The following "Question" was asked by a member of the congregation at Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, and "Answered" by their pastor, John MacArthur Jr. It was transcribed by Brenda Rivera of Orlando, Florida from the tape, GC 1301-O, titled "Bible Questions and Answers Part 17." A copy of the tape can be obtained by writing, Word of Grace, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, CA 91412 or by dialing toll free 1-800-55-GRACE. ©1978. All Rights Reserved.
Question
I just visited my parents back in Missouri and they believe that you can loose
your salvation. And I was trying to witness to them and tell them what I had
found out through DE (Discipleship Evangelism) and several other things that I
had studied. But I came across some scriptures that I did not understand because
I haven’t read the context and one is in Hebrews 6:4-6 that says, "For 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, and have tasted the good word
of God and powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is
impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucified to
themselves the Son of God, and put Him to open shame." And I did not understand,
I mean, when I read that I said "Woe!" it says fallen away that they can not,
it’s impossible to be renewed to repentance and I don’t understand what he is
saying here. And I wanted to ask you how it was is light of...like it also
mentions in Galatians...it’s in Galatians 5:4 "You have been severed from
Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace."
It mentions that "fallen from grace" and then in also the parable of the sower
where it talks about the seed who has fallen on the rock, fallen away through
temptation. And I didn’t know what [it all means]?
Answer
O.K. Basic question, how long does salvation last?
Questioner
Forever.
Answer
O.K. So now that we got that settled.
Questioner
Yea, I believe that.
Answer
O.K. well now that we’ve settled that [then] all we need to do is explain those passages, right? No problem.
See, we don’t throw out our whole theology, we don’t say "Oh, "eternal" doesn’t mean "eternal" and "forever" doesn’t mean "forever"--"Oh, it doesn’t mean that."
You see the temptation is, "Oh, I can’t explain that passage, we’ll throw out that doctrine." See and that’s what people do.
All right, you’ve fallen from grace--that doesn’t mean you necessarily ever knew grace. It means you have fallen away from grace as a principle, there’s a lot of ways to explain that. But basically what he’s saying is that if you live by law you have fallen from the principle of grace, whether you’re a regenerate or unregenerate. If I go out and try to live my Christian life legalistically I’ve fallen from the grace principle, right? So he’s writing to believers and he’s saying if you’re going to live your life by law, having begun in the Spirit are you perfected by the flesh? If you’re going to start living by law you have fallen away from grace as a principle of living. That’s all. You have to see the context there.
Now in the parable of the seed and the sewer, the whole point there is there was only one of the four that was real. Some of them made an initial reaction and an initial response, and you see that all the time with people and then as soon as something happens there gone.
But now the key one is Hebrews 6, because this is the one everybody goes, you know, takes this big trek to Hebrews 6. I’m going to write a commentary on Hebrews and then you can read it.
The Book of Hebrews is written to believers. But periodically through the book are warnings to unbelievers. "Harden not your heart" chapter 4, "How shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation" chapter 2, "How much more punishment shall those suffer who have trodden under foot the Son of God and counted the blood an unholy thing" chapter 10. Boom, boom, boom, boom--you have these shots at the unbelievers in the community that he’s writing to among the believers.
Here’s one of them, and he says verse 12 of 5, it has to start there, he says, "Look, some of you know enough to be teachers, but you have to be taught again the very ABC’s of the oracles of God." Some of you have been Jews, you have been taught and taught and taught and he’s not talking about Christians here, he’s talking to the unbelieving Jew who knows all of the Gospel, he’s heard it, he’s heard it, but he sits on the fence and he won’t make a commitment to it, he is restrained by fear of being "unsynagogued,"--excommunicated. He won’t make a commitment, he says, now you by this time should be propagating the Gospel, need to be taught the ABC’s of doctrine. You need milk, you’re unskillful.
Now it says in verse one of six, moving down, let’s leave the principles of the doctrine of Messiah, can we go on from this basic thing, of over and over the basics, the basics, the basics and I think he’s primarily talking about their Old Testament understanding of the Messiah. Let us go on the perfection, now the word "perfection" in Hebrews refers to salvation and I don’t have the time to prove that to you, when I went through the book of Hebrews, to me it’s crystal clear, that the word perfection is not used in a Pauline sense of maturity but is used of salvation. He says let's go on to salvation, let’s not go back to dead works, basic faith, doctrines of washings, and by the way that is not the word for baptism, that is a word translated every single time in the Bible "washing" except here, and somebody translated it "baptism" and made a Christian passage out of this. Let’s not go back to Hebrew washings, you know, of pots and pans and hands and all that, and laying on of hands, and basic stuff about resurrection. Do we have to keep going over all the basics and the primer of the Old Testament all the time?
Now come to verse 4, he says, "You know so much that it is impossible, for you who have been so enlightened and tasted the heavenly gift, partakers of the Holy Spirit, tasted the good word of God, the powers the age to come, if you fall away to renew you to repentance." In other words, with all you know if you turn your back on this you could never be saved. Why? Because if you reject with such full light, how could you ever be saved? Do you see the point?
In other words, if you walk away from this there’s no hope for you, because this is all the revelation you could possibly have, you ought to be a teacher. I mean you know everything. And if you turn your back on this…it’s hopeless. Your going to go right out and crucify the Son of God and put Him in open shame. He says in verse 7, "The earth drinks in the rain and brings forth herbs," but in verse 8, "You’re like the thing that happens also when it rains, that which bears thorns and briers, is rejected and near unto cursing and your end is to be burned." You see, the rain of the Gospel falls on some people and they bring forth herbs, you’re like the people who bring forth bitter thorns, you don’t respond.
Now look back in verse 4 for a minute. What does it mean to be enlightened…basically? What is enlightenment? Intellectual understanding, right? What does it mean to taste the heavenly gift? Who’s the heavenly gift? Really the Holy Spirit? How could these people have tasted the Holy Spirit? If you ever sat in a church and heard the Word of God preached with power, you’ve tasted the Holy Spirit. If you ever seen a life changed you’ve tasted the Holy Spirit. If you ever saw a miracle done by Jesus you’ve tasted the Spirit because He did everything by the power of the Spirit, right? And you are partaker of the Holy Spirit if you stood on a hillside when Jesus fed 5000 and ate a fish and a little cracker, you partook of the power of the Holy Spirit.
Let me tell you something, you’ve tasted the good word of God? Jeremiah said, "Thy words were found and I did eat them,"--you didn’t eat them, you just got a taste of them. You tasted the power of the age to come, the miracle power of Christ. In other words, what he is saying is, you got intellectual enlightenment and you’ve been exposed to all of this stuff and if you fall away with all this information that should render you a teacher instead of a student you’ll never be saved.
And I want to add a footnote to that. Not one word in verse 4 or 5 is ever used anywhere in the Bible to speak of salvation. Salvation is never called enlightenment, it is never called tasting the Spirit of God, it is never called tasting the powers of the age to come, it is never called tasting the good Word of God. Those are references to having an intellectual perception. So you see, the point there is they weren’t even saved,
Then in verse 9, he says, "But beloved" and he goes right back to the original audience and he says "We’re persuaded of better things of you, even things that accompany salvation."
Questioner
Now I explained that to them as, what I have come to know as the "18 inch miss"--from the head knowledge to the heart knowledge. That these people had seemed to have known about Jesus Christ, had known intellectually the Bible and all the principles, and had also been exposed to the teaching, but had only accepted it in the head. It’s a head acceptance not a heart.
Answer
It’s Hebrews 2, 3, and 4. "How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation, which was spoken unto us by those that heard the Lord and confirmed it unto us by signs and wonders and gifts of the Holy Spirit. See they saw the signs, they saw the wonders--the miracles. Remember the twelve were sent out with the ability to do miracles raise the dead and all that? They saw that, they saw the power of the Spirit, the power of the age to come. And they didn’t believe and he says how are you going to escape?
That’s an important question and I think a lot of people get confused by that passage.
You know what the key to the book of Hebrews is? It’s understanding to whom
it was written. And if you don’t understand the warning passages and where they
appear in Hebrews you going to get totally lost. Context is so important.
Added to Bible Bulletin Board's "MacArthur’s Questions and
Answers" by:
Tony Capoccia
Bible Bulletin Board
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