back to indexDoes My Sexual Past Make Me Unsavable?
Chapters
0:0 Intro
1:12 Does sexual sin mean I cannot be restored to repentance
2:12 How to save people who made a great beginning
3:43 We have come to share in Christ
4:25 We were truly in Christ
5:16 His covenant is a better covenant
6:46 Warnings
7:31 Esaus Problem
8:17 Conclusion
9:3 Outro
00:00:04.000 |
Well our inbox holds at least 50 questions already about Hebrews chapter 6 verses 4 to 6 00:00:10.000 |
because we get a lot of questions about falling away and losing salvation like this question from Josh. 00:00:15.000 |
Pastor John, a couple of years back I heard you speak on Hebrews 6, "I fear a lot." 00:00:20.000 |
And your words have not helped my fear because you talked about what it would look like if you, John Piper, were to fall away. 00:00:27.000 |
"I have professed faith and I have been dealing with sexual sin for a long time. 00:00:31.000 |
It manifests itself in my marriage as I acted out on fantasies and committed adultery multiple times. 00:00:37.000 |
My sin was found out of my wife who left me. I spent last summer living as one with the world. 00:00:43.000 |
I slept around and was one of the guys in every respect. 00:00:50.000 |
I've repented and I'm trying to overcome the root sexual sin that caused my downfall. 00:00:55.000 |
I'm getting back into the Word and praying daily. 00:00:57.000 |
I know that my salvation depends on Christ, but would what I have done count as falling away in the context of Hebrews 6 verses 4 to 6? 00:01:07.000 |
Does my sexual sin mean I cannot be restored to repentance?" 00:01:17.000 |
I don't know whether your protracted sexual sin will have the effect of preventing you from being restored to repentance. 00:01:29.000 |
And I hope the fact that I don't know will sound to you both sobering and hopeful. 00:01:38.000 |
Sobering because it is possible to sin oneself into a condition of inability to repent. 00:01:48.000 |
And hopeful because in Christ Jesus, the worst of sins, the worst of sins will be forgiven if there is authentic repentance in faith in Jesus Christ. 00:02:03.000 |
So let me try to help by giving the bigger picture of the book of Hebrews. 00:02:10.000 |
This book is written precisely to help people, save people, who have made a great beginning in the Christian life. 00:02:20.000 |
Described, for example, in chapter 10 verses 32 to 34, "Recall the former days when you were enlightened. 00:02:32.000 |
You had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, 00:02:39.000 |
since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one." 00:02:43.000 |
That's an amazing beginning in the Christian life. 00:02:46.000 |
They joyfully accepted the plundering of their property for the sake of love. 00:02:51.000 |
They made a great beginning, but now they're starting to drift away, according to chapter 2 verse 1. 00:02:58.000 |
"We must pay closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it." 00:03:04.000 |
Or chapter 12 verse 12, "Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, 00:03:10.000 |
and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather healed." 00:03:17.000 |
Or chapter 3 verse 12, "Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, 00:03:23.000 |
leading you to fall away from the living God. 00:03:25.000 |
Exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, 00:03:29.000 |
that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, 00:03:33.000 |
because we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end." 00:03:42.000 |
So we know that they were born again because they're persevering. 00:03:51.000 |
We have come to share in Christ if indeed we hold our confidence firm to the end. 00:03:58.000 |
So our perseverance to the end confirms that we were truly in Christ. 00:04:04.000 |
And what's so baffling for many people, and yet so wonderful about this book, 00:04:10.000 |
is that the strategy of the inspired writer is to lavish the readers with glorious displays of superiority, 00:04:19.000 |
the superiority of Christ and his salvation for sinners. 00:04:26.000 |
And yet, on the other hand, to give the most stark and stunning warnings of destruction 00:04:31.000 |
if we turn away from this overflowing grace and join Esau by selling our birthright for a bowl of pottage 00:04:40.000 |
and so prove that we were never in Christ like we saw in 3.14. 00:04:45.000 |
So I strongly encourage anyone who may be stumbling over the warnings of chapter 6 and chapter 10 and chapter 12 00:04:54.000 |
to read the whole book beginning to end and let yourself be swept up into the superiority of Christ over angels, 00:05:03.000 |
superiority of Christ over Moses, superiority of Christ over Old Testament priests, 00:05:15.000 |
Let yourself be swept into the fact that his covenant is a better covenant, 00:05:21.000 |
and his promises are better promises, and his sacrifice is a better sacrifice. 00:05:26.000 |
This book is a volcano, an overflow of spectacular provisions of God through Christ to save the worst of sinners. 00:05:40.000 |
Let this be the primary impact of the book of Hebrews. 00:05:45.000 |
Now, to be sure, the terrible warnings of destruction are there, like Hebrews 12.15. 00:05:52.000 |
"See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God, that no one is sexually immoral or unholy like Esau, 00:06:03.000 |
For you know that afterward, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected." 00:06:14.000 |
He couldn't repent, "though he sought it with tears." 00:06:18.000 |
That's the heart of the warning in this book. 00:06:21.000 |
Don't treat the grace of God and the preciousness of Christ and the forgiveness of sins and eternal life 00:06:30.000 |
with such contempt that you harden your heart to the point where you can't cherish Christ anymore. 00:06:42.000 |
You can't repent or receive forgiveness anymore. 00:06:47.000 |
The warnings in the book of Hebrews are most fundamentally not warnings about being beyond the reach of grace. 00:06:57.000 |
They are warnings about hardness of heart that cannot receive grace as a precious gift 00:07:08.000 |
and rest in grace as free and cherish grace as all-satisfying. 00:07:15.000 |
The problem with Esau in chapter 12—and this is the main problem that the writer is dealing with— 00:07:20.000 |
the problem with Esau in chapter 12 was not that grace and forgiveness were unavailable, 00:07:27.000 |
but that he had sinned himself into a condition where he could not welcome them 00:07:34.000 |
as more precious than his bowl of Cheerios, oatmeal, pottage. 00:07:44.000 |
He loved sin so much that freeness, the freeness and the all-sufficiency of grace 00:07:52.000 |
couldn't be seen or felt or received as more precious than sin. 00:07:58.000 |
So it says in 12.17, "He found no place, no occasion, no ability of repentance, 00:08:06.000 |
though he sought it with tears." Not tears of repentance over the ugliness and the distastefulness 00:08:14.000 |
and the Christ-crucifying evil of sin. No, no. 00:08:17.000 |
His tears were the tears of fearful remorse that refused repentance because of the sin he still loved. 00:08:27.000 |
So, the point of the book of Hebrews—and my point here is not to identify people for whom it's too late. 00:08:36.000 |
That's not what Hebrews is trying to do. That's not what I want to do. 00:08:39.000 |
I don't want to decide for anybody whether it's too late for you. 00:08:41.000 |
I pray, and I hope it's not. I don't believe it is. 00:08:44.000 |
Rather, the point is to say to everyone, just like it does in chapter 3, 00:08:50.000 |
"Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, but take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you 00:08:59.000 |
an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. 00:09:04.000 |
Exhort one another every day, as long as it is called today, that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin." 00:09:11.000 |
This is a man crying out to a church for whom he believes it's not too late. 00:09:16.000 |
It's not too late if you can do this. Would you do this? 00:09:23.000 |
Or as chapter 10 says, "Oh, do not throw away your confidence, which has great reward, 00:09:31.000 |
for you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what is promised." 00:09:56.000 |
Amen. Thank you, Pastor John, for those sobering words. 00:09:59.000 |
And Josh, thanks for your openness to talk about your past here on the podcast. 00:10:03.000 |
It's very much appreciated that you would share your story with us. 00:10:08.000 |
Over at our online home, you can explore all of our episodes in our archive now of about 1,300 episodes to date. 00:10:14.000 |
There you can see a list of our most popular episodes, read full transcripts, even submit a question you might be wrestling with yourself. 00:10:21.000 |
For all of that, go to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn. 00:10:26.000 |
Also, be sure to subscribe to us and your favorite podcast app. 00:10:32.000 |
How do we pray boldly for things while also honoring God's final decision that his "no" may be the best option? 00:10:39.000 |
How do we rightly pray in confidence with authority on someone else's behalf for healing, for example, while remaining in full submission to the mystery of God's will? 00:10:48.000 |
That's a really sharp, good question, and that's on Monday. 00:10:52.000 |
I'm your host, Tony Reinke. Have a wonderful weekend. We'll see you back here then.