November 4, 2024 -Scripture Alone
- brooks16055
- Nov 4, 2024
- 3 min read
EZEKIEL 10:1-11:25
HEBREWS 6:1-20
PSALM 105:16-36
PROVERBS 27:1-2
Ezekiel 10:18 “They will return to it and remove all its vile images and detestable idols. 19 I will give them an undivided heart and put a new spirit in them; I will remove from them their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh.
I think of all the young people who I have known who learned about God and Jesus who could talk the talk and seemed to know and understand the Christian faith but when they went to college and or the work force, they turned from all they knew. They turned to the idols of the world and turned away from God. Many of they even come to deny Him. I have prayed for God to take away the heart of stone and give a heart of flesh to many who are lost and living far from God. God did it for the Israelites over and over again. He can do it for our children as well.
I picked this out thinking about my kids and then I read Hebrews.
Hebrews 6:4 It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age 6 and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace.
I didn't like it but this verse was one that I had to pick after the above verse from Ezekiel. I didn't want to pick it because it's hard to understand. But I can't deny it. I picked it thinking I would look into some commentaries to see what the biblical scholars have to say and how they make it fit with the once saved always saved teaching. But it looks to me like the scholars are divided on the subject as well. I have shared the link for the Enduring Word Commentary at the bottom because it shares the different thoughts well but I really like the preface that I am sharing in text below.
B. The danger of falling away.
Preface: Understanding an approach to controversial passages like this.
a. There is a great temptation to shape a difficult passage in to what we think it should say, according to our theology system or bent. Yet we must first be concerned with understanding what the text says (exposition), before we are concerned with fitting what it says into a system of theology.
b. Systems of theology have some value, as they show how Biblical ideas are connected and show that the Bible does not contradict itself. But the way to right systems begins with a right understanding of the text, not one that bends the text to fit into a system.
i. “We come to this passage ourselves with the intention to read it with the simplicity of a child, and whatever we find therein to state it; and if it may not seem to agree with something we have hitherto held, we are prepared to cast away every doctrine of our own, rather than one passage of Scripture.” (Spurgeon)
ii. “We had better far be inconsistent with ourselves than with the inspired Word. I have been called an Arminian Calvinist or a Calvinistic Arminian, and I am quite content so long as I can keep close to my Bible.” (Spurgeon)
c. Satan knows Scripture, and this passage has rightly been called “one of the Devil’s favorite passages” for the way it can (out of context) condemn the struggling believer. Many Christians feel like giving up after hearing Satan “preach a sermon” on this text.
Even if I don't know how to rectify this in my mind when it comes to what this means for many people I know and love I don't need to. I don't want to try to make it fit into my understanding. I trust that God loves them more than I do and I know that He knows hearts in ways that I don't. It's just one more thing that I have to trust God with and accept that I can't really understand it because I can't know the hearts of others. But I can know the word of God is true and it doesn't contradict itself. So again I must just trust in the Lord with all my heart and lean not on my own understanding.
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