THE KING’S BUSINESS
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tinuing in sin, and therefore it is impos sible that he ever be lost. Of course, the doctrine is often taught in such a way that the natural impression is that when one is once born again (or is “in grace,” as it is often put), no matter how he lives he is still a child of God and is in grace. (The way they put it is, “once in grace always in grace”). Now there is no warrapt in the Bible for any such doctrine. If one lies down in sin after seeming to have been born again, it does not prove he is a child of God in spite of his sin, it proves he never was really a child of God. What does the following mean in Heb. 6 : 4 , 5 , "Have tasted of the heavenly gift and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come”? I ask this since “partakers o f’ is found in Heb. 3 : 1 , 14 ; 12:8 evidently with the idea of possession, and that “taste” in Heb. 2 : 9 ; John 2 : 9 ; 1 Peter 2:3 evi dently means partaking of the things spoken of? The word “possession” as you use it is an ambiguous term. It would mean one thing in connection with some things that one is said to be a partaker of, and quite another thing in another thing that one is said to be a partaker of. For example, par taking of the Holy Ghost does not mean “possession" of the Holy Ghost except in one sense; it does not mean possession of the Holy Ghost in the sense of having received the definite gift of the Holy Ghost. We should always bear in mind that there are a variety of operations of the Holy Ghost, and that there are various works of the Holy Ghost short of regeneration.
The Holy Spirit, for example, produces conviction of sin, and the man -wh6 is brought- under conviction of sin would be, in that sense, a partaker of the Holy Ghost. That is to say, he has had experience of the convicting work of the Holy Spirit. But he is not in “possession” of the Holy Ghost as one is in whom the Holy Ghost comes and dwells permanently. But the Holy Spirit does a work beyond that of conviction in many a man who is not yet definitely regenerated by the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit of God works in many a man, and works effectively up to a certain point, short of that man’s being born again by the Spirit of God, And a man may, in a certain measure, partake of the “powers of the world to come” without having become, a fully regenerate man. In a similar way the word “taste” .is used in a variety of senses. In one of the passages which our questioner himself gives, 1 Peter 2 :3, “tasted” certainly does not mean par taking in the sense of becoming a posses sor of the thing spoken of. Before we leave this passage, Heb. 6:4, 5, let us also call attention to the fact that the writer does not say that the case that he imagines will, become an actual fact. In fact, he says just the opposite in the context. In verse 9 he says, “But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, things that accom pany salvation, though we thus speak.” In other words, he leads them up to an awful yawning chasm, not because they are going to fall into it, but to keep them from fall ing into it. The very description of it is one means used to keep them from falling into it.
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