What does it mean to hold fast to your confession (Hebrews 4:14)?

Hebrews 4:14 gives this exhortation to believers: “Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession” (NKJV). The word fast here means to “firmly” or “securely.” It is related to the word fasten. We are to hold our confession firmly.

The word confession in modern usage usually conjures up the idea of admitting that you have done something wrong. However, the essential meaning of the Greek word translated “confession” means “agreement” or “acknowledgement.” When a person confesses sin, he agrees with God about it—that he did it, and it was wrong. In Hebrews 4:14, sin is not the object of our confession but rather the truth about who Jesus is and what He did on the cross and the fact that He is the only way of salvation. It is a confession of faith. We are to hold fast to our faith.

The NIV translates the phrase as “hold firmly to the faith.” The NLT says, “hold firmly to what we believe.” The truth of the gospel must be acknowledged and clung to.

Hebrews makes the point that the New Covenant in Jesus Christ is better than the Old Covenant under the law. It appears that the book of Hebrews was written to Jewish converts to Christianity who were facing persecution and were therefore tempted to go back to the Old Covenant and the old way of living under Jewish laws and customs. This makes sense historically. Because of their long tradition of monotheism, Jews were exempt from many of the religious duties owed to the Emperor (Caesar), such as praying to or offering sacrifices to him. When Christians were considered to be a subset of Judaism, they were also exempt from those duties.

However, as Jewish leaders became more hostile to Christians, as evident in the book of Acts, the unbelieving Jews began to separate themselves from followers of the Way (see Acts 19:9). Christians were expelled from synagogues and denounced before Roman authorities. If Christianity was a new religion in the eyes of Rome and not simply a sect of Judaism, then Christians would lose their exemption from Rome-mandated religious duties. This would open them up to persecution.

Some Jews who had professed Christ were tempted to renounce Christ and go back to Judaism. Others were tempted to compromise and say that, while they still believed in Christ, they would go back to the sacrifices and temple worship as their expression of Christianity. Either way, they would be denying the sufficiency of the sacrifice of Christ for their sins and going back to a system of useless sacrifices. It is in this context that the Jewish recipients of this letter are told to hold fast to their confession. It was time to stand firm in their faith in Jesus.

The specific context of Hebrews 4 is the Israelites who left Egypt under Moses. Their exodus took them from Egypt and across the desert to the Promised Land. They had an initial positive response to the promise. However, they did not “stick to it.” When they got to the border of the Promised Land and heard the report of the spies, they decided that they could not take the land and started talking about going back to Egypt:

As a result of their stubborn lack of faith, God punished that generation, and none of them except Joshua and Caleb (the two spies who brought back a good report) got to enter the Promised Land. Every person 20 years or older died as the Israelites wandered in the desert for nearly the next 40 years. That generation is an example of those who had an initial positive response but later denied their confession (i.e., the belief that God would take them into the Promised Land) and wanted to return to Egypt. Hebrews 4 sees this as a parallel to the first-century Jewish believers who had made a profession of faith in Christ but now wanted to go back to Judaism.

The same can be true for any person today. When a person hears the gospel, he or she may have an initial positive response. That individual may make a profession of faith, get baptized, join the church and get involved in various ministries and activities. However, when pressures come, some who have made an initial positive response may drop out. It may be outright persecution, but in Western countries it is more often social pressure and the allure of other activities—perhaps sinful ones. Some time later, the person who was so active and church and seemed to be so committed is no longer involved in church or any Christian discipline, and Jesus is of little or no importance to him. His life is ordered around his own priorities and sinful activities.

Jesus spoke of this kind of person in the parable of the soils: “The seed falling on rocky ground refers to someone who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. The seed falling among the thorns refers to someone who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, making it unfruitful” (Matthew 13:20–23). It is not a question of a genuine believer losing salvation but of a professing believer giving up on something that was never genuine to begin with—although at the beginning it looked promising.

A person may make a profession of faith and not yet truly be a believer. When his profession is tested, then his faith is either shown to be genuine or he abandons it. Admonitions and warnings like the ones found in Hebrews can help professing believers in a crisis. Will they hold fast to the confession, or will they fall away, showing the insincerity of their faith?

The truth of who Jesus is, as articulated in Hebrews 4:14–16, is what encourages believers to hold fast to the confession of their faith. He is our “great High Priest who has passed through the heavens”; He is “the Son of God.” The truth of God’s Word is the practical means by which the Holy Spirit enables a true believer to remain true, firmly holding to the faith.