James White - Apostasy: Its Nature, Kinds & Causes

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Turn with me, please, to Colossians chapter 4. We will be looking at a number of texts this evening, hopefully to our benefit, though the topic is not exactly one that is going to create a great deal of rejoicing in our hearts.

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It is one that we need to look at and look at seriously. We will begin in Colossians chapter 4, but let us ask the

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Lord to bless our time together. Father, now quiet our hearts, help us to focus upon your truth, help us to understand the full measure of what your word reveals to us about our relationship with you.

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Give us insight, give us courage to believe what you have revealed, we pray in Christ's name, amen.

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In Colossians chapter 4, at the end you have greetings, as is often the case in Paul's epistles.

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In chapter 4, verse 14, we read, Luke, the beloved physician, sends you his greetings as also

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Demas. Now here you have a situation, we know

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Luke, we know he is called the beloved physician, we understand his importance in Paul's ministry, but we also have another man, and he is part of the apostolic work of building churches and spreading the gospel, and he is traveling with Paul, and his name is

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Demas. And he is mentioned along with Luke and others as part of that important work and that important ministry.

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And this is not the only place where he is mentioned. In the letter to Philemon, in the letter to Philemon, good luck finding that one real quick without your computer,

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I don't hear pages turning, I really miss that, I have to admit. You know, when you just see people tapping away, it's like,

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OK, are they actually getting there or not? I'm not really sure. But you'll notice that Demas is mentioned in Philemon, which gives us somewhat of the time frame, the order in which the

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New Testament letters are being written, Demas is again involved in verse 24 with the apostolic band.

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So we have this person named Demas. Have you ever noticed you don't ever run into children named

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Demas? Well, there goes little Demas, you know, you don't...

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With all the kids that we have at Apologia, no one has ever named their kid

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Demas. And if you wonder why, then turn with me to 2

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Timothy chapter 4. That's right before Philemon. 2

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Timothy chapter 4. Now, we know 2 Timothy is one of the last, probably the last letter that the

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Apostle Paul writes. We don't exactly know how Paul dies, how he is martyred, exactly when it is, there's all sorts of arguments, did he get to go to Spain and do all the things that he wanted to do, and we just simply don't know, tradition says different things.

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But as Paul is writing to Timothy, he asks Timothy for certain things.

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He says in verse 9, be diligent to come to me soon. You can tell here is a man who is experiencing great trials and difficulties.

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Be diligent to come to me soon, for Demas, having loved this present age, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica.

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Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me, pick up Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful to me for service.

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And so you have this insight into how the Apostle is dealing with the need to continue ministry just because he is now imprisoned, doesn't mean the ministry stops, there are still needs for ministry in the various churches that have already been founded.

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And there is, I think, on a real positive side, pick up Mark and bring him with you.

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Remember in Acts, the great schism that took place when there's a problem with Mark.

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Mark goes back, and Paul, as a result, does not want to bring him along anymore, and there is a schism that results, and that's where Paul and Barnabas becomes

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Paul and Silas, and so you literally have disagreement amongst those in the early church, and it had to do probably with the same

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Mark, I mean, there could be other Marks, but most people feel probably what has happened is

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Mark has proven himself again, and so there's been a reestablishment of relationships.

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That's a positive thing, where for a while, from Paul's perspective, no,

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Mark's not worthy with us, he went back, but then he proves himself faithful at a later point in time, so there's restoration, possibly, possibly.

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But for us this evening, it's that first section. For Demas, having loved this present age, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica.

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Those are strong words, he's deserted me. Why would he desert

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Paul? Well, we don't know for certain, we are simply told he loved this present age.

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What does that mean? It could mean a lot of things. It could mean a lot of things.

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For example, it says he had gone to Thessalonica, and he is, his name is associated with someone else back in Colossians, who also was probably by tradition from Thessalonica, so maybe that was his hometown.

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Maybe he became homesick, maybe there was family business back there in Thessalonica, and he got word that it's time to come home, it's time to take care of things here, and we just don't know.

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Another possibility, it's a real, real solid possibility, Paul's in prison, and being associated with someone who may be executed by the

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Roman state might not be the situation you want to be in. You might not want to hang around with someone like that.

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That may be something that causes you fear, and of course I think we need to think about that in our day.

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What happens in China right now? We can think of a number of Chinese pastors that are in prison, wouldn't it be dangerous to be amongst those members who go and visit those pastors in prison?

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Because you're exposing yourself to the government, they're obviously watching, they watch everything in China, and they're pretty much watching everything here now too.

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And they know who's coming, and aren't you increasing your possibilities of being arrested? Your possibilities of ending up in prison by coming and visiting?

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Was Demas afraid because now Paul was under the thumb of the

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Roman Empire, and maybe that could cause Demas a problem? We just simply don't know.

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We simply have this cryptic description, having loved this present age, and that's not a good phrase.

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That's not a good description. Paul understands that the reason that Demas has left the role of ministry that he had, and the privilege that he had, it's a privilege for your name to be in Scripture.

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And we would have a whole lot more Demases running around if we only had

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Colossians and Philemon. But we have 2 Timothy, which is why we don't have

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Demases running around. And so he's loved this present age.

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Was it love of money? Was it fear of the government? There was something about his affections being in the wrong place.

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Now he had undergone, he had undergone difficulties before this. It hadn't been easy to be with Paul.

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He wasn't rolling in the dough, but he had stayed with it.

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But from Paul's perspective, he understands that there was a problem of the heart.

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But when did it begin? Did Paul know? Probably not.

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Was Paul deeply surprised when Demas announced that he was going to Thessalonica?

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I'm sure he was. Was Paul hurt? I'm sure he was.

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Did he shed some tears? He probably did. He doesn't tell

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Timothy the whole story as to exactly how this love of this present age worked out.

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But loving this present age causes someone who is involved in kingdom work to walk away.

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Now we're going to see as we read other passages. Paul doesn't say here, this man lost his salvation.

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He doesn't say that he has turned him over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh.

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He doesn't say any of these things. We're not told. Obviously, loving this present age, given what we read in 1

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John, he who loves this world, love of the Father is not in him, that's not a positive thing.

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But at the same time, we know, for example, in Mark's situation, would

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Paul have said at some point that Mark loved this present age when he turned back in the book of Acts?

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And yet Mark was restored. If that's the same Mark, I don't know. These are all things we can only speculate on.

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But the reality is Demas ends his appearance in the New Testament in love with the present age, abandoning the aging and coming to the end of his life,

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Apostle Paul. That's not a positive thing. The reality is that we read the

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New Testament and we see the perfection of the work of Christ as Savior.

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We see that in John chapter 6, Jesus says, I have come down out of heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me.

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And this is the will of him who sent me, that of all that has been given to me, I lose none of it, raise it up on the last day.

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We have a perfect and powerful Savior. He says in John chapter 10, no one can snatch my sheep out of my hand.

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The Father who's great and all has given them to me, no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one.

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He's not saying he is the Father. In fact, the verb is plural there. I and the Father, we are one.

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He's saying we are absolutely perfectly united in bringing about the salvation of God's people.

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That is a reference to the deity of Christ, but it needs to be understood properly. And so we know that salvation is the work of God.

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We know he has an elect people. We know that he's going to save his elect people and that there is no question about these things and that Jesus never fails.

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Anyone who is united to him in the sovereign purpose of the Father will be saved.

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There is no question about that. And yet, and yet the

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Apostle Paul experienced the heartache of having an individual who was in his inner band, abandoned him out of love for the world.

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And Jesus told parables. He told the parable of the sower and the soils.

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And he was warning the apostles, you're going to have people, you're going to sow that seed and it's going to land on certain soils and there's going to be immediate growth, luxurious growth, fast, and then they die off.

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They have no depth of soil. They never bring about fruit. Then there are the others that do.

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But for a period of time, you can't tell which is going to be which.

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In fact, it looks like there's these certain plants and man, they're growing fast and boy, they're going to look great.

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Then they die out and it's the slower growing plants that end up lasting and they have roots and they bear fruit.

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And this is a warning to the apostles. This is a warning to the apostles.

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Be ready for the fact that when you spread this message, there are going to be those who respond, but they will not endure.

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So how do we put all this together? How do we understand this? Well, there's the

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God -centered way and there's the man -centered way. We have to believe all of it.

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We have to accept all of it. But people have come up with some interesting ways of dealing with it.

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And the tendency of mankind is always to emphasize that we control all of this.

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God does. God gives the grace. He throws it out there, but it's up to us. And so you have all the sacramental systems and even someone that we would respect in so many ways, like Augustine.

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Not Augustine, that's a totally different context there. But Augustine of long, long ago, he came up with a very unusual way of dealing with this issue.

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He believed that a person could be truly born again, truly regenerate, and lose that salvation that is theirs.

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And yet, he believed that God has an elect people and that the difference between the two is that he gives to his elect the gift of perseverance.

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And that's the only way that they continue on. That's the only reason that they persevere is that they are given the gift of perseverance.

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But that means in Augustine's theology, you have people who are temporarily regenerate.

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And I don't even know how that works, to be perfectly honest with you. It's not a biblical understanding, but that's how

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Augustine came down on it. And of course, after his time period, semi -Pelagianism developed.

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And so you had a moving away from the high view of God's sovereignty. And most people still believe that there were an elect people, but they didn't really know who they were.

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And the emphasis was really very much upon the sacraments and your responsibility.

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And you didn't really have any type of confidence. And then the Reformation comes, and even the

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Reformers come to differing conclusions with each other on to exactly how this works.

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But we have to believe everything that Scripture teaches us. And so we need to look at what the

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Scripture says on this subject, accepting everything that we know

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Scripture says about the elect, about the perfection of the work of Christ, and seek to come to an understanding of how it is that I've said to you many times before, that when you are a minister in the church for any period of time at all, let alone almost four decades now as far as actually being in eldership, you have a long, sad list of names and faces in your mind.

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The way we do the supper here, I normally stand down here when

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I have the privilege of being here. And so I get to see everyone who's coming forward to take the bread and the wine.

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And there's normally a smile, a nod. I talk about the encouragement, the encouragement we should take from seeing the profession of faith of each one of us as we come forward to take the supper.

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But on the backside of that are the number of people that you remember who came forward to take the supper that take it no longer.

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Now they may not just take it here. Maybe they're somewhere else. But maybe they're in another religion now.

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Maybe in a religion that denies what we believe. Maybe they're not even believers any longer. Maybe they've loved this present world and they've gone back to the world.

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And maybe they deny that Jesus is the only way of peace with God.

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By partaking of the supper, they were saying one thing. Now they're saying its opposite. And we think of these people.

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And we have to. A lot of churches just put that under the rug.

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Let's not talk about it. It's too hard. It's too difficult. We can't do that.

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You cannot be honest with the entirety of the Word of God and not deal with the reality that if you've been a

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Christian for any period of time at all, you already have that list in your mind. It may not be as long as mine.

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But it's there. And you have to think about it. Turn with me to 1 Timothy.

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1 Timothy chapter 1, verse 18.

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This command I entrust to you, Timothy my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you may fight the good fight, keeping faith and a good conscience, which some, having rejected, suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith.

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Among these are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan so that they will be taught not to blaspheme.

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Suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith. What does that look like?

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Well, we're given two names. In fact, Hymenaeus is mentioned more than once. Hymenaeus is also mentioned elsewhere in regards to specific false teachings.

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And so clearly, here were two names that Paul didn't have to explain to Timothy.

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Timothy probably knew who they were. And they had clearly had some kind of leadership position in the infant

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Christian church. And Paul says that they had suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith.

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Now, we don't hear a lot about shipwrecks anymore. They were significantly more common in the ancient world than they are today.

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We have GPS and the Coast Guard and helicopters and all that neat kind of fun stuff.

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But the reality was, until very recent times, shipwrecks would result in tremendous loss of life.

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You have the Edmund Fitzgerald, we all know that song, right? The wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.

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And that's a, it's not a good way to die. And so shipwreck of the faith.

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Very often, you know, Paul experienced shipwreck. And we know that very often what would happen is these ships would be driven onto the rocks and then the sea would batter them until they broke into pieces.

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And very often there would be visible signs of what had happened in that situation.

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And when you have public apostasy, whether just as a walking away from the faith or an embracing of falsehood, an embracing of heresy, a denial of the central aspects of the

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Christian faith, there is a visible outward sign. It happens. We see it.

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Recently, within the past couple of years, a very, very well -known

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Christian apologist passed away. And after his passing, it became known that there were tremendous problems.

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So much so that his own ministry admitted that these were the, this was the case. And there couldn't be any, there really couldn't be any resolution given that he was dead.

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There couldn't be any discipline. There couldn't be any confession. Nothing like that. So you really couldn't have the conclusions that God's law could provide in those situations.

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It didn't happen. And yet there was real shipwreck.

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There was a very large ministry, and the buildings have been left behind.

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The people have been left behind. People who have been disillusioned have been left behind.

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The debris is still there. It's still washing up on the shore. And so there are those who make shipwreck in regard to their faith, such as Hymenaeus and Alexander.

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And they seemingly did not repent. They seemingly did not accept apostolic correction.

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And so Paul says that he had handed them over to Satan so that they would be taught not to blaspheme.

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We don't know exactly what they were blaspheming about. It had something to do with the resurrection, at least with Hymenaeus, though maybe that wasn't where he started.

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Very frequently people will start with a small deviation and move on to a larger one. But they've made shipwreck of their faith.

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And that can refer to a heretical denial of who

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Jesus is. We'll be seeing that in a few other passages. But it doesn't necessarily include that.

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It could have been divisions that simply were inappropriate for the church, but they didn't involve fundamental denials of the faith.

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We're simply not told with Alexander, for example, of exactly where he's going or which

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Alexander it was, things like that. It's a common name. But we have this phrase, shipwreck of the faith.

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But of course, when we think of the term apostasy, there's one text that comes to mind.

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We all know it. Hebrews chapter 6. In fact, I've lamented the fact that when you think of Hebrews chapter 6, about all you think about is verses 4 through 6.

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And that's a shame because the end of the chapter is actually a stirring assertion of the power of Christ as Savior and the anchor that we have in the holy place.

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It's beautiful. It's beautiful. But you have in Hebrews these warning passages.

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And very often, Reformed people are accused of not taking the warning passages seriously.

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We do need to take them seriously. And only by ignoring the history of the church and our own experience in the church.

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I suppose the only way some churches get away with not taking them seriously is that they never do public discipline.

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They just sweep things under the rug. And maybe you can get away with that that way,

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I suppose. We don't do things that way, so it doesn't work that way. But remember that in the book of Hebrews, what you have is,

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I believe, Paul preaching to Jewish converts, probably in Aramaic, and he's preaching to them a fully developed argument that fundamentally boils down to, there's nothing to go back to.

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There was tremendous pressure upon Jewish believers in the first century, before the destruction of the temple, to go back to Judaism.

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You've joined a cult. That Jesus guy is dead. Can't you see? You're abandoning everything.

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You're abandoning God's people. You're abandoning all these things. Come back to the priesthood. Look at that beautiful temple.

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It's one of the most beautiful buildings in the entire world. Come back. And Paul's preaching to them and saying, there's nothing to come back to.

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And then I believe what happens is, Luke writes down Paul's sermon in Greek.

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And that's the book of Hebrews. Why do I say that? Because it's not in the same vocabulary style that Paul writes in at all.

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It's in the exact same style and vocabulary as the book of Luke and Acts.

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And so that's what makes sense to me. It has the theology of Paul and the language of Luke. And the argument is, there's nothing to go back to.

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But these are people who have seen people who have gone back. We're preaching to people who have seen people.

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They've got the same list in the mind. And what would it mean to go back in that day?

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What did you have to do? You had to offer sacrifice. And if you offered a sacrifice in the temple, what were you saying?

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What was the significance of that act for you to offer an animal sacrifice?

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You were saying Jesus was a fraud. He was not the final sacrifice.

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He was not the Lamb of God. He did not rise from the dead. You were spitting on his name.

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And this was the ultimate act of apostasy. And I believe it is in view in most of the severe texts in the

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New Testament. It's not just walking away, it's not becoming apathetic. It's not just going back to the world but not really saying anything about Jesus one way or the other.

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It was going back to Judaism and offering the sacrifice and saying, he wasn't the

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Messiah. He wasn't the Lamb of God. I repudiate him. So, in Hebrews chapter six, verse four, for in the case of those once having been enlightened, and having tasted the heavenly gift, and having become partakers of the

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Holy Spirit, and having tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and having fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucified themselves the

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Son of God and put him to open shame. For ground that drinks the rain, which often falls on it and brings forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled, receives a blessing from God.

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But if it yields thorns and thistles, it is unfit and close to being cursed, and its end is to be burned.

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And most people stop there. They shouldn't. But we are convinced about you, beloved, of things that are better and that belong to salvation, though we are speaking in this way.

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So you must keep in mind, this text specifically lays out a distinction between things that belong to salvation and the things mentioned beforehand.

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So what does that mean? What it means is, you have people who have been enlightened, people who have tasted the heavenly gift and having become partakers of the

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Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come. How? They were a part of the

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Christian congregation. They saw lives changed.

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They saw hearts changed. In the apostolic period, they may have seen specific miracles.

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May I point out to you how forgetful even we are today? We've seen miracles in our own fellowship, right?

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Do I need to have Jeff come up and re -narrate? Little Augustine? We've seen miracles, and we forget about them.

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It's amazing how fast we forget about them. Then again, the people of Israel walked through on dry land on the

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Red Sea and were griping against God in a matter of days. They saw miracles.

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They were being fed from heaven, and they'd still forget. They'd still forget, and we do the same thing.

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And so here, Paul is preaching to people, and they have seen those that were in the fellowship, those that had sung the hymns, said the prayers, partook of the supper, and they're back in the synagogue.

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And to get back into the synagogue, they had to curse Christ. And so they had tasted the good word, they had heard, they had listened as those passages from the scriptures had been opened to them.

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They had listened as the apostles had expounded on Isaiah 53, written 700 years earlier.

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Look how it was fulfilled in Jesus the Messiah, and they still went back.

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And the people knew. They knew the names. They may have been family members. And Paul says, they've fallen away.

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It's impossible to renew them again to repentance. Since they again crucify themselves the son of God and put him to open shame.

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I think there's the hint is what they've done. They have turned his sacrificial death into a mockery by offering an animal on the altar.

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It's impossible to renew them again to repentance. They've put him to an open shame. They are the ground that received rain, but they didn't bring forth vegetation useful to those for whose sake it is also tilled.

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In each one of these illustrations that Paul uses and that Jesus uses, it's the issue of fruit.

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The plants that sprang up had lots of pretty leaves. The fig tree that Jesus cursed, look at the leaves on that thing.

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You investigate, no fruit, die, it withers and is gone.

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Here, the ground that receives the rain, the blessings of being in the fellowship of the saints, no fruit.

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Cursed, withers, dies. It happens.

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We don't want to see it happen. And when it does happen, we all have the same reaction.

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We start thinking about ourselves. And there's a good side to that and a bad side to that. We are told to examine ourselves, see whether we're in the faith.

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We're not told to just stick our heads in the sand. And here in Hebrews, there's no hiding that there have been people who've walked away from the

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Christian faith, in this case, denying who Jesus was. That becomes a very damaging thing if we have not already thought through what salvation really is, what the membership of the church really is, and how it is any one of us persevere in the faith, what the nature of saving faith is.

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And Christ's ability to accomplish what the Father would have him to accomplish in the salvation of his people.

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You know there's another, there's actually three, we just don't have time for all of them, but Hebrews chapter 10, Hebrews chapter 10, you can't not read this.

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Hebrews chapter 10 verse 26, for if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries, anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy by the mouth of two or three witnesses, how much worse punishment do you think he will deserve, who has trampled underfoot the son of God and has regarded as defiled the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and has insulted the spirit of grace, for we know him who said, vengeance is mine,

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I will repay, and again the Lord will judge his people, it is a terrifying thing to fall in the hands of living

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God. Now again, if this section just existed unto itself, it would be frightening enough, but you must remember this comes immediately on the heels, just a matter of sentences, after the assertions that we have earlier in Hebrews chapter 10 about the sufficiency of the finished work of Christ, so for example in verses 9 and 10, then he said, behold

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I have come to do your will, he takes away the first in order to establish the second in regards to covenants, by this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all, there is the once for allness of the work of Christ, so how can you take that, and then verse 14, for by one offering he is perfected for all time those who are being sanctified, here is

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God's work, how do you fit that together with verses 26 and following? Well there's just a couple things to notice.

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Most importantly is this, and I don't have time to develop this this evening, I preached a whole series,

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I preached all of Hebrews for a number of years at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church, those sermons are still online at Sermon Audio, and so we went through Hebrews 6 and 10 much more slowly if you want to go into more depth, and there are some excellent commentaries, one that I can suggest to you actually from, if I recall correctly, a

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Church of England scholar, there are still some some solid guys over there, especially down in Australia, but Philip Edgecombe Hughes, his commentary on Hebrews I found to be extremely useful when

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I was working through that sermon series many years ago, but the key is found in verse 29, when it says, and has regarded as defiled the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and the assumption of everyone who uses this text to say, yeah

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Jesus does a great job, but in reality you can actually be sanctified in the blood of Christ, you can be in the new covenant, and still be cut off and lost.

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They point to that verse. The he, far more consistently with the argument of the book of Hebrews, the he here is

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Jesus. It's the Son of God who was sanctified, set apart, shown to be holy by that blood of the covenant which he spilled, and it is the rejection of that blood in the offering of the sacrifice in the temple that is in view here.

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So it's he has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has regarded as defiled the blood of the covenant by which

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Jesus was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of Grace. That's the description of the person who, having been baptized in the name of Christ, having partaken of the

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Lord's Supper, but a part of the congregation, goes back to Judaism, and to do so he has to deny that Jesus was who he claimed to be.

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And Paul is saying, how much worse punishment do you think he will deserve?

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How much worse punishment will he deserve? These are sober words.

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They were words that were delivered in the congregation. In a congregation it was being persecuted.

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In a congregation it was under pressure to go back to Judaism, to escape that persecution.

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And there was a warning, don't go, there's nothing to go back to. There's nothing to go back to.

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But it wasn't just in that context. It wasn't just in that context. Turn with me to 2nd

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Peter, 2nd Peter chapter 2. And both 2nd

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Peter and Jude are texts that are focused upon the reality that in the early church, in those really, honestly, first 250 years or so, there was a tremendous amount of opposition and false teaching.

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While the greatest enemies that the church has ever faced,

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Gnosticism, existed at that time. It was specifically designed to be an imitation.

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It's a tremendous challenge to deal with. Ministering in that day was a amazing.

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You had internal issues and you had the persecution of Rome outside. It was a day for very serious

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Christians. Let's just put it that way. And both Jude and Peter warn us in similar language, but we'll just look at one section, 2nd

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Peter chapter 2, verse 17. Describing these false teachers that up above said, they feast with you.

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They were in the church. These weren't people that showed up in clown suits saying,

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I'm a false teacher. No, they look just like us. They dress like us.

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Spoke like us. They always do. These are springs without water.

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Mists driven by a storm for whom the black darkness has been kept. For speaking out arrogant words of vanity, they entice by sensual lusts of the flesh.

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Those who barely escape from the ones who conducted themselves in error, promising them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of corruption.

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For by what a man is overcome, by this he is enslaved. For if they are overcome, having both escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the

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Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and having again become entangled in them, then the last days become worse for them than the first.

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For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.

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The message of the true proverb has happened to them, a dog returns to its own vomit, and a sow after washing returns to wallowing in the mire.

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You see the illustrations? The dog vomits up what it ate that it shouldn't have eaten.

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Then it goes back and eats what it threw up. The sow washes and returns to wallowing in the mire.

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What's the issue? There's been no change of nature. It's still a dog. It's still a sow. And they go back eventually to what is part of their nature.

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And if there is no regeneration, if there is no change, there can be religious reformation for a period of time.

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The sow washed, oh look at that holy pure sow, no more mud, all cleaned up, looks good.

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And my experience has been that can happen for a long period of time. The sow can remain clean for a long period of time for all sorts of reasons.

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I mean especially in a nominally Christian context, being washed and made clean might make life easier for you.

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It might make you, it might help you get along with with your wife or your wife's family, or it might actually help you with your job.

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There can be reasons why people are in the congregation for a period of time.

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But if their nature has not been changed, the sow will go back. The dog will return to its vomit.

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And so they can escape the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

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There have been many people who have been outwardly reformed, but unless they are inwardly renewed, they will not remain outwardly reformed forever.

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How long can that last? I don't know. I'm thinking of a man, different church, different context, that was there when

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I came to that church. He was a deacon. Countless Lord's Supper.

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Now we didn't do the Lord's Supper every Sunday, but countless times. There were times that man handed me the elements.

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Then one day, and interestingly enough it was both he and his wife, just honestly said, you know what?

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We're tired of this and we really don't believe it. And they left. The temptation for you and me is to think that somehow my experience of sanctification and partaking in the

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Lord's Supper is somehow altered or cheapened because there was somebody there that wasn't of the true faith.

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And that's something you have to think through in your mind. That's a wrong understanding.

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It is perfectly right for us to say that we should be encouraged by the number of people that are gonna come forward and take these elements in just a matter of minutes, but it does not require you to know their hearts.

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We have to realize there may be some, and in fact in all probability will be some, who will partake of these elements today wrongfully.

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Even though we warn, if you're not in Christ, but there are people who think they are.

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There are people who think they are. They're playing at religion. And Peter warns about those false teachers.

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But finally in 1st John, turn with me to 1st John. You know this text. You probably thought we'd be here before we got here.

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I preached a sermon, some of you have heard it many years ago, called The Blessing of Apostasy.

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The Blessing of Apostasy. Children, 1st

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John 2 .18. Children, it is the last hour. And just as you heard that Antichrist is coming, even now many

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Antichrists have appeared. From this we know that is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not really of us.

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For if they were of us, they would have remained with us. But they went out so it would be manifested that they all are not of us.

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And then keep your finger right there. We'll come back. Just chapter 5 verse 16. If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death.

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There is a sin leading to death. I do not say that he should make requests for this. That's a tough passage.

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Let me just give you my quick understanding. I think John here is referring to what we have in chapter 2.

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And this is all the same sin. It is the repudiation of Christ. It's going back to the temple.

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It's offering sacrifice. It's saying that Jesus' blood was no greater than the blood of a cow or a goat or a bull or whatever else it might be.

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That's the sin leading to death. And John says, you know someone who's done that?

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Don't even pray for him. Don't even pray for him. Because as Paul said, as Paul in Hebrews chapter 6, there's no renewing them to repentance.

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So I think that's what's in view in 516. Because any other sin, there's forgiveness, there's repentance, but that one, what can you do after you've done that?

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But I want us to hear, John says that these Antichrists, those who were denying that Jesus truly came to flesh, those that were denying he was truly the

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Son of God, these are the early Gnostics. And John says they went out from us.

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They were once a part of our fellowship, and now they are denying the faith.

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And he says they went out from us, but they were not really of us.

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For if they were of us, they would have remained with us, but they went out so that it would be manifested that they all are not of us.

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You see what the blessing of apostasy is? If there is no dividing line, if there's,

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I don't know if you heard that this past, a week ago today, Andy Stanley preached a sermon at his church.

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After having had a conference at his church run by affirming, people affirming homosexuality, he had two men who pretend to be married speak there.

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Interestingly enough, one of the two men I debated ten years ago. He didn't believe in what he believes now back then.

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That's interesting, couldn't see that one coming. But now he's quote -unquote married to another man.

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And Andy Stanley said something to his congregations, huge congregations.

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He said Jesus did not draw lines. He drew circles, big circles that can include all kinds of sinners like me.

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Now that sounds wonderful, doesn't it? Doesn't that make you feel warm? The point is

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Scripture, and we believe Jesus is the second person of the

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Trinity, and therefore when you really think about it, all of Scripture is red letter. Scripture draws lines.

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And here's a line. If they were of us, they would have remained with us, but they went out so that it would be manifested that they all are not of us.

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What if there weren't any lines? What if there wasn't any way to be able to even identify who's a true

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Christian, who isn't? That's the blessing of apostasy.

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John says they went out from us. The church would have no voice.

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Do we not see, even in our own day, isn't it true that the apostate churches damage, for example, the work that we try to do?

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When Jeff goes and testifies in Colorado, they can go get 47

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United Methodists, liberal Presbyterians, Episcopalians, and every other group on the planet,

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United Church of Christ, to testify on the other side and say, he's crazy.

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God's all about love, and that means allowing us to murder babies in the womb.

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The apostate church needs to be able, we need to be able to identify that is an apostate church.

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There's an objective standard. Scripture draws lines, and that's a blessing, and it's proper.

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It's good. They went out from us. One of the great tragedies of the modern day church is that we preach a gospel that is so soft, so appealing, that we can have apostates sitting in our midst and are not even offended by what we have to say.

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We should be so clear and so forceful in proclaiming the claims of Christ that those who are playing at religion won't want to be amongst us for very long at all.

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We should want them to go out so that it might be demonstrated, it might be manifested, it might be made known.

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They are not of us. They are not of us. So how are we to understand?

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How are you and I to put together everything that Scripture teaches?

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Many of you come from churches that put the emphasis upon you and your accomplishment.

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Maybe you came from a sacramental church, and so it was you doing the sacraments and making yourself available to receive grace in this way and that way.

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It was all based upon your performance. I remember so clearly my mom, she went to a funeral of a relative, and I can't remember now if this particular funeral was a

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Roman Catholic or whether it was a Seventh -day Adventist, but it was somebody in a faith that had no confidence in the ability of Christ to save his own.

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It was, she came back and said, it was so sad to listen to them talking, and they're going, well,

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I hope she didn't have any bad thoughts right before she died, because if she did, oh well, she's gone.

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No hope. My goodness. We know that's not the salvation that Jesus Christ provides for his people.

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That's not what the Good Shepherd does. The Good Shepherd knows his sheep, and his sheep hear his voice, but the

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Good Shepherd also will only bring his flock to glory, and whenever other creatures try to sneak in, they will eventually be found out, and it is a good thing that they go out from us.

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So what about you? You see someone that you've looked up to, someone that has been important in your life, and you see them stumble and fall.

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The first thought across your mind is, what about me? And the first thought across your mind should be,

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I trust in a perfect Savior. You shouldn't be looking to your own accomplishments.

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I'm not saying you should not examine yourself, because generally what happens is a slow decay over time.

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Most people just don't wake up in the morning and go, we're out of here. It happens over time.

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So don't become apathetic. Listen to our exhortations.

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Be serious about your faith. Serve others. One of the greatest ways that, look, you can serve out of duty, or you can serve out of love, and the only person who knows why you're doing it is you.

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The only person who knows why you're doing it is you. But you can focus upon the perfection of Christ, his love for you.

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You don't always have to be gazing at your navel, but there does need to be a balance.

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Never allow periods of spiritual coldness to allow you to start down a path that will lead you to your own destruction.

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Listen, as we warn you, we warn you all the time, but don't ever let your faith be based upon anyone else than Christ.

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Does God use other people as examples for you? Yes. If you're an elder in the congregation, you'd be an example, but I have to wonder if Hymenaeus and Alexander weren't elders.

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Maybe Demas had a position of apostolic authority. You're gonna see people stumble and fall.

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No one who stands behind this pulpit should be your ultimate authority.

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We should always strive to be examples, but we should never be the one that you are trusting in.

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I've been warning for years. It seems to me that in part of the judgment of God upon our nation, there is a tsunami of apostasy coming.

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That means if you see people who you once admired, maybe you even learned from, when

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Demas taught in the church, did people learn from what Demas said?

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I mean, Demas was repeating what he had heard the Apostle Paul say. So do you think there are people who were blessed by Demas's Bible studies?

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Sure there were. Were they hurt when he loved the world and went back? Yes, but their faith should not have been crushed, because if he was teaching the truth, he was directing them to Christ, not to himself in the first place.

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And that's what we have to think. That's what we have to be focused upon. When you see someone stumble and fall, yes, let

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God use that to make you very serious about your faith, but don't let the enemy use that to take your eyes off of the risen

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Savior. Someone who goes out from us now does not roll the stone back in front of the grave.

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It remains open. He remains risen. That must always be what we focus upon.

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Does all apostasy lead to destruction? We're not told that.

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There is certain apostasy that does. And it's hard for us necessarily to know, because many people just leave and they become apathetic.

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They don't necessarily become opposed to the gospel. They just don't care.

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But there are, very clearly, those… well, you can't… you might say, well, no one could actually be a true apostate today, because there's no temple to go offer the sacrifice in.

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No. I think very clearly, as an example, if a person were to leave this fellowship for Mormonism, that would be the same thing.

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You know what the Bible says about who God is and who Christ is and what his work is. To go to a religion that's polytheistic and believes

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Jesus is the firstborn spirit child of Elohim and one of his heavenly wives and that his blood does not cleanse from all sins, that's no different than going back to Judaism in the ancient day.

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So can there be those who commit that sin unto death today? Yes. Can we always know they've done it?

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No. No. We can't always know. But as elders of the church, we have to protect the church.

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And once someone does what, in our best understanding, involves a dangerous departure from the faith, then we tell you.

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We're not like… look, we don't enjoy that. It would be a whole lot easier not to do that.

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But the fact is, those churches where the shepherds hide that from the people are putting those sheep in danger.

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And we are willing to put ourselves in the line for your sake. For your sake.

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It's not for us. It's not a power trip. It's astonishing how few churches today will protect their people in this situation.

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In 99 % of the cases it mums the word.

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That's dangerous. It's wrong. We can't do it. We can't do it. So we're going to come forward in just a moment for the supper.

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The supper is a time for remembering Christ. And that will be the perfect time for you and I to once again focus upon what actually is the foundation of our relationship to God.

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It's not the work we've done. It's the work He did and accomplished and finished long, long ago.

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That's where our confidence comes from. That's what we must be focused upon. Let's pray together.

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Our gracious Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Word. We thank you for its balance, its perfection.

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And Lord, we need your balance. We need the balance that only the Holy Spirit can give us. We tend to fly off every which direction.

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Protect us, Father, by your Spirit. Help us to hear all of Scripture. Help us to focus upon the finished work of Christ.

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Help us never become apathetic. Let us hear the warnings, make application without ever becoming focused upon us.

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Lord, encourage those who need encouragement. Bind up wounded and broken hearts.

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Make us to be a mature people that follow Christ no matter what happens in the world around us.

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As we were taking the supper now, we pray that you will remind us of the great cost that was paid for our redemption.

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It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. A few brief words of instruction.

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You do not have to be a member of Apologia Church to partake of the Lord's Supper. If you are a baptized believer in Jesus Christ, we invite you to partake with us if you desire to do so.