of promise the unchangeableness of what He had determined to do, He did it by means of an oath in order to demonstrate that there would be no way in which He would alter what He had determined.
The impression given here is that those heirs of promise were already fixed and determined in the mind of God, and that His oath was being made to them as well as to Abraham. He was speaking to them as much as to Abraham. Those who are His now can look back and see themselves as there in Abraham, receiving the promise. And that is why they can have full assurance of God’s faithfulness to them.
Our Great Master and King wanted all to know that what He had determined to do He would do, that what He promised He would perform, because it was His unchangeable will. Thus do we recognize that it was not left to chance, or to the will of man, but was determined by God in every detail.
6.18 ‘That by two immutable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we may have a strong encouragement, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.’
This is guaranteed by two immutable things, two totally unchangeable things by their very nature, in which it is impossible for God to lie. This may be seen as referring to, firstly His solemn promise to Abraham, and secondly His solemn oath. Having such a solid basis for believing God we who have fled for refuge to the hope set before us, may have a strong encouragement to be steadfast, because they were made to us.
We who have thereby entered into His rest by fleeing from sin and disobedience and unbelief, and all the constraints of the world and of Satan, and all that would destroy us, in order to seize the hope set before us
‘To lay hold of the hope set before us.’ This hope is the hope of eternal life (Titus 1.2), the hope of final salvation (1 Thessalonians 5.8). It all is able to come about because of the hope in Christ.
6.19-20 ‘Which we have as an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast and entering into that which is within the veil, whither as a forerunner Jesus entered for us, having become a high priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.
The hope, which is like an anchor of the soul, is fixed on The Lord Jesus Who has entered as our Forerunner ‘within the veil’, that is into the very presence of God, as our eternal High Priest. It is both sure and steadfast. Such an anchor will not slip (is sure) or lose its grip (is steadfast) It is thus a hope sure and steadfast for it is fixed on and anchored in our Forerunner The Lamb of God Who took away the sin of the world, our Lord Jesus Christ, the perfect representative of Manhood and Great High Priest appointed on our behalf Who has gone ahead on our behalf.
The picture of the anchor is vivid. An anchor is cast out into the sea where it sinks and is lost to sight in invisibility, and reaches out to the bottom of the sea where it takes hold on some invisible strength. So is our anchor of hope cast out and disappearing into invisibility in the great beyond is caught up in our Great Forerunner Who will hold us firm to the end. We can thus live our lives in the full confidence that we are safely anchored to The Name that Is above all names, The Lord Jesus Christ.
The use of the name ‘Jesus’ emphasizes that in mind is Jesus as perfect, reinstated representative Man (2.9), but the whole sentence indicates that as such He has also become our eternal High Priest, not one bound by Levitical ordinances, but as a High Priest after the order of Melchizedek, and thus free from earthly restraint, and made higher than the heavens. We will learn in the next chapter that His ministry as High Priest is superior to that of Aaron in every way.
In conclusion of this awesome chapter let us take a look at these awesome descriptions of what our Fantastic Master has and is doing for us;
1. ‘Forerunner.’ - One Who has gone before as Man to prepare the way and lead us into glory. Because He Is our Forerunner, we will eventually follow Him within the veil into the very presence of God Most High. Nothing could be more amazing to a Jew than this, for to him that within the veil was forever barred.
2. ‘Within the veil.’ The veil separated the part of the sanctuary into which the priest could enter from the Most Holy Place where none could enter, except the High Priest once a year on the Day of Atonement after certain complicated special sacrifices, and where he could only remain for a short while (Leviticus 16). To enter within the veil at any other time would be blasphemy of an extreme kind, for God was envisaged as being there, usually invisibly, in all His awful holiness
3. ‘A High Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek’. He will not die as earthly High Priests did. The death of a High Priest was no ordinary event. It was seen by Israel as an event having great significance a reminder of man’s frailty and itself a kind of atonement for the manslayers, an atonement no longer required now that the great Atonement has been made (Numbers 35.25; Joshua 20.6). Nor will He be required to come out from within the veil after a short period, as an earthly High priest was compelled to do, His ministry is perfect and heavenly and unceasing and triumphant forever. He remains within the veil.
So, Any questions?
