Trinity Baptist Church

 

One of the responsibilities that a pastor has is warning his people. Paul reminded the elders at Ephesus that he had not failed over a period of three years to watch and warn them with tears night and day. 

 

Perhaps the major problem of the church that we deserve to warned about is unrecognized and un-confessed sin, and the fall-out that it causes. It might be a sin against God; it might be a sin against another brother or sister, or it might be a sin against the lost world around us. But I would dare say that strained relationships and anger and hurt feelings probably raise their head more and cause more fellowship problems than any other thing in the church. 

 

Now generally, those problems give rise to another problem that I want to address over the next three weeks, and that is spiritual defection. It seems to me that very seldom do people just drop out of church. There is almost always an underlying reason. The preacher said or did something they didn’t like; feelings got hurt because of a misunderstanding or maybe even intentional act. 

 

For whatever reason, church rolls are full of people who used to be involved, but no longer attend or are active. They have defected. That is of grave concern to me because of the way Scripture deals with the problem. 

 

In fact the Bible identifies one of the causes of spiritual defection as never being converted. Some fall away simply because they were never saved to begin with.

 

There are some people who come very close to knowing God, some people who come very close to having their sins forgiven, but never are truly saved and they eventually turn and fall away. They are defectors. 

 

Sometimes they are called apostate; I mean by that they know the truth, but depart from it. Others are victimized by the abundance of false doctrine that is preached. But nonetheless they are defectors. There is always a great danger in defection and always very serious and eternal consequences.

 

To illustrate how God feels about this matter of spiritual defection, knowing the truth and turning from it, let me draw you attention all the way back to the Law as given through Moses. 

 

Deuteronomy 13:12-18

 

Now the point of this text is this: if anyone comes along and leads you astray from what you know is the truth and leads a village or a city to worship a false god, then the response to that will be to slaughter all the people, destroy the city, kill all the cattle, burn all the booty and don't take anything out of that place for your own so that God will not continue to be angry with you. That's how God feels about spiritual defection. Destroy everybody involved with it.

 

In chapter 17 it moves from being a corporate issue in a city to being a personal matter.  

 

Deuteronomy 17:2-6

 

So God says, If it is a town that is defected from what they know is true, burn it after you've slaughtered everybody with a sword.

 

If it is an individual in any city, stone them to death for their spiritual defection. I want people to understand how serious it is to know the truth and to depart from it. It is a very serious matter.

 

Now with that Old Testament perspective in mind, I want you to go to Hebrews chapter 10

 

In the New Testament we find a very important parallel.

 

Hebrews chapter 10:28

 

Now that is the Old Testament principle that we read a moment ago in Deuteronomy 17. 

 

Anyone who sets aside or defects from the law of Moses which included the worship of the true God and the true God alone and no other God, anyone who defects from the law of Moses after proper investigation and the confirmation of two or three witnesses that such defection was indeed true dies without mercy. 

 

 

 

 

Now if that is true, if God says when they violate the law wipe out the whole village, if God says when an individual defects from what they know is the truth and what they have outwardly covenanted to, if they defect to false gods, stone them on the spot, if that is the punishment for a defection from the law of Moses, then notice verse 29

 

That's a question. Did you notice the question mark at the end of the verse?

 

You see, it is reasonable to assume that if a defection in the Old Testament which was a violation of the Law of Moses brought about instantaneous death there would certainly be deserved a far more severe punishment for trampling under your feet the Son of God. 

 

Defecting from the law of Moses is one thing, trampling the Son of God is a worse thing. Now that's the point that I want you to focus on. And I want to speak to you this morning on the danger of spiritual defection.

 

Down through my ministry, including 14 years here, there have been those about whom I have questioned the reality of their salvation. 

 

There are those who come for a while; they’re setting the woods on fire. They are involved in everything. They teach Sunday School and drive the vans and help in VBS sing and all the stuff and then all of a sudden they disappear.

 

I must tell you I have this nagging fear that the reality is they came and they outwardly identified but they never really knew Christ. 

There are only two possible responses to the gospel. Any time a sinner is confronted with the claims of Christ, he either moves on to saving faith, or he defects from the truth. Those are the only two responses. If you have heard and understood the gospel, either you believe or you reject.

 

If you believe unto salvation, you know that God then promises you eternal heaven. If you defect and reject then God promises you eternal hell. Those are the only two responses.

 

In this tenth chapter of Hebrews the writer of Hebrews has been talking about the gospel. In fact, earlier in the chapter it's very clear what he's been saying. 

 

He says, for example, in verse 10 that we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And there he focuses on the gospel, the death of Christ for sin. 

 

In verse 12 he says that Christ having offered one sacrifice for sins for all times sat down at the right hand of God. 

 

In verse 14 he says, "For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified." 

 

So several times he looks at the cross and the saving work of Christ done there. That's the essence of the gospel.

 

And the writer is saying it is the work of Christ that has provided for salvation. In fact, in verse 17 he says that God will remember our sins no more when they are covered by Christ's death. 

Verse 18 says that out of the work of Christ comes the forgiveness of sins. So he's been talking about the gospel and the saving work of Christ.

 

Now among the readers of this epistle to the Hebrews, just as today, there are those two categories. There are those who believe, i.e. the saved, and there are those who reject; the lost. 

 

In both cases they know the gospel. They understand it, they comprehend it. 

 

That is why in verse 29 he says, "You have trampled under your feet the Son of God. You have treated or regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant and you have insulted the Spirit of grace." Why? 

 

Because they had seen the working of the Spirit, they had understood the shed blood of Christ and the covenant which it purchased and they understood who the Son of God was. So in knowing the gospel they had two options...believe unto salvation, reject unto damnation.

 

Now the thing that makes this so important is that when you know the gospel and you understand who the Son of God is and you understand what the blood of the covenant is and you have seen the working of the Holy Spirit and you reject, there is reserved for you a more severe punishment. 

 

Now get a hold of that.   

 

No one will suffer in hell more than those who are the closest to Jesus. The most evil and unbelieving of the old covenant will not suffer in hell the way the rejecting defectors of the new covenant will suffer. 

That's what he's saying. It is the more severe punishment.

 

Now what does that say to us? If nothing else, it says that knowing the gospel is the greatest blessing on the face of the earth and through all eternity. 

 

But it is also the severest curse God will ever place on a person is reserved for those who reject Jesus.   

 

Those who have known and understood the gospel are either in line for the most profound blessing or in line for the most severe judgment from almighty God.

 

Now let's look at those two options. Having given the gospel through verse 18, the first part of the chapter, he then applies it beginning at verse 19 and following 

 

Starting then in verse 19 we see option number one of accepting Christ. 

 

Verse 19-22a (draw near)

 

Now stop right there.

 

That's an invitation. The invitation is let us draw near. That’s the main thought of the text. 

 

Draw near. What do you mean by that? Come to God. Draw near to God, come to God. You say, "How can I come to God?"

 

Well he has already given you the answer to that question. 

 

Reread verse 19. "We have confidence to enter the holy place where God is by the blood of Jesus. Because through His sacrifice He has made the way and it is...verse 20...a new and a living way and He has inaugurated it so that we can go through because the veil now is His flesh and we're in Him and He is our great high priest and He ushers us in." He made the way. He opened the way. He shows the way. He is the way. He leads the way. And God is now available to us. The way is open.

 

And so, the writer says, "Since the way is open, the sacrifice for sin is accomplished, the holy place is accessible, God's presence is unveiled, and He waits for sinners to come and Christ will even take you there, then he says, draw near. 

 

What are you waiting for? God is there. He's waiting for you. The way is prepared, draw near." 

 

But notice also, that drawing near has some basic elements to it. 

 

He says those who draw near must come with a

true heart. 

 

You know what that means? Sincerity; a pure motive. And what is the true motive for salvation? What is it that genuinely and honestly compels a person to come to God through Christ? 

 

I'll tell you what it is. It is the desire to experience the forgiveness of sins. A sincere heart rises out of a sense of sinfulness. You're coming with no ulterior motive here. 

You're coming to God because you are desperately in need of the salvation that only God can provide. 

 

Second feature, he says, you come in full assurance of faith. 

 

What does that mean? That means you respond to the gospel with complete trust in its message. You're committing everything to Him. You realize your sinfulness, but you trusting the Bible’s claims. You fully believe the gospel. 

 

And when you draw near with a true hear and confident faith, what happens? 

 

Verse 22,

 

What happens? God then cleanses your heart from an evil conscience.

 

You say, "What is conscience?" The simplest way that I know to define conscience is simply this: it is a sense of moral responsibility that is guided by the Word of God. 

 

An unsaved man does not have a proper sense of moral responsibility. An unregenerate person has a skewed conscience, a warped sense of moral responsibility. 

 

But when a person comes to God and draws near and has a pure motive, repentance and has true faith, saving faith, the faith that is genuine, then God puts within him a cleansing work that washes out that evil sense of morality and replaces it with a righteous kind of morality. 

 

And a Christian then can function by his conscience. We are to have a clear conscience. Can you trust your conscience? Yes, if you're a Christian, because it is a God‑given sense of moral responsibility and it will square with the Word of God. And a true Christian is going to see morality for what it really is.

 

And then he also says in verse 22 that our bodies will be washed with pure water. 

 

When a person draws near, God gives them a sincere repentant heart, God gives them a sincere genuine faith, God washes the inside evil conscience out and plants in a good conscience that is in a tune with the Spirit of God. And then God washes the outside with pure water. What does that mean? 

 

Well, this is a beautiful picture, it was the picture used of a bride who had a ceremonial bath before her wedding, symbolic of her cleanliness and her purity. And what it's simply saying is God not only works on the inside, he works on the outside. He is concerned about your attitude and your actions. 

 

Then go to verse 23 and here is where we really deal with the defection issue. 

 

First we are to draw near, and having drawn and been converted let us hold fast the profession. 

 

Listen: true salvation is always marked by a sincere heart, a confident faith, an internal cleansing, the washing away with all sin and of staying with the stuff. That's what verse 23 is saying.

 

The person who draws near stays there and holds fast. That's the human side of the doctrine of eternal security. 

 

From God's side, we're eternally secure because He secures us. But from our side, we know we are secure because we continue in the faith. True Christians continue in the faith, John 8, "If you continue in My Word you're a real disciple." 

 

Every so often someone says, I just don’t feel saved. Almost without exception, when we discuss that felling, I will discover that the person is drifting away from the Lord. No wonder you don’t feel saved. You aren’t living like you’re saved. Why would you have security? So he says persevere, continue under the faithful God who promised to keep you.

 

And then in verses 24 and 25 he says, with this in mind, "Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together as is the habit of some but encouraging one another and all the more as you see the day drawing near." 

 

Now put all that together: True salvation involves a sincere heart, a confident faith, a cleansed inside, a changed outside, a continuing security and listen to this, a love of the fellowship.

 

When true conversion occurs in the heart there will be an assembling together, there will be a mutual stimulation of one another to love and good deeds and there will be an encouraging of one another and all the more as you come closer and closer to the time of the drawing near of Christ.

 

Now think about what that is saying: The writer says the way is open. He's pleading with these Jews reading this letter who know the gospel but they haven't come to Christ. They've just stood on the edge and they know it's true. And he's saying the way is open. Access to God is available. 

 

The veil is removed and there's a new and living way. 

 

Because of that, he says draw near, come out of true conviction, true repentance, genuine faith, and be washed and cleansed inside and out that you might persevere and that you might enter in to God's company in fellowship. That's the right thing to do.

 

Listen, I plead with you: If you have known the gospel, you've heard the gospel, you've understood the gospel, it is possible that you may even affirm that it is true and you've outwardly identified with the church and you've sort of lined up with what's going on, but there's something holding you back from coming to Christ and coming in sincere conviction and repentance, coming with a confident genuine faith, may I say to you what the writer said? 

 

Please draw near...please draw near. And I plead with you because of verse 29.

 

The worst punishment that will be known in hell will be known by those who knew the truth and rejected it.

 

Now let's back up to verse 26 and see the other option, rejecting Christ. This is tragic. 

 

Here we face the situation of people who have heard the gospel, come face to face with the claims of Christ, they've even been associated with the church but they defect. Their hearts have been warmed by the gospel of Christ. They may even have made a superficial commitment. They may even have joined the church. They may have become identified with the visible body but they weren't sincere.

 

They didn't have a pure motive, a genuine repentance, a true faith. They weren't cleansed in and out. They do not persevere. And they fall away from the fellowship.   I want you to understand how serious an issue this is.

 

verse 26

 

And here we have a definition of this defecting apostasy. 

 

The first characteristic of the defector is willful sin. 

 

"For if we go on sinning willfully," and by the way, would you note that that's the characterization of an unregenerate person? An unregenerate person is characterized as a person who goes on in an unbroken pattern of continual willing sin. 

 

You say, "How is that different from a Christian?" A Christian does not have an unbroken pattern of sin, we sin but the pattern is broken with righteousness. And we sin but it is not the expression of the deepest will of our heart. But the unregenerate go on continually in an unbroken pattern of sin willingly. 

 

 

They do not break the pattern of sin. They just go on willingly. The idea here is they've heard the gospel, they know the way is open. They see the access through the blood of Christ. They recognize the holy place, the presence of God is available. They can go on in. But instead they turn from that and go back to the pattern of sin.

 

The second element he follows up with in verse 26, is someone who has the knowledge of the truth.

"For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth." 

 

And there it is. Those are the two characteristics. Very simple, they know the truth, they reject it for an ongoing continual pattern of sin.   They don't fall away out of weakness and they don't fall away out of ignorance, they fall away willingly of their own accord...of their own accord. 

 

It's first degree, plotted, premeditated, planned defection. Some people do fall short of salvation by ignorance, some fall short of salvation out of weakness, but not these. It's willful, it's planned, it's premeditated.

 

So there you have it, two choices. If you opt for choice two where you understand and maybe you're outwardly identified for a while, so much so that the church and the world thinks you belong so that they take you when they go visit the prisoners and the world persecutes you when it persecutes the true Christians. 

 

If you're that close and you look that real and you defect, I want you to know something, the results are frightening.

 

Look again at verse 26.  

 

 

Now listen to this. There were sacrifices and sacrifices and sacrifices by the millions in the Old Testament and if you missed out on one you could always pick up another one. But when Jesus died, there was one sacrifice and if you reject the sacrificial offering of Jesus Christ by which He opened the way to God, there is no other provision for your sin. 

 

What does that mean? It means you have no other hope. There's no other sacrifice, absolutely none. There was only one. And if you reject Christ there is no salvation in any other name. 

 

That is a profound thing. That's why Hebrews 6 says that if you know all these things and you reject them, it is impossible for you to be renewed to repentance. Why? Because you've rejected the one offering. 

 

That’s why we are told that after Jesus, the one sacrifice for sins offered Himself, sat down. Why did He sit down? The work was done. If you reject Christ there's no sacrifice for your sins, you will die in your sins. 

 

There's only one way.

 

 

Verse 27

 

There's no sacrifice but there is judgment. Would you notice the word "adversaries"? Isn't it sad to think about it? These were people who understood the gospel, understood the Son of God, who He was, understood the blood of the covenant, what it was, understood the working of the Holy Spirit, they had seen the signs and the works of the Spirit of God. 

 

These are people who got outwardly identified to the church. I mean they sang in the choir, they taught Sunday School, they were kind to people, they preached messages and gave offerings and were fine, upstanding members of the church. 

 

They looked like they belonged but the truth is they turned out to be the enemies of God.  He calls them His adversaries or His enemies. 

 

Want an illustration? Who of all people who ever lived in the history of humanity was the closest to Christ and defected? 

 

Judas. And hell will be hottest for Judas Iscariot because the closer you are the greater the level of responsibility and the severer the punishment. 

 

So, he says, you can expect a terrifying judgment, a fury, a fire that will consume the adversaries. 

 

No more sacrifice, only judgment. 

 

And that brings us to the text where we started, verses 28 and 29. 

If you choose to defect, you deserve to know God is going to deal with you stronger than anyone else in judgment. 

 

If God has been gracious enough to have favored with the knowledge of the gospel, if you have been enlightened by the Holy Spirit, if you have been around the truths of the Bible, if you have been around the church and in the midst of that somewhere along the line failed to believe, turned your back, despised His lordship, denied His authority, broken His command, walked with His enemies, gone on in an unbroken willful sin then you have placed on the cheek of Jesus a Judas kiss and you shall receive what Judas received who went to his own place...the place God sends those who reject His Son even though they feign affection to Him.

 

Why such severe punishment? 

 

Verse 29, "Because they trample under foot the Son of God." 

 

That phrase, “the Son of God” speaks of the exalted Christ. To the Philippians, Paul described Jesus as humbling Himself, and becoming a servant, even to the point of death. But God highly exalted Him and has given Him a name which is above every name which, by the way, is the name Lord. And He has commanded everyone to bow. 

 

He says this is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased, listen to Him. He calls for us to accept His Son, acknowledge His Son, believe on His Son. 

 

 

 

And if you choose to just walk across Him, and consider His death on the cross to be worthless and useless and of no regard, not even worthy to be picked up, then you have spurned the most worthy object you will ever encounter, Hell couldn’t be hotter for you and you deserve everything you get. 

 

You have done the very opposite of what God required and thus you have experienced the severest rejection and will experience the severest punishment.

 

Next he mentions the blood of the covenant.  

 

The perfect spotless lamb of God who shed His perfect blood on the cross as an offering and an atonement for sin, you have literally regarded as unclean, treated it as if it were nothing, counted it as an unholy thing, it isn't holy, isn't sacred, it isn't significant. 

 

And in so doing you have despised the Son. First you despise the Father by trampling on His Son. Second, you despise the Son by counting as unholy His blood.

 

Then in verse 29 he says, "You have insulted the Spirit of grace." 

 

Catch what that means: when you defect from the truth, you trample the trinity. You manage to offend every expression of God. 

 

The Father who loved you enough to send His only begotten Son. The Son who willingly laid down His life for you. The

 

The Spirit who makes the truth understandable, the Spirit is the one who illuminated the mind, the Spirit is the one who by virtue of spiritual gifts allowed the gospel to be preached with power and effectiveness and so you have insulted the Spirit.

 

 You have trampled the Father, you have trampled the Son, and you have trampled the Spirit.

 

And as a result, you'll have a severer punishment. 

 

And so verse 30 says, "For we know Him who said, Vengeance is Mine." and He said it in Deuteronomy 32:35, "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay." And again He said in Deuteronomy 32:36, "The Lord will judge His people." 

 

And then this, "It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God." 

 

So I say to you, be warned. If you know the truth and you're being lured away from it, you are in danger of falling into the hands of the living God who will bring about the severest punishment. 

 

It's a tragic passage, isn't it? 

 

There are really twp messages in one this morning: 

First, If you are not saved, draw near. 

 

And if you are saved, thank God that He drew you near and show your love by the way you live. 

 

Let's bow in prayer.