Things of note for today:
1.) I love my wife, and I loved going to the farm with her this weekend to spend time with family. Blessed and refreshed.
2.) Hebrews 6:1-8 should be a great encouragement to the regenerate, and a dire warning to the religious.
3.) I do not believe this passage speaks to the Christians ability to fall away. I do believe this passage refers to the life who has tasted, and to some degree understood the goodness of God (v. 4-5), but continues in rebellion (“fallen away”) (v. 6). The Christian life is one of fruit. For the Christian to drink in the rain (to be full partakers of Christ) is to walk in repentance and the blessing of God (v. 7). “Thorns and thistles” (v. 8 ) are born of a life that rejects repentance and continues in unbelief (“to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.”) (v. 6)
4.) From John Gill – “Now there are some who have a saving spiritual taste of this gift; for though God’s people, while unregenerate, have no such taste; their taste is vitiated by sin, and it is not changed; sin is the food they live upon, in which they take an imaginary pleasure, and disrelish every thing else; but when regenerated, their taste is changed, sin is rendered loathsome to them; and they have a real gust of spiritual things, and especially of Christ, and find a real delight and pleasure in feeding by faith upon him; whereby they live upon him, and are nourished up unto eternal life, and therefore cannot be the persons here spoken of: but there are others who taste, but dislike what they taste; have no true love to Christ, and faith in him; or have only a carnal taste of him, know him only after the flesh, or externally, not inwardly and experimentally; or they have only a superficial taste, such as is opposed to eating the flesh, and drinking the blood of Christ, by faith, which is proper to true believers; the gust they have is but temporary, and arises from selfish principles.”
5.) NOW…the question was asked of me can someone be saved, and still believe that Christians can “fall away” from the faith. I say, yes. The Apostle tells us in Hebrews 6:1 the following verses will be hard (“let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity”). I understand there are differing views on this matter. I’ve stated what I believe the whole of scripture supports. I also believe these verses are not our beginning point in a conversation on salvation (again Hebrews 6:1 “not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God”). This is why I would say someone could be convinced it is possible to “fall away” and still be a Christian…even though we would disagree on what is being said in Hebrews 6.
6.) And with that I give you the Low Anthem 
7.) Feel free to conversate in the comments.
The explanation of this passage in the church I grew up in (old skool SBC) requires one to interject into the text an “If it were possible”, and then twists the passage into a proof of the eternal security of the believer.
My wife’s family, (General Baptists), seemingly ignore the clear teaching of this passage and teach that you can “back-slide”, lose your salvation and be brought back to repentance.
I find that of the two, the General Baptists are more consistent in their beliefs. While both groups teach “decisional regeneration” – That is I am saved when I choose Jesus – The General Baptists follow that line of thinking to its logical end – that if I choose to be “saved”, I can then choose to be “un-saved”.
Both groups, then, start with a faulty premise. John 1:12-13 says
“12 But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,13 who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”
Ephesians 2 also speaks to the inability of Man to save himself.
So then, this passage, in context, I believe, speaks to the “Hebrew Christians” to whom it was written and this passage is a warning to those who had tasted and seen the Gospel and yet fell back into Judaism. By extension, it then is written to us today. As Dennis Smith has eloquently stated – “Your possession of faith is made evident by your progression in faith rather than your profession of faith.”
Hebrews 6 is a favorite passage of mine, and was the text Jesus used to begin the deepening of my understanding of the Gospel.
Thanks for the comment Matt.
Did Dennis Smith really say that? Did he have a mouth full of chicken wings when he said it?
I don’t see in here where it mentions “those” being “chosen.” Many are invited but few are chosen.
Jesus had a lot of spectators and participants, but not all were chosen in the end. Some followed him around and saw his aceness; one even worked for him.
So, what does “fallen away” refer to? Fallen, as in in Genesis 3? Suppose they had not “fallen away”-would they have received salvation? The text seems to give some merit to the enlightened. That’s the hardest part about it for me, that there is less clarification about the standing of the enlightened.
Dude…thanks for the comment.
I believe being “enlightened” falls in line with the tasting and sharing also mentioned in these verses. It is possible to know of God, to know of sin, to know the essentials of the faith, to experience common grace, to find truth in scripture and still have no part of Christ.
I also believe we were one Alan Minor short of a victory last Thursdee…lost 8 to 9.