Our text this evening comes from the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter 6, beginning at verse 1. Dr. Clark and I didn't compare notes as far as what we were going to preach on, but this evening's sermon dovetails well with this morning's. Therefore, let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God and of instruction about washings or baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits. For it is impossible in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift and have shared in the Holy Spirit and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come and then have fallen away to restore them again to repentance since they are crucifying once again the son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt. For land that has drunk the rain that often falls on it and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated receives a blessing from God. But if it bears thorns and thistles, it is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned. Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things, things that belong to salvation. For God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints as you still do. And we desire each one of you to show the same earnestness to have the full assurance of hope until the end, so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises. For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, saying, Surely I will bless you and multiply you. And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise. For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes an oath is final for confirmation. So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of His purpose, He guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. I think I've outworn my welcome with God. I just said, one thing too many, or a bunch of things too many. He's been generous to me, and I have not repaid his kindness with thanksgiving. In fact, maybe I've committed the unpardonable sin. I've had countless conversations with Christians, even lifelong mature Christians, dare I even say, those who have been raised in Reformed churches. who express these kinds of concerns, these kinds of doubts. And the truth that addresses these doubts is the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. And so tonight, I'd like to turn to Hebrews 6 to talk about the perseverance of the saints in order to encourage all of us, those who are doubting, those who are either by temptations, perhaps sins, that have weighed us down, Or through the circumstances of life, question whether God loves us or whether we're suffering because of his anger toward us. And Hebrews 6 is a passage that a lot of people turn to in order to disprove the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. And so that's why we're going to turn to that this evening. But first of all, I want to ask you to indulge me for a long introduction. The introduction, I tell you in advance that it's long so that you can gauge that the sermon won't be. First of all, I want to lay out the positions on this doctrine and then compare those positions to what we find in this passage in Hebrews 6. There's one position we're going to exclude at the very outset because the whole Christian church has excluded this as a legitimate position, and that's called Pelagianism. Pelagius was a 4th century British monk who came to Rome and saw all the immorality and blamed it on Augustine. This preacher of grace, particularly his saying, God, give, command what you will and give what you command. Pelagius said that was a cop-out. God wouldn't give us free will. God wouldn't give us commands if he didn't give us the natural ability to fulfill them. Have you ever heard that? God would never command anything that we couldn't do. And so, of course, if God commands it, then we can do it by nature. And so grace for Pelagius was simply God giving us his law to reveal what God's commandments are. No more than that. Well, that was excluded. In fact, it was condemned by more bishops of Rome and councils than any heresy in church history. In fact, in 529, a council was called the Second Council of Orange that even went so far as to say if anyone says that he is saved by the praying of a prayer by free will. Rather than it being that it is the grace of God that causes him to pray in the first place, let him be anathema. So we're going to exclude the Pelagian position entirely. But now we have a spectrum of views. The first view is synergism. I know a fancy term. Theologians like to take really simple concepts and make them more complicated. But actually, it's useful because it's a combination of two words. Working together. That God and I, working together, are going to make this happen. Now, of course, God's going to do the lion's share, I realize that, but I can do my part. He's going to make it possible for me to save myself with his help. That's basically the position we're talking about here. And this is the position of Eastern Orthodoxy. It's also the official position of the Roman Catholic Church, although, as we've seen, it wasn't taught in the best centuries of the Catholic Church. And it's also the position that is taught by Arminianism, officially. working together. If we cooperate with God's grace, we will finally be saved. The only way we know that we'll be finally saved and not lost is if we cooperate with the grace that God gives us. So God's grace does not make it certain that we will persevere. It makes it possible for us to persevere if we persevere with grace. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, written in the 1990s, the children of our Holy Mother of the Church rightly hope for the grace of final perseverance and the recompense, notice the word there, the payback, the recompense of God their Father for the good works accomplished with His grace. You see? We merit God's recompense by our good works that, of course, are accomplished only by God's grace. God's grace makes it possible for us to save ourselves with God's help. But it is sheer presumption to say, I know that I am one of the elect and I will persevere to the end. Sure presumption to say, I am assured that I am one of the elect and I will persevere to the end because he will persevere with me. If people take that tack, Rome says, they'll just live however they want. won't they? Well, I have perseverance guaranteed to me, and so I'm going to live however I choose. The Arminians expressed their point with respect to synergism in their articles of remonstrance, and here's what that article says. Those who are united to Christ by faith are furnished with abundant strength and succor, sufficient to enable them to triumph over the seductions of Satan and the allurements of sin. Nevertheless, they may, by the neglect of these succors, fall from grace and dying in such a state may finally perish. So once again, God gives us sufficient grace if we cooperate by our free will, but not efficient grace. In other words, God makes it possible for us to persevere, but His grace doesn't guarantee that we will. At the other end of the spectrum is what's called monergism. One working. If synergism is two people working at it. Monergism is one person working at it. Guess who that is? And this is the position that Augustine, the great church father, argued over against Pelagius and his followers. It's also the position that we take in the Reformed Confession. Augustine put it this way, this grace God placed in Christ, in whom we have obtained a lot, being predestined according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will, quoting Paul in Ephesians 1. And thus, as he worketh that we come to him, listen to this, this is the logic really of it, and thus as he worketh that we come to him, so he worketh that we do not depart. You see the difference in logic here? Just as he sovereignly ensures that we come to him, doesn't just make it possible, ensures that we come to Him, so He ensures that we stay with Him. This point is so well expressed in the fifth head of the canons of Dort. According to Dort, not even the regenerate are free entirely of sin. Quite the contrary, daily sins of weakness arise, it says, and blemishes cling to even the best works of saints, giving them continual cause to humble themselves before God, to flee for refuge to Christ crucified, to put the flesh to death more and more by the spirit of supplication and by holy exercises of godliness, and to strain toward the goal of perfection until they are freed from this body of death and reign with the Lamb of God in heaven. No perfectionism here. Donald Gray Barnhouse used to say that whenever a man used to come up to him and say, influenced by Wesleyan perfectionism, that he had attained perfect holiness, he would push him aside and ask his wife. Every genuine Christian will struggle, says Dort. But God is faithful, mercifully strengthening them in the grace once conferred on them and powerfully preserving them in it to the end. Genuine believers can even fall into serious sins, as did David, Peter, and other saints. In such times, they can feel a lack of assurance until they have returned to the right way by genuine repentance. However, the power of God strengthening and preserving true believers in grace is more than a match for the flesh. Wonderful comfort? So believers have to always be watchful against temptation, Dort continues, but even this is because of the grace of God. For God, who is rich in mercy, according to the unchangeable purpose of election, does not take the Holy Spirit from his own completely, even when they fall grievously. Neither does God let them fall down so far that they forfeit the grace of adoption and the state of justification, or commit the sin which leads to death, the sin against the Holy Spirit, and plunge themselves entirely, forsaken by God, into eternal ruin. God won't let it happen. God never lets that happen to one of his own. God always renews the fallen to repentance. So, Dort concludes, it is not by their own merits or strength, but by God's undeserved mercy that They neither forfeit faith and grace totally, nor remain in their downfalls to the end and are lost. With respect to themselves, this, that is falling away, losing our salvation, not only easily could happen, but undoubtedly would happen. But with respect to God, it cannot possibly happen. God's plan cannot be changed. God's promise cannot fail, the calling according to God's purpose cannot be revoked, the merit of Christ, as well as his interceding and preserving, cannot be nullified, and the sealing of the Holy Spirit can neither be invalidated nor wiped out. All three persons of the Holy Trinity are engaged in this work of your perseverance to the end. Then there is what I call inconsistent synergism. Inconsistent synergism. That is a synergism that claims to believe that it's all of grace and yet at the end of the day makes perseverance depend on an act of the human will. And this is the view of most evangelicals. They talk about the salvation contract. Many of you don't know what I'm talking about. I grew up with this. Raise your hand with every head bowed and every eye closed. And if you really meant that prayer, then you're eternally secure. Some people are nodding their heads here. You know what I'm talking about. Or an actual, at the end of a tract, you sign your name at the end of a tract. It's a contract. And the thing is, God's stuck with you. The reason you're eternally secure, this is the doctrine of eternal security. The reason you're eternally secure is because God is stuck with you. You made a decision. You signed the contract. And therefore, you show God the contract. See, I made a decision on such and such a date, and now you have to honor the contract. Norman Geisler presupposes this basic scheme when he says, God's grace works synergistically on free will. Put in other terms, God's justifying grace works cooperatively, not operatively. In other words, God's grace makes it possible for us to cooperate, but God's grace doesn't make it certain. Elsewhere, he writes, Indeed, God would save all men if he could. God will achieve the greatest number in heaven that he possibly can. And out of this doctrine comes the notion of the carnal Christian. You may have heard of this, that there are first-class Christians and second-class Christians, Some who fly first class, some who fly coach. The ones who fly coach say, you know what, it's enough for me that I'm justified, that I signed the contract and now God is stuck with me. I'm eternally secure, now I can go live however I want. I don't care about the crowns, not really, not a big deal for me. I can be saved but singed. Charles Stanley expresses it this way. He says that Jesus' description of the outer darkness where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth refers not to hell, but to a region of heaven occupied by carnal Christians. It's hard to distinguish that from hell. Maybe it's purgatory. It sounds like purgatory. The only difference between that and the Roman Catholic doctrine of purgatory is you can get out in the Roman Catholic view. In this view, you're there forever. What are the problems with this? Well, the New Testament knows nothing of first- and second-class Christians. It knows nothing of Christians who are justified, but who are not being sanctified. It knows nothing of Christians who are eternally secure, but don't persevere in faith to the end. There's no such thing as a Christian who lives completely carelessly in sin and unbelief, and yet is saved because of that decision that I made way back when. Rather, all believers are to some extent carnal, meaning immature, and spiritual, meaning mature. We're all partly carnal, partly spiritual, and there is no second-class heaven for carnal Christians. They say that once you accept Christ by your own free will, it's once saved, always saved. But here's the thing. If you got yourself in by your own free will, can't you get yourself out by your own free will? We find a very different logic in the Scriptures. Here's what Paul says. He who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. That's the Augustinian logic, right? That we contrasted with synergism. You saw that. Synergism says that if you cooperate with God's grace, then you'll be saved finally in the end. Well, Scripture teaches that when God starts something, He finishes it. It's not because I started something by signing a contract, now God's stuck with me. It's that God started something all the way back in eternity past, and He's fulfilling it. We will persevere to the end in faith and repentance. So it's not eternal security, God being stuck contractually because of our choice, But God's indefatigable pursuit of us, better than the perseverance of the saints, this doctrine should be called the preservation of the saints by God. And then finally, there's what's called, what I call anyway, to the great chagrin of my Lutheran friends, inconsistent monergism or Lutheranism. We join arms with our Lutheran brothers and sisters in affirming monergism that God alone saves. but our Lutheran friends are contradictory. On one hand, they believe in unconditional election, that God has unconditionally chosen who will be saved, and that anchors their security. The elect will finally be saved, and yet Lutheran theology teaches that some people are regenerated in baptism. and yet fall away. They lose their justification. They lose their regeneration and are finally lost. They never were elect, but they were regenerated. And so David and Peter, for example, lost their salvation and got it back. But the problem here is obvious. How can you say that God alone saves from beginning to end while also affirming the possibility of losing our salvation? Does that really affirm that God alone saves? And so now with those views in mind, that spectrum in mind, we come finally to Hebrews. I told you it was a long introduction. We're halfway through. But Hebrews, I think it'll all sort of fit into place and we can see very clearly which position makes the most sense of this passage. Two questions. Who are those who fall away and from what do they fall away? Who are those who fall away, and from what do they fall away? First of all, according to the views, those who fall away are, according to synergists, those who believe in perseverance based on grace plus our free will cooperating, say that this passage is talking about the truly regenerate and justified. Those are the ones who fall away, people who are really saved. They're actually saved. Inconsistent synergists, our evangelical, most of our evangelical friends say, nobody, it's a hypothetical empty set here in Hebrews 6. It's a warning, but no one ever actually falls away and loses their salvation. That can't happen, right? Sonarists, Augustinian and Reformed Christians, say it's covenant members who were nevertheless, like Esau, not actually united to Christ by faith. That's the people who fall away here in Hebrews 6. Now, let's think about this. The audience, first of all, is very specific. This epistle, if you remember back a while ago to Pastor Gordon's series on Hebrews, this audience is made up mostly of Jewish Christians who are being persecuted and in the face of persecution are going back to the types and shadows of the law. So some of them would like to take Jesus with them. They would like to include Jesus, but they would still like to go back to the types and shadows of the law, much like those agitators against Paul's gospel in Galatia. And so these people are not just Christians in general, but they are Jewish Christians who are leaving the reality. It's like they're leaving the feature film to go back to the preview. And that's why the writer says that they're crucifying Christ all over again. They're going back to the types and shadows of the law. And that's why he says it's impossible to renew them again to repentance. You can't take Jesus with you. You're gone. If you leave to go back to those types and shadows, you're gone. You've lost the privileges of membership. What are the privileges of membership in the covenant of grace? He tells us, having once been enlightened. Now, see, again, our Baptist and evangelical brothers and sisters will say, this can't be referring to an actual set of people who fall away. Clearly, they're losing their salvation here. They've once been enlightened. No, that actually is what happens with children of the covenant. We do believe that the Holy Spirit actually works in the lives of people who are not elect. We actually do believe in the means of grace, that the Word really is powerful. We really do believe that the sacraments are signs and seals of the covenant of grace. And that in baptism, people are once enlightened. Enlightened here, this term here was often used in the early church to refer to baptism. So they've been baptized. They have tasted, secondly, they have tasted of the heavenly gift. What does that refer to? What do you taste of? The Lord's Supper. They have tasted of the heavenly gift. By tasting, by drinking the cup and eating the bread we feed on the body and blood of Christ, and they even tasted the heavenly gift. They even tasted, thirdly, the goodness of the Word of God and the powers of the age to come. They were often watered, verses 7 and 8, by the common operations of the Spirit through the Word and the sacraments, through the fellowship of the saints, and yet they fall away. Our Baptist brothers and sisters don't have a category for this. You're either saved or you're lost. And we have a third category. Covenant members who are not inwardly united to Jesus Christ through genuine faith, and yet are sharers in that corporate assembly, that visible assembly where, as Calvin put it, the common operations of the Spirit are at work. It's an awful lot to leave. It's an awful lot to give up. These are remarkable blessings of the covenant. Well, then secondly and finally, from what did they fall away? The full blessings of the covenant. They had the signs. They even had a taste of the reality, but they didn't drink it. And notice then in verse 13 he says, But we are certain of better things in your case, brothers and sisters, things that pertain to what? salvation. Now, why would he say that? Why would he say we're certain of better things in your case? You're not in this case. You're not in the position of being covenant members who have once been enlightened, who have tasted of the heavenly gift and the powers of the Word of God and of the age to come, and yet give it all away. You're not in that category. What category? You're in the category of those to whom salvation pertains. Now this is what goes against our Arminian and Lutheran and Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox friends when they say that the people talked about here are saved people, justified people, regenerated people who lose all that. No, Hebrews doesn't say that. It clearly says they enjoyed all sorts of blessings through the word and the sacraments. But they weren't saved. Not things pertaining to salvation. Thus the only view that really works here is the covenantal reformed perspective. So the warning is real. There are people who fall away. Yes, even in this church and its history, tragically. In every church there will be, every visible expression of Christ's body, sadly, tragically, horribly, there will be those who fall away. But they're not the elect, and they don't fall away from salvation. Rather, they were watered often. They were enlightened. They tasted of the heavenly gift. They tasted the goodness of the word of God and of the age to come. And like Esau, they sold their birthright for a bowl of stew. For nothing. To be absorbed back into the bloodstream of this passing evil age. They reject the promises made to them in their baptism. They count them as nothing compared with the promises the world makes to them. They hear sermons, but they don't respond in faith. They're like the wilderness generation, even on the verge of entering the promised land, filled with unbelief and did not combine the hearing of the gospel with faith. For the same writer to the Hebrews says in chapter 4, good news, after all, came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them because they were not united by faith with those who heard it. Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things, things that belong to salvation. Why? Why does he feel better toward them in this case? Isn't it a wonderfully assuring thing that he does here? I'm sure those of you who are hearing this are in a better situation. Why? He's told us again in chapter 4, Let us therefore strive to enter that rest so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account. Since then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens. Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in time of need. So don't say, brothers or sisters, or if there's someone here who is wondering, yeah, I'm just kind of, I'm just here. Don't just say, I'm just an Esau. Or I'm just the wilderness generation, I guess. It is still today. It's not judgment day yet. While it is still today, the writer says, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. Enter it. That's all. Just walk into it. Cease from your works as God did from His and enter into His glorious, joyful rest. Just walk into it. You're on the verge of it. You've been watered. You've been enlightened. You've tasted. But now walk into it. Enjoy the Sabbath day. And the clincher in Hebrews 6 really is the last verses, verses 13 through 20. For when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, he swore by himself, saying, Surely I will bless you and multiply you. And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, obtained the promise. For people swear by something greater than themselves, and in all their disputes, an oath is final for confirmation. God stands, Jesus stands right now at the Father's right hand, raising his hand in an oath of confirmation, a hand that he will never lower. Your hope, dear Christian, is not the promise that you've made to God. Like Israel at Mount Sinai swearing, all this we will do. It's that promise that God himself swore that he could swear by no one greater than himself. And so he said, I swear to me, these people will not be lost. That covenant is unbreakable. Your perseverance is anchored in that unchangeable purpose. And so he concludes, verses 17 to 20, so when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise, that's you, the unchangeable character of his purpose. He guaranteed it with an oath so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain where Jesus has gone already as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Let us pray. Our kind and generous Father, we acknowledge our manifold sins, doubts, And the continual perversity of our flesh, even when you make such great promises, we so easily turn our gaze back onto ourselves rather than fixing it on Christ, the author and perfecter of our faith. Help us to cling to him more and more. And even when we falter, even when we trip, even when we fall, Help us to know that it is His hold on us and not ours on Him that guarantees our perseverance and faith to the very end. And we can pray this in His name. Amen.