Falling Away (Hebrews 6:4-12) with Pastor Andrew Courtis

One of the things I truly love about what the Lord is able to do through our gathering in worship of Him every Lord's day is among the many things the beauty, the reverence that we are able to offer in the excellence of music.

Music very quickly can become something that is a performance done out of preference and done out of an appeal to culture.

But when we understand that our God is the true, the good, and the beautiful, then we must offer that up unto Him.

May the Lord continue to reform his churches in such transcendent, majestic praise.

Whether it be done with many or a few instruments, may the true, the good, and the beautiful always be on display in worship of our holy God.

Please turn with me in your Bibles this morning to Hebrews chapter 6.

Hebrews 6 · chapter mention

Hebrews chapter 6, verses 4 through to 12.

Hebrews 6:4

This is a passage that for some causes great distress.

Some believe it to be a controversial passage.

And I will say in just a moment, some wrongly call it a problem passage.

But let's begin with the reading of God's Holy Word, beginning in verse 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, 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.

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.

But if it bears thorns and briars, it is rejected, and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you, yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner.

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.

And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end.

That you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

That is the reading of God's Holy Word.

Please join me in prayer.

Our gracious and almighty Lord, we thank you for sacred scripture that has now been read.

As we consider this text, we thank you for the seriousness in it, but also the encouragement that is ours.

I pray that you would help us now, minister to us, and give us the understanding that we need.

In the name of our Lord Jesus.

Amen.

Can a true Christian lose their salvation?

That is a question that has troubled some people over the centuries.

And there's a number of reasons that have caused people to be troubled by that question.

Some have heard teaching that implies or perhaps explicitly says that a Christian can lose their salvation, and this makes them feel very uneasy.

For others, they may be experiencing struggle in their life, struggle with sin, and they then ask the question: Have I lost something that I once had?

And some are even walking in great fear, lest they will cross that line and fall out of the experience of eternal life that they believe they possessed.

Well, I want to be very upfront and very clear.

It is my firm, unwavering conviction on the authority of God's word that a true Christian cannot and will not lose their salvation.

And the reason why I believe that to be absolutely true is because I think the Bible gives at least four lines of evidence as to why a Christian, a true Christian, will not lose their salvation.

The very first line of evidence is the purpose of God.

Salvation is a part of God's eternal purpose.

We learn that salvation begins in eternity past by means of God's sovereign decree.

And as a part of God's sovereign decree, he elects and chooses who will be saved.

Salvation doesn't begin with man, but it begins in the plan of God.

And we learn that those who experience the blessing of the predestinating work of God in his sovereign purpose of salvation will also experience the other parts of salvation, and that is the blessing of justification, in which the penalty of sin is removed from them.

They'll experience the blessing of sanctification, in which the power of sin is progressively being defeated in them, and they'll also experience the ultimate blessing of glorification, in which they'll be removed ultimately from the presence of sin.

The purpose of God in the gift of salvation is not to be separated from the whole.

When God grants salvation, salvation is a part of the whole.

You can't have justification without experiencing glorification one day.

It's a single package.

So the first line of evidence as to why a Christian cannot lose their salvation is the purpose of God in salvation.

Secondly, a Christian cannot lose their salvation because of the promise of God in salvation.

The promise is that no one will be able to snatch you out of the hand of Christ.

And the hand of Christ is in the hand of the Father, and that is also sealed by the Spirit.

That is the greatest security system in all of the universe.

No one can penetrate the protection of the Holy Trinity.

The Son will not let go, the Father will not let go, and the Holy Spirit will not remove his seal upon those that have inherited the gift of salvation.

It is the promise of God that those that are his, those that have been given unto the Son, those that the Son has atoned for their sins, they will be no they will by no means be lost.

Thirdly, a true believer cannot lose their salvation, not only because of the purpose of God in salvation, not only because of the protection of God, but also because of the promise of God.

God has made a promise, and that promise is that if you receive the gift of salvation, you have received eternal life.

And eternal life by definition is eternal life.

How can you possess eternal life and then lose it?

You never had eternal life.

You could have said I potentially had eternal life, but if Jesus has promised in actuality that those who experience this gift of salvation have been promised eternal life, then they by definition have eternal security because salvation is eternal.

There's many more promises, there's many more references to protection and purpose.

But just finally, we have a fourth reason why a person who is truly a Christian cannot lose their salvation.

And that is because of the petition of Christ.

Christ prays for those that are his.

We see this most clearly in John 17.

He references those that had been given to him from the Father.

And we learnt in our expositions of John 17, but also John 10, John 6, that this gift was a gift given to the Son before the foundation of the world.

This was a part of God's eternal plan.

The Father gave a love gift to his son, and the Son entered into covenant agreement to redeem these people that the Father had given him.

And the Son prayed for those that the Father had given him.

Some of them had already believed, and in John 17, verses 6, all the way through to verse 19, he prays for those disciples.

John 17:6

But he didn't pray for Judas Iscariot, he said, for he is a son of perdition, but he prayed for the others, and he prays that they will be kept.

And then not only does he pray for those who had already believed that they be kept, but in John 17, verses 20 to 26, he then prayed for those who are yet to believe.

John 17:20–26

So here you have the Son of God praying for those that have been given to him.

And we have said it many times whatever the Son asks for, he gets.

And the Lord Jesus Christ is not praying a potential prayer, he is not praying a powerless prayer, he is praying an effectual prayer, a powerful prayer.

And when the Son of God prays that those that have been given to him will be kept, the Father will honor that prayer and they will be kept.

So I began by asking a very simple question.

Can a true Christian lose their salvation?

No.

A true Christian cannot lose their salvation because of God's purpose, because of God's protection, because of God's promises, and because of God's petition, the Son of God is praying that those who are given to him will be saved.

Why do I share that with you up front, right at the beginning of this sermon this morning?

Well, it's because some people have read Hebrews chapter 6, verses 4 through the 12, and they've come to the conclusion that this text is teaching that somebody can lose their salvation, that an actual Christian, a person who has been justified, declared righteous before God, someone who's been taken out of the domain of darkness and brought into the kingdom of God's dear Son, can actually lose the experience of that.

Hebrews 6:4

And though they were experiencing the blessing of justification, were on the pathway to sanctification, will not experience finally the blessing of glorification.

This salvation can be broken.

This eternal life was actually never eternal life to begin with.

It was only a potential.

And some people have been troubled by that, and this is one of those texts that people will use to say that a true Christian can lose their salvation.

Well, what I want to do this morning is work our way through this passage because we are going through Hebrews and we must consider the argument that the writer gives.

But I think the first thing I want to point out about this passage is a myth.

And I want to show you why that myth is just completely wrong.

Hebrews chapter 6 is labeled by some as a problem passage.

Hebrews 6 · chapter mention

Have you ever heard that phrase?

Some people say in the Bible there are problem passages.

Let's be clear.

Get that out of your vocabulary.

If when I was little and I had said something wrong, and I know many of you had this experience, it happened to me on one definitive occasion.

Soap was put in my mouth.

I don't think that actually helped me other than not want to do that again.

So I guess ultimately it did help me, but we've got to get that spiritual soap in our mouth when we say that there are problem passages in the Bible.

The Bible does not have problem passages.

The Bible has passages that are hard to understand, it will have hard sayings, but there is no such thing as a problem passage.

In fact, when you look at Hebrews 6 and if you look at it in its context and not just merely extract it from its context and just fixate on this, this passage is not a problem passage at all.

It's actually a positive passage.

It's a partial passage.

It's a passage that gives us great comfort and encouragement.

Yet at the same time, it is a hard passage.

Hard, yes, in the sense that there are some things that might be a little bit difficult to understand, but I don't think that really is the issue here.

It's a hard passage because of the hard truths it conveys.

And what I want you to see as we go through Hebrews 6, verses 4 through the 12 is two important things.

Hebrews 6:4

The writer, first of all, presses home a very serious point.

I call it the seriousness of the warning.

The seriousness of the warning.

And then after that, he's going to give us an encouraging point, and we could call that the security of the warning.

So in all, Hebrews 6, verses 4 through to 12 is a warning.

Hebrews 6:4

And it is one of the five warning passages in the book of Hebrews.

And these warning passages are doing just that.

They are warning people.

They are warning people concerning the devastation of compromise, but they are also warning us against those who think they truly belong to the Lord, but they're not.

So what's going on here in Hebrews 6, verses 4 through to 12?

Hebrews 6:4

Well, I want to give you these two points: the seriousness of the warning, and that is found in verses 4 through to 8.

And then I want to give you in the final section in verses 9 through to 12, the security of this warning.

And this really is the encouragement and comfort.

So there is an exhortation and then there is this encouragement given.

But what we need to ask up front is this who are the people that the writer is talking about in verses 4 through to 8?

You'll notice he says how serious it is concerning these individuals, that it is impossible to renew them unto repentance.

We see that in verse 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 open shame.

This is referring to people who clearly are in rebellion, people who are being disobedient, and these individuals are not viewed ultimately as a part of the fellowship of the saints.

What's going on here?

Who is he talking about?

Well, first of all, I want you to note the description given to them.

We see a very interesting description in verses four and five.

Look at the language.

He describes them first of all as those who were once enlightened.

They tasted the heavenly gift, they have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come.

At first appearance, this sounds like a very good church member, doesn't it?

If someone described you this way, I don't think you would take it as a criticism.

You should take it as a compliment.

And I think that's the point.

This here is a description of an externally faithful life.

But it is notable what words are missing here.

There is one big word that's missing here, but it shows up later on in the passage when a huge contrast is made between the group described here and those that he actually encourages.

And that's the word salvation.

The word salvation is actually not mentioned in these verses, but it is used later on in the text.

You note that in verse 9.

But, beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you.

Yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner.

And then he'll go on and talk about the actual evidences of salvation.

The things that are used to describe these individuals in verses four and five will be true of true Christians, but can also be true of a counterfeit.

These things by themselves do not necessarily mean somebody is converted.

Now, in order to really understand this, there's two things I want you to see.

Arguably there's a third, but I want you to see two really clearly.

I believe that the people being described in verses four and five are a people who made a clear, public profession of faith in Jesus Christ.

They themselves were convinced and persuaded that they belonged to the Lord.

Other people believed that they belonged to the Lord.

But these people in the end defected.

And these individuals prove that they were never the Lord's to begin with.

They didn't lose something, they just simply demonstrated they actually never had it to begin with.

And why do I believe that to be case to be the case?

I want to give you three reasons, but really there's two that I want to focus on.

There's three reasons why I believe that the description here specifically is referring to those who are not true converts, but they're associated with the covenant community of God's people.

They actively attended church, they participated in the life of the church, they experienced the blessings of the life of the church, they even waxed eloquent about their knowledge of things of God in the life of the church.

They talked theology, they sounded Christian.

You would have been convinced by their Christianity, but in the end, they were proven not to be the real deal.

And there's at least three reasons why.

Number one, the context.

Number two, the contrast, and number three, and we can see this in the fact that the Bible gives actual illustrations of counterfeits.

The Bible does tell us explicitly that there are counterfeits.

But what do I mean by the context?

Well, before we get into a passage like this and just simply do a word study on every single one of these, the very first thing that you ought to do in Bible interpretation is always ask the question, what is the context?

And the context here, more immediately, is remember, the writer has just introduced this theme in chapter 4, verse 14, and it goes all the way to chapter 5 and verse 10, where he introduces this important doctrine of the high priestly ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.

It is a lofty truth, an exalted truth, a powerful one for the Christian life.

But then he he pauses.

Even after mentioning that Christ has come in the order of Melchizedek, he pauses.

And remember what he did?

We saw it last week in chapter 5 and verse 11 through to 6 3.

He says, I can't proceed.

I can't go on and tell you these things because this is mature stuff.

This is the meat.

Of the Christian life.

These are the New York strips of the Christian life.

But the reason I can't go into these things is because among many of you, there you ought to have been teachers by now, but instead you're just talkers.

You are spiritual crybabies.

You're still on your bottles.

And it's been 40 years since the gospel has come to you, and you have not grown.

You are being spiritual infants.

You're being lazy and you are not committing yourself to these things.

You're not advancing in the gospel.

And for this reason, he has to pause and give them a warning.

And to awaken them out of that spiritual laziness, out of that spiritual stupor.

He needs to arouse them to devotion and commitment to Christ.

He wants to drive these things home to their consciences.

That's the most immediate context.

But prior to that, beginning in chapter three and all the way through to 4.13, remember the focus was on the blessing of experiencing rest.

And that rest is the ultimate experience that we have in Christ for all eternity.

That rest is experienced now in the preview of our eternal rest on the Lord's day in Jesus Christ, commemorating his resurrection.

But he said, I want to warn you lest you be like some of the Israelites of old.

Remember, he talked about the wilderness wanderings and he's quoting Psalm 95.

And what he said there was, there was a generation of Israelites that came out of Egypt and they wandered in the wilderness for the 40 years.

And while they were in the wilderness, what did they experience?

They were enlightened.

They were led by the fiery pillar, they were instructed in the law of God, and that did bring an enlightenment, enlightenment to them.

They tasted of the heavenly gift, they tasted the manna.

We also see in parallel to what we see here in Hebrews 6, that they also became partakers of the Holy Spirit.

They experienced the work of the Spirit in their midst, in which God delivered them from their enemies.

They saw the work of the Spirit endowed upon men who had constructed the tabernacle with the beauty as they were filled with the Spirit and they got to partake in the blessings of the work of the Spirit.

They were also being reminded of that which is to come.

They were looking for the promised land in the future.

The whole generation experienced these blessings.

They were partakers in God's promises.

They did participate in the blessings of what God had given.

They had tasted of the heavenly gift, they were enlightened.

They experienced all these things on the outside.

They were blessed, they are exposed to God's covenant goodness, and the covenant goodness of God was experienced by the people as a whole.

But what happened to the vast majority of those people?

They did not go into the land.

Why?

Their unbelief.

And the writer drives home this really important point, and he says to the congregation, hear God's voice while it's today, lest you be like that wilderness generation.

May there be none among you in the church, he says, who were just like the children of Israel and talked the things about God and experienced the perks of God's good hand, but in the end you were stubborn, you were truly unbelieving, and you were then rejected, and you didn't go into the land.

And it's with that imagery in the background, knowing that he is writing to the Hebrews with brilliance of rhetoric style, he takes these parallels, and then he says to his existing congregation, for it is impossible for those who are 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 to themselves the Son of God and put him to open shame.

What he's referring to here is people who have fallen away.

They've fallen away from those things.

And what is the cause of them falling away?

Well, this falling away has nothing to do with someone who's struggling in their Christian life.

Nor is it referring to somebody who's going through a season of suffering in their life and is beginning to falter a bit.

Nor is this referring to someone who experiences backsliding.

None of those things is falling away from the faith.

Every Christian's going to have seasons of struggle.

Every Christian will go through a season of suffering, and as a result of that suffering, may end up acting quite poorly.

There will be some who will backslide from the faith.

Here he's referring to someone who has fallen away.

He's referring to the sin of apostasy.

What's apostasy?

It's not the same as backsliding, it's not the same as struggling.

Apostasy is somebody who has consciously experienced the goodness of God.

They've been connected to the covenant community of God's people.

They've seen God at work.

They've said out loud how good God is.

Perhaps they've even waxed very eloquent in their theology and knowledge.

Maybe they've even got great theological labels that they can throw around.

They've been associated, they've experienced it, they've seen God move in their midst.

But then this individual renounces the Lord Jesus Christ and departs from him and definitively rejects him.

Now that definitive rejection can come out in two ways.

It can come out in a conscious one or a deceived one.

And what I mean by the conscious one is it could be the kind of person who experienced all those things.

They professed faith, they were baptized, they were in Bible studies, they were contributing, they were active in the life of the church, but then they come to a point and say, you know what, I don't believe any of this to be true.

I renounce it all.

I know what I believed once before, and it is just absolutely wrong.

I've gone into the heights and depths of theology, and after considering it all, I just reject it and I shake my fist at Christ and I and I do not want it at all.

Now that is that conscious, hard-hearted apostasy.

But there can also be a deceived apostate, and that is someone who departs from the truth of the word of God and still claims to be a Christian, but they're now affirming heresies.

And that, my friends, is very dangerous.

And that will come out with those who will deconstruct their faith.

It will come out in those who still claim to be Christians, and this really is the heart of liberal Christianity.

And liberal Christianity will often be marked by those who are actual apostates, where they know better.

They know the truths, but they have now embraced these teachings that are outright heresy.

They deny the substitutionary atonement, they deny the clear realities attached to the purity of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

These are dangerous areas.

So the writer is not talking about a struggling Christian.

He's not talking about someone who forgot to have their quiet time one week.

He's talking about somebody who experienced the depths and the goodness of the community of God's people.

But at the end of the day, because of the sin of unbelief, remember chapters three and four, this unbelief has resulted in their rebellion.

Whether the rebellion has manifested itself in an angry atheist way or in a liberal Christianity way, it has manifested itself by means of rebelling against God's word.

And they've got themselves into a place where they are so hardened.

They don't want to come back.

And the writer is saying here, these individuals, they're shaking their fist at God.

They are resisting God.

And because they are in this hardened state in which they hate God, they do not love the purity of God's word.

They are chasing after these other things.

It is impossible to renew them because they are hostile towards Christ.

They are just like those hostile crowds at the time of the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they are acting shamefully.

When the writer says that they were once enlightened, just like the children of Israel were once enlightened yet didn't enter the land, these individuals were enlightened.

They are enlightened through instruction.

They heard doctrine proclaimed clearly, they saw the light of the gospel.

Some early church fathers linked this word enlightened with the instructions they would receive during their baptisms.

Either way, they were enlightened because they heard truth.

They had tasted of the heavenly gift, they had experienced the heavenliness of God's workings and operations in their midst.

They had become partakers of the Holy Spirit.

They experienced the overflow of the blessings of the Spirit of God in their midst.

Think of this as well.

One of the greatest examples of somebody who Christians, believers thought was a true convert, but in the end wasn't, was someone who had experienced the ministry of the Holy Spirit, and that was Judas Iscariot.

Judas Iscariot was given the ability to cast out demons.

That was a work of the Spirit.

The Spirit of God had come upon him in a unique way, as he did the other disciples.

Yet we learned that Judas Iscariot was a counterfeit.

He was not the real deal.

The other disciples didn't see it coming.

That's why when he left the upper room, remember, he leaves, and the Lord said that one of you is going to betray me.

When Judas left, no one questioned it.

No one saw it coming.

Because on the outside, he had all these activities.

And also they had experienced the powers of the age to come.

Now, when the Bible says age to come, sometimes that literally is referring to that time period when the Lord Jesus Christ returns in the consummation of his kingdom.

But in Hebrews, the age to come refers to the messianic age.

It's the inaugurated kingdom that Christ has brought about.

And so that age to come is happening now.

It's happening already, but not yet.

And they've experienced some of the power of that messianic age.

They're gathered in the community of God's people.

And whether it be seen in just very subjective things like we gather together in a church service and we sing some grand songs, a reading is given, a baptism takes place, we gather around the Lord's table, a sermon is preached, and some people can go, wow, I was just so moved today.

I just saw the grandeur.

There was something special in our midst.

But it's possible for someone not to be converted and to experience those things.

So when we look at all of this in verses four through to six, what we have here is the context has reminded us that these are the same things that the children of Israel experienced long ago.

And they experienced these things and didn't enter into the land of promise, not because they lost anything, because they actually never really believed.

And in this passage, we see the same idea continue over.

This group of people here have been attached to the covenant community, they have been experiencing the external blessings, and these external blessings have brought about some internal blessings for them, but they've apostasized, they've fallen away.

Why?

Well, it's not because they've lost something, they're demonstrating they never had it.

And then we also see the second reason, not just the context, but the second reason is is the um the contrast.

And the contrast is seen in verses seven to eight.

It's interesting, he says, 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.

But if it bears thorns and briars, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned.

What he's referring to here is there is this soil.

But this soil is going to result in that which is blessed for some, and it's going to result in that which is cursed by others.

This earth will drink up the rain, but in some portions it's going to produce herbs and they've been cultivated, and it's noted as a blessing of God.

But then there's going to be other parts of this soil that drank up that same water, but in the end it just bears thorns and briars.

It is rejected, and it is near to being cursed, and at whose end is to be burned, it's going to be judged.

When you hear the language blessing and cursing, that's never used of faithful Christians and unfaithful Christians.

That's only used of those who truly believe and those who don't believe.

This is covenant language, blessing and cursing.

And that's why I reject the view that this is not talking about a Christian who's lived a backslidden life but still gets to heaven and just loses rewards.

A true Christian can never be among the cursed.

They will only be among the blessed.

And so what we have here is the idea is there are different outcomes of life by means of this contrast.

Both receive the blessings of the water, but both produce different outcomes.

And why is that?

Well, the answer would be simple.

It's different kinds of soil, isn't it?

And that's exactly what our Lord taught in Matthew 13.

Our Lord there isn't talking about four different Christians, He's talking about one soil that is a true Christian and the other soils that are counterfeit.

There is the stubborn soil, there's the shallow soil, and there's also the soil that will have thorns in it that will strangle a person through worldliness.

But then there is the soil that brings about salvation.

And that's the difference here is we can't always see the difference in the soil, but that's the explanation as to why the same people can hear that same word of truth, but eventually some will persevere and some won't.

It's because there was a different soil.

Now, that's what we see in verses four through to eight.

Verses four through to eight is a serious warning.

Why does the writer give this serious warning to this church?

Because some people have thought, well, if he's saying this to the church, evidently it's possible for true Christians to do this then.

Well, you need to remember that the writer doesn't actually know the heart of everyone who professes faith in Christ.

And this warning is designed to actually encourage them and stir them up into good works, to spur them on to perseverance and faithfulness.

And warnings like this are means that God uses to help us in our perseverance.

So what he does in verses 9 through to 12 then is he then says, But I expect better things of you.

But beloved, we are confident of better things concerning you.

Yes, things that accompany salvation, though we speak in this manner.

What he's saying there is that I know that when I look at your in in the midst of you, that I expect greater things, that are things that pertain to salvation itself.

And here is the distinction between what he's just described in the previous passage.

A person who has true salvation will have the things mentioned in verses four and five, but a person who has true salvation will not have only verses four and five.

What are the things that accompany salvation?

What are the evidences of genuine salvation?

Well, it's interesting that he goes on to say in verse 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.

You see what he's saying there in verse 10?

He's giving the true marks of salvation.

The true marks of salvation are not that someone attends church, it's not that they've got lots of Bible knowledge, it's not that they've experienced things and feel things.

The true marks of salvation are simply this.

They genuinely love God and they genuinely love the people of God.

And that's really the heart of the law of God and relating to God.

That's the sum of the law, isn't it?

To love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

And here we see that the writer is saying, the reason why I expect better things of most of you is because when I look at you, I actually see that you love God and you love his people.

Yes, you might be struggling.

Yes, you might be stepping back sometimes in your Christian life, and yes, you may even go through a season of backsliding.

But here's the difference a true convert, a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, even in the midst of their suffering, even in the midst of their struggle, the point is they still love God, and they hate the fact that they're not loving him the way they ought to.

They're sinning, but they hate the fact that they're sinning.

They're failing, but they hate the fact that they're failing.

Why?

Because they love God, they love him, they love his law, they love Christ, but they also love the people of God.

They love gathering with the people of God, they love the Lord's day, they love worshiping the Lord, the Lord's way.

They love the Lord, they love the Lord's people, they love God, they love what God loves.

And that love for the people of God is evidenced in the way in which they minister to the saints.

And isn't it interesting that he uses the word saints there?

Because now he's showing the authenticity.

The saints here are not those who are just merely attached, but the saints here are those that he is describing in the genuine article in verses 9 through to 10.

They've ministered to the saints, and ministering to the saints means more than just hanging out, it means doing life under the word of God together, bringing the word of God to bear in the saints, ministering, supporting, encouraging, uplifting, helping, confronting, challenging, praying for, standing alongside, rebuking, doing all of these things.

This is what the saints do.

This is what it is to be in the family of God.

They stir one another up for good works because they love God and they want to serve Him with faithfulness.

So here he gives the marks of this genuine salvation in verse 10.

And then he goes on to say in verse 11, and we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end.

What he's getting at there is, I'm challenging you, he says.

I'm challenging you to keep on going, to keep on pressing on in your Christian life.

And the idea here is that if you are a genuine believer, then your assurance of salvation will come by means of your perseverance.

You can be a true Christian and not experience assurance of salvation.

Assurance of salvation doesn't mean that you're saved, or to lack assurance of salvation doesn't mean that you're not saved.

But assurance of salvation is there for the taking.

And the way in which we experience a growing assurance of salvation, the way we cultivate our assurance of salvation is through our faithful perseverance and diligence in loving God and loving his people.

And as we continue to go in that way, it strengthens and enables us.

The writer here is pressing that home.

He desires that you would show that same diligence, as there are some in your midst, he says, who are showing diligence in their love for God.

They're showing diligence in their love for the saints.

He says to the rest in the church, and I call on you to do the same.

And he says this to be a means that would spur them on, so that those that are truly the Lord's will respond to that and say, Yes, I want to continue to grow in my love for God and my love for the saints.

But those who hear that and just continue to just drift along, or those who continue to just talk to talk, there's no lack of, there's no losing of salvation for them, but what may be revealed is they were never truly of us.

He finishes by saying his ultimate purpose in all of this.

And this purpose was introduced last week.

Remember, I pointed out that chapter 5, verse 11, goes all the way to 612.

And remember, verse 11 and verse 12 has the same word, and that word is you've become sluggish or dull.

Literally, you've become lazy.

He says in verse 12 that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises of God.

The preacher here is saying that I see in the midst of this congregation, many of you are starting to become sluggish.

Your babies.

And the danger is that this is going to demonstrate something.

And I call on you, not knowing your heart, to persevere, to press forward, to keep your eyes on that heavenly prize.

So this passage really calls us to a positive pursuit of godliness and faithfulness.

So a passage like this at the end is not actually a problem passage, it's a pastoral one.

It's a positive one.

It's one that calls us to persevere.

And the key to the doctrine, as one scholar said, to the perseverance of the saints, is actually the word saints.

Because those who are truly saints persevere.

And that's the point that the writer is making in verse 10.

So the great challenge in this passage is we ought to take it seriously.

That just simply external outward acts do not prove our salvation.

And we ought to challenge ourselves on that.

I think we ought to do self-examination.

Are the things that I do on the outside routine do I do it because that's what they do in the church?

Do I do it because that's tradition?

Or do I do those things because I love God and I love his people?

That's the challenge of this text.

And this text is a call for that self-examination, but a beautiful, positive exhortation to go forward and to press on, that those who are the Lord's will experience the hope of assurance until the end.

May God grant us the blessing of that assurance, and may we persevere by his grace.

Our gracious and loving Heavenly Father, I thank you for what you have manifested for us in this text.

Lord, we recognize that there are some hard things in a passage like this, but we need to hear them.

And I pray that if there be any hardened hearts here, that you would convict them of their unrighteousness, that you would break those hearts and give them soft hearts to receive the treasures of your word.

Prepare us well now as we come around this table.

As we commune with Christ, I pray that you work in us and help us to draw near to you.

For Christ's sake.

Amen.