And if I were to ask you this morning, where do you think the most dangerous place you could be this morning in the whole world would be? It'd be interesting if we went around the room to hear how people would answer that question. If you think about dangerous places, some of you might think, well, to be a Christian in an Islamic country would be dangerous because in many Islamic countries you can even be killed for your faith. Maybe you would think of Lake Kaivu in Africa, which has 2.3 trillion cubic feet of methane gas trapped underneath it. And the only thing holding it there, keeping it from killing over two million Africans, is the pressure of the lake. And so at any moment, if the pressure of the lake changed, that gas could come up and kill two million people. Or maybe you'd even think of San Pedro, Honduras, which is the most violent city in all the world. But wherever you're thinking of is the most dangerous place in the world. I'd imagine very few of you, and maybe not any of you, are thinking you are right now in the most dangerous place in the whole world. I would argue that one of the most dangerous places you could ever find yourself is to be sitting with the people of God in church, to hear God's Word, to take communion, to sing songs, to read your Bible, and to pray, and to be in that place as a false professor of Christ. And that's really the warning that we have in Hebrews chapter 6 that we're going to look at this morning as the writer of Hebrews really takes up again the issue of apostasy. This is the third warning in the book of Hebrews where he warns us about how dangerous it is to turn away from the faith. So I'm going to read Hebrews chapter 6 verses 1 through 8. not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith towards God, of the doctrine of baptism, of the 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. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for passages like this this morning. Lord, it's intended to shock us, to awaken us, to cause us to examine ourselves, to expose our hearts. And father, we pray that you would meet with us this morning. We don't, we don't come here today just as a bunch of people doing a social club. We're your people meeting with our God. And so we pray that you would accompany your word this morning with the power of your spirit and that your people would be met with. And we pray this in your name. Amen. Well, we're actually going to have two sermons this week. One very short sermon on verse three, because I ran out of time last week. It contextually should have fit in with last week's, but I ran out of time. So we're going to have one short sermon on verse three, and then we're going to focus most of our attention on verses four through six. So sermon number one has one point. Then we'll look at three points under sermon number two. Some of you are like, man, you don't do short sermons. And if you're preaching too, we're going to be here till like tomorrow. That'll be okay. Last week we were in Hebrews chapter six, verses one and two. We saw how important it is for us as professing Christians to persevere in the faith. We saw how important it is for us to mature rapidly, to grow in sound doctrine, to be rooted in Christ, and then to build on those foundations that he gave us. And really, the emphasis of chapter 6, verses 1 and 2, is on our personal responsibility. He comes to us and there's... there's grace in all of scripture. But if you're just going to look at those two verses, you could look at them and be like, there's not a lot of grace. There's not a lot of gospel there. It's a whole lot of get up and do commands. It's you need to progress and you need to grow and you need to do it now. And he's he's about to bring the strongest and really the most terrifying warning in all of scripture about the danger of apostasy. And if there wasn't a verse three, we'd look at this and we'd say this is one of the most hopeless terrifying passages in all of scripture. Because we'd look at it and say, you need to grow up and be a man and be mature and be a responsible Christian, and if you don't, you're gonna apostatize and go to hell and there's no hope of repentance. If there wasn't a verse 3, that's where Hebrews 6 would take us. But instead of saying that, in verse 3 he comes and he says, and this we will do if God permits. It'd be easy for us to read over that verse three briefly and just think, well, that's that's a nice sentimental way of saying, Lord willing, we're going to grow up. Lord willing, we're going to persevere in the faith. But that's not actually what he's doing when he says this. We will do if God permits. He's showing us not only our helplessness to grow into maturity, but really because of that helplessness, our dependence on Christ, that that if God doesn't do that, if God doesn't permit us to grow, we won't grow. We won't mature. The word if in verse 3 is what's called a third class conditional participle. And what that means is it introduces to us a state of being, but it also introduces to us conditions to enter into that state of being. And so the state of being is this we will do, referring back to verses 1 and 2, we'll mature and we'll grow up in the faith. And then the condition for that happening is if God permits. We do that all the time in the way we talk and we don't even realize it. We say, if it rains tomorrow, we're not going to work outside. The state of being is not working outside. The condition for not working outside is if it rains. And if we take that grammar lesson and we bring it back to Hebrews chapter six, what he's saying is the way and the only way we're going to grow, the only way we're going to mature in the faith is if and only if God allows that to happen if he permits it, if he supplies everything necessary for that to happen. So where does our ability, where does our strength come from to mature in the Christian faith? It doesn't come from us. It doesn't come from me waking up tomorrow morning and saying, I am going to be the strongest Christian in Worland, Wyoming or in Thermopolis, Wyoming, and I'm going to do so because I'm just strong and I'm amazing. No, in and of our own strength, we depart from the living God. In and of our own strength, we go back to the world. We crucify, as he says, Christ. And so we are desperate, we are needy people for this grace of God to come into our lives and to give us everything necessary for us to persevere. He's reminding us that although we're accountable to God for our own maturity, we're incapable of doing that ourselves. So in Psalm 127 verse 1, It says, unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it. Unless the Lord guards the city, the watchmen stay awake in vain. And so, unless God comes and He supplies everything necessary for our maturity, you wake up tomorrow and you read your Bible and you listen to a sermon on the radio and you come home and you read the Bible with your family, all in vain. Unless God uses those things by His grace and He supplies the strength, to bring you into maturity. Here's what that means for us. That means that we're not spiritually as capable as we're prone to think we are. We're not as strong as we think we are, but we are hopeless. We are helpless apart from the grace of God. So we should wake up tomorrow. We should go to bed tonight. We should even finish listening to this sermon with an understanding that unless God supplies all the grace and strength necessary, It's really of no benefit to us. And so we should go to God and we should pray and we should ask Him to give us what we need to mature. So that's sermon number one. I told you the first one was going to be short. Now we're going to look at verses four through six, and we'll do so under three main points. You'll see them in your bulletin. What he does in verses four and five is he gives us what is undoubtedly the strongest and most terrifying warning about departing from Christ. He says, 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 say this is one of the most terrifying passages in all of the Bible because it tells us that there's something impossible. There's a spiritual condition we can enter into where if we were to go into that condition, it would be impossible for us to then come out of and repent. So this is a passage that's really supposed to shake us. It's supposed to jar us and cause us to say, this is serious stuff. This isn't just another sermon we can take or leave. This is a very serious message for each and every one of us. But also because it introduces to us a spiritual condition where he says there's no hope there's no chance of repentance from this spiritual condition it also becomes a very difficult passage to interpret and to say what does it mean because as a church we're we're a calvinistic church and when i say that what i mean is that our desire as a church is to say all of salvation is of grace we we experience the grace of god before we're even created when god elects us and chooses us and makes us objects of his love and grace before we even exist. And then in time, Christ loves us and graciously brings us to himself. That's of him. And our perseverance throughout the Christian faith all the way up until our glorification is all of grace. It's not anything we do. And so we come to a passage like this that that if we aren't careful, it appears to say we could even lose our salvation. And we have to go back and say, no, that's not what he's talking about. It's not contradicting that salvation that's all of grace. So the first thing I want to do is ask, who is this talking about? There's really three common interpretations that try to answer that question. The first one says, these are true Christians. These are people that came to faith in Christ, they repented of their sins, they believed the gospel, they bore fruit, and then they fall away. They lose their salvation. Hopefully by now each and every one of us know we have to reject that interpretation of this passage. We have to reject it because really that's contrary to the rest of scripture, but it's also contrary to the very nature of salvation. Salvation is called eternal life. And if eternal life can be lost, it's really not eternal life. But it's also contrary to other places in scripture. In John 10, Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me and I give them eternal life. and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand." And so to be in Christ is to be in his hands as a sheep. That's synonymous in John 10 with possessing eternal life. And he says anyone that's in that hand is eternally safe and there's nothing that can take you out of that place of safety. Also Romans chapter 8 verses 29 through 30. It says, for whom he foreknew, he also predestined. to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom he predestined, these he also called, and whom he called, he also justified. And whom he justified, these he also glorified. Romans chapter 8, verse 29 begins clear back in eternity past with God electing, with God choosing who he'd save. And that enters into time and it says that he actually saves those people, he redeems them, He calls them. He justifies them. He declares them righteous. And then verse 29 ends in the future with God glorifying his people. And that's called the golden chain of salvation. And there's nowhere in that. There's nowhere in that process that begins in eternity past and continues for eternity future. There's nowhere in there a believer can fall out of that process. And that's why he concludes in verse 30 the way that he does He begins with God choosing and predestining. And then in verse 30, it concludes in eternity future that we will be glorified. There's no holes in that process. Then he goes on in verse 38 and 39 to say, I'm persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, or principalities, or powers, or things present, or things to come, or height, or depth, or any other created thing is able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So nothing can separate a true Christian from God. So this doesn't teach that you can be a Christian and then you can lose your salvation and there's no hope of ever being saved again. The second interpretation says it's talking about a person who's a true believer, but the warning that he gives us about falling away isn't really a real warning. It's kind of like the mother in the grocery store who says, if you keep taking things off the shelf, I'm going to take you to the bathroom. And then you see him like an hour later on the other side of Walmart, and the kid still hasn't gone to the bathroom, and she's still saying the same threatening, repeating warnings over and over again. It's not that kind of a warning. It's a real warning. And really, one of the problems with thinking about it as a fake warning is that when we look at the other warning passages in Hebrews, they're clearly not fake warnings. They're not empty threats. Our God, when he gives a warning, when he gives a threat, He also is going to do exactly what he warns and threatens. And so the final interpretation, and obviously where we're going, I believe is the right interpretation, says that this passage is not talking about true believers, but it's talking about people who have made a verbal profession of faith. It's talking about people who have come into the church that look just like all the other Christians in the church, that have experienced much grace, as he goes on to describe, But they did so as unbelievers. They were able to look like sheep. The imagery elsewhere in scripture is the wheat and the tares. They look alike and they grow up together. But ultimately, in the end, they reveal they're not true believers. Really, it would be contrary to the rest of the book of Hebrews to interpret that this passage any other way. In Hebrews chapter three, verse 14, he says, for we have become partakers of Christ. if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm to the end. So he's saying we have already become partakers of Christ. We've entered into a relationship with Jesus and the evidence of that, what that looks like is that we will, if that's true, hold fast to the end. So this is talking about unbelievers that look like Christians and experience grace and then fall away. So let's get into the specifics. and see if they hold up against that interpretation. Hebrews chapter 6 verses 4 through 6. And first we're going to see a fearful depiction. Then we'll see a fearful declaration. Then we'll conclude by seeing a fearful justification. The first thing that just what he does is he begins by describing this person. What is this person that falls away and can't repent? What do they look like? What's their experience been? And the first thing he tells us is that they were once enlightened. What does it mean they were once enlightened? The word enlightened means to shed light on something or to cause light to shine upon an object. Figuratively, it would mean to give guidance or to give understanding, to make something clear, to cause something to be understood. And so what is this spiritual light that's revealed and even comprehended by these people that ultimately fall away? I think the answer to that is it's the light of the gospel of Jesus. The imagery of light being or being enlightened is a common way that the Bible talks about Jesus and how in the gospel Jesus comes and he illuminates us. He allows us to see reality. In John chapter 1 verses 6 through 9 it says there was a man sent from God whose name was John. This man came for a witness to bear witness to the light that all through him might believe. He was not the light, but he was sent to bear witness of the light. That is the true light, which gives light to every man coming into the world. So John is the forerunner for Jesus. He's the one that comes and prepares the way. And what does he do? He says, there's a light coming. Christ is the light. He's the one that illuminates the world and shows us everything that's true. John chapter 8 verse 12 it says again Jesus spoke to them saying I am the light of the world whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life so he's describing someone that's heard the gospel proclaimed to them either through reading the word through having a friend share it with them while they were drinking coffee by going to church listening to sermons on the radio in some way they've heard the gospel They've heard about Christ. They've heard about his sacrificial death on their behalf. They've heard about how his resurrection gives them life. And they've understood in some degree what Jesus has done for sinners. They've been enlightened in that sense. And it's important to notice that that illumination that he's talking about is in the passive tense. They have been enlightened. In other words, these professing Christians who then fall away didn't illuminate themselves. They were experiencing grace. It was God that came through His Spirit in the Word and illuminated them and caused them to see, caused them to understand who Christ is and what He's done. They had experienced the working grace of God in causing them to understand the gospel. But unfortunately, their exposure to the light and even comprehension of the light wasn't an exposure, it wasn't a comprehension that was embraced in personal faith in Christ. Because they were enlightened by Christ, and they then turn away from Him, He goes on to tell us that it's impossible for them to repent. In John chapter 12, verses 35 through 40, it says, Then Jesus said to them, A little while longer the light is with you. Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you. He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light that you may become sons of the light. These things Jesus spoke and departed and was hidden from them. But although he had done so many signs before them, they did not believe in him so that the word that Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled, which was spoken. Lord, who has believed our report and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? Therefore, they could not believe Because Isaiah said again, So understand that if God allows you in some way to come to an understanding of Christ, if God allows you to understand the gospel, that's grace. But that's grace that if it's not responded to in personal faith, is in great danger because ultimately it could lead you into this unforgivable sin. Then in verse 4, in addition to the grace of being enlightened, he goes on to tell them that these people had also tasted the heavenly gift. For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened and have tasted the heavenly gift. The word tasted is obviously a metaphor for experiencing. They tasted it in the sense that they experienced something. And so in Psalm 34 verse 8 it says, It's not saying eat the goodness of God. It's saying experience with all that you are the goodness of God. That's what he means. It's a metaphor for having experienced something. So what is it they've experienced? It says they have tasted the heavenly gift. There's a lot of discussion and disagreement about what that phrase the heavenly gift means. And it's hard to be certain what the heavenly gift is. Some commentators take it to be referring to communion because the word tasted is there. And so they would see it as, you know, we come and we taste this heavenly gift, this reminder of the gospel. Some interpreters take the heavenly gift to be Christ. Some take it to be the Holy Spirit. I think Christ and the Holy Spirit are probably a little too redundant for the flow of argument because he's already talked about enlightenment, which focuses on Christ. And then at the end of verse four, he goes on to say they've become partakers of the Holy Spirit. So I don't think it's talking about either of those. But what I do think it's talking about, and this is open to discussion, but I think it's likely a reference to salvation itself. Salvation is a heavenly gift. In Ephesians 2, verse 8, it says, for by grace you've been saved through faith. That's not of yourselves. It's a gift of God. Salvation is a gift that comes to us from heaven. And what I don't mean by that is that they were saved, but they experienced many of the blessings and the benefits that flow to those who are saved. If you're here with God's people, if you're hearing the word of God, if you're enjoying the fellowship of being with God's people, In a lot of ways, you're experiencing some of the temporal blessings that come with salvation, although you may not truly possess it. And notice, they didn't fully take it in. They didn't eat this heavenly gift. They didn't make it their own and receive the full benefits of it. They tasted it. They let it sit on their tongue. And ultimately, they spit it out and they reject it. That happens all the time, doesn't it? how frequently do we as a church and in other churches see people who are unconverted and come and they receive a lot of the blessings, a lot of the benefits that come to those that are saved. Life gets messy and there's no stability and so there's a lot of people that know, I can find that in the church, I can find that with God's people. And then what happens is the common grace that comes through salvation hits those people and then what happens is life stabilizes they spit it out they reject it and they go back to the world so in addition to having been enlightened and tasted the heavenly gift he goes on in verse four to say they've also become partakers of the holy spirit one of the things that makes hebrews 6 4 through 6 so difficult to interpret is that when whoever wrote Hebrews wrote it, he did so very intentionally to try to make these people look Christian. He wants us to know that he's not writing, he's not talking about your average run-of-the-mill pagan. He's not talking about the drunk guy with a brown paper bag sitting under the bridge. He's not talking about the promiscuous woman who spent all of her life selling her body. He's talking about people that sit in the pews of church, that wake up in the morning and read their Bibles, that look just like the rest of the church. He's describing someone who at many points in life looks to be a true Christian. And the reason I say that here is because when it comes to becoming a partaker of the Holy Spirit, we have to ask, does he mean an unbeliever can experience the fullness of what it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit? What does he mean when he says that they have become partakers of the Holy Spirit? And what he can't mean is that they are indwelt by the Spirit. Only a true Christian can be indwelt by the Spirit of God. In Romans 8 verse 9 Paul says, Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of God, he is not his. And so to belong to Christ is to have the Spirit of God, is to be indwelt by the Spirit of God. And so he doesn't mean that these unbelievers that look like believers are filled with the Spirit. Neither can he mean they were sealed by the Spirit. In Ephesians 4.30 it says, And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. The sealing ministry of God's Spirit is really twofold as we saw when we went through Ephesians. The seal of God's Spirit is really a mark of authenticity. It's God's stamp of approval that this is a genuine, true believer. And so to be filled with the Spirit is to have God's Spirit as a stamp, a mark of authenticity that we're genuine believers. But it's also a mark of preservation. He seals us for the day of redemption. Again, the imagery is that God's Spirit is what preserves, it's what keeps, it's what holds us safe in the hand of God so that on the day of redemption we're saved. And so he's not talking about that ministry of the Spirit. Instead, what he's talking about is those who have become partakers of the Spirit in the sense that they've experienced many of the works of the Holy Spirit. But that work has stopped somewhere short of genuine conversion. So how is it that they've experienced the Holy Spirit? I think John chapter 16 verse 8 really helps us understand that. John 16 8 says, And when he has come, the Holy Spirit, he will convict the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment. And it's in that sense that they experienced the Holy Spirit and that they experienced his convicting work. They experience the Holy Spirit testifying to the gospel. They experience conviction over personal sin. But really, all of that stops short of genuine repentance. Then in addition to those things, he goes on in verse 5 to say, This is a lot easier than some of the other ones that he mentions that describes this apostate person. He says they've tasted the good word of God. And one of the reasons it's easier for us to understand this one is because when he goes on, as we'll see next week, he gives us an analogy. He gives us a word picture of what this apostasy looks like. And the imagery he uses is one that Christ used frequently of our hearts being like soil and the seed comes in and the water. And ultimately, it's the word of God that brings that to us. And so when he talks about the word of God, that's what he has in mind. They've heard the Word of God. They've read the Bible. They've heard sermons. They've heard the testimony of their friends. He's showing us that unconverted people can hear the Word of God. Unconverted people can even, in a sense, understand the Word of God. They can even mentally give assent to the truth of the Word of God. They can even enjoy hearing the Word of God. There's unconverted people that like to hear sermons. There's unconverted people that love sitting down with a good devotional or with Burkoff's systematic theology or with a great sermon or whatever, that love to have the Word of God come to them. They can experience the Word of God and have that Word stop short of genuine conversion. Remember in Mark chapter 6, we have the story of John the Baptist being beheaded. And listen to what it says in that account about King Herod. For Herod feared John, verse 20, knowing that he was a just and a holy man, and he protected him. And when he heard him as John preaches the gospel, he did many things and he heard him gladly. King Herod was an unbeliever. Nowhere else in scripture do we even get the impression that he was ever converted. But in chapter 6, verse 20, it tells us he loved to hear John preach. He enjoyed hearing the word of God. Periodically, people come to me after church, and they'll be like, you know, I love hearing you preach because I understand what you're saying, and I've heard other preachers I didn't understand, and I just like hearing you preach it. And historically, I've responded to that by saying, thank you, or glad you enjoyed it, or something like that. But as I was looking through Hebrews 6 this week, I couldn't help but think, I need to respond to that differently. The response to that needs to be, be careful. Because to say that is to be in this category of people that are receiving grace. and to respond to that grace wrongly is to enter into danger. So the fact that you can hear and even enjoy the Word of God is not always a sign of conversion. Then the final thing he tells us about these people is that they have tasted the powers of the age to come. The age to come is really the age or the period of time that was inaugurated by the death and resurrection of Jesus. that is ultimately going to reach its fulfillment at the return of Christ. But it's an age, it's a period of time marked by powers and miracles and signs done by the Holy Spirit. The age to come is also the age of the Spirit in which the Holy Spirit is doing amazing, mighty things among the people of God. And the reason he's doing those is to attest to the validity of the gospel. Remember in Acts chapter 2 when the Holy Spirit came, There were people gathered from all over the world, people that didn't speak the same language at Pentecost. And the Holy Spirit comes. And then what happens is the apostles are there with tongues of fire on their head and they're speaking in different languages that they don't even know, being heard by all these different people in their own language. And there's this mighty rushing wind. There's this amazing expression and miracles of the presence of the Holy Spirit. And then the crowd sees this display of the Spirit's power. And they suppose that these people are drunk for what's going on. But listen to what Peter says, starting in verse 14 of Acts chapter 2. It says, God, that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters will prophesy. Your young men will see visions. Your old men will have dreams. And on my maidservants and on my manservants, I will pour out my spirit in those days and they will prophesy and I will show wonders in heaven above and I will show signs on the earth below fire and blood and vapors of smoke. the sun will be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before the coming of the great and awesome day of the lord it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the lord will be saved and so so the coming of this new age the coming of the spirit is marked by miracles and signs and wonders and by amazing expressions of supernatural power and when he says that they have experienced or they have tasted the powers of the age to come he's saying they've seen those things They've experienced miracles. Maybe some of them were even healed or raised from the dead or had seen tongues in the church. He's describing someone who's been shown grace. He's describing someone who's had various, numerous encounters with spiritual experiences that are often described as Christianity. But notice what else he tells us about this group of people in verses 4 and 5. He tells us that after experiencing this enlightenment, after having tasted the heavenly gift, after becoming partakers of the Spirit, after tasting the good word of God, and after tasting the powers of the age to come, He then goes on to tell us that they fall away. And that once they've fallen away, it's impossible for them to repent. It's to those people that have been exposed to that much grace, that the writer of Hebrews tells us, if they fall away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance. What does it mean to fall away? And what does it mean it's impossible to renew them again to repentance? To fall away is to leave the faith. To fall away is to reject Jesus. It's to apostatize. It's to turn away from the gospel. For whatever reason, a lot of people have tried to soften this and make it say, it's really difficult or it's unlikely for these people to repent. But the Greek word he uses there is very interesting because it means it's impossible. It means this is something that can't happen. They cannot repent if this is true about them. It means that the person that's experienced this much grace and has not responded to it in true saving faith, if they then experience all of that grace and turn away from it, if they reject it, To reject it is to enter into a spiritual condition which is beyond repentance. Later in Hebrews chapter 12, he'll give us an Old Testament example of this very thing about how it's impossible for some people to repent if they apostatize. And in verse 17 of Hebrews 12, he says, and with tears. He was beyond repentance. Mark 3 29 says, He who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is subject to eternal condemnation. And so there is a sin for which there is no forgiveness, where there's no repentance. And it's the sin of receiving all of the gracious works of the Holy Spirit and not responding to them in true saving faith and then to turn away from them and to reject them and to expose Christ to shame. To experience the kind of grace that he's talking about in Hebrews 6 and to appear like a believer for a time and then turn away is to leave grace. It's to go into the land of no return. It's to go beyond the reach of hope into condemnation and judgment. 2 Peter 2, verses 20 and 21 say, For if after you have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior, that you again entangle in them and are overcome, the latter end is worse than the beginning. For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it to turn away from the holy commandment delivered to them. So scripture warns us over and over again that to receive the grace of God, to understand the gospel, to experience the work of the Holy Spirit, and to not embrace all of those things that surround salvation and not actually embrace them, to not come to Christ in faith with repentance, is to go into spiritual hopelessness. That really brings us finally to a fearful justification. What's the writer's rationale or his justification to say that these people who experience this grace and fall away cannot repent? What's his evidence for that being true? Why is it impossible for them to repent? It's impossible, he tells us in verse 6, because they crucify again for themselves the Son of God and put Him to an open shame. And what he's saying is that to experience this kind of grace that he's just described, to experience the enlightenment of Christ, to taste the heavenly gift, to become a partaker of the Spirit of God and experience conviction, to taste the good word of God, to taste the powers of the age to come, to experience all of that and to reject it, is really to put Christ to an open shame. It's to reject him after much grace and to join with the crowd in saying, crucify Christ. It's to join with everybody who sides against Christ at His death and to say their affirmation that Christ should die is true. To reject Jesus after receiving so much grace is to stand with everyone who is opposed to Him and call for His death. In other words, to experience this kind of grace and then to reject it is to agree with the crowd and to shout with them, crucify Him, crucify Him, kill Him, It's to scorn him and wish that he was dead. To experience the grace that he's describing in verses four and five and then to turn away from it is to stand with the soldiers with a nail in one hand and with a hammer in the other and to wish, to hope that you could take the nail and you could drive it in his hand. It's to wish that you could take a spear and you could stab it in his side. And that's the heart behind receiving this grace and rejecting it and turning away from it. Because that's the heart behind apostasy. The writer of Hebrews tells us that because that's the heart, repentance is impossible. And I think we could all probably say, we've seen this happen. We've seen people come and join the church and appear to bear fruit and appear to have faith and appear to be Christians. And when they depart, when they turn away from Christ and reject Him, They do so with an anger. They do so with a hatred for Christ much greater than they did before they experienced grace. And so that's one of the reasons you look at the groups that are totally antagonistic to Christianity. And what you'll find is most of them are led by people who have turned away from Christ. They don't turn away and go, Jesus, I could take him or leave him. They go, Jesus, I hate him. Jesus, I wish I could kill that guy. Jesus, I would spit in his face if I had the opportunity. I would join with the crowd and I would curse his name if I saw him. That is the heart behind apostasy and that's why with that kind of heart there is no hope of ever repenting. Isn't that the life of Judas? Judas received all of these graces. He saw the work of the Holy Spirit. He knew who Christ was. He had Christ himself teach him. He was looking just like the rest of the twelve. And when he left, he didn't say, I think I'd rather go fishing. No, he left to sell Jesus to die. That's the heart that can experience grace and then turn away from it. So what a terrifying warning for all of us. And one of the things a passage like this often does for us is it makes us ask, does this passage describe me? Really, I think the answer to that is found in the fact that up until this point in chapters five and six, he's been using first and second person pronouns. He's been saying we, he's been saying us, he's been saying you, he's been saying me. But when he comes to chapter six, verses four, five, and six, he starts using third person pronouns. they, them, other people. He distances himself and the true Christians that are addressed in the book of Hebrews, and he distances themselves from those people. And I think the reason he does that is because he understands that as long as you're here, as long as you're reading this letter, as long as you're hearing the Word of God preached, as long as you're reading your Bible in the morning, there's hope. As long as you haven't turned away from those means of grace, you haven't committed this sin. A lot of times, Christians think about the unpardonable sin, and am I beyond the reach of God? Am I beyond the reach of God? And they get all caught up in it. But really, the fact that we can even think that way, the fact that we're not standing there cursing God with the angry crowd, is evidence that none of us yet are at that point. So how do we respond to Hebrews 6 verses 4 through 6? I think one of the ways we do so is we prepare our hearts to respond to the grace of God appropriately. We anticipate, I'm going to come to church every Sunday morning. I'm going to go to Bible study every Thursday night. I'm going to get in my car every day on the way to work. I'm going to wake up in the morning. I'm going to read my Bible. I'm going to, after dinner, put my kids in bed, and we're going to read the Bible together. I'm going to have three or four encounters with the grace of God. Actually, all of life is the grace of God, as long as we're alive. But I'm going to have numerous encounters with Christ and His word throughout the day. And we prepare our hearts for those things. We come to them not saying, okay, I've got to check the box of reading the Bible. I listened to a good sermon today on the way to work, and we forget about it. We prepare our hearts to enter those times. So that the Word of God doesn't harden our hearts, it softens them so that we're capable and ready to receive the Word of God. We understand that to receive the grace of God is grace, but it's also danger because if we don't respond rightly, it's dangerous to us. To experience conviction of sin is a dangerous thing. How many times do we sin and we think, you know, probably shouldn't have done that. God's Word exposes that as sin. God hates that. And we just blow it off. We forget about it. We don't repent of it and deal with it appropriately. And to experience this grace and to dispern it, to not respond appropriately by confessing that sin to God and to repenting of it, is to enter a dangerous state. But we should also examine our hearts Because what should be obvious to all of us is that mere intellectual knowledge of the gospel, religious experiences, even gracious religious experience driven by the Holy Spirit exposing truth to us in Christ, even those things don't equate to salvation. You can experience all of the things described in Hebrews chapter 6 verses 4 through 6 and not be Christian. and not be one of God's sheep. And so we should examine ourselves. We should look at our hearts and say, OK, are these things true about me? But are those things true that have then led me to put all of my confidence, not in myself, not in my good works, not in the fact that I'm an American or I go to church, or not even in the fact that all of these things are true, but that my confidence, my faith, my hope is in Christ, that Christ has died for sinners and that when he did so, he died for me. and that all of the wrath that my sin deserves was given to Jesus. That's my only confidence. And I have looked at my good works, I've looked at my sin, and I've repented of them, I've confessed them before God, and that is my only hope. Maybe you're here today and you're not a follower of Jesus. But maybe you've come to church and you're trying to blend in with other Christians. You're trying to hear about Jesus and receive some of the benefits and the blessings of the common grace that just come from hanging out with God's people. And that's all good and well. That's great. We're glad you're here. But to do so is to be in a very dangerous spiritual condition. Because to receive that grace and to then turn away is to go to a place where there is no hope of repentance. But you're here today, and there is hope. There is grace. There is the gospel being extended to you, even this morning, saying, come to Christ. Put your faith in Christ. Don't try to blend in with Christians. Don't try to experience the blessings of being a Christian without actually being a Christian. Don't be like the people that followed Jesus because he passed out bread. But put all your confidence in Christ and make Him the object of your faith, make Him the object of your love, and reject everything else. And if you do so, the promise of Scripture is that you will be one of God's sheep, that you will be safe in His hand and have eternal life. And so, Father, we come to you and we pray that these things would not be true of any of us. Lord, apostasy is a dangerous and even a damnable sin. And Father, we pray that you would continue to show each and every one of these people grace and mercy. Lord, that if there are those that have experienced this grace and have yet to respond in faith, Lord, give them that faith. Give them grace. Give them repentance. Father, if there's any that hear the message this morning that are genuine Christians that are given doubt, Lord, would you please beef them up? Would you strengthen them in their faith and cause them to see that the work of Christ is sufficient, that we need not fear this sin. We need not fear this judgment because we are held and we are saved by your Son. Father, we pray this in your name. Amen.