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Christ the True and Better - Hebrews 6:1-8 - The True and Better High Priest - Maturity in Christ pt.4 · Mount Eaton Church

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Alright, if you guys would, I'm going to read, this is not from the Westminster Confession,
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this is just the issue of one of the solas.
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So we know there's five solas.
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This is Sola Scriptura, and so I'm going to read that question and you're going to read
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the answer.
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What is the doctrine of Sola Scriptura?
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Sola Scriptura means that the Bible is written about the Lord God, and that all church traditions
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and interpretations are subject to correction by the scriptures, and the scriptures alone
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may be final, perfect, and faithless.
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Nice.
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That's a great definition.
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So, get to know these things.
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These are some very important truths that we carry with us, and I can't help but think
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as we continue to see things deteriorate, which has been deteriorating for a while now,
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how many will fall away from that because they're not grounded in the mature faith of
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Christ.
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That's really what we're going to be dealing with here.
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When we're stuck in the milk, you really can't deal with the meat, and so it's important
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that we move from milk to meat.
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So these are going to be some very, three very important principles that we'll deal
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with, some truth statements that will go along with that, and you know we go verse by verse
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and word for word, and I hope you grasp the importance of this chapter.
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The letter to the Hebrews is a difficult letter.
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It's not an easy letter.
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It's something that I think we need to spend more time in in these difficult letters because
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it really grows and challenges the faith.
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So let's pray, and let's dig in.
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Father, I want to thank you so much for your goodness and faithfulness.
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You are holy, righteous, sovereign, and true, Lord, that there is nothing in all of creation
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that your sovereignty and your providential hand is not in, and all things are done for
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your glory and for your name to be proclaimed throughout all of creation that you are God
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and God alone, and that you in the three persons of who you are, Father, Son, and Spirit, have
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accomplished salvation for man, that we may be with you forever, and that you have for
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all eternity have placed us in Christ, and that we are his and we will be with him as
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he reigns as king forever over all the things that you have placed in his authority.
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So Lord, guide us as we spend time in your word.
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I pray that the full counsel of your word is spoken and that we learn some very important
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truths of who you are as God and the importance of understanding our practice of maturity.
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Lord, we praise you and we thank you in Jesus' name, amen.
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So we want to read chapter 5 verse 11, and we're going to go right in to verse 6.
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It says, about this, we have much to say.
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About what?
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Salvation.
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We know that in verse 7 through 8.
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He's talking about salvation, specifically in verse 9.
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And he says, so about this salvation, we have much to say.
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And it's hard to explain since you have become doll of hearing.
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It's an interesting term he uses here, doll of hearing.
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For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic
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principles of the oracles of God.
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You need milk, not solid food.
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For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a
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child, but solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment
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trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
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That's important.
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So when we get into chapter 6, as we're going to get into next, I want you to understand
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something.
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You cannot discern real good from evil if you don't know the word.
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You have to know it.
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You've got to spend time in it.
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And so verse 1 says, therefore, because he said all this, therefore is therefore, therefore.
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It sounds kind of funny.
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That's why it's there, for.
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Just trying to be more funny.
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It's not working.
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Let us, thank you, whoever laughed for me, appreciate it.
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Let us therefore leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying
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again a foundation of repentance from dead works or of faith toward God and of instruction
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about washings, the laying on of the hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal
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judgment.
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So there is this list that he says are elementary truths.
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In other words, what he's saying here is these things you should be absolutely convinced
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of.
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This should not be something you're going back to because you need to learn something
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new.
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These should be settled.
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These are doctrines within the Christian faith that it's a done deal.
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You move on and you grow in faith.
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You grow in the full stature of Christ.
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And so principle number one, basic truths of the Christian faith are to be known and
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understood, not repeated over and over again for the believer as if it is needed to ensure
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your faith.
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In other words, I keep going back to it because I am not sure if I know.
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If you're not sure that you know, you have to question if you really know.
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These are things that we should not be sitting down questioning.
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They're basic understandings of facts for the believer.
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How do we know this?
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Every believer must press or move to a deeper understanding of Christ.
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I like the word press better than move.
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We must press to a deeper understanding of Christ.
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Here's the scriptural proof of that.
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Here's the context with context and here's the precept for precept.
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Ephesians 4.13, until we attain the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son
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of God to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
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In other words, what God has for you is to be like his son.
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That is it.
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Not to be stuck crawling as spiritual infants, spiritual newborns.
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Should be beyond this stuff.
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And so, Paul clarifies and I believe this is Paul who wrote Hebrews, but some would
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argue.
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Therefore, let us leave.
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Now this word leave is not meaning that we completely abandon.
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It's not that kind of an abandonment.
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It's not even like a departure.
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It's like, you know when you grow up, you don't go back to crawling.
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I could clarify this a little bit better in first service.
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I don't want to crawl again.
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One, I'm too old and my knees get bruised.
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So we don't go back to crawling.
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Once you learn to walk, you keep walking and eventually you run.
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Now I know the older you get, you end up back in the same position.
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I get it.
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You're like, speak for yourself, Pastor Joe.
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So he says, let us now go back to the elementary doctrine of Christ.
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Elementary the simple.
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These doctrines that are listed here.
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And he gives a really good clarifying list of what these elementary doctrines are.
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But he says, and we must leave, but go press on to maturity.
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We must work it out.
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We must drive ourselves to know him more.
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And he gives this list at this point.
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Let us leave elementary doctrines, move to maturity, not laying again a foundation of
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repentance.
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This word foundation is the understanding of beginnings.
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The beginnings of things, the first principles, the system of truth.
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What is the system of truth?
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We are sinners and you must repent and believe the gospel.
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That's what Jesus says, right?
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Mark 1 15, pretty simple.
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That's what he's saying here.
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So let's not go back to the first principles of repentance.
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What are the first principles of repentance?
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I'm a sinner.
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You know, you keep going back to repent because you think you aren't saved.
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You keep going back to thinking you've lost something that God can't keep.
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There are many churches in our day today that keep pushing to this idea that you have to
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repent to come to faith all the time.
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Like as if the first time you truly repented and were truly changed wasn't strong enough.
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So he deals with this issue of foundation, this system of truth, of repentance.
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The word repentance here is matronia or matronia, the change of mind.
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I want you to think about that.
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Don't go back to the simple first principles of the changing of your mind.
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From what?
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Changing your mind from dead works.
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This word dead works means a life lived destitute of power, inactive, inoperative and faithless.
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What happens to dead people?
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Their brains are what?
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Inoperative.
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They're dead.
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They're fruitless.
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They, they do nothing.
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Let's not go back to this foundation of repentance which was from a life that was destitute of
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power.
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And then he says end of faith toward God.
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This word faith toward God means the conviction that God exists and is creator of all things,
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the provider and bestower of eternal salvation.
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I mean how many times do we have to be convinced that God is the creator of all things?
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Do you want to know why we're struggling with this idea here?
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I mean this idea has crept into the church.
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If you guys ever listen to Ken Ham, Ken Ham fights against this ideology of creationism
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slash evolutionary theory.
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This understanding that God spoke and over time it evolved to be what it is today.
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That's not the understanding here.
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It's not, it's not even that God spoke and bang.
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There it is.
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I even fight against that idea.
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That God spoke and banged it.
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There it is.
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That's a simple very foolish way to think about it.
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When God spoke every detail was intentional.
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Every detail has his signature on it.
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Every detail has his fingerprint.
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When he spoke he spoke for the glory of himself.
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So the very atom that is created was intentionally created.
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It wasn't like I'm going to create it.
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Bang there it is.
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He lovingly brought it into existence.
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It's a lot more than that stuff.
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We simplify God to a thing that we can mold.
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But when you think about God and his intentionality and everything he does you can't help but
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think he's much bigger and stronger than that.
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This is an important truth because if he is the creator of all things and the provider
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and bestower of eternal salvation and he gives it then he has to be the one to keep it.
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And we deal with this issue.
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And then he says after this verse two end of instruction about washings.
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This word washings is the word baptismo and it means baptism.
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Let us not go back to baptism.
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In other words when you are baptized you're baptized out of an heart of obedience towards
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Christ and that your baptismism is a proclamation of what Christ had done on the cross and that
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you yourself have been crucified with Christ yet I know that only you live but Christ lives
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in me.
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During Bible study today we actually went through this in Romans 6 and this clarifies
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a little bit more.
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This truth of not returning back to the issue of baptisms like baptisms can make you right.
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Can you imagine how many times you come to Christ you walk away from the faith because
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of some really bad teaching because you sin.
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Then you have to go back in repentance again.
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You have to ask for forgiveness again.
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Christ has to be crucified again.
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Then you have to go to baptism again.
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That's what the writer is saying here.
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Look what it says in chapter 6 verse 1.
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What shall we say then?
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Are we to continue in sin that grace may bound?
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By no means.
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How can we who died to sin still live in it?
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Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into
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his death and we were buried with we were buried therefore with him by baptism into
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death in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead we too may walk in newness of
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life?
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I mean think about that.
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Is the work of Christ on the cross enough?
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And if it is why do we continue in the elementary doctrines of Christ?
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We should be beyond this and that's what the writer is saying here.
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And then he says the laying on of hands because you know the next step of every believer is
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one they act in obedience get baptized.
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They are associated with the crucifixion and death and resurrection of Christ through baptism.
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It's a proclamation of the gospel and then they come they're part of the family.
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And the family brings them and lays hands on them and asks God's blessing to be given
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to them in ceremony.
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That's what the laying on of hands means.
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And for those who are called to position of leadership many times as ordination.
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Either way do we go back to the laying on of hands?
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Because we think that it's not good enough that the work of Christ isn't good enough?
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Do we go back to the resurrection of the dead?
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Do we have to do we have to argue over the fact that Christ raised from the dead?
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If he didn't raise from the dead we might as well just go home because it's a waste
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of time.
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Should we go back to the resurrection of the dead?
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And should we go to eternal judgment?
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Should we go back to the reality that God will judge everyone?
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And the writer says here and this we will do if God permits.
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So elementary truths principle number two.
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The doctrines of renewal, renewal meaning renewing the mind continually and the doctrine
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of regeneration meaning to make alive that which was dead are only done by the power
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and the work of the spirit.
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An impossibility for anything that the spirit does to be undone.
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That's the idea here.
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It is impossible to be made alive in Christ to be brought back to death and corruption
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and to have our minds changed and continually renewed in the truth to return to knowing
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nothing of his goodness.
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Now I want you to get that.
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If we are radically changed, made completely brand new by the power of the Holy Spirit
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and regenerated, made alive a new creature in order for us to have to go back to repentance
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means we would have to become back what we were.
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We have to become the old creature.
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So is that what we're saying?
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That the work of Christ isn't enough to keep us from being the old creature?
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My argument is there are denominations that teach that.
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Eternal security is real.
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I am secure eternally in Christ forever, his forever.
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I am in him.
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All that the father has given me I will not lose.
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And he says if we are in him, he is in the father.
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That's like a double lockdown.
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You can't get any more lockdown than that.
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And so what happens to many, to our charismatic friends is they miss out.
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They miss out on the sureness of knowing Christ.
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And so here it is.
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Verse four through six.
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For it is impossible.
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What's impossible mean?
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Not possible.
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All right.
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I'll say it in good old, you know, street language ain't gonna happen.
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And ain't is a word because it's in the Webster's dictionary.
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Okay.
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For it is impossible in the case of those who have once been enlightened.
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Now who are those?
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Us.
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The believer.
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So it's impossible concerning the believers who have once came to the saving knowledge.
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That's what the word enlightenment here means.
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The saving knowledge of Christ who us who have tasted experience the heavenly gift,
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the heavenly gift, eternal life.
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Us who have shared partook in the Holy Spirit and have experienced tasted the goodness of
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the word of God and the powers of the age to come to and then having to fall away from
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all that to be restored, to restore them again to repentance.
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It's an impossibility.
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Here's what I mean.
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When the Holy Spirit comes upon the heart and he starts the process of regeneration
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in their lives, which is instantaneous, his illumination of the truth of the gospel so
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enters the mind in the heart of man that he's impactfully changed forever.
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He is literally changed.
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Okay.
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He is waken from the dead, made alive in Christ.
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His mind is completely changed.
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He recognizes the creator of all things, the one who bestows salvation.
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He in response to that repents of his sin and say, Jesus is my Lord and savior.
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I am not going to live this life anymore because of the work of God in his heart.
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He then after that in obedience to him comes to repentance.
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Do you see the process?
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In his repentance, he baptizes out of obedience to him is recognized to be like Christ in
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crucifixion, being buried and resurrected into newness of life.
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The Holy Spirit, if our sin was powerful enough to rip us from his hand, the Holy Spirit would
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then have to reconvert us back to what we were and then we'd have to start the whole
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process over again.
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Now I want you to think about that because if we have to go through all that process
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in order for us to be deconverted, to be reconverted, there's one more part of the process that
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has to happen in order to make it right.
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Because without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin.
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And then what they're going to say is, well, the Bible says Jesus's blood is once for all.
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Oh really?
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If it was once for all, then how come it's not strong enough to keep?
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It's strong enough to once for all, but it's not strong enough to keep you.
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So what does that mean?
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He has to be crucified all over again and that's exactly what the writer says here.
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If you have to deconvert the whole thing, if you have to change everything back to what
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it was originally, then guess who has to come and die again?
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And that's exactly what he says.
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For it is impossible in the case of those who have been enlightened, who have come to
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the saving knowledge of Christ, who have tasted and experienced the heavenly gift of eternal
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life and have shared and partook in the Holy Spirit, to have tasted and experienced the
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goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away
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to restore them again to repentance since they are crucifying once again the Son of
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God to their own open shame, to their own harm.
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And then you're holding him up to contempt.
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Now I want you to understand that.
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Every time you claim that Jesus isn't good enough to keep you, guess what you're doing?
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Do you forget the shame that he experienced on your behalf?
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Do you forget the reality of him being crucified without clothing, being beaten to the point
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that he was unrecognizable?
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Are you willing to put him through that again?
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Of course you are, because your God's not big enough to keep you.
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See, your salvation is based upon your dead works.
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That's what the writer's saying here.
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So some very important things I think we need to mention here concerning the powers of the
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age to come.
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I did some deeper research on this particular statement.
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It's like, what powers of the age to come?
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What is he talking about?
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Well specifically he's talking about what's to come for the believer.
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What are we believing in?
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The goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come.
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We experience God's word and we also are going to experience what's to come.
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What's to come for us?
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Eternity with Jesus.
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What else is to come?
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The ultimate rain on the earth with him forever.
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He takes the earth, he refines it in fire and behold, out of the heavens come a new
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heaven and a new earth.
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Revelation 21.
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Isn't that the point?
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What's our hope?
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Our hope is that we get to reign with him forever.
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We are his forever.
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That's the point.
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And so Revelation, this age to come, this age of hope, of eternal reigning with Christ
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on the earth and enjoying him forever.
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What else is there to come?
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The judgment of all things.
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Very important truth here.
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Turn to Revelation 20.
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So not only do we experience in Revelation 21 the amazing new heaven and new earth, and
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we've got to remember Jesus says, behold, I make all things.
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There's also a clear understanding here concerning the judgment seat of Christ.
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That God does not let the evil go unpunished, nor does he take away our reward who is him.
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So part two of this age to come is seeing the God who reigns.
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Verse 11.
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Then I saw a great right throne and him who was seated on it.
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From his presence the earth and sky fled away and no place was found for them.
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And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne.
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And books were opened.
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What books?
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Books were opened.
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How many books?
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A whole mess of books.
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I'm thinking all of them.
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God be all of them.
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Not just one book, it's all the books.
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The books were opened.
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Then another book was opened.
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A. You get that?
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There's a whole mess of books.
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And then there's this one book.
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Just the mess of books, wide road.
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One book, skinny road.
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I like the skinny book.
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Then another book was opened which is the book of life.
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And look, he opens both books.
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Why?
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Because the dead are raised.
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The dead are now before the throne.
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The wicked and the good.
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Doesn't that make sense?
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Wait a minute, Jesus said something about that, didn't he?
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He says those who are on his right, well done my good and faithful servants.
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Those on his left, depart from me I never knew you.
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Oh, it's right here.
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Here we go.
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And then he says, and the dead were judged by what was written in the books according
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to what they had done.
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And the sea gave up the dead that were in it.
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And death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them.
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And they were judged, each one of them according to what they had done.
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And death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire.
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This is the second death in the lake of fire.
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And if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the
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lake of fire.
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A judgment seat.
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That's it.
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Pretty amazing.
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So this is the powers of the age to come, the thing we look forward to.
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Our eventual reign with Christ forever.
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And the reality is the day has come that that judgment of God for anything contrary to him
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has been thrown into hell.
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Verse six, we're back in the Hebrews chapter six, verse six, and then have him falling
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away.
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This word falling away means reject or willingly denounce what you once had.
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This word restore means to renovate, to renovate them, to renew them again to repentance.
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You notice he takes you back to where you first began.
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That's they are crucifying the son of God all over again to their own shame.
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That's what it means to their own harm means put to open shame.
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Now last principle and we're done for the day.
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The person whose heart receives the gift of salvation produces the fruits of faith in
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their life.
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But the person whose heart did not receive the gift of salvation continues to produce
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bad fruit.
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And I use this analogy because this is what Jesus says, a good tree produces good fruit,
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but a bad tree produces bad fruit.
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So here's a statement, Matthew 13 verse 23, says it this way, as for what was sown on
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good soil, this is the one who hears the word, understands it, he indeed bears fruit in yields,
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in one case a hundred fold and another 60 and another 30.
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Either way he produces fruit.
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The writer in Hebrews verse seven through eight says it this way, the land, the ground,
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this word land is ground suitable for growing.
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Is your heart suitable for growing?
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Has God cultivated the land of your heart?
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Because the land that is suitable for growing that has drunk the rain that has that often
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falls on it and produces a crop useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated receives
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a blessing from God.
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They produce fruit.
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Here's what it means.
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You ready?
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God is the cultivator and when he cultivates the heart and he reigns upon the heart of
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man the truth of his gospel, Paul plants Apollo's waters, he produces in that person a crop
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that is useful because the heart has been cultivated.
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The cultivating thing is the gospel.
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The gospel cultivates the heart.
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God uses it.
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Sometimes that rain and cultivation if you ever know, if you guys know when it rains
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here does it rain on the farmland?
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Does it rain also in the woods?
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Anybody like to go out in the woods and plant some corn?
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Why can't you plant corn out there?
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Someone says sunlight?
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Why else can you plant corn?
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I know you guys are going to say it a little.
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There's also rocks and thorns and there's also thistles and there's stuff that killed
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the plant.
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You know when you want to do farmland there's two ways to deal with the land of farmland.
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One to deal with the issue of the farmland is what?
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To rip it up.
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And typically it takes about two years to rid the ground of all of the pestilence that's
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on it.
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Insects and vines and all this other junk.
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Most times they'll go and they'll rip it up.
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And then what do they do?
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You ever get grubs in your grass?
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What do you do to your grass?
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You burn it.
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Burning refines.
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Okay?
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Now this is what the writer says here.
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See the rain falls on both the good and the bad.
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The wicked and the righteous.
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But only the heart that's been cultivated will produce a crop.
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But there are hearts that will not be cultivated.
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Because they can't be cultivated, because they're not supposed to be cultivated.
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That's what he says here.
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But if it bears thorns and thistles after the rain falls on it, it's worthless and near
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to being cursed.
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Interesting term here.
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It's near to being cursed.
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And what is its end to be burned?
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That's a hard statement.
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In other words, there are hearts that will receive the rain and produce a crop.
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Then there's hearts that get rain but it doesn't take the rain in.
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It just produces stuff like that way out there in the woods.
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Useful is that?
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What kind of use is that?
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It's no use at all.
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So here's my translation.
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The ground that drinks the rain that often falls on it and is tilled produces crops and
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herbs and receives a blessing from God.
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The ground that produces thorns and thistles, even though the rain has fallen on it, that
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ground is worthless and cursed and its end is to be burned.
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It's useless.
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Well that's not fair.
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I thought God says, my desire is that all men would come to repentance.
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That's not fair.
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You know what's not fair?
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That he rains on the bad ground anyway.
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That's not fair.
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Why does he give rain to the ground that doesn't deserve it, doesn't want it, doesn't like
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it, rejects it?
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Now I'm sure you look at the trees and the thistles and stuff.
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You're like, you know, I cultivated you and tilled you and you're still not producing
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good stuff.
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Like that's not fair.
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Like why am I working so hard?
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But people, we have a tendency not to look at things I think as God sees them.
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He says, I give grace to everyone.
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I put rain on everyone.
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It rains on the good and the bad.
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But blessed are those who receive the blessing of God because God has tilled the land and
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that land has received the water from the rain that has fallen on it.
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How come we can't see that grace?
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How come we always got to point out God must be a bad God if he doesn't save everybody?
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The fact that he saves one is a grace that's beyond measure because the scripture says
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for all have sinned, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
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No one seeks God, no not one.
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All have turned aside.
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All have venom that come from their lips.
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All of us are desperately wicked.
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There's no one righteous.
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The wages of sin is death.
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We're all dead and are trespassers in sins.
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The fact that God saves one is a grace beyond measure.
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But God just didn't save one.
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He saved many.
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And that's what we're going to read in the next couple of verses starting next week in
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verse 9.
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So I want us to really understand that the grace of God is beyond measure and that this
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amazing doctrine of renewal, regeneration, election, and doctrine of righteousness, doctrine
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of justification is all saturated through this chapter.
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Very important to understand God's grace is beyond what we can ever imagine.
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We all deserve one thing.
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It's interesting, and it's about to be the only political statement I'll say it this
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way okay.
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It's interesting after listening to Trump's speech at the RNC, you know, as you guys know
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where I stand as a in my politics.
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Everybody was claiming it was a miracle.
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You know what Trump said?
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I shouldn't be here.
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I'm here only by the providential hand of God.
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You know what?
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He was absolutely right.
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The only reason why he was there is because God providentially had set it in time for
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him to be there.
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And for that to happen the way it happened was not because God took his head and just
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turned it just a little bit.
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It's called providence.
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A power you can't see that does not break nature, but it's so affected through time
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that at that moment God knew and so it happens.
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Providence is not a miracle.
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Providence is a power unseen.
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That's an amazing thought.
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So let's thank God for opportunities to see him at work and for someone to finally say
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God is providential.
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So let's pray.
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Father, I want to thank you so much for your faithfulness and goodness.
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To you be honor and glory and power and might forever.
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Lord, we praise you and thank you for your word.
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We thank you that we need to move away from milk and move into solid food that we may
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grow in a full stash of maturity of Christ for your glory.
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In Jesus' name.