Lesson 305: "The Way I See It"
“We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away” (Heb. 2:1)!The original Greek translation included “for this reason” pointing back to Hebrews chapter one.The reason was that even though the angels played an important role in delivering messages about the Redeemer, the Redeemer Himself is now here and speaking and because God Himself is speaking this warning then we MUST pay attention.When God says we must it is not a request but a command dealing with something of grave importance.There is nothing in God’s message more important than salvation and there is no room for improvement or changing this message.We do not add or take away, sugar coat the message or alter the nature of the One who has given us the message.The “church” today has made this message so acceptable to taste and mind that there seems to be no difference between an eternal message of hope and the worldly message of “feel good”.We cannot pick and choose the parts of this message we like and toss away the parts that prick our conscience.This is life and death and the author of Hebrews wants us to understand that we cannot tamper with what God Himself has given us in His Son.Taking liberties with the truth of God’s Word and compromising in certain areas of the gospel is the reason the Hebrew’s writer gives for “drifting away from the truth”.
The term “drifting away” in Greek suggest something which flows by or glides by as if being swept along by a river.Being swept along by peers; being swept along by popular movements in the churches.Christianity is rowing upstream with one oar; stop rowing and you drift; floating down stream in rafts enjoying each other and creating an environment where our Christianity is convenient when the rapids and the falls are just around the bend.Stop rowing and you will find yourself further down stream than you earlier rowed upstream and the trek is harder and longer the second time.Jesus Christ has spoken and it is His life we are to live in by faith as we paddle for our spiritual lives, living according to His Word by the power of the Holy Spirit who indwells us.Drifting speaks of deception; false prophets; ferocious wolves in sheep’s clothing; being tossed here and there by the waves; confused and frustrated.I believe Jesus when He said He would never lose one the Father gave Him (John 6:39) and I believe Paul when he says that nothing will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:38-39).But I also believe that each and everyone will give account of themselves to God (Rom. 14:12).We are all weak in the flesh and we all have sinned and Jesus will bring us through our temptations; but His attitude toward the truth is one which none of us should take for granted and to which we are all held responsible before Him.
Although salvation is a choice, the fact that it is a command is made clear in Acts 17:30-31; “in the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now He commands all people everywhere to repent.For He has set a day when He will judge the world with justice by the Man He has appointed.He has given proof of this to all men by raising Him from the dead”.God has commanded all men to come unto Him for salvation because sin must be paid for.Jesus made a down payment for your salvation with His death on the Cross and He died for everyone’s sins.However everyone must accept this payment/this free gift because if you choose to disobey the command to be saved, you will pay for your own sin; with your soul.The message is primarily for the lost but there is a message for believers too.The One who came to condemn sin in the flesh and to set the captives free is the same One who is Judge and all will stand facing Him one day.You will either be covered with the Blood of the Lamb or you will be naked in your own righteousness and suffer the consequences.
I do indeed appreciate and heed the Hebrew’s warning about falling away (Heb. 6:6), however I believe that Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever (Heb. 13:8); that He will keep safe that which I have entrusted to Him (2 Tim. 1:12); I regretfully fall into the category of sinning and falling short (Rom. 3:23); I respectively and repentantly have no desire nor intentions of falling from grace (1 Cor. 10:12); my confidence is not in my own strength but in God’s (Pro. 3:5); I boast only in the Lord (2 Cor. 10:17); and am convinced of Romans 8:38-39.