Shrinking Back To The Soon-To-Be Missile Crater

We’re all familiar with the idea of taking a verse out of context, right? Probably the classic one is Philippians 4:13, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”

When combined with Isaiah 54:17, “No weapon formed against me shall prosper!!!” it becomes the ultimate football huddle prayer before the big game. We love to take verses out of context and make them into mantras for guaranteed victory in the sports arena. Or hitting that new personal best in weight room.

But take that verse in Philippians: In context, this verse isn’t a guarantee that Jesus is going to make you succeed in literally anything the you can call a “thing.” No, in context, it’s about Paul’s confidence that God will see him through hunger, persecution, or anything the world may throw at him for the sake of his witness. It’s basically Paul saying, “Even if they kill me for the sake of the gospel, I can face it through Christ.”

There is a sentence in our text this morning—the very first sentence, in fact—that is like that, except the effect is almost the opposite of the example I gave above. We often take verses out of context to make us feel good, but this sentence is one that will actually make you feel pretty terrible if you take it out of context.

So when we read that first sentence, I’m going to ask you to just hang on, be patient for a minute, and not jump too quickly to any conclusions. Let’s get right to it, then we’ll pray and get started. This is the Word of the Living God:

“For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. 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? For we know him who said, ‘Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.’ It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. For,

‘Yet a little while,
and the coming one will come and will not delay;
but my righteous one shall live by faith,
and if he shrinks back,
my soul has no pleasure in him.’

But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.”

-Hebrews 10:26–39

I’m sure you saw it, that first sentence:

“For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries.”

-Hebrews 10:26–27