The Rise of Apostasy
Notes
Transcript
I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom;
Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.
Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;
Speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;
Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know the truth.
For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving:
For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.
Introduction:
Introduction:
In , there is a story of a king, a king of Judah by the name of Amaziah.
He was the son of Joash and the father of Uzziah who was king during the time of Isaiah the prophet.
Amaziah reigned in Jerusalem 29 years.
Scripture says of him, initially, that he did which was right in the sight of the Lord.
And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, yet not with a whole heart.
He functioned in accord with the religion of Israel on the outside.
He knew it, he understood it and he behaved by its ethics, but not with a perfect heart.
He had a heartless external religion.
He performed the his religion only on the outside, but his heart did not know the Lord on the inside.
So, soon, he was lured away into idolatry.
After Amaziah came from striking down the Edomites, he brought the gods of the men of Seir and set them up as his gods and worshiped them, making offerings to them.
2 Chr 25:14
His life ended tragically.
He was murdered by his own people.
From the time when he turned away from the Lord they made a conspiracy against him in Jerusalem, and he fled to Lachish. But they sent after him to Lachish and put him to death there.
Departing from the faith is nothing new.
It happens today.
It happened in Ephesus when Timothy was Pastor.
It happened is the history of Israel with everyone from kings down to peasants.
There will always be people who believe intellectually, who will behave externally according to the revelation of God but who have no heart for that.
Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.
And the heart is the issue.
And all that really refers to one word and that is the word apostate.
An apostate is someone who departs from the faith they know, the faith they understand and the faith which they previously affirmed.
An apostate is not someone who never knew but someone who knew, not someone who never believed but someone who even on the outside believed, not someone who never behaved according to the revelation of God.
But that is because their heart was never in it, because they never really knew God, they were lured away by the siren voices of demons behind idols and a false religious system.
In the verses that are before us, the Apostle Paul is referring to the apostacy that is happening and has always happened.
The NT is filled with examples of people that have committed apostacy.
holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting this, some have made shipwreck of their faith,
among whom are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme.
1 tim 1:19-20
For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia.
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction.
And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed.
And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
Likewise, the OT is filled with examples of people that have committed the sin of apostacy.
“I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments.” And Samuel was angry, and he cried to the Lord all night.
King Uzziah in
King Ahaz in .
We see the progression as the Apostle and the Spirit warn about Apostasy.
We see A Falling Away Expected, A Falling Away Exacted and A Falling Away Explained.
I. A Falling Away is Expected (vs. 1b)
I. A Falling Away is Expected (vs. 1b)
Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, and doctrines of devils;
The events that the Apostle is going to be talking about are things of which there is no doubt will happen.
He says that the Spirit is the one that is speaking regarding the things that are going to happen.
He uses the word “expressly” to describe how the Spirit is speaking.
It is the word “ῥητῶς” and is used to describe the idea of something that is spoken in a manner that is precise and clear.
The Spirit of God is clearly speaking concerning things that are going to happen.
We could say that the things that the Spirit is about to speak are things that are undeniable.
Now, the Spirit is saying that in the latter times, people will depart from the faith.
When the Spirit spoke about the latter times, He is referring to the time of the Coming of Christ.
Latter times are not just starting now because the world is so wicked, the latter times started at the coming of Jesus Christ, that Messianic era ushered in what we would call the last times.
When Jesus Christ came to earth, preparation for end times began in the earthly realm.
This is also backed up my Scriptures.
Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour.
He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you
but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.
for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
We must understand that the events that the Spirit is going to discuss here are not just events that have happened in the last decade, century, or Millenium.
They are events that have happened since the first coming of Christ until HIs return.
And in that span of time. apostasy will occur and escalate more and more.
And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold.
So, since the first coming of Christ until His return the Spirit says that people will depart from the faith.
“Depart” is the word “ἀφίστημι” and it carries the idea of distancing yourself fro something.
This is not just “when the newness wears off” (that would be an indication of false faith, certainly), but this is idea of a purposeful abandonment of something where you distance yourself from it.
This is not a dissimilar idea that Christ spoke about in the Gospel of Luke.
And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. But these have no root; they believe for a while, and in time of testing fall away.
The idea here is that people who originally seem to trust Christ, show that they really have not because when the trial come they distance themselves from the faith.
Whenever someone has believed the truth and then depart from the faith that they once embraced, they are said to have apostatized.
Apostasy is a very serious things to fall into with fatal consequences.
The reason that this is so serious is because the idea that the Spirit has here is that this is a purposeful,. deliberate departure from a former position.
These are people who come very close to the truth that saved, one to leave.
An apostate is not someone struggling to believe, but one who willfully abandons the biblical faith he had once professed.
The term “the faith” refers to the content of divine revelation that constitutes what Christians believe.
This phrase, then, describes an apostate, a rejector of Christ from within the ranks of the Church.
The writer of Hebrews discusses the seriousness of apostasy when he wrote of the Jews:
For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit,
and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come,
and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.
Now, the seriousness of this is laid out in the force of the fourth word of the text, “impossible”.
Some have translated this as “difficult”; however the way that this the Greek word “ἀδύνατος” here in 6:6 is used in other passages, this translation is unjustified.
Notice how this same Greek word is used in other passages in Hebrews.
so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.
For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.
The idea of all of those passages is that the idea that is brought out in absolute impossible to happen.
It is absolutely impossible for God to lie.
It is absolutely impossible for the blood of animals to take away sin for all time.
It is absolutely impossible to please the Lord with having faith in Him.
John MacArthur shares this insight:
Hebrews: The MacArthur New Testament Commentary A Fourth Warning
A vaccination immunizes by giving a very mild case of the disease. A person who is exposed to the gospel can get just enough of it to immunize him against the real thing. The longer he continues to resist it, whether graciously or violently, the more he becomes immune to it. His spiritual system becomes more and more unresponsive and insensitive. His only hope is to reject what he is holding onto and receive Christ without delay—lest he become so hard, often without knowing it, that his opportunity is forever gone.
When a person has all the knowledge about Christ that the writer is talking about and they ultimately turn their back on that knowledge, it becomes absolutely impossible to renew them to repentance.
When one rejects Christ at the peak experience of knowledge and conviction, he will not accept at a lesser level.
So, salvation becomes impossible.
They could not return because they had “crucified Christ and put him to an open shame”.
Admittedly, this is an odd statement.
What the writer of Hebrews is trying to rely is that by those people have knowledge and then turn away, they are basically siding with the crucifiers that Jesus Christ is not the true Messiah.
The people to whom the writer is writing, the Jews, had turned around and gone back to Judaism.
To them, Jesus Christ was an imposter and deceiver and got exactly what was coming to Him.
They declared openly that Jesus was guilty as charged.
Hebrews: The MacArthur New Testament Commentary A Fourth Warning
When anyone has heard the gospel and then turns away, he has done exactly what these Jews did. Though he would never take up a hammer and spikes and physically nail Jesus to a cross, he nevertheless agrees to Jesus’ crucifixion. He takes his place with the crucifiers. If this happens with full light, such a person has become an apostate, and for him salvation is forever out of reach. He has rejected Jesus Christ against the full light and power of the gospel. He is incurably anti-God, and for him is reserved the hottest hell. He takes his place with Judas, who walked and talked and ate and fellowshipped with God incarnate, yet finally rejected Him.
How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace?
This is how absolutely dangerous apostasy is; yet the Scriptures and the Spirit are clear in our text that from the time that Jesus Christ came to the earth until He returns we should expect a falling away.
The true child of God does not like it and they should mourn over it, but it should not be a surprise.
So, Paul informs Timothy that people will apostate from the truth; do not take it personal, it is not about you.
It is about the rejection of the truth of Christ.
A Falling Away is Expected.