XIV.
IMPOSSIBLE TO RENEW TO REPENTANCE
"It Is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted
of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have
tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they
shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify
to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame."-HEBREWS
vi. 4-6.
The sacred writer enumerates four fundamental
principles: Repentance from dead works, which in the old dispensation was
symbolized by divers baptisms, or washings; Faith toward God, typified
by the laying of hands on the head of the victim-sacrifices; the Resurrection
of the dead; and Eternal Judgment. And then he proposes not to lay them
again, but to leave them. There is no thought, however, of
deserting them. The great principles on which God saves the soul are identical
in every age, and indispensable.
We can only leave them as the child leaves the multiplication-table,
when it is well learnt, but which lies at the root of all after-study;
as the plant leaves the root, when it towers into the majestic shrub, which
draws all its life from that low origin; and as the builder leaves the
foundation, that he may carry up stone on stone, and leans on the foundation
most heavily, when he has left it at the furthest distance below him. And
we are taught the reason why these principles are not laid afresh. It would
be useless to do so; it would serve no good purpose; it would leave in
the same state as it found them those who had apostatized from the faith.
And so we are led to one of those passages which sensitive spirits have
turned to their own torment and anguish; just as men will distil the rankest
poison from some of the sweetest flowers.
HOW FAR WE MAY GO, AND YET FALL AWAY. These apostate
disciples had been enlightened (ver. 4). They had been led
to see their sin and danger, the temporary nature of Judaism, the dignity
and glory of the Saviour. Other Hebrews might be ignorant, the folds of
the veil hanging heavily over their sight; but it could never be so with
them, since they had stood in the midst of the Gospel's meridian light,
and had been enlightened.
So may it be with us. Not like the savage, crouching
before his fetish, or roaming over the wild; not like the follower of Confucius,
Buddha, or Mahomet, groping in the twilight of nature or religious guess-work;
not like myriads in our own land, whose hearts are as dark as the chaos
into which God commanded the primeval beam to shine: we have been enlightened.
We may know that we are sinners; we may have learnt from childhood the
scheme of salvation; we may be familiar with the mysteries of the kingdom
of heaven, into which angels desire to look: and yet we may fall away.
These Hebrews, here referred to, had also tasted
of the heavenly gift. What gift is that? I hear a voice, which
we know well, speaking from the well of Sychar, and saying: "The water
that I shall give shall be in thee, springing up into everlasting life."
It is the life of God in the soul; it is Christ himself; and he is willing
to be in us, like a perennial spring, unstanched in drought, unfrozen in
frost, leaping up, in fresh and living beauty, like some warm spring that
makes a paradise in the arctic circle.
But some are content not to receive it, only to
taste it. This is what these persons did. They sipped the sweetness of
Christ. They had a passing superficial glimpse into his heart. Like Gideon's
soldiers, they caught up a few drops in their hands from the river of God,
and hastened on their way. So we may have some pleasure in thoughts of
Christ. His sufferings touch; his beauty attracts; his history moves and
inspires. But it is only a taste; and yet we may fall away. They had also
been made partakers of the Holy Ghost. It is not said that
they had been converted, regenerated, or filled by the Holy Ghost. The
expression is a very peculiar one, and it is used because the sacred writer
could not affirm any of these things of them, and yet Was anxious to show
that they had been brought under his gracious influences. For instance,
he had convinced them of sin, had striven with them, had plied them with
warning and entreaty, with fear and hope. And they had so far yielded to
him as to give up some of their sins and assume the outward guise of Christianity.
Moreover, they had tasted the good Word of
God, and the powers of the world to come. The first of these is
obviously the Scriptures; and the second is the usual expression for the
age in which we live, and which, with all its spiritual forces, was beginning
to thrill the hearts of men when these words were penned. They liked a
good sermon; the Bible was full of interest and charm; they had heard the
prophets, and seen the apostles of the Pentecostal age. All these had been
analyzed, weighed, and counted; and yet they were in peril of going back.
Let us, therefore, beware!
WHAT 15 IT TO FALL AWAY? It is something more
than to fall. The real child of God may fall, as David or as Peter
did; but there is a vast difference between falling and falling
away. This latter experience can no more come to a real believer
than a second flood of waters to the earth; but it will certainly find
out the counterfeit and the sham.
To fall away is to go back from the outward profession
of Christianity, not temporarily, but finally; not as the result of some
sudden sin, but because the first outward stimulus is exhausted, and there
is no true life beating at the heart, to repair or reinvigorate the wasting
devotion of the life. It is to resemble those wandering planets, which
never shone with their own light, but only in the reflected light of some
central sun; but which, having broken from its guiding leash, dash further
and further into the blackness of darkness, without one spark of life or
heat or light. It is to return as a dog to its vomit, and as a sow to her
filth; because the reformation was only outward and temporary, and the
dog or sow natures were never changed through the gracious work of the
Holy Spirit. It is to be another Judas; to commit the sin against the Holy
Ghost; to lose all earnestness of feeling, all desire for better things,
all power of tender emotion; and to become utterly callous and dead, as
the pavement on which we walk, or the rusty armor hanging on the old castle's
walls.
WHY IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RESTORE SUCH TO REPENTANCE.
Notice, there is nothing said here of what God can do. The only question
is as to the limits of human power, and the ordinary methods of influencing
human wills. Also notice, we are not told that God could not save those
who had fallen away; but that it is impossible to hope that a man who has
passed through the experiences just described, and has nevertheless apostatized,
can be reached or touched by any of those arguments or motives which are
familiar weapons in the Gospel armory. If the mightiest arguments have
been brought to bear on the conscience in vain; if after some slight response,
which gave hopes of better things, it has relapsed into the stupor and
insensibility of its former state, there remains nothing more to be done.
There is nothing more potent than the wail of Calvary's broken heart, and
the peal from Sinai's brow; and, if these have been tried in vain, no argument
is left which can touch the conscience and arouse the heart. If these people
had never been exposed to these appeals, there would have been some hope
for them; but what hope can there be now, since, in having passed through
them without permanent effect, they have become more hardened in the process
than they were at first?
Here is a man dragged from an ice-pond, and brought
into the infirmary. Hot flannels are at once applied; the limbs are chafed;
every means known to modern science for restoring life is employed. At
first it seems as if these appliances will take effect, there are twitchings
and convulsive movements; but, alas! they soon subside, and the surgeon
gravely shakes his head. "Can you do nothing else?" "Nothing," he replies;
"I have used every method I can devise; and if these fail, it is impossible
to renew again to life."
This passage has nothing to do with those who fear
lest it condemns them. The presence of that anxiety, like the cry which
betrayed the real mother in the days of Solomon, establishes beyond a doubt
that you are not one that has fallen away beyond the possibility of renewal
to repentance. If you are still touched by Gospel sermons, and are anxious
to repent, and are in godly fear lest you should be a castaway, take heart!
these are signs that this passage has no bearing on you. Why make yourself
ill with a sick man's medicine? But if you are growing callous and insensible
under the preaching of the Gospel, look into this passage and see your
doom, unless you speedily arrest your steps.
THE NATURAL ILLUSTRATION (ver. 7). Behold that field,
well situated, prepared by careful culture and arduous toil: the good seed
is scattered with lavish hand; the rain comes oft upon it; the sunshine
kisses it; the seasons, as they pass, woo it to bear fruit. At first it
would appear as if it were about to answer the expectations freely entertained.
But see, the show of green which covers its face turns out to be a crop
of briars and thorns. The owner for whom it was dressed comes to visit
it. "What," cries he, "have you done all you could, this, and that, and
the other?" "All," is the reply. Then the decision comes back, stern and
sad, "It is useless to expend more time or care. Leave it to its fate.
Let no fruit grow on it henceforth and forever."
We may resemble that field; and yet, whilst there
is a spark of devotion, a thrill of holy longing, a sigh after a better
life, a yearning to be penitent and holy, there is still hope. The great
Husbandman will not cast us off, so long as there is one redeeming feature
in our condition. He will not break the bruised reed, nor quench the smoking
flax. He will not fail, nor be discouraged, until he has made the desert
into a garden, and the wilderness like the paradise of God.
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Chapter XV.