Hebrews 6 and the Promises of God (Part 3)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. My name is Mike Abendroth and we are here at the studios recording some NoCo shows on Saturday night. It is 527, Saturday, December 1st, and I think I figured out what I was doing wrongly.

I think I was saying I could go to NoCo�s friends, but then there was no friends on there. So, this is intended for the NoCo closed group. I don�t know how it gets there, but if it gets there, that is great.

Oh, now we do have some people. There�s Susan. Susan, how is your Foxtrot doing? That�s my big question of the hour. Ken, I don�t know if you Foxtrot or not, but Viennese Waltz is very difficult. I finally figured this out.

Anyway, what I thought I would do tonight is come to the church and kind of work on my sermon a little bit, and the way I work on my sermon is talking about it out loud. I figured I might as well record a show at the same time.

If you want to email me, you can. It�s info at nocompromiseradio .com. Spencer would be glad to help you, or if you want to email me directly, mike at nocompromiseradio .com. And again, what happens sometimes is I think to myself, since I have a day job and it�s not No Compromise Radio, I like to do two things at once, and that is come in and talk about what I�m going to preach about tomorrow, but do it on no-code time.

That is to say, this is not like a sermon delivery, but if you�re listening to the show for very often, for very long rather, you know, I just kind of come in and talk about the sermon. I talk about what we�re going to talk about.

Hebrews 6 and the Difference Between Professors and Possessors

So we are in Hebrews chapter 6, and if you want to ask me a question about Hebrews 6 on Facebook, I might read it as I�m talking, if I can do that. Sometimes it�s hard to do two things at once, and I�m finding that out very quickly.

So I�m going to just give you a little bit of time. That�s about the time you have right there on this little�you know what this came from? This little thing that I�m holding up, the radio people can�t hear this or see this, but the Facebook people can.

This was the little hourglass, although it�s about 30 seconds worth of sand going through there. Probably salt. It�s actually probably arsenic, because it came in the Joe Osteen, Your Best Life Now game that was sent to me, and I don�t know why.

I continue to just get�it�s, you know, this kind of stuff is sent to me, and here I think it�s supposed to be Jesus, but I don�t want to break any commandments, so I�m just going to say that�s Mary. Doesn�t that look like Mary?

I think that looks a lot more like Mary than Jesus, unless it�s Depeche Mode�s your own personal Jesus, then it might be that. This is�see how I�ve dulled it for you so I don�t break any commandments?

What�s it called? Ope, I now have done everything wrongly. It�s called a pocket Jesus is strength. Can you imagine? This is kind of Christianity today. This is Christianity astray, where you are going to be strengthened in your walk by having a little eraser in your pocket, and at the bottom of the eraser it says, �Trademark Rocket USA.

I mean, no wonder people�s lives are falling apart is because essentially they have the pocket Jesus, their own personal Jesus. Well, back to the passage at hand, Hebrews chapter 6. Early on in the first eight verses, people are very concerned because they think it describes a Christian, and it says in Hebrews 6, whoever these people are, if they have sin in their life, if they won�t believe, if they do something wrong, it�s impossible for them to be restored to repentance again, and they freak out.

You know, how many times do you have to sin if you�re a Christian to lose your salvation according to this particular view of Hebrews chapter 6? But the best way to look at Hebrews 6 is to see verse 9.

This is the key to unlock it. This is so helpful. It�s not really that hard. I mean, it was David Martyn Lloyd-Jones that said, �Hebrews 6 has perplexed more Christians than any other passage, yet it�s very easy to understand.

And so, if you get Hebrews 6, 9, you�ll get the rest of Hebrews chapter 6. �Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things. He does not call unbelievers �beloved.

I don�t think any place in the New Testament Scriptures will you see the word �beloved� used for anything except for one who�s really loved. First of all, that is used for the Father, the Father�s description for the Son, rather.

This is my beloved Son in whom I�m well-pleased, and it�s used for believers. So now he�s talking about believers. �Though we speak in this way, yet in your case, beloved, we feel sure of better things.

What better things? This is the book of Hebrews, �better, better, better, better, better. I think that was an old Who song, �You better, you bet. Remember that? That wasn�t a good album. Things that belong to salvation.

Things that belong to salvation. So whatever we�re talking about in chapter 6, verses 1 to 8, they�re not talking about salvation. Here�s what they�re talking about. They�re talking about professors, not possessors.

They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny him. They don�t really possess God. These aren�t people that God has saved. These are people that have had religious experiences. Let�s call them �Judas experiences.

Let�s call them and can you imagine, by the way, Judas heard every sermon that Jesus preached. Judas was given the power to cast out demons and to perform miracles. Jesus was preaching, walking on the water, casting out demons, healing blind men, raising little girls from the dead, and Judas saw it all.

That�s amazing. I�m sure Judas met Lazarus, and yet he didn�t believe. He had a fake faith. He professed, but he didn�t have real faith. And so what�s going on when you see Hebrews chapter 6? There�s this language that the Hebrew audience would understand.

If I was going to preach to a bunch of Jews back in that day, what kind of language would I use? I would probably use language like, hmm, Israel in the wilderness language, and this language here in Hebrews 6 about enlightened.

If you were thinking, if Old Testament Jewish people thought about enlightenment, verse 4, what would they think of? I think they�d be thinking about the pillar of fire, right? They�re thinking about the wilderness wanderings.

If I said they�ve tasted the heavenly gift, I mean, it�s almost too easy, right? The Israelites were in the wilderness and they tasted the heavenly gift. What heavenly gift might that be? Well, that�s before the quail came down, and they were complaining about the manna, and then God gave them quail.

We�re talking about manna. These are all things that bring the people very close to saving faith, but they�re not truly resting in the Messiah. They�re not truly trusting in the high priest. So when you come to Hebrews chapter 6, you don�t even need to say, oh, by the way, Hebrews 10 says that no one can snatch me out of the Father�s hands.

By the way, Romans chapter 8 says there�s no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus, and nothing shall separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. First chapter of Ephesians says you don�t even have to do that.

You can just stay right here, stay camped in Hebrews chapter 6, and instead of teaching, you can lose your salvation. It teaches the opposite, quite frankly, because now everything turns. Here is the hinge that turns, and it turns on verse 9, things that belong to salvation.

And then he notices what people are doing, that they�re doing things for the Lord. God is going to recognize that. Stay firm in your earnestness, and you�ll have full assurance. And God is a promise-keeping God, and that�s where we are right now.

God’s Promises, Abraham, and the Test of Faith

Let�s think about promise-keepers for a second. Who do you know that keeps all their promises? Remember when promise-keepers organization came out years ago? I want to say it came out 25 years ago or something like that, 28 years ago.

I don�t know. Somebody could email, Google it, and find out. But there were a lot of more promises for me to break, essentially, seven promises. Some had some roots in biblical, some biblical mooring, but a lot of them were just dopey, and the whole race won.

You can see where that�s all led us. But anyway, promise-keepers. Really? This is like Deuteronomy, when the Israelites are saying, you know, after God said, �Curses is he who doesn�t obey everything in the law.

And they�re like, �Yes, amen, and we will obey you completely. There�s only one promise-keeper, and all the promises of God are yes in Him, and His name is Lord Jesus Christ. That is 2 Corinthians 1.

So if I had to encourage you, and I had to try to help you, you�re in a difficult situation. Maybe it�s your job or your health or your child�s health, or there�s persecution. Maybe you�re watching overseas, and you�re going to get persecuted.

How would I help you? Would I be like those complete, lying, heretic dogs called false teachers on some of the national stations? These people that are health-wealth folks, would I be like that? Remember, this health-wealth gospel, this blab it and grab it, name it and claim it, stuff that you hear, and we�re going to let God, and words are containers, and words have power, and God wants you rich and successful and everything else, that�s satanic is what it is.

That�s what Satan was doing through Peter. When Peter did not recognize, it�s the theology of the cross, then the crown. It�s not crown, then cross. There�s a way to glory, but it�s through suffering.

Jesus is the suffering servant. So when these people are promoting, you know, the T .D. Jakes, and by the way, the man who aspires to be T .D. Jakes is Stephen Furtick, when you listen to those guys, they are men who are expounding not the Word of God, but glory first, then, you know, suffering won�t even appear.

Cross doesn�t even appear. It�s all glory, glory, glory, having these things right now. When I just said glory, glory, glory, I wanted to say hallelujah. And so, what would I tell someone? I would say, �Listen, I know that you are going through these troubles.

I won�t minimize any of these troubles that you�re having, but God can be trusted. God knows. I�ve been in hospital rooms, holding babies when they die, and so have you, in different circumstances. What do you say to people?

Well, if you�re smart, you don�t really say anything. You�re just there. But when you finally have to say something, and I often have to then later at a funeral or someplace else, we just have to throw ourselves on the promises of God.

I can trust in the person and work and the character and the fidelity and the integrity of God�s steadfast, sure, reliable promises. Friends, it would be enough if God were to just say, �If you trust in the Son, you will have eternal life.

That would be enough for God to say that, and it would be true. We wouldn�t need anything else for that promise to be accomplished. But isn�t the Lord good? Isn�t He gracious and kind? He knows how weak we are, and so what does God do?

He gives us a promise. He gives us His Word, and He gives us a promise, and that�s what is happening in Hebrews chapter 6. He�s using Abraham as an illustration of a man who walks not by faithfulness.

Remember what he said about Sarah to Pharaoh in Genesis chapter 13, and then did it again in chapter 20? No, this is a man who walks by faith. And so Hebrews says, you know, you ought to imitate people who walk by faith, because really, you�re not imitating them, you�re imitating people who are trusting in who God is.

Faith and faithfulness are two different things. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, faith in the Messiah revealed. It will lead on to faithfulness, that�s true, but right now, God is faithful. And He here, in this Romans chapter, Hebrews chapter 6, He says, you know what, here�s My Word, here�s My promise, and here�s an oath, and here�s a man who, like you, had to wait a long time for the promises of God to be fully completed.

But that didn�t mean God didn�t keep His promises. Sometimes you just have to wait. You know, God promised Abraham, think about the Abrahamic promises, the Abrahamic covenant, Genesis 12, Genesis 15, Genesis 17, Genesis 22, and God promised through Isaac that the world would be blessed.

And of course, we know the ultimate seed, the Lord Jesus Christ, would come through that line. But how old was Abraham when the promise was made, and how many more years did it take before Isaac was even born?

And so, when we come to Hebrews chapter 6, I don�t know what it is with me tonight, I�m calling Romans, Hebrews Romans, and now Hebrews Isaiah, but by the way, all three of those, it�s perfectly one, you know, one author, one divine author.

And you can sense how Isaiah just leaks over into some of these books, and Romans and Hebrews. Maybe since this is a sign now from God, I think He just said something to me. Yes, Lord, your servant is listening.

God just asked me what three books that I would take to a desert island if I ever had to go to a desert island. I�d take my Macbook, take my Chromebook. I think I would take Isaiah, Hebrews, and Romans, wouldn�t you?

Those are the three greatest books. I can�t say that they�re the greatest, but right now, I think they�re pretty great. Side note, this is a great book you can get online for free now, Assurance of Faith.

I think this one cost me 20 bucks. Louis Berkoff, The Firm Foundation to Christian Hope, Assurance of Faith, Both Objective and Subjective. So, in the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter 6, there�s a promise, the promise of all promises, that�s eternal life for those who believe.

And if you�re a believing person, resting and hoping in Christ Jesus through faith, then what�s going to happen when you go through trials? You�re going to need to be reminded that you have to walk by faith and that there are times when it seems like God might not be faithful, but the problem isn�t with Him, the problem is with you.

And what the writer does is he quotes Genesis 22, the test of all tests. If there�s ever a test in which people might question the integrity of God and God�s fidelity and God�s holiness, it would be the test where Abraham is told directly by God to offer Isaac his son.

And that�s the promise that we look at here in Hebrews chapter 6. And so, if you have your Bibles, you can see from that very verse, verse 14, saying, �Surely I will bless you and multiply you. That is from Genesis 22.

And so, when you think of Abraham, this writer, the writer of Hebrews, maybe it�s Paul, maybe it�s someone else, he loved to talk about Abraham. Only the epistle of John and the epistle of Luke, what am I doing?

I can�t think. You know what�s happening? My kids are texting me and I�m looking at their texts at the same time that I�m looking at you, and Hebrews 6, and Genesis 22, and Isaiah, and Romans, and Berkov, and this person right here.

John�s gospel, Luke�s gospel, and the book of Hebrews talks about Abraham about 35 times. And of course, if you�re a Jewish person, you�re thinking, �Oh, yeah, Abraham, Father Abraham. And many sons, many sons said, �Father Abraham, I�m one of them, so are you, if you believe.

So, let�s just praise the Lord right on. He goes that passage, and he wants you to see God can be trusted. And remember what�s happening. We talked about this on the show yesterday on No Compromise Radio.

Here�s the deduction process in Abraham�s mind. Through Isaac, the world is going to be blessed. He is the promised seed through Isaac. Not Ishmael, not anyone else, number one. Number two, I�ve just been told to sacrifice my son.

What�s the only deduction? The only deduction is that God, since He keeps His promises, since He is faithful, since He does have integrity, the only thing that I�m going to do is trust that He�s going to raise him from the dead, and that�s exactly what Hebrews 11 talks about.

Abraham thought that his son would be raised from the dead as He would kill him. Remember what happens? He�s out in the middle of the wilderness, and he�s told, �I�ll tell you where you�re going to go.

And then he, and this is, we talked about this in depth last show, and then it says this in Genesis 22, 8, �God will provide Himself the Lamb for a burnt offering, my son. So, they went, both of them, together.

Remember, he said, �The servants, you stay to the side. I don�t know if they were going to try to inhibit him from slaying his son, but he says, �You know, you servants, you stay over here, and we�re going to be back.

Why did Abraham say that to the servants, �We�re going to be back Was he lying to them? Was he trying to deceive them? Was he trying to make sure that they didn�t fall for the plan so he could kill Isaac?

No, he really trusted in the promises of God. Here�s the thinking. Number one, God said, �Through Isaac. Number two, God said, �Slay Isaac. Only possible logical deduction is God�s a tyrant, God is an ogre, God gives and God takes away, God is like a pagan god, don�t they do this with their children to Molech?

Won�t later on Leviticus and Deuteronomy both say, �Don�t slay your children like this And of course, we know the answer is no, no, no, no, and no. But since God is faithful, since God keeps His promises, since God has fidelity and integrity, He must be implying, there must be the implication, �Through Isaac, I�ve got to kill him, God is going to raise him from the dead.

And that is a promise that kept Abraham obedient. That�s what happened. That�s what was going on. And so, what does the text go on to say in Genesis 22, 9? �When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar on top of the wood.

I could say many things about that. Remember, Isaac, the Hebrew word, it could mean, it�s kind of a fluid word, it�s an elastic word, he could be 15 to 25. Try laying your 25-year-old son down as the sacrifice.

My son Luke was 16, and I hadn�t spanked him for quite some time, and I thought about spanking him for something because it was something I thought was, you know, it was either disrespectful or disobedient or probably both.

And so, we had a good talk, and I didn�t, I think I gave him some other kind of punishment, some kind of discipline. You know, he had to go work or do something, he had to read his Bible for punishment.

Just kidding. And I said to Luke, though, later, I said, �Luke, if I would have told you to lay down and take your spanking, what would you have done I mean, because the kid could have fought me. You know, I�m an old man now, my back hurts, my shoulder hurts, my neck hurts.

And Luke said, �I would have laid down. So, it�s interesting, it has really nothing to do with the whole story, except I thought to myself, Abraham said, �Lay down. I don�t know if he whispered to Isaac and said, �You�re going to be raised from the dead.

I have no idea, but Abraham is thinking about the promises of God. To what degree will I trust in the promises of God during trials and persecutions? That�s the point of Hebrews chapter 6. And you can�t find that answer in yourself, in other people, in the stars, in other religions.

It has to be in Yahweh, Yahweh the Father, Yahweh the Son, and Yahweh the Spirit. I�m going to trust my eternal soul to a God who does right, to a faithful Creator that does what�s right. It�s one thing to get ripped off by an insurance company, by a product selling something, by some con artist, by some bunko artist, some bamboozler.

It�s another thing to entrust your soul to God, and God drops the ball. God doesn�t know. God forgets. God falters. God fails. And the writer of Hebrews says, �God is not going to fail. You can trust God.

Remember what happened in the test of all tests? Remember the test that involves a father slaying a son? And you can remember R .C. Sproul, as he talked about this passage in Only the Way R .C. Could, and you�ve got Abraham taking Isaac to Mount Moriah and raising up the knife.

�Abraham, Abraham. You know, �Stop. The angel of the Lord said, �Stop. Don�t do it. And essentially, Abraham had already killed Isaac in his own heart, and he did it, and God said, �Therefore, stop.

And then you have centuries later, over 1 ,000 years later, on the same place, R .C. said, And a father takes a son to be sacrificed and raises up his knife, but this time no one says, �Stop. And so you see that going on.

The Genesis 22, father and son. Remember Genesis 22? That�s the first time test is used in Hebrew Scripture and all the Scripture, and it�s the first time love is used, and it�s in the context of a love of a father and a son.

This is Isaac, the one whom you love, right? This is my beloved son in whom I�m well pleased. And you begin to see how Genesis 22 and Mount Moriah and the crucifixion and this temptation, this testing rather, all go together.

But the point for the recipients of the book of Hebrews, you can trust God no matter what. I know your eyes are telling you something, I know your heart�s telling you something, I know you�re feeling something, but you can trust in who the Lord is, right?

You�re not like those professors in verses 1 through 8, those people that have experiences and have quick, you know, praise the Lord, you know, parable of the sower kind of, you know, soils. No, no. You�re the good soil.

You�re the right kind of soil, and you bear fruit, and God is not unjust, so you stay earnest, full assurance, full hope, full anticipation of what�s going to go on. You can trust God because you can trust His promises.

That�s what they needed. They didn�t need ra-ra, they didn�t need morality, they didn�t need virtue, they didn�t need anything else. They needed to be resting in the promises of God, and that�s why at the end of chapter 6 of Hebrews, you can just see how the writer lays it out.

God can be trusted because He�s a promise keeper. You�re trusting your soul to this God for eternal life. He keeps His promises. He keeps oaths. He makes oaths and keeps them. He tells the truth. The Lord Jesus, He�s like a refuge, and you can run to Him, and He�s like an anchor, and He will give you stability, and He�s like a forerunner into this great veil, according to the priesthood of Melchizedek.

And so see how this all happens to make you focus on who the Lord is instead of focusing on yourself and your trials and your circumstances? What a great chapter. Don�t let people go to Hebrews 6 and rob you by getting into some debate only about is this a professor, is it a possessor, is it a loss of assurance, loss of eternal life, loss of rewards.

You can�t lose your salvation because you didn�t earn it. These people are apostates in verses 1 through 8, they�re Judas�s. But once verse 9 switches, the tables are turned, and the rest of the chapter is nothing but the exaltation of God.

He keeps His promises. He makes His oaths. He tells the truth. He is a great refuge. He is a great anchor. He is a forerunner, and the focus is all on the Lord Jesus Christ. My name is Mike Abendroth.

This is No Compromise Radio. You can write me, info at nocompromiseradio .com.

Program Close and Ministry Information

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God�s Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We�re right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.