Sermon Cloud

A Fearful Expectation

Hebrews 10:26-31

Grace Fellowship Church

March 30, 2008

Series 3 Sermon 40

²⁶ For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, ²⁷ but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. ²⁸ Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. ²⁹ How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? ³⁰ For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” ³¹ It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Introduction

Romans 3:18 says, “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”

This should be a frightening statement.  There is no fear of God before their eyes.  Even the Lord Jesus said, "Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.”

Hebrews 10:31 says, It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Fear is not a popular thing but it is a necessary thing.  Think about all of the things we fear.  I don’t drive my car at the top speed it will go simply because I fear I may kill myself or others.  I don’t go walking around on the roof of my house because I would probably slide off and severely injure myself.  There are things that we fear for good reason and usually that is a physical reason.  We do not do certain things because it could cause us great harm.  We normally do not drive without putting on our seat belts.  Why?  Because we fear we may get into an accident and fly out of the car onto the pavement if we are not restrained.  When we are in the woods hunting or by the lake fishing what do we watch out for?  Snakes.  Why?  Because they can hurt us or even kill us.  We watch where we step.  We are very particular about the places that we go.  When we are in a parking lot at night we are careful to be keenly aware of our surroundings.  We take self defense classes to help protect us from bad people. 

Many things that we do is fear motivated.  You work harder because you may fear being broke.  You work harder teaching your children because you fear they will not be successful.  The list can go on and on of all the things that we do because of fear. 

But what about the fear of the Lord?  The Old Testament is replete with admonitions to fear the Lord.  A simple search will net the phrase “fear the Lord” 61 times in the Old Testament and the phrase “fear of the Lord” is found 60 times.  There are other variations of this phrase.  “Fear God” is found 7 times.  The New Testament bears out the same testimony.  So if the Bible is abundantly clear that we are to fear God, both lost and saved, then why is there such a lack of fear for God in our day.

I want you to think about this for a moment.  The most powerful Being in all the universe is God.  By His mere word and will He spoke everything into existence.  By that same will and word He holds everything together.  When the chicken little scientists and others are running around saying that mankind is destroying the earth the Lord is making sure that the earth maintains its proper tilt, its speed of rotation, and that it does not drop out of orbit around the sun.  He maintains the weather and all the things that we puny humans have no control over.  All by His word and will.  In an instant He could decide that He did not want this Universe anymore, destroy it, and then create a new one and never break a sweat.   As finite as we are we technologically advanced people can not even determine how big our universe actually is.  One estimate put it at 156 billion light years wide.  A light year is 5,865,696,000,000 miles.  If I understand that properly that means that if you decided to travel at the speed of light across the width of the universe it would take you 156 billion years to get there.  And yet our life span is a mere 75 years.  That means it would take 2 billion 80 million lifetimes to get across.  Talk about a multigenerational focus. 

And God spoke, and the universe came into existence.  We should tremble at the thought of the infinite power of God.  Just the things we observe should cause us to quake at the sheer magnitude of the infinite ability of God.  We marvel at the miracles that our Lord Jesus performed here in His earthly ministry but to Him these were everyday occurrences. Raise someone from the dead?  Not a problem, He holds the universe together by the thoughts of His mind.  The writer ends the thought of this passage in verse 31 by stating: ³¹ It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

So it should be obvious to us that we should fear God.  I am not speaking of what some have said that this fear is a healthy respect.  I mean we should do what Scripture says and fear God. We in our human frailty whose lives can end by one quick tragic event should shudder at the thought of standing before this infinite being who is all powerful and all knowing.  We should take heed lest we tread on dangerous ground before the Lord. 

What we find here in Hebrews 10:26-31 is one of the most solemn, fearful warnings in all of Scripture.  It ranks right up there with Matthew 7:23, “Depart from me I never knew you.”  The tendency we have when we arrive at passages of Scripture like this is to try and quickly dismiss them.  We don’t want to think about them too much and you probably like me just want to be faithful to the Lord and avoid even having to brush up against such a passage.  But the passage is a tough one.  It should bring fear to our hearts.  It should drive us on and spur us on to faithfulness while also providing us a healthy dose of fear. 

I have read quite a bit on this passage this week and I can tell you there are a plethora of interpretations.  One commentator wrote that this passage was only applicable for the first century Jew who had converted to Christianity and therefore there was absolutely no application for us.  This is the theological equivalent of putting your fingers in your ears and yelling so you don’t have to hear what someone is saying.  Then there were others who said that the people in this passage were not indeed believers but rather had made a spurious confession of Christ.  This is a great way of ignoring some very obvious things in the passage and chalking up the words to false believers.  But this has little to no application for us and I think it is not taking the whole of the passage, the chapter, nor the epistle into consideration. 

Some ride the theological mule of eternal security so hard they can not fathom having such a passage in Scripture and if asked probably would tell you that they prefer this passage to not be here. 

But we can not say or think such a thing.  When you have a commitment to Scripture and Scripture must speak to us and teach us then we are indeed forced to deal with difficult passages and this is a thorny, difficult path to navigate. 

So as we look at this passage we need to ask some questions.  First, who is the writer talking to?  I think it is pretty clear that he is talking to the same group of assembled believers that he has been writing to this whole time.  These are first century Christians who have been under intense persecution. But the writer makes it even more clear who he is talking to.  Notice the first three words in verse 26.

For if we…   The writer lumps himself right over into the same category. The “we” in the text does exactly what the writer intends.  He is putting us all in the same category.  He is preaching to himself as well as his readers.  So what is it that we may find ourselves in?  Look again at verse 26.

For if we go on sinning deliberately (Now is this sin out of ignorance or is it full blown knowledge of what we are doing is wrong?  Look at the rest of verse 26.) after receiving the knowledge of the truth,(Then what?) there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,

So we have established the fact that the we are those who have received the knowledge of the truth and the writer includes himself in this category and therefore we must include ourselves in this category as well.  We have indeed been receivers of the knowledge of the truth.  There are other clues within the text that point to this speaking to legitimate believers.  Look at verse 29.

²⁹ How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?

If you will remember back just a couple of weeks ago we looked at how in the New Covenant the one time sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ has both sanctified us and is sanctifying us at the same time. 

And then there is verse 30.  Notice the first phrase, “For we know him…”  This is the same word for know that is found in chapter 8 when the writer quotes Jeremiah 31 and says, “they will all know me from the least to the greatest.”  But that is not the only clue we have in verse 30.  Look at the verse.

 ³⁰ For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.”

I can not stand before you this morning and say to you anything other than this warning is going out to legitimate converted Christians.  I believe that the people in this passage that the writer is speaking are the elect of God. 

There are New Testament examples of people making spurious confessions.  There are New Testament examples of people departing the faith.  But the language is very clear in this text and I can come to no other conclusion than to say that this is a passage that is dealing with legitimate Christians. 

But what do we make of the sinning deliberately in verse 26?  I believe this is the crux of the issue.  Look at verse 26 with me.

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,…

What is that talking about?  There have been those in church history who understood that this passage was written to believers and thought that this meant that anything you did intentionally meant that hell awaited you.  So they would wait until the death bed to be baptized in order to be eternally saved.  Now we can not make that same mistake but we also can not make the opposite but equal mistake and just pretend this passage does not exist. 

In determining the meaning of a particular text what should we look at first?  The context.  Last week we saw the context right before verse 26 and from Hebrews 10:19-25 we saw there were three commands for covenant faithfulness.  The first was to continuously draw near to God, the second was to hold fast our confession, and the third was to provoke faithfulness in one another by meeting together among other things.  To not obey these three commandments is to commit deliberate sin against the Lord which if not repented of leads to apostasy. Apostasy is the act of abandoning the faith.  It is in essence stating that the Christian faith is not legitimate and therefore not good enough to save and so you leave for various reasons. 

What are some of those reasons? In the context of Hebrews, one of the reasons was suffering and persecution.  Another could be disappointment.  Another could be because of gross sin.  But whatever the reason, the deliberate sin here is the refusal to draw near to God, the refusal to hold fast the confession, and the refusal to be with other believers. In essence it is a clean break from the faith.  The person who has committed the deliberate sin in verse 26 is one who no longer has any affiliation with the Lord, Christianity, nor the church.   

It will not take very long for you to be a Christian and discover that there are people whom you either sat under as your teacher or fellowshipped with as believers who will ultimately leave the faith.  I personally know three men whom I went to seminary with who have left the faith.  One was a pastor, one a staff member, and one had dreams of being a pastor.  But all three have for all intents and purposes departed the faith.  There are others.  There are those who continue to teach error in their churches that need to depart.  There are those who have succumbed to the temptations of the world and disqualified themselves from ministry.  There are those who need to leave the ministry who have compromised the faith for worldly desires.  I have seen professors change their theology to suit a particular president in order to save their jobs.  I know of one seminary administrator and professor who is by my estimation a Judas Iscariot.  These are harsh words.  These are charges that are leveled against these people and it sickens me to no end to have to make them.  I have seen so called believers hang other believers out to dry.   

As the church goes further and further into apostasy in the 21^st Century we will see more failures, more fleshly pursuits, more hypocrisy.  And we will all be shocked.  But we should not be. 

Whether we have one or not, God has a full orbed theology of judgment. 

And whether we as twenty first century believers have a biblical understanding of the fear of God or not God has a biblical understanding of fear.  I think the reason I have had such a difficult time with this passage this week is because I personally do not have a well developed theology of the judgment of God.  And I confess to you this morning that I think I have only scratched the surface on the understanding of the fear of God.  

I think what we have here in Hebrews 10:26-31 is God’s last resort in dealing with His wayward people.  There are those who will never stray.  There are those who may stray for a time.  And then there are those who will stray and never return.

The problem that I think is ever present in the church today is that there is a total lack of an understanding of the judgment of God. Many have this idea that they can make a confession of Christ, be baptized, join a church and then live however they want to because once they are saved they are always saved.  Others think they can leave the faith altogether and still get to Heaven one day.  And many have affirmed this as pastors and evangelists by not offering a thorough understanding of the judgment of God. 

We don’t want that to be the case here.  This passage has caused me to step back and review my own theology of the judgment of God and I think if we are going to understand what God intends for us to understand about Hebrews 10:26-31 then we must have a working knowledge of how God judges both the lost and His own people.  Look at verse 30.

³⁰ For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.”

So what does God do with the people that He judges?  The Bible says that all of mankind will be judged.  Remember Hebrews 9:27, “It is appointed for man to die once and then the judgment..” This of course speaks of eternal judgment.  But there is also temporal judgment as well. 

What we have to come to understand before we can understand Hebrews 10:26-31 is that God indeed judges people and He even judges His people. 

Think back in biblical history with me.  God judged Adam and Eve for their sin and that punishment was physical death.  The death they died was slow and steady but yet they still died.  Why did God punish them with death?  Because they violated His covenant with them.  Later we see the judgment that God handed down to Cain.

All of the world was to walk with God and yet in a few generations the world was evil and so God saved one family and utterly destroyed the people in the flood.  What was their temporal punishment?  Physical death.  The cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were utterly destroyed by fire and brimstone for its wickedness while Lot and some of his family were rescued. 

There were times when God judged the disobedience of His own people swiftly and quickly.  The story that comes to mind is that of Nadab and Abihu who were the sons of Aaron the High Priest.  Take your Bibles and turn to Exodus 24.

Then he said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and worship from afar. 2 Moses alone shall come near to the Lord, but the others shall not come near, and the people shall not come up with him.” 3 Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules. And all the people answered with one voice and said, “All the words that the Lord has spoken we will do.” 4 And Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. He rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 And he sent young men of the people of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the Lord. 6 And Moses took half of the blood and put it in basins, and half of the blood he threw against the altar. 7 Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.” 8 And Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said, “Behold the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.”

9 Then Moses and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up, 10 and they saw the God of Israel. There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. 11 And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ate and drank.

Here is Nadab and Abihu in the very presence of almighty God and they beheld Him and they ate and drank in His presence.  They are in the very presence of holiness and are charges with carrying out the Covenant that God has given the nation of Israel.  They serve in the tabernacle as priests.  These are chosen men descended from Aaron who will be High Priests at some point in their lives.  They will be the ones who will carry the blood into the Holy of Holies and sprinkle it on the mercy seat.  It was during this trip on the mountain that God gave Moses these instructions. 

So you would think two men who had been in the presence of God would understand the importance of their covenant duty before God.  You would think that having been in this privileged position would instill a healthy fear of God in Nadab and Abihu.  But turn over to Leviticus 10 and start reading in verse 1. 

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the Lord, which he had not commanded them.

This was not an accidental sin committed by these two sons of Aaron.  This was a blatant disregard for the commandments of God.  Exodus 30:8-10 tell us the commands for the burning of incense.  Listen as I read.

⁸ "When Aaron trims the lamps at twilight, he shall burn incense. There shall be perpetual incense before the LORD throughout your generations. ⁹ "You shall not offer any strange incense on this altar, or burnt offering or meal offering; and you shall not pour out a drink offering on it. ¹⁰ "Aaron shall make atonement on its horns once a year; he shall make atonement on it with the blood of the sin offering of atonement once a year throughout your generations. It is most holy to the LORD."

So these men go before the Lord willfully disobedient to the commands of the Lord and offer what the Old Testament calls unauthorized fire or strange fire on the alter of God which He has given specific commands for. 

Now in modern day theology God would just overlook this sin.  He would not say or do anything because in most peoples minds the Lord is no longer in the business of judging His people for their rebellion against His commands.  After all this is Old Testament and we don’t live in that dispensation.  Right?  Well that is not exactly how the writers of the New Testament see it. Hebrews 10:26-27 says.

²⁶ For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, ²⁷ but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.

Look at what happens to Nadab and Abihu.  God does not overlook their offense.  Read verse 2.

² And fire came out from before the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord.

In our minds the punishment does not fit the crime.  But it does.  This willful act of disobedience on the part of Nadab and Abihu if gone unpunished would have led many an Israelite down the road to destruction.  It starts out kind of small in our minds and sin grows until it festers like a rotting sore only to infect those around us. 

James 1:14-16 says, ¹⁴ But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. ¹⁵ Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. ¹⁶ Do not be deceived , my beloved brethren.

Nadab and Abihu are dead.  God has killed them for violating His covenant.  These who ate and drank in the presence of God are now dead.  Moses quickly intervenes.  Look at verse 3.

³ Then Moses said to Aaron, “This is what the Lord has said, ‘Among those who are near me I will be sanctified, and before all the people I will be glorified.’ ” And Aaron held his peace.

This should be a solemn warning to us all to walk circumspectly before the Lord.  Remember Ephesians 2:11-13 says:

¹¹ Therefore remember that formerly you, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called "Uncircumcision" by the so-called "Circumcision," which is performed in the flesh by human hands— ¹² remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. ¹³ But now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

We are a kingdom of priests and we have been brought near to God through the blood of Christ.  As believers we occupy a high and holy place.  We have been brought into the heavenly holy of holies and are positionally seated with Christ.  We are His people who are a peculiar people called by God to be holy as He is holy.  And in our actions we are to show the world that God is a holy God and that He is to be glorified.  That is the standard and that is the standard that Nadab and Abihu violated.    And it cost them their lives.  Look at the rest starting in verse 4. 

4 And Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Uzziel the uncle of Aaron, and said to them, “Come near; carry your brothers away from the front of the sanctuary and out of the camp.” 5 So they came near and carried them in their coats out of the camp, as Moses had said.

This judgment against Nadab and Abihu was so swift and so severe that God did not even allow for public mourning by the family.  Look at verses 6-7.

⁶ And Moses said to Aaron and to Eleazar and Ithamar his sons, “Do not let the hair of your heads hang loose, and do not tear your clothes, lest you die, and wrath come upon all the congregation; but let your brothers, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning that the Lord has kindled. ⁷ And do not go outside the entrance of the tent of meeting, lest you die, for the anointing oil of the Lord is upon you.” And they did according to the word of Moses.

What if God began to judge His people quickly and swiftly like He did in the Old Testament for violating the covenant?  I bet there would be a revival of holiness in our day. 

For those who don’t think that God still acts this way I want to show you two more examples of God’s judgment on people violating His covenant and this time from the New Testament.  Turn to Acts 4:32.

32 Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common. 33 And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all. 34 There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold 35 and laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need. 36 Thus Joseph, who was also called by the apostles Barnabas (which means son of encouragement), a Levite, a native of Cyprus, 37 sold a field that belonged to him and brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

Now look at chapter 5. 

But a man named Ananias, with his wife Sapphira, sold a piece of property, ² and with his wife’s knowledge he kept back for himself some of the proceeds and brought only a part of it and laid it at the apostles’ feet. ³ But Peter said, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back for yourself part of the proceeds of the land? ⁴ While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal? Why is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.” ⁵ When Ananias heard these words, he fell down and breathed his last. And great fear came upon all who heard of it. ⁶ The young men rose and wrapped him up and carried him out and buried him.  ⁷ After an interval of about three hours his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. ⁸ And Peter said to her, “Tell me whether you sold the land for so much.” And she said, “Yes, for so much.” ⁹ But Peter said to her, “How is it that you have agreed together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out.” ¹⁰ Immediately she fell down at his feet and breathed her last. When the young men came in they found her dead, and they carried her out and buried her beside her husband. ¹¹ And great fear came upon the whole church and upon all who heard of these things.

Well some might say that these two examples are big sins.  God enacted judgment because He needed to in order to squelch that type of behavior.  But God does not judge only for big sins like we think are big sins.  But the violation of His covenant and treating holy things as common will also bring about the judgment of God. 

But what about disorderly or even unbiblical church meetings?  Surely God does not see that as a violation punishable by death does He? 

Turn to 1 Corinthians 11 and we will start reading in verse 17.

¹⁷ But in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. ¹⁸ For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you. And I believe it in part, ¹⁹ for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized. ²⁰ When you come together, it is not the Lord’s supper that you eat. ²¹ For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. ²² What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not. ²³ For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, ²⁴ and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”  ²⁵ In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” ²⁶ For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

²⁷ Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. ²⁸ Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. ²⁹ For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. ³⁰ That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. ³¹ But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. ³² But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world.

What I would like for you to take away from this sermon this morning is that God indeed is in the business of judging His people.  Those who decide to live in direct disobedience to the word and will of God stand in great danger. 

I want us to step back from Hebrews for a couple of weeks and to develop a theology of judgment and find out the God given safeguards for preventing this ultimate judgment before we actually discover what this text is saying. 

Lets pray.