The text says, “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, of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits.
For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, 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.”
I confess that I get the question. As a committed believer in the doctrines of grace, I often say that there are no Arminian prooftexts. Yet, if there were one, this would likely be it. At first glance it looks like a denial of perseverance or preservation of the saints, the idea that a true believer can never lose his or her salvation. A second glance can either be a polite way to describe hermenutical gymnastics, or a prudent interpretive practice. I’m saying it’s the latter.
The first thing to notice in this second glance is that this long list of blessings the hypothetical person has received, while impressive, and while listing good things genuine believers receive, is well short of the blessings that only genuine believers receive. Each of them, in fact, are blessings that are given to the visible church as a whole. One can be enlightened, taste the heavenly gift, a partaker of the Holy Spirit and taste the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and not be elect, regenerated, repentant, given the gift of faith, have one’s sins atoned for, be vindicated in the resurrection, indwelt by the Spirit, gifted by the Spirit, and adopted into the family of God.
The visible church consists of those that we believe have received both sets of experiences. When one falls away, however, we learn that such a person hasn’t received that second set of blessings. It strikes me that the author of Hebrews, as broad as his description of the gifts is, studiously avoids listing anything that only genuine believers receive. A person who is unregenerate and in the church has been enlightened in that that they have been taught the gospel. They have tasted the heavenly gift in that they eat the bread of life at the Lord’s Supper. They, by virtue of being a part of the church which is the dwelling place of the Spirit, have been partakers of that Spirit. They, by sitting under the preaching of God’s Word have tasted its power, and again, by being within the church have been witnesses of the powers of the age to come.
I could add two more. What if someone had received all the above, plus had performed miracles in the name of Jesus, and even had Jesus Himself wash his feet? That adds up to Judas. I’m afraid we have too low a view of the work of God in the visible church, and, if we doubt that the One who suffered for us will never lose us, too low a view of the fullness of His salvation.
It is a presumptuous and dangerous thing to claim that the future will vindicate us. “You’re on the wrong side of history” isn’t an argument against a position or practice but a mere boast. Unless, of course, the One who knows all things has told us about the future. The world today is in something of a tizzy based on the recent leak of a draft of a majority opinion of the Supreme Court which is predicted to undo the most evil decision the court has ever made, Roe v. Wade. As wicked as the Dred Scott decision was, it is dwarfed by Roe. Our Father has not revealed, to me at least, whether this is in fact what will happen. Justice Roberts has confirmed the authenticity of the leaked document, but affirmed that it is just a draft. What God has revealed is that the wrong side of history is for goats, the right side for sheep. History will, because it ends in the final judgment from the Ruler of heaven and earth, expose Roe as the Moloch worshipping evil that it is.
It is vital that we not only believe this but cling to it. Because the rhetoric is about to get scorching hot. Any assault on the perceived sexual liberty of the world is met with howls of protest. This, however, will be worse. Roe, when it is overturned, will no longer protect their bloody sacrament. Those of us who rejoice over such a decision, and those who bring the battle to every state in the union, will be subjected to hatred, violence, accusation, vilification, mockery. We will be seen as knuckle dragging baboons, clueless barbarians, heartless Nazis. And that will hurt.
But we must remember that we are receiving such for this reason- we believe it is the God given duty of the civil government to protect all image bearers, whatever age they might be, and wherever they might be at the moment. Do not allow the rhetoric to become the story. Do not, in fact, let our hardship become the story. The problem with Roe is not that it makes Christians who oppose it lose standing in the broader culture, but that it protects the murder of babies. A little social ostracism isn’t a burden. It is, in fact, a mark of honor according to our Lord (Matt. 5: 10-12).
We must not shrink back, nor dream of returning to the Egypt of cultural respectability. We must not seek out a non-existent middle ground. We must not apologize for laboring for protection of babies. That said, neither now, nor if the day actually comes that Roe is overturned, then, is not the time to dance in joy. Give thanks, yes. Praise God, yes. That time, however, will be better spent mourning for the more than 60 million dead since Roe. We must remember that that’s not a statistic but a tragedy, that each victim was an individual bearer of God’s image, as human and as valuable as each one of us. When, if, this decision comes down, that day will be D-Day. Then comes the long, bitter march to Berlin. And when He returns, judgment.
“By this,” Jesus said, “all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). Here Jesus gives us an apologetic we seem to have lost sight of. One of the blessings that come with God’s people loving one another is that those who are not God’s people are better able to recognize God’s people. It blesses those within the church and those without the church. Better still, it shows forth His glory. We, on the other hand, would rather argue worldviews, amass compelling evidence, make bold prophetic statements. What God would rather have us do is to love one another. God would rather we do the hard thing, for that is where the power is.
The common bumper sticker makes a salient point. The watching world affirms that what makes Christians so reprehensible is our hypocrisy. They see us sin, while believing we believe that we don’t sin. And they hate us for it. The sticker, then, answers the objection: “Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiven.” We’re not perfect. We are forgiven. But the forgiveness we have from the Father works itself out, takes on feet, when we in turn forgive others. The fruit of forgiveness received is forgiveness given. How many times does Jesus remind us of this connection? We who have been forgiven much manifest that truth in forgiving others. Perhaps that ought to be our bumper sticker: “Christians aren’t perfect, just forgiving.” I’m afraid the world around us may find that too hard to swallow. They know us all too well.
We are accustomed to thinking of worldliness in the narrowest of contexts, if we
think of it at all. We think it a synonym for pleasure, as if the devil has cornered that market. We don’t want to be caught at the local movie theater or dance hall, for instance, because such hurts our “witness.” That is, it presumably makes us look worldly to the world. Our problem, however, isn’t that we go to movies or dance like the world, but that we think like the world. The world is a place, we and they think, where every human interaction is a battle, a zero-sum game that you either win or lose. We suspect one another, rather than trust one another. We are always intent on protecting our interests, or at least what we perceive our interests to be. It’s a dog-eat-dog world, and no one likes to be eaten.
Love suffers long, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, and bears all things. “If I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1 Cor. 13:2b–3). Love is the antithesis of the grasping paranoia that marks the world. Love, in short, is the very fruit of our own deaths. That is, as we die to self, we are no longer interested in keeping score. As we die to self we feel no need to protect our own interests. As we die to self, when our brothers do us wrong, we find it easy to forgive, for who can harm a dead man? As we die to self, we let our lives shine before men, and show them that we are His.
A very wise man once said, “Never ask God for justice. He might just give it to you.” What defines us is that we are a people who have been given grace. We were not only given the grace of forgiveness, but were given the grace of repentance. As we keep our sins ever before us, we will see His forgiveness ever before us. And we won’t have opportunity to see the speck in our brother’s eye.
A day will come by God’s grace when the church of Jesus Christ won’t be known for hypocrisy. We won’t be defined by the men we vote into office. Our reputation won’t be built around the things that we are against. A day will come when we are no longer recognized by the bumper stickers on the backs of our cars. A day will come when Jesus’ promise will be fulfilled, that the world will know that we are His by our love one for another. That love will show itself the same way God’s love for us is shown, in our zeal to forgive one another. A day will come when every man, as he passes by a church, will know that this is the place where you will find forgiveness not only from our Father, but from our brothers and sisters as well. We hasten that day as His will is done on earth as it is in heaven, as we love and forgive like only His children can do.
Like prose and poetry, these two terms are better understood as opposite ends of a spectrum, rather than raw opposites. When we write prose we are given to sundry poetic devices, word-plays, metaphors, etc. and when we write poetry we are communicating information. In like manner it is rather difficult if not impossible to teach without preaching to some degree, or to preach without some level of teaching.
One way to illustrate the distinction however is to note the difference between the indicative and the imperative. The former tells us what is, the latter tells us what we’re supposed to do. Teaching, obviously, tends toward the indicative while preaching tends toward the imperative. But what if we made the distinction absolute? Would not any teaching utterly bereft of any imperative cause us to yawn, to reply, “So what?” In like manner, were we to drain preaching of all indicative, and be left with only imperative, would we not have sermons that merely shout, “Do something!”? Would it not end up sound and fury, signifying nothing?
Which means, in the end, that these are each matters of degree. I’ve been blessed to be able to teach at several colleges and universities. Because my desire for my students is that they would grow in grace and wisdom it is not my design to merely download information from my brain to theirs. My classes therefore tend to follow a real, though unplanned pattern. It usually happens that I spend roughly two thirds of my class time giving and explaining information. Then, in the final third of class I tend to commence to preaching. I begin to exhort my students to live in light of what they have learned, to change their perspectives, and their lives. I begin to implore them to change their hearts.
I have been blessed also to preach. Here I certainly have an obligation, as best as I am able, to explain the text. I seek to place the text in its historical context. I try to clear up any grammatical ambiguities, or translation issues. But, persuaded that the Bible is not some odd and mysterious book that isn’t eminently understandable, believing that our problems are more moral than intellectual, that we are more foolish than stupid, I exhort the congregation to believe, to trust, to rejoice, to give thanks, to love, to forgive. Every Sunday when I preach I walk into the pulpit not only hoping to be true to the text, but hoping to encourage growth in godliness. I want the flock to go away persuaded that in Christ they are beloved of the Father, and that Jesus changes everything.
We who are Reformed tend to be stronger teachers than preachers. The non-Reformed tend to be stronger preachers than teachers. We agree with the Bible, but remain unmoved by it. They are quick to be moved, but not always by the Bible. The Bible is not just filled with truth. It is filled with truth that ought to change us. It isn’t enough that we are taught the Bible. We need the Bible preached.
He was a pastor, one who believed in and preached the doctrines of grace. The church he served was not far from my then home, and on more than one occasion our paths have crossed. Today he sits in jail, charged with sexual assault against a minor. I don’t, of course, know if he is guilty or not. What I do know is that we will be seeing more and more of this as time goes on.
The devil is more crafty than any of the beasts of the field. He is crafty enough to know that just because all Christians know something is wrong, that he can still use that something. There are not, as far as I am aware, any Christians in favor of pornography. We all know it is a sin to consume pornography. If we succumb to that temptation, the devil is there to remind us of what we have done. We have sullied our marriage bed. We have embraced sexual immorality. We have dishonored someone’s daughter. We have distanced ourselves from our spouse. It is precisely because of these sins that the internet has been such a boon to the devil. Before the internet the consumption of pornography required real interaction with a live human being. You had to make the exchange with the clerk at the convenience store or the video store. You had to buy a ticket to the seedy theater. All the shame we feel was once public, and therefore potent but is now private and therefore weak.
The devil is content for us to feel this shame for at least two reasons. One, shamed Christians are likely porn for the devil. That is, it excites him, delights him, watching us, beloved of the Father, wallowing in our shame. The second reason is this- when we focus on the destruction wrought by looking at this website or watching that movie, we miss where we are going. It is a sin to alter our minds by injecting heroin, but the great evil is where it will lead, the sins of tomorrow whose path we blaze today. So it is with pornography.
Pornography disguises itself as a rabid ferret- fierce, destructive, but small, when it is actually a tyrannosaurus rex. What starts as immorality, the dishonoring of an unknown daughter of an unknown father, what starts as a small wedge in a marriage bed will and does become imprisoned fathers and husbands, and worse still, scarred little children who are more likely to continue the swath of destruction to another generation.
It’s a good thing to fight pornography by remembering the damage a ferret can do. But it’s a dangerous thing. Better to understand the nature of our enemy here. Would we not more earnestly flee if we knew our homes will blow up, and our lives will be ruined? Pornography is no cherry bomb; it’s an atom bomb. When we bring fire to our hearts, we light the fuse. Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways; do not stray into her paths; For she has cast down many wounded and all who were slain by her were strong men. Her house is the way to hell, descending to the chambers of death (Proverbs 7:25-27).
