Many years ago, a terrified minister of the gospel told me he knew he was going to hell because he could not stop sinning. As a result, he was committing other sins to divert his mind from the guilt and fear he felt. Then after a while, he would feel better, and the cycle would repeat itself.
So I asked him, “Why do you think you are going to end up in hell?” He quickly opened his Bible and read Hebrews 10:26-27.
“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.”
Here’s what I told him. On face value, this appears to mean that any Christian who commits habitual sin will face dire consequences after death. In other words, Christ will choose to eject from that person’s spirit, and God the Father’s judgment will fall upon them. The final results would be getting thrown into hell. By the way, all sin is deliberate, whether we know it or not.
If you started watching a movie three-fourths of the way through, you would have no context for the story. You would be confused and could jump to wrong conclusions. When we read Hebrews 10:26-27, we are entering three-fourths of the way through the story. So, without context, people are often confused and jump to wrong conclusions about its meaning.
Hebrews is about how Jesus is better than Moses and how the New Covenant is better than the Old Covenant. It was written to two groups of Jewish people. Those who believe that Jesus is the Messiah and those who are wondering if they need to reject Jesus and continue believing in the Old Covenant sacrificial system.
The writer is warning the second group in this Scripture that if they permanently reject Jesus Christ as the one and only Messiah, the ultimate sacrifice for sins, the Old Covenant sacrifices have no value. Jesus’s sacrifice for their sins is infinitely better than sacrificing animals for sins. They can stop those daily sacrifices and embrace the one and only sacrifice of Jesus’s body and blood. If they don’t, they will face a terrifying judgment before God with grave consequences.
So even today, this Scripture is not for believers in Christ and His sacrifice for sins. In fact, you can rest assured that whether you are a Jew or a Gentile, God wants to help you overcome habitual sins. Yet, habitual sins will not bring about God’s eternal judgment on you. God’s mercy and grace in Christ are greater than your sin struggles.
