Sinning With A High Hand

by Mike Ratliff

Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. (1 John 2:18-19 ESV)

Under the Old Covenant, sinners would confess what they had done against the Lord. They would then bring a guilt offering to the Lord to atone for their sin. This guilt offering was variable not on the extent of the guilt of the offender but upon the amount that the person could afford to sacrifice, making it affordable for everyone to be able to make sacrifice for their sin. Such is the graciousness of God. On the other hand, there are such things as highhanded sins. These are sins for which there is no available sacrifice for which to offer to make atonement. These are capital offenses like murder, adultery, bestiality, homosexuality, kidnapping, et cetera. The only recourse was the death of the offender for they were seen as sinning with a high hand against God. These sins were in every sense deliberate. 

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. (Hebrews 10:26-27 ESV)

 

Think of the so-called Christian leaders in our time who are attempting to lead as many as possible into the apostasy of Contemplative Prayer through Spiritual Formation or CRT and WOKEism. They are attempting to transform their churches into staging areas for the Post-Modernists attempts to transform the world into a better place.  These very simplistic examples of things going on right now in the visible church are markers of apostasy and are so because they are not orthodox in any shape or form when lined up with God’s Word as the exclusive determinant of what is and what is not. Any flavor of the Post-Modern form of Christianity fails the test because of the inclusion of mysticism, ecumenicalism, and universalism in all its forms in its mix. The issue with all this  is that it is temporally focused rather than eternally focused, which is a violation of Colossians 3:1-4.

1 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. 3 For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory.Colossians 3:1-4 (NASB)

We see this in its contextualization efforts in the corruption of the gospel it preaches. The move to integrate Critical Race Theory or Wokeism with the mission of the Church is a clear violation of this as it s 100% temporally focused rather than eternally focused.

Now, what has all of that to do with highhanded sin? Highhanded sin is deliberate disobedience after receiving the knowledge of the truth. In other words, these people know that what they are doing is outside the lines. They know that what they are practicing flies in the face of what Christianity really is. They are apostatizing deliberately. Oh, they may have been deceived into doing so, but that does not change the fact that they are deliberately running against the grain, ignoring the true means of grace and creating a new version of the visible church as they go and that means that they are out of bounds and are guilty of highhanded sin. The Apostle John said it like this.

Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us. (1 John 2:18-19 ESV)

Soli Deo Gloria!