The Five Foolish Virgins

QUESTION: Were the five foolish virgins regenerated?

ANSWER: Yes; they were all companions of the Bride, all had brightly burning lamps or torches, all up to a certain time were fully prepared to meet the Bridegroom. The moral of the parable is the blessedness of endurance unto the end through the faith which secures and preserves the fullness of the Holy Spirit of whom olive oil is the emblem (Zech. 4:3-14, I John 2:20, 27), and the sad failure of some to secure a full preparation for the future exigencies of the spiritual life. See Matt. 13:3-7.

— Steele's Answers p. 187.

Insulting the Spirt of Grace (Hebrews 8:21)

How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? — Hebrews 8:21 (ASV).

In the description of the guilt incurred by an apostate from Christ to Judaism is found another phrase descriptive of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of grace (Heb. x. 29). If this is not the irremissible sin, it is sin at its climax. The Son of God is trampled down with ruthless scorn and hatred, His "precious blood" is counted as that of either an ordinary man or that of a guilty criminal. Then the description reaches the summit of wickedness, the sin of all sins, the irremissible sin — "and insulted the Spirit of grace." Most modern exegetes say that the Spirit is thus called because He is the gift of grace. But by referring to Zechariah xii. 10 we find the expression "Spirit of grace and supplication," evidently implying that the Spirit is "the source of grace" and the inspirer of all true prayer (Delitzsch). [The Spirit] is the source of grace not only in His own person, but He is the channel through which the love of the Father and the grace of His Son are poured upon penitent believers.

The importance of the Spirit's office in human salvation cannot be overestimated. The Father's love and the Son's self-sacrifice in the scheme of redemption are ineffectual without the Spirit's personal agency in applying the provisions of salvation. He is the appointed and indispensable almoner of the divine bounty and messenger of the King's pardon. If a city has a bureau of charities, its poor who proudly refuse its help and rely on the general benevolence of the city government, and starve because of their folly, are no more unreasonable than are those who admit that they are sinners, but are trusting in the fatherhood of God for forgiveness, ignoring His bureau of pardon, through the mediation of His Son, as administered by His accredited commissioner, the Spirit of Grace. Many Christians who are almost destitute of Spiritual strength might become strong through the more abundant life which Christ came to bestow, if they would honor with an intelligent faith that personality whom He has appointed as the Lord and giver of life.

— The Gospel of the Comforter (1898) Chapter 1.

When Was Peter Converted?

QUESTION: Explain "When thou art converted strengthen thy brethren." (2) Was Peter converted before the crucifixion of Christ?

ANSWER: To be converted is to be turned back from the course one is pursuing. Peter in a few hours would be in the way of apostasy, when by divine grace, the grace of repentance, which accompanied the sorrowful look of Jesus, he would be turned back to loyalty and love to his Master. (2) Peter became a disciple of Christ, a Christian, when he left all and followed him. By his apostasy he lost justifying faith, but not the faith of conviction and penitence. As a backslider he needed to be restored and was restored, within a few hours after his fall.

— Steele's Answers p. 173.

Is It Impossible to Restore Fallen Believers?

QUESTION: Explain the impossibility of renewing fallen believers, as stated in (1) Heb. 6:4-6 and (2) 10:26, 27.

ANSWER: The Hebrew Christian who apostatized to find favor with his Jewish kindred must abandon not only the practice of Christianity, but the theory also. Before restoration to the synagogue he must declare Jesus an accursed impostor, a malefactor, "a hanged man." So long as he is doing this he is crucifying the Son of God afresh, in the present tense, denoting continuousness, it is impossible for God, who respects free agency, to save him. In (2) the sinning willfully is another present tense. So long as willful sin continues the apostate can find in Judaism no effectual sacrifice, but, if he should turn to Christ, he will find that his sacrifice has not lost its virtue. So long as any man is abiding in a state of willing sin he is shutting the door of repentance behind him. God does not shut that door, the sinner shuts it himself, and he alone can open it. He is the first cause, the cause uncaused of all his moral acts. He is the creator of his own character and destiny.

— Steele's Answers p. 147, 148.

Esau & Apostacy

QUESTION: Is Esau as described in Heb. 12:17 a type of the hopeless apostates who have committed the unpardonable sin?

Hebrews 12:17 (KJV): "For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected:for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears."

ANSWER: Some scholars say "Yes," but others say "No." I agree with the latter. Those who say that because Esau, faint with hunger, sold to his hard-hearted, selfish, grasping twin brother his birthright for a mess of pottage, he was forever afterwards incapable of that true repentance necessary to eternal salvation, are mistaken in their exegesis of Heb. 12:17. The repentance which Esau found no place for was not a change in his own mind, but a change in his father's decision, by which he might regain a double portion of Isaac's estate and the headship of the tribe which he had foolishly sold. For this he repented with tears, but they did not secure the earthly blessings which he desired. But the favor of God in the forgiveness of sin and the gift of eternal life were still attainable. Another mistake is found in answering the question, "By whom was Esau rejected?" Some say, "By God." The true answer is "by his father Isaac," when he refused to reverse his decision about the birthright. When Esau got through "sowing wild oats" he seems to have become quite a respectable man, kind and forgiving toward his brother. I hope he died in peace with God and attained eternal life.

— from Steele's Answers pp. 42, 43.

Can a Sinner Be Restored?

QUESTION: I am in great distress, having been pardoned and baptized with the Holy Spirit, a happy, aggressive Christian worker, then knowingly and deliberately committing sin and repeating it for months and years. Is it possible for me again to find acceptance with adoption into the family of God? do you think there is any hope for so great a sinner?

ANSWER: Your case is a very sad one, but I see one ray of hope. Your desire to be restored to the state from which you have fallen is an indication that the Holy Spirit has not left you. He who commits the irremissible sin has, we are told no longing for restoration. Hebrews 6:4-8 may be quoted against our position, but this text does not apply to you because you are "not crucifying (present tense) the Son of God afresh," but rather, earnestly seeking him as your Saviour. Hebrews 10:26-31 has also a present tense denoting a persistent sinning: "For if we are willingly sinning," etc.: It should also be borne in mind that the apostasy of a Christian Hebrew is the rejection of the Christian system and a return to Judaism, in which such an apostate will find no effectual sacrifice for sin. But should he return to Christ he will not cast him out.

"There's a wideness in his mercy

Like the wideness of the sea."

The adversary, the devil, often tempts backsliders to believe that they have committed the unpardonable sin. In my pastoral experience by quoting the divine promises to a dying sailor who said, "There is no mercy for me, I have broken all of God's laws," his despair was changed into faith in Christ. He found pardon and died in peace. My advice to this sorrowing inquirer is to go to Jesus saying, "If I perish I will pray and perish only there."

— Steele's Answers pp. 26-28.