Hebrews 5:11Of whom we have many things to say, and hard of interpretation, seeing ye are become dull of hearing. 12For when by reason of the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need again that some one teach you the rudiments of the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of solid food. 13For every one that partaketh of milk is without experience of the word of righteousness; for he is a babe. 14But solid food is for fullgrown men, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil.

Hebrew 6:1 Wherefore leaving the doctrine of the first principles of Christ, let us press on unto perfection; not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, 2of the teaching of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. 3And this will we do, if God permit. 4For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, 5and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come, 6and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. 7For the land which hath drunk the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them for whose sake it is also tilled, receiveth blessing from God: 8but if it beareth thorns and thistles, it is rejected and nigh unto a curse; whose end is to be burned.

The main aim of 5:11–6:12 is to help us have full assurance of hope and a diligence to remain faithful. There was something starting to ruin that assurance in this church. The problem was called sluggishness in 6:12 and its called dullness of hearing in 5:11.

Questions We Can Ask About This Warning

1. What is the danger of this falling away? Lostness and condemnation?
2. What brings this danger to pass? What must we do or not do so that we do not fall away?
3. Can this happen to a person who has been justified, adopted into God’s family, and sealed by the Spirit?
4. Should true believers apply this warning to themselves?

What are the Consequences for One Who Falls Away?

Hebrews 3:13but exhort one another day by day, so long as it is called To-day; lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin: 14for we are become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end

The danger is real lostness forever, the final curse of God and the fire of hell. He is not talking about a mere temporal disciplining of the child of God. He is talking about a final fiery curse.

This is the case of someone who has been brought close enough to taste something of the transforming grace of God, seeing what the gospel truly is, understanding it, believing it, being in some measure cleaned up by it. Then, because there is no grace of perseverance, because that’s not a component of their faith, they look it straight in the eyeball, see it for what it is, and say, I don’t need this, and they walk away.

First, the emphasis on the seriousness of this falling away, precisely because this gospel is the climatic gospel; In Hebrews 2, “How shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation?”
Secondly, there is no return. The seriousness works out unambiguously in saying that there is no return from this falling away.

The illustration of the Farmlands

The two pieces of farmland suggest that God’s final curse is in view.
The Land which has drunk the rain that often falls upon it, and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a blessing from God. But if the land bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed; its end is to be burned.

The two fields represent two kinds of persons: one a fruitful person, and a fruitless person. Three words point to the final condemnation and lostness of the fruitless person. The fruitless field is worthless (Romans 1:28; Timothy 3:8;), and it is about to be cursed, and its end is burning. Worthless, cursed, destined for burning. That is the language of final condemnation.

Hebrews 12:14 the author says, “Strive for peace with all men, and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.”

The warning here is that a person that does not pursue holiness will not see the Lord. So what is at stake in this book is not seeing the Lord. But not seeing the Lord final separation in hell.
What do we do with a Simon Magus? “

What Reasons in General Might Cause a Person to Fall Away?

It’s worth noting, there is a fairly rare word that occurs in 5:11 and in 6:12, in the opening verse of the section and in the closing verse of the section. That word is nothros, and it can be translated sluggish or thick, perhaps lazy, but lazy in your hearing.

What is it that prompts this sluggishness, this inability to hear, to listen, or to understand? The basic problem is simply immaturity in listening to, studying, absorbing, and conforming to the Word of God.

In the context of Hebrews, this means the reader should have already been thinking through their Scriptures, the Old Testament Scriptures, in line with the way the author is expounding these themes. He’s really treating them in such a way as to say, are you kidding me, you don’t get this. By this time you don’t know this stuff? You were on the tenth grade level before, now you have gone back to the first, you mean I have to start over. What have you been doing, surely have not tried to move on, you have been lazy with this.

The whole context tells us that more than a simple change of mind is involved. What’s involved is a life that is persistently fruitless.

Here, in the day this was written, those he warns have a desire to go back to the old rites, the old traditions, the old covenant in such a way that their true pointing to Christ is not seen, so that one is fixating on the types and not the antitypes, one is fixating on the old covenant and does not see how it is pointing to the new day in Christ which has now dawned.

There is a passage in Deuteronomy, chapter 17:18–20, where Moses looks forward to the time when there will be a king in Israel, and he prescribes the first order of business for such a king.

“When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the priests, who are Levites. He is to study in order to progress as a leader and to lead his people.
Here in Hebrews, the writers says, the mature, who by constant use of Scripture have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. in a discernment sense, in a sense of understanding what Scriptures really do teach.

God Takes Part in Keeping Us from Falling

There will be no lack in the grace of God to prevent a falling away. v10 for God is not unrighteous to forget your work and the love which ye showed toward his name, in that ye ministered unto the saints, and still do minister.

There must be no lack in diligent perseverance on our part. Verse 11And we desire that each one of you may show the same diligence unto the fulness of hope even to the end:

That he is able to keep us from falling and to present us without blemish before the throne of his glory with rejoicing Jude 24.

The point of these promises is to engage our affections for the eternal glory of God. The point of the warnings is to disengage our affections from the perishing glory of this world.

Can True Bonified Believers Fall Away?

Hebrews 3:14 For we are become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm unto the end:

It does not say that you will become a partaker of Christ if you persevere. It says you HAVE become a partaker if you persevere. The point is that persevering does not earn your participation in Christ; it verifies your participation in Christ. Perseverance is not a payment for getting into Christ. It is a proof that you are in Christ. So the person who drifts along in sin and makes no business in life of holiness does not fall out of Christ. He was never in Christ.

Hebrews 10:14For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.

It does not say that his death will perfect them if they get sanctified. It says that his death HAS PERFECTED those who are being sanctified.

So a person who drifts into sin and neglects the pursuit of sanctification and falls away from God is not a person who was once saved by the death of Jesus and then lost that salvation, because Hebrews 10:14 says that salvation is an everlasting accomplishment for a certain group of people. And our assurance of being part of that people is our perseverance in faith and the pursuit of holiness.

Looking at these verses in Hebrews where the warnings are given once could conclude, if someone drifts away from God and makes shipwreck of faith, it is a great indicator they were never born again, justified, adopted, and sealed by the Holy Spirit. They might have gone through the motion and did things that looked like a born again person, but in reality, they were not.

Can Believers Apply This Warning to Themselves?

Should those of us who believe that we have been saved by our trust in Jesus work on the cross, that we are justified by the blood of Jesus, reconciled to God, indwelt by the Spirit of sonship, should we apply this warning to ourselves? Should we read Hebrews 6:4–8 and take heed to ourselves?

Yes, We should.

Because the writer saw the importance of the very writing of this warning.

When the writer of this book finishes his warning in 6:4–8, he says in verse 9, “Though we speak thus, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things that belong to salvation.”

He has a strong confidence that his readers are NOT going to make shipwreck of their faith. They are not going to commit apostasy and fall away from God. They are going to persevere. But he knew this when he started writing this warning in chapter 6 just five verses earlier. So it seems that the writer wants people whom he is very confident about to read his warning and take it to heart.

Because of the writer’s description of who can fall away we should take note.

The kind of description that he gives in verses 4–5 of the person who can fall away from God should remind us that we need to examine ourselves and beware that it can happen to people that might appear saved.
That person can be enlightened—have much truth and insight into the Bible and the gospel.
The person could have tasted the heavenly gift and be a partaker of the Holy Spirit—the very Spirit of God can be at work in his life convicting of sin, drawing to Christ, revealing truths.
They could have tasted to goodness of the Word of God—sat under its influence from mother and Sunday School teacher, and pastor; confessed it to be good.
They could have tasted the powers of the age to come—he can, Jesus says in Matthew 7:22, prophesy and cast out demons and do mighty works in Jesus’ name.
All this! And yet hear the dreadful words in the last day, “Depart from me, you workers of iniquity. I never knew you.”

And so the warnings of the Bible support our assurance in this way: they make us aware of the real danger of careless spiritual drifting, and then send us back with vigilance to the two main sources of assurance that we saw last week.

Look to Christ and all that he has done

Exercise faith in the pursuit of the holiness without which no one will not see the Lord.
We have this hope (verse 19), this anticipation, absolutely sure, and it becomes, thus, an anchor for us, and then in a glorious mixed metaphor, the anchor goes behind the veil. Normally anchors go down in the sea, but it’s almost as if the rhetoric of the man is escaping him now, and he mixes up his metaphors and the anchor goes behind the veil and then the anchor is suddenly Jesus. So the anchor is Jesus behind the veil, and if Jesus is behind the veil, it’s got to be because he’s High Priest and we’re back at Melchizedek again.

This business of Christian assurance and Christian apostasy is not supposed to be something first and foremost that one fights over to get the technical details right; it’s supposed to be an incentive to persevere, because of the certainty of all of God’s promises, the blessed graciousness of his oath, and the finality of Christ’s cross work as the High Priest, the certainty of the whole plan of God across the sweep of Scriptures so that we have certain hope. Amen.