| In the first email, we looked at the three most common ways to interpret the warning passages of Hebrews (including Hebrews 6:4-8).The fourth and final interpretation is called the means-of-salvation view. Like the loss-of-salvation view, this view believes that the author is warning Christians not to commit apostasy and therefore avoid eternal judgment. However, contrary to the loss-of-salvation view, interpreters of this view do not believe that Christians can lose their salvation. Instead, the warnings are understood to be a means God uses to enable his people to persevere in faith and keep trusting Christ. Thus, the warnings are a means of salvation. Already-Not YetMany interpreters recognize that salvation in the New Testament is presented as something that is already but also not yet. By his life, death, and resurrection, Jesus Christ has inaugurated the kingdom of God, already bringing salvation to those who repent and believe in him. Nevertheless, his kingdom reign and the salvation he has won for his people have not yet been fully consummated. Thus, salvation is both present (e.g., Ephesians 2:5, 8; 2 Timothy 1:9; Titus 3:4–5) and future (e.g., Matthew 10:22; Romans 5:9–10; Hebrews 1:14; 9:28); it is already and not yet.The means-of-salvation view of the warning passages is consistent with this “already / not yet” perspective. Jesus has purchased salvation for those who trust in him; however, believers are called to persevere in faith to the end. God enables Christians to reach the goal of their faith through conditional promises (e.g., Acts 16:31: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved”) and warnings (e.g., Matthew 10:33: “Whoever denies me before others, I will also deny him before my Father in heaven”). These divine promises and warnings work together, urging believers to continue in faith, pursuing the goal that Christ has promised and won for them (Philippians 3:12–14). Persevere in FaithThis raises a question for many: If the New Testament assures Christians that they can’t lose their salvation since God preserves them, why warn them not to apostatize? Because perseverance must be lived! Believers do not persevere in faith by merely flipping a switch. Instead, by the grace of God, we persevere by continually repenting of sin and trusting in Christ amid life’s temptations and sufferings. New Testament warnings serve a vital function. They are a means God uses to enable his people to avoid dangers, keep running the race, and endure to the finish.Notice the divine promise and warning that we find in Acts 27, which illustrates this perspective. As Paul sailed to Rome in anticipation of his appearance before Caesar, the ship encountered a destructive storm. Paul informed the crew that God sent an angel to him promising the deliverance of everyone on board (27:21–26). Nevertheless, when some of the sailors tried to escape by lowering a small boat into the sea, Paul warned the Roman centurion, “Unless these men stay in the ship, you cannot be saved” (27:30–32). The promise of divine deliverance from harm did not nullify the necessity of obedience to a divine warning as a means of obtaining that deliverance.Consider this scenario: If a Christian you know and love were experiencing intense difficulties and confessed to you that he was giving up on Christ and renouncing his faith, what would you do? You wouldn’t tell them, “Well, genuine Christians persevere to the end, so I’m confident you’ll be alright.” Instead, you would pray for them, offer to walk with them in their troubles, and urge them to keep trusting in the love and grace of Jesus—who is the only hope. This, you see, is exactly what the author of Hebrews is doing. Out of love for his readers, he is urging them not to turn away from Christ but to keep trusting in his salvation, for there is no other refuge. To do otherwise is hopeless and eternally dangerous. There is salvation nowhere else. Here is how the great preacher Charles Spurgeon expressed it in a sermon he delivered on perseverance: |
God preserves his children from falling away; but he keeps them by the use of means; and one of these is, the terrors of the law, showing them what would happen if they were to fall away. There is a deep precipice: what is the best way to keep anyone from going down there? Why, to tell him that if he did he would inevitably be dashed to pieces. In some old castle there is a deep cellar, where there is a vast amount of fixed air and gas, which would kill anybody who went down. What does the guide say? “If you go down you will never come up alive.” Who thinks of going down? The very fact of the guide telling us what the consequences would be, keeps us from it…. So God says, “My child, if you fall over this precipice you will be dashed to pieces.” What does the child do? He says, “Father, keep me; hold thou me up, and I shall be safe.” It leads the believer to greater dependence on God, to a holy fear and caution, because he knows that if he were to fall away he could not be renewed, and he stands far away from that great gulf, because he knows that if he were to fall into it there would be no salvation for him. (Final Perseverance; Scripture: Hebrews 6:4-6; Charles Haddon Spurgeon, April 20, 1856). |
| To read more about a biblical understanding of New Testament warnings in general and the warnings of Hebrews in particular, see Thomas R. Schreiner, Run to Win the Prize: Perseverance in the New Testament (Crossway, 2010); and Thomas R. Schreiner, Hebrews, Evangelical Biblical Theology Commentary (Lexham, 2021). Source:Christopher W. Cowan (Ph.D. in New Testament, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, KY) serves as editor for Bibles and reference books at B&H Publishing. |
