Hebrews 6:4a

Hebrews 6:4a

Tasting the heavenly gift

Let’s continue to deliberate on the “impossibilities” of verse 4 shall we? The first of these is enlightenment, a goal pursued by many of the world’s religions. The Bible talks about people who walk in darkness seeing a great light (Isaiah 9:2), it also says that Israel has been spiritually blinded, that God gives men a spirit of stupor, eyes that cannot see and ears that cannot hear. (Romans 11:8) Jesus came to open blind eyes and set captives free! (Luke 4:18) This life-changing encounter with Him is miraculous and unforgettable, there is no going back, once we have our eyes opened everything looks different and our hearts and minds are illuminated like never before. This may start with a simple prayer of repentance but if the ”light goes on” it will become an unrelenting torrent of love and joy and it’s irreversible. It does make me wonder about some of the “professions of faith” that I have witnessed!

The verse goes on to talk about tasting the “heavenly gift” and links that with sharing in the Holy Spirit. Surely this is the crux of the matter? The most significant day in my own life was an encounter with the Spirit of God that still resonates so meaningfully, even though it was nearly 50 years ago! Everything changed, I had faith and was already a young preacher and actively involved in Christian ministry, but that day I moved from knowing about Jesus Christ to actually knowing Him. I was seeking Him, I knew there was more but did not have the means to make something happen. And then, in 1978, He came to me in the night and what happened changed my life and set my faith alight! What God gives us is a taste of heaven, a divine interaction within us that we will never forget and that leaves a ripple effect that lasts for a lifetime. The writer of Hebrews is “bang on”, once we have tasted, once we have shared in the Holy Spirit, it is impossible to go back! 

Let us never forget that nothing we have gained through being a Christian is earned, everything is a gift. We cannot make ourselves believers, the Lord must draw us and open our eyes. Our beliefs and our knowledge of Him are only received by faith, it is that awareness and the intervention of heaven in our earthly lives that cannot be explained away or communicated rationally. We are all different, and our journeys of faith are different, but let’s never forget, they all started when the Lord God moved in our hearts and enlightened us by His Holy Spirit. We tasted and now we see! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

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