Hebrews 10:29, commentary and pictures

Hebrews 10:29 describes a threefold contempt that deserves sorer punishment: trampling the Son of God by rejecting Him, counting the blood of the covenant that sanctified as common and unholy, and insulting the Spirit of grace. That punishment is greater than the death without mercy imposed for despising Moses' law, leaving the defiant sinner to vengeance, judgment, and falling into the hands of the living God. To tread Him underfoot is to refuse Him as the divine Son and Lord, to despise His atoning blood that alone could save at infinite cost, and to trample His authority by open contempt for His law. Doing despite to the Spirit is rejecting reproof, counsel and warnings after great light, treating Spirit-attested messages with indifference and calling them merely human. Yet guilt need not remain final, for while the sinful life continues condemnation abides, but if the sinner stops, humbles himself at the cross and repents the cleansing fountain still flows to wash him white.

Meaning of the Three Acts

The verse sets forth a threefold contempt that makes a person worthy of especially severe punishment: trampling the Son of God underfoot by rejecting and refusing Him, counting as common and unholy the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and insulting the Spirit of grace. Neglecting the salvation Christ offers is itself this refusal, for He alone could save fallen humanity and salvation came at infinite cost, so to reject the gift puts eternal life at risk. Those who have known Christ and His sanctifying power can fall into this grave apostasy, and in the shaking time Satan works to wrest people from Christ and lead them to trample the Son after faith has been received. Character is being formed while God tests His people and angels weigh their moral worth, and the warning bears especially on those who persist in sin while claiming to believe the truth, whose course can lead others into sin.

To tread the Son underfoot is to refuse to acknowledge Jesus as the divine Son of God, to refuse His rule, to deny the only Lord God and the Lord Jesus Christ, and to choose unbelief instead. Those who do so reject the means through which blessings come and despise the Spirit of grace. To tread underfoot and despise the blood is to treat as worthless the blood by which the person was sanctified, to count as unholy what should have sanctified him, and to despise Christ's atonement and redeeming sacrifice. This rejection includes resisting the light and truth the Spirit brings, opposing the word of God, and turning people away from heaven-sent truth, so that those who persist choose darkness and put themselves on the path to ruin. It is seen in those who, despite great privileges, become proud of doubting the truth and choose infidelity, thereby doing despite to the Spirit and trampling Christ's blood.

Trampling God's authority and His law is trampling the Son and despising the covenant blood, for open contempt for the law given in grandeur at Sinai is despising Jehovah the Lawgiver and treading underfoot the blood of the Son of God. The warning applies to all who disregard the commandments of God and points to judgment to be executed when the Son appears in the clouds in His Father's glory surrounded by all the angelic host. As Israel transgressing the first and second commandments could not come near the mount where God descended and could not even look upon the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance after he had communed with God, much less will transgressors of God's law be able to look upon the Son at His coming. This treading underfoot and despising is happening now as the law is trampled in the raging battle where truth and error near their final conflict and the precious hours of probation are closing. Those warned must therefore arouse, march under the bloodstained banner of Prince Emmanuel, fight the good fight of faith, make sure work for eternal life, glorify the Father, and become the means of saving souls for whom Christ died, for truth will triumph and they may be more than conquerors through Him who loved them and win eternal honors.

Disrespectful conduct by professed followers that brings the Redeemer to open shame crucifies the Son of God afresh, puts Him to open shame, and dishonors God. The verse applies to those who claim to be Christ's followers while walking contrary to His teaching and not following His example. It is a terrible thing to sin for this reason, and the remedy is to behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world in matchless love and compassion for sinners. The innocent, holy, undefiled Lamb stood as guilty to endure punishment so that sinful people deserving punishment may stand innocent clothed with the garments of His righteousness, and beholding Him in incomparable love melts the heart to accept Him as the sin-pardoning Saviour and walk no longer in darkness.

A person educated in the truth from childhood who knows the truth and then follows Satan, breaks the law of God, and pursues a course of sin tramples the blood of the crucified Redeemer underfoot, grieves the Saviour who died for him, puts Him to open shame by renouncing truth and Bible religion, and takes his stand with unbelievers. Such backsliding comes from pride, self-conceit, wilfulness, and trying to serve two masters, and it leads stumbling on to perdition with a terrible account to render to God for imperiling the soul. Guilt remains while the sinful life continues, but it is not yet too late if the sinner stops, humbles himself at the foot of the cross, and repents, for the cleansing fountain still flows to wash the polluted robe of character white in the blood of the Lamb.

Refusing the sacred union Christ died to establish in order to bind believers in sacred relationship to Himself is to neglect the great salvation and despise the blood of the covenant. Applied to family life, allowing children entrusted as stewards to claim the devotion of life and rob God of the love and service due Him is ingratitude to a gracious Benefactor and despising Christ's blood. Believers are not their own but His who bought them with an infinite price, and are bound and determined to glorify Him in body and spirit which are God's.

How Severe the Punishment

The sorer punishment is greater than the death without mercy imposed under witnesses for despising Moses' law. It falls on Sabbath-keeping Adventists who claim to believe the truth yet continue in sin and will not give up lustful practices, whose consciences are defiled and hearts corrupted so that they do not discern sin as sinful, who counterwork God and lead others into sin as decoys to unclean practices that defile the whole being. Continuing in that defiant course leaves the offender to the vengeance of God, to the judgment of His people, and to the fearful fate of falling into the hands of the living God.

The law at Sinai came with glory so great that Israel transgressing the first and second commandments could not approach the mount where God descended, and could not look upon Moses' shining face after he had communed with God. Christ will appear in far greater glory, in the clouds of heaven in the glory of His Father surrounded by all the angelic host to execute judgment on those who disregard the commandments and treat His blood with contempt. Transgressors of God's law will be even less able to look upon the Son of God at His coming.

When He comes in the clouds attended by the angelic host to give life to the righteous dead and ransom them from their graves, the righteous are crowned with glory and honor. At that same appearing the wicked who trampled Him, the boastful presumptuous self-willed generation arrayed in rebellion against God's law denying the only Lord God and the Lord Jesus Christ and despising His atonement, are banished from the Lord's presence, separated from Him and consumed by fire. Those who sin against great light and scorn His grace will in the judgment be condemned to separation from the Lord and the glory of His power.

Punishment comes not directly from the Lord but by the Lord removing the heavenly protection that through His angels has preserved men from Satan's cruel power and unseen snares and dangers in travel, in homes, and in eating and drinking, and by no longer commissioning His angels to hold back Satan's decided attacks. After repeated warnings, reproof, correction, great light and special care to reach the highest standard of Bible requirements, those who refuse correction, resist the Spirit of grace, choose their own wisdom and course independent of the Spirit, and choose their own way are left beyond God's protecting care, exposed and unshielded to Satan's workings. Left to themselves, Satan entangles and destroys them if he can and works calamity and distress by sea and land with storm and tempest in great wrath. God bears long, but His patience and mercy have a bound and a line that marks mercy and justice.

Those who trifle with salvation rather than trusting Christ, abiding in Him, exercising faith and building character according to His directions will face the bitter regret of realizing too late that church membership alone did not save them. The destruction of Jerusalem for casting away the Lord's law, cherishing man-made traditions, refusing to reverence the only begotten Son, filling up the measure of iniquity and treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath until long forbearance ended and retributive judgment came for the vindication of God's honor and the magnifying of His law, typifies the destruction of the world.

Prophetic Setting and History

In the shaking time the danger is of being wrested from Christ and led, after having known His sanctifying power, into trampling the Son of God, with character being formed while God tests His people and angels weigh moral worth. The verse describes the corrupt generation living when Christ is about to appear the second time as boastful, presumptuous and self-willed, arrayed in rebellion against the law of God. That generation denies the only Lord God and the Lord Jesus Christ, trampling upon His blood and His law and despising His atonement.

This last-day condition was shown to Enoch in prophetic vision concerning the death of Christ and His coming in glory with all the holy angels to ransom His people from the grave. The treading underfoot of the Son of God and despising of the blood of the covenant is happening now, as the law of God is trampled underfoot. The setting is a raging battle with truth and error nearing their final conflict while the precious hours of probation are closing, leaving no room to fold the hands and say there is nothing to do. Those warned must arouse, march under the bloodstained banner of Prince Emmanuel, fight the good fight of faith, make sure work for eternal life, glorify the heavenly Father, and become the means of saving souls for whom Christ died, for truth will triumph and they may be more than conquerors through Him who loved them and win eternal honors.

The Jewish nation committed this sin by rejecting Christ, casting away the law of the Lord, cherishing man-made traditions, and refusing to reverence the only begotten Son. Each rejection of Christ's invitation to repent moves a person closer to rejecting salvation until hope of pardon and desire for reconciliation are lost, and anyone may repeat the Jewish sin by refusing mercy and listening to influences that draw the soul away from Him. The Jews filled up the measure of iniquity, treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath until long forbearance ended and retributive judgment came for the vindication of God's honor and the magnifying of His law, with the destruction of Jerusalem typifying the destruction of the world. In the last days the Christian church has that example before it yet does as the Jews did, and by that rejection of light does despite to the Spirit of grace.

To receive the teachings of pretended visitants from the world of spirits is to set aside the law of God, despise the Spirit of grace, and count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing. The spirits deny the divinity of Christ and place even the Creator on a level with themselves. This is Satan still carrying on under a new disguise his warfare against God begun in heaven and for nearly six thousand years continued upon earth.

False Teaching and Unbelief

The warning falls upon teachings that undermine confidence in Scripture, set aside the law of God, deny the divinity of Christ, and place even the Creator on a level with created beings. Such teaching is spread by deceptive spirits, and to receive the instructions of pretended visitants from the world of spirits is to set aside the law, despise the Spirit of grace, and count the blood of the covenant an unholy thing. This is Satan still carrying on, under a new disguise, the warfare against God begun in heaven and for nearly six thousand years continued upon earth.

Having light and truth and then openly joining Spiritualism and connecting for years with demons is trampling underfoot the blood of the covenant. Such a one becomes Satan's agent, more fully on the enemy's side than before, gaining no more light and no closer connection with heaven. Her influence is unsaving and unfit to be brought before God's people, and coming out of that deception requires no hidden return but an open retraction and a complete riddance of demonic influence. Christ is likewise trampled underfoot and insulted when those who pretend to be good despise virtue and holiness and accept Satan's corrupt teachings as messages from the spirits of the dead. As at His first advent, so in this age corrupt pretenders despise and insult Him, accept Satan's deception, and give to Satan the worship belonging to God alone.

Doing despite to the Spirit of grace includes treating the faith with scorn, jesting at the faith of the fathers, and fostering skepticism and doubt toward the fundamental truths and pillars of Christianity. It includes trusting the boastful decisions of human reason and imagining that divine mysteries can be explained and truth arrived at unaided by the wisdom of God, by which all who value eternal interests are entangled in Satan's snare. Satan adapts this attack to every class, using jests and sneers against the illiterate and scientific objections and philosophical reasoning against the educated to excite distrust and contempt of the Scriptures. Even inexperienced youth take up this shallow unbelief, spread its influence to others, and a life that promised to be an honor to God and a blessing to the world can be blighted by infidelity.

Pride in one's own opinions, self-confidence, distrust of God, and the influence of companions who foster doubt lead on to despising the blood of Christ's atoning sacrifice and doing despite to the Spirit of grace through unbelief. Those who boast of wisdom and sharpness while holding this contempt are blind and do not know their wisdom is foolishness. They hold a lofty opinion of their reason and believe they have strength of mind to discover fallacies in divine mysteries, while Satan weaves entanglements about their feet and whispers heresies continually in unsanctified ears, leading the minds of thousands to this contempt for the blood of the atonement.

Rejecting Light and Warnings

Doing despite to the Spirit of grace is rejecting the reproof, counsel and warnings God sends after great light has been given, calling His work through a messenger merely human and dismissing reproof delivered through the spirit of prophecy as human opinion. It is treating messages attested by the evidence of the Holy Spirit with comparative indifference because they reprove a course of action and do not agree with personal ideas, which is speaking against and denying the Holy Spirit. Such rejection makes the rejecter responsible for opposing the Spirit of God.

Rejecting God's reproof of definite individual wrongs insults the Spirit of God. Treating messages given by God as mere human gossip picked up from spouses or brethren, refusing to receive correction, offering only general admissions of not serving God without naming and forsaking definite wrongs, and justifying opposition to the light while sustaining wrongdoers is doing despite to the Spirit, and those who persist go farther from God and into darkness. Those who have known the work and had the evidence incur greater guilt for doubt and unbelief than those with no experience and are without excuse. Those who have seen where dissimulation, doubt and strengthening unbelief lead yet travel the same path and repeat the same course, and ministers who persistently hold to wrong taken in blindness, stand before God in no better place than others who have resisted the Spirit and cannot be saved in that attitude unless they recognize and confess their errors.

Doing despite is resisting the truth while the Spirit strives with heart, mind, soul and strength in order to be linked with the world. It is yielding to Satan instead of yielding to God in the hour of resolve, taking sides with the rebel chief, discarding ownership by creation and redemption, refusing Christ's mercy, refusing to obey His commandments, and refusing to be a partaker with Him of suffering, self-denial and cross-bearing. It is choosing Christ to be discarded and the service of Satan to be chosen because the way is broad and the gate wide and the world goes therein, until Satan overcomes the person and sickness may come or reason be removed with no time or inclination for repentance, leaving the choice of Christ or the world. It is receiving great light and hearing the message of mercy yet refusing to humble self and change and turn fully around, misusing God's gifts in the service of evil, thereby hardening the heart against God's goodness, shutting oneself in a fortress of unbelief and placing oneself in unbelief and opposition to Jesus Christ.

Coming near to doing despite is holding a spirit of prejudice that refuses to fast, pray, humble the heart before God, and sit down calmly to investigate the Scriptures together. That spirit closes the door to God's richest blessing and brings in another spirit, and those who have come that near will not be in a favorable position to see light until they repent before God and gain some sense of how near they have come. Professed Sabbathkeepers come very near doing despite when God has given them evidences of His power that few churches have had, at times almost shaking their place by His power, working through humble instruments and speaking to the church and more definitely to individuals, yet they receive His words of reproof and warning with careless indifference. Doing despite is remaining under Satan's leadership while claiming to believe the truth, living in faultfinding and criticism, obstructing the molding influence of the Holy Spirit, standing directly in the way of God's work and refusing the message God sends. Now is the person's time and day of opportunity, and the choice is life or death: to come onto the Lord's side and be used to save souls, or to keep hardening in that school and remain a body of death to the church.

Doing despite happens when a man separates from God so that his heart is no longer under the subduing power of the Holy Spirit and he has no living connection with God. Then the attributes of Satan are revealed in him, he begins to oppress his fellow men, and an influence goes forth from him contrary to truth and justice and righteousness, manifested in institutions both in the relation of workers to one another and in the desire of one institution to control all others by men entrusted with weighty responsibilities. It is the very same spirit indulged by Korah, Dathan and Abiram and by the Jews in the days of Christ, persisted in after warnings from God have come again and again and have been cast aside. Trampling on God's Word and acting against the Holy Spirit after receiving all the evidence that will be given and hearing truth spoken in demonstration of the Spirit, yet hating the light, choosing darkness rather than light, defiling the soul and entering dark secret paths, brings ruin on self and others.

Those who so interpose themselves between heaven-sent light and the people become parties to the ruin of souls, while the Spirit of God departs from them, with some never to return but to continue stumbling to their ruin. No man or church can associate with a pleasure-loving class and still show appreciation for the rich current of truth sent to those with simple faith in His Word, while the only remedy for a world polluted and corrupted as in the days of Noah is belief in the truth and acceptance of the light. Doing despite is betraying the Lord Himself and not merely a human messenger, by rejecting the light and mercy that shows a person just where he stands spiritually and becoming embittered against God who gave the message. It is acting the part of betrayal foretold for the last days and brings peril, with the person's case passing in review before God and investigated in the courts of heaven before the heavenly universe, so he must stop at once where he is. Treating God's message with ridicule and contempt insults the Spirit of God, and such words and actions stand recorded against those who take part until they confess their wrong, with danger that those who do not repent will repeat the same actions. Unbelief regards the precious light and precious evidences God gives as a matter of no special importance and treats the Holy Spirit as a common thing, and for this reason the Lord can do nothing for those who have not faith, so that this unbelief binds about the work of God.

Repentance and Faithful Living

Each refusal of the invitation to turn back moves the soul nearer to final rejection of salvation, for resistance hardens the heart until it loses both hope of pardon and desire for reconciliation, and persistent wrongdoing molds character until few still want Christ's image formed in them. The Jewish people fell by this refusal, and anyone repeats it who turns from mercy to influences that draw away from Christ.

Repeated yielding to temptation while departing from God's requirements and slighting reproof blinds the offender to the true nature of sin, leading to self-flattery that the motive was good and no wrong was done in leaving the Lord's way. Excusing departure as well-intentioned ends in losing the capacity to hear the Spirit's voice, until its pleadings and warnings are silenced and the person is abandoned to chosen delusions, a perilous step.

Sabbathkeeping Adventists who profess truth yet persist in sin come under sorer punishment than death without mercy under witnesses, especially when they will not abandon lustful practices that defile conscience, corrupt the heart, destroy discernment of sin, counterwork God, and decoy others into defiling practices that pollute the whole being. To continue in that course is to trample the Son, to reckon as common the covenant blood by which they were sanctified, and to insult the Spirit of grace, leaving them to vengeance, to judgment of His people, and to falling into the hands of the living God. Knowingly persisting in trampling the Sabbath after receiving truth is a grave breach of trust and defiance of the Spirit, so the sinner is called to flee to Jesus, cease grieving the Spirit, and obey without delay lest presumption cross the boundary of forbearance to judgment at the reckoning day.

Those who have received present truth but conform to the world face heavier condemnation unless they change, for treating salvation with disregard and resisting the Spirit brings severe punishment, and acting against God's will and way insults His grace. Outward religion cannot save those who appear Christian yet trust self, morality, influence, or knowledge instead of making Christ their refuge, for church membership and profession without exercising faith, abiding in Him, and building character by His directions is trifling with salvation that ends in bitter regret over neglect discovered too late. Since Christ gave His life, love, and suffering for redemption, those who have received His grace should not withhold their hearts from Him nor resent the self-denial of following Him, for resistance to such love is grave rejection of saving grace.

Ceasing insult to the Spirit means returning to first love, breaking with Satan, submitting to God, dying to self, and making a radical thorough change through Christ's grace, wrestling until sins are pardoned for His sake, since without that repentance the deceived soul is lost with no other hope. Guilt continues while the sinful life continues, seen in one educated in truth from childhood who follows Satan, breaks God's law, renounces Bible religion, stands with unbelievers from pride, self-conceit, wilfulness and attempting to serve two masters, thereby trampling the Redeemer's blood, grieving the Saviour, putting Him to open shame, stumbling toward perdition and imperiling the soul with a terrible account to render. Yet it is not too late if such a one stops, humbles himself at the cross and repents, for the cleansing fountain still flows to wash the polluted robe of character white in the Lamb's blood. Beholding the Lamb who takes away sin in matchless love — innocent, holy and undefiled yet standing as guilty to bear punishment that the guilty deserving punishment may stand innocent in His righteousness — melts the heart to receive Him as pardoning Saviour and walk no longer in darkness.

Those who refuse warnings, choose to transgress the law, and reject the offered way to life trample redeeming blood and insult the Spirit, and must bear their iniquity without excuse, though the warning is mercifully given to turn them from evil. Those who have had their last entreaties can be saved only by obeying the warnings they despised, for resisting the Spirit hardens the heart through unbelief despite evidence and gracious appeals, leaving the unyielded will unblessed and unsaved while opportunity remains and in need of thorough repentance rather than continued resistance.

Deliberately repulsing the Holy Spirit and rejecting His offered work and blessings is contempt for God's gracious messenger, not harmless neglect or delay but serious offense by determined choice. Insult to the Spirit includes ascribing Spirit-given revelations to Satan, rejecting gospel truth and persisting in sin in opposition to Christ, endangering the church, so that refusal of correction without repentance may require removal. Such persons may seem to flourish for a time under Satan's influence, even after former zeal, but God permits their envy and hatred against His people to become evident, revealing true character and exposing Satan as deceiver, accuser and murderer before the heavenly universe and the worlds.

Knowingly turning from light, knowledge and obedience after being purchased by Jesus' blood brings sorrow both to the soul and most deeply to Jesus in disappointment over those He bought at such cost. No offering of possessions or even of human life can save a soul unto eternal life, for the one great sacrifice has already been made in the life, mission and death of Christ, and contemplating its greatness enables the mind to grasp the greatness of the salvation it provides.