JEFF TURNER
Hebrews 6:4–6 often raises concern because it describes people who have seen and experienced spiritual truth, but then fall away. At first glance, this sounds like someone losing their salvation. However, a closer look shows something different.
The passage mentions those who were “enlightened,” who “tasted the heavenly gift,” shared in the Holy Spirit, and experienced the goodness of God’s word and the power of the coming age. But after all this, they turned away. The writer then says it is impossible to bring them back to repentance.
Some believe this means salvation can be lost, but if that were true, the text clearly says it could never be regained. That would mean once someone loses salvation, there would be no chance to return to God—a very final statement. But the passage doesn’t use words like “saved,” “born again,” or “justified.” Instead, it talks about people who were exposed to God’s truth, who tasted it but never fully embraced it.
The warning is aimed at those who had every opportunity to believe but still rejected the message. Jesus said something similar in Matthew 11:20, where He rebuked towns that saw His works but did not repent. Hebrews 6 is not about losing salvation. It is about the danger of resisting it completely after fully understanding it.
They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be evident that they all are not of us.
1 John 2:19
