Falling Away

(This is just my thoughts from the last post continued). Let me say before you read on that all I am doing - in my own studying and in sharing with you - is laying out the process I've gone through in studying this - laying out what the Bible says. I will continue to pray on this topic and seek God for clearer understanding and revelation. I encourage you to do the same.

Falling away - I mean, really turning your whole heart away from God - is a dangerous thing. This next set of Scripture I read stunned me. I was a little at a loss because I had never read or heard anything like it before (clearly I've not spent much time in Hebrews, either...LOL). I think I reread it several times trying to find a way that it might not mean what it says. I think once I even said, God, are You sure that's right? But I was quickly reminded that it's His Bible, not mine. It's His truth, not mine. If I believe God, then I must also believe His Word - the way He wrote it, not the way I imagined it should have been written. I was/am still trying to get my head around the severity of the consequence for one who walks a path of turning from God.

Hebrews 6:4-6 - For it is impossible to bring back to repentance those who were once enlightened—those who have experienced the good things of heaven and shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the power of the age to come— and who then turn away from God. It is impossible to bring such people back to repentance; by rejecting the Son of God, they themselves are nailing him to the cross once again and holding him up to public shame.

It is impossible to bring back those who were once enlightened who then turn away from God. That's scary dangerous! If you look at the passage in Hebrews, it's clearly talking about a mature believer, and not someone who has newly come to Christ and is just learning to walk. It refers to someone who has been enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift, been filled with the Holy Spirit, and has felt the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of heaven.

It is not backsliding. It is not mistakes. It is not the regular types of sin that we struggle with every day. It is the continual, habitual, intentional turning away from Christ that makes a mockery and a disgrace of Him and His perfect and beautiful sacrifice. There must be a heart change. Until I read this, I've always thought sin is sin. And I guess this is mostly true. All wrongdoing is sin. Whether we tell a white lie or commit murder, it is sin that needs to be confessed, and 1 John 1:9 tells us that when we confess our sins He is faithful to forgive us. But 1 John 5:16 - 17 draws a distinction between sin that can be forgiven and sin that results in spiritual death.

If anyone sees his brother [believer] committing a sin that does not lead to death, he will pray and God will give him life - yes, He will grant life to all those whose sin is not one leading to death. There is a sin that leads to death; I do not say that one should pray for that. All wrongdoing is sin, and there is sin which does not involve death that may be repented of and forgiven.

So what is the sin that cannot be forgiven? That seems to be the next logical question. What is it that is so bad that God tells us not to even pray for one who has committed such a sin because that person cannot be forgiven? I don't have all the answers, but I would say this is part of it: just a few verses after the one above, it says this (in 1 John 5:21):

Little children, keep yourselves from idols (false gods)--from anything and everything that would occupy the place in your heart due to God, from any sort of substitute for Him that would take first place in your life. Amen (so let it be).

Consider this...

1. The first commandment: You shall have no other gods before or besides Me. (Exodus 20:3)
2. Further in Exodus 20, God tells Moses to tell His people this: 'You shall not make gods to share with Me My glory and your worship' (verse 23)
3. When Jesus is asked, 'What is the most important commandment?' His response is this: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. (Matthew 22:37-38)
4. And Moses said to the people, Fear not; for God has come to prove you, so that the reverential fear of Him may be before you, that you may not sin. (Exodus 20:20)

The Bible clearly shows us the condition of heart we are to have toward God. He is to be first. He is to be the ONLY one who captures our heart. We are to love Him with everything we are. And we are to have a reverential fear of Him...that we may not sin.

I looked again at Romans 1. The people in Romans once knew God, but stopped glorifying Him. They stopped thanking Him. They allowed other things to take priority in their lives. They replaced Him as god of their lives. They no longer loved Him with all of their heart, soul and mind. They had no remaining reverential fear of Him. And the entire process of falling away from God began when they ceased to give Him glory and thank Him.