Hebrews 6:3-5 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

And this we will do We will go on to perfection; if God permit That is, afford assistance and opportunity. And we will do this the rather, and the more diligently, because it is impossible for those who were once enlightened With the knowledge of the truth as it is in Jesus, (Ephesians 4:21,) and have been made free thereby from the bondage of sin and Satan, John 8:31-36; and have tasted the heavenly gift The gift of righteousness imputed to them, Romans 5:17; faith counted for righteousness; or the remission of sins through faith in Christ, sweeter than honey to the taste; and have been made partakers of the Holy Ghost Of the witness and fruits of the Spirit of God; and have tasted the good word of God Have had a relish for and delight in the doctrine of the gospel, have fed upon it, and been nourished by it; and the powers of the world to come Μελλοντος αιωνος, of the future age, as the Christian dispensation was termed by the Jews, the Messiah being called by the LXX. in their interpretation of Isaiah 9:6, (instead of the everlasting Father, which is our translation of the clause,) πατηρ του μελλοντος αιωνος, the Father of the age to come. If the expression be thus taken, by the powers, here spoken of, we are to understand the privileges and blessings of the gospel dispensation in general, including, at least with regard to some, the miraculous gifts conferred on many of the first Christians. But as the future state, or future world, may be meant, the expression may be understood of those earnests and anticipations of future felicity which every one tastes who has a hope full of immortality. “Every child that is naturally born, first sees the light, then receives and tastes proper nourishment, and partakes of the things of this world. In like manner the apostle, comparing spiritual with natural things, speaks of one born of the Spirit as seeing the light, tasting the sweetness, and partaking of the things of the world to come.” Wesley.