BACKSLIDING TO HELL - Mike Peralta (fb2 epub reader .TXT) 📗

In Hebrews 10:26-31 it is referring to the person “who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, who has treated as an unholy thing the Blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace.” Most people, even though they know they are living in sin, when they read this, feel that this does not apply to them, but only to those who are blatant enemies of God such as atheists, etc. But sin is very deceptive, Hebrews 10:26-31 is referring to those WHO PROFESS CHRIST, “CONVENANT THAT SANCTIFIED HIM”, but who “DELIBERATELY KEEP ON SINNING.” And it states that by their deliberate sinning they are “trampling the Son of God underfoot.”

I very much hope you understand the importance of what “trampling the Son of God underfoot” and “treating the Blood of the covenant as an unholy thing” really means. By your ongoing deliberate sinning you are treating the Blood of Jesus as an unholy thing and so you are despising and rejecting “the Blood of the covenant that sanctified him.” You may not be doing this with words but you are doing it with actions. And actions count more than words. Recall what Jesus said in Matthew 21:28-32 about the son who said he wouldn’t obey, but later did; and the son who said he would obey, but didn’t. Also take note of Titus 1:16 which states that, “They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny Him.”

Hence by your willful, deliberate, ongoing sinful actions you are rejecting “the Blood of the covenant that sanctified him, you,” and so according to verse 26, “no sacrifice for sins is left”. Please take note this means that: BY DELIBERATELY PERSISTING IN SIN, THE SACRIFICIAL BLOOD OF JESUS NO LONGER COVERS YOU. And once the Blood of Jesus no longer covers you then God will hold you personally accountable for all the sins in your life. Instead of the Blood of Jesus taking the penalty of your sins, you personally will have to pay the judgment for your sins. And as verse 27 says, the judgment for this is nothing short of eternity in Hell, “a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.”

Just like many others, at one time I thought this Hebrews 10:26-31 passage might have been talking about the disciplining of God’s children but this view of simple discipline cannot be reconciled with the phrase “a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.” The penalty for those who “deliberately keep on sinning” is the same as that for the enemies of God - eternal torment in Hell. I sincerely hope that you believe God’s Word as stated. We must come to understand that God never violates His Word. God ALWAYS adheres precisely to His Word - whether it is a promised blessing or a promised judgment.

Again sin is very deceptive. Some will be thinking, “But this only applies to the lost who have heard the gospel but who refuse to believe.” But Hebrews 10:29 and all of Hebrews 10:26-31, also Hebrews 10:38-39, is referring to those who once believed, “the Blood of the covenant that SANCTIFIED HIM”. If you have given your life to Jesus in the past, but are now willfully living a life of sin - this passage of Scripture is addressed directly to you. Not to the atheist, not to a lost person who has never known Christ, but to those who were previously SANCTIFIED. Please, please, please believe God and His Word. God never lies to us or just says things for effect. He always means precisely what He says in His Word.

A much worse and severe punishment is in store for the backslider who does not repent. I am sure you have seen or heard about believers backsliding and committing adultery and staying in that situation or those who persist in sleeping around and even living with their girlfriends or boyfriends. Or those who are consistently getting drunk and high on drugs. That my reader is deliberate and persistent sinning. And even if you don’t believe it, those who do such things and don’t repent and die in that state will go directly to Hell. For God never violates His Word and there is no question about it “It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God”.

Let us read a few verses that list some of the sins that will send a person to Hell. Now remember, according to Hebrews 10:26-31, those who deliberately keep on sinning forfeit the covering of the Blood of Jesus and so they will receive the full punishment for their sins in the lake of fire.

“He said to me: ‘It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be My son. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars - their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.’ " Revelations 21:6-8.

“But suppose the servant says to himself, ‘My master is taking a long time in coming,’ and he then begins to beat the menservants and maidservants and to eat and drink and get drunk. The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the unbelievers.” Luke 12:45-46. 

“Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.”, 1 Corinthians 6:9-10.

Remember God is faithful and He always keeps His Word. In spite of all the Scriptures that he is aware of, the unrepentant backslider expects God to violate His Word. But the Lord cannot violate His Word. If the Lord were to violate His Word then He would be a liar. If the Lord allows you to enter Heaven in an unrepentant backslidden state then He would have to break His Word. Do you really think God is going to break His Word?

The following testimony is one that Charles G. Finney had in part of his sermons. It is about a person who was warned about his drunken lifestyle. The Lord warned this person, through a dream, that the consequence of his drunken life, if he continued in it, would result in his damnation to Hell. I realize that the inclination of so many is to doubt. But the nature of this testimony is so consistent with the warnings in the Scriptures that I believe we all should take this testimony very, very seriously. For God’s Word is true and unbreakable. Yes, you can doubt God’s Word. You have that choice. But the consequence is still going to be what God promises in His Word.

- Beginning of Charles Finney Excerpt -

Excerpt from the Sermon, “The Self-Hardening Sinner’s Doom”. in the book “The Way Of Salvation”, Sermons by Charles G. Finney, 1891. Release by G. FREDERICK WRIGHT, OBERLIN, OHIO, September, 1891.

Sometimes he brings the lives of men into great peril, so that there shall be but a step between them and death; as if he would give this movement of his providence a voice of trumpet power to forewarn them of their coming doom. So various and striking are the ways of God's providence in which he reproves men for their sins.

God also reproves men by his Spirit. According to our Savior's teachings, the Spirit shall "reprove the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment." Hence when sinners are specially convicted of sin they should know that God has come in his own person to reprove them. His spirit comes to their very hearts, and makes impressions of truth and duty there revealing to the sinner his own heart, and showing him how utterly at variance it is with a heart full of divine love.

Again, I have no doubt that in the present as in former days, God reproves men of their sins by means of dreams. If all the reliable cases of this sort which have occurred since the Bible was completed were recorded, I doubt not they would fill many volumes. I am aware that some suppose this mode of divine operation upon the human mind has long ago ceased; but I think otherwise. It may have ceased to be a medium of revealing new truth doubtless it has; but it has not ceased to be employed as a means of impressing and enforcing truth already revealed.

Sometimes the great realities of the coming judgment and of the world of doom are brought out and impressed upon the mind with overwhelming force by means of dreams. When this is the case, who shall say that the hand of the Lord is not in it?

A striking instance of a dream in which the hand of the Lord may be seen, is related by President Edwards, President Edwards was a descendant of Jonathan Edwards and President of Oberlin Bible College. One of his neighbours, an intemperate, alcoholic, man, dreamed that he died and went to Hell. I will not attempt to relate here the circumstances that according to his dream occurred there. Suffice it to say that he obtained permission to return to earth on probation for one year, and was told distinctly that if he did not reform within one year, he must come back again. Upon this he awaked, undermost solemn impressions of the dreadful realities of the sinner's Hell. That very morning he went to see his pastor, Pres. Edwards, who said to him, "This is a solemn warning from God to your soul. You must give heed to it and forsake your sins, or you are a ruined man for eternity." The man made very solemn promises.

When he had retired, Edwards opened his journal and made an entry of the principal facts: the dream, the conversation, and of course the date of these events. The inebriate reformed and ran well for a time; attended church and seemed serious; but long before the year came round, he relapsed, returned to his cups, and ultimately in a fit of intoxication opened a chamber door in a shop which led down an outside stairway pitched headlong and broke his neck. Pres. Edwards turned to his journal and found that the one year from the date of his dream came round that very night, and the man's appointed time was up!

Now it is no doubt true that in general, dreams are under the control of physical law, and follow, though with much irregularity, the strain of our waking reveries; and for this reason many persons will not believe the hand of the Lord ever works in them; yet their inference is by no means legitimate; for God certainly can put his Hand upon the mind dreaming as well as upon the mind waking, and multitudes of instances in point show that He sometimes does.

Again, God reproves the sinner whenever his Spirit awakens in the mind a sense of the great danger of living in sin. I have often known sinners greatly affected with the thought of this danger the terrible danger of passing along through life in sin, exposed every hour to an eternal and remediless Hell.

Now these solemn impressions are God's kind warnings, impressed on the soul because He loves the sinner's well-being, and would fain save him if he wisely can.

Often God's Spirit gives sinners a most impressive view of