Hebrews 6:4-12

What does it mean to be faithful?

I have a wife, and I need to be faithful to her. Does that mean I shouldn't sleep with other women? Well, sure--but doesn't it mean a lot more than that?
What do I have to do to be a faithful husband? Do I have to love my wife? Do I have to try to love my wife, even when she's being difficult? Do I need to show her that I love her? Do I need to provide for her? Do I need to do my best to make her happy and to give her what she needs?
Don't I need to do all these things to be a faithful husband? If I stop doing these things, these things I promised her I'd do when we said our vows, I may lose my right to be her husband.
And doesn't that seem fitting and right? Isn't that just?

I have a friend. (More than one, really...) In order to be a faithful friend, I need to spend time with my friend, let him rant when he's having a bad day, care about what he's going through, help him out when he needs it and I can. I need to be there as a friend. If I stop doing those things, I might lose a friend.
Right?

I have a job. In order to be a faithful employee, I need to show up at work, do my work, give it my best effort, work well with other people. I need to contribute to the company's success. If I stop doing that, it's quite possible that I'd lose my job.

All these things seem right and proper to us, don't they? We don't complain about any of these things, because they just seem fair.
So why is it that sometimes we feel like our relationship to God should be different? Sometimes we feel like God owes us salvation--or, maybe we wouldn't put it in those words: maybe we'd say to ourselves, God would never take away my right to be His child.
...
I'd say that's pretty close to being accurate. Read the book of Hosea. I'd say that it would kill God to take away my right to sonship in His family just as much as it would kill me.
Maybe you have kids and you saying that you can't imagine ever giving them up, no matter what they did wrong. I'd say you've got an inkling of how God feels.

And yet, there it is. Sometimes we have to give up relationships that we don't want to give up. Read Hosea chapter 10 and understand that God did not want to punish the nation of Israel, the kingdom of Samaria. He suffered with them long, but He finally destroyed them.
And yet... And yet, hundreds of years later, when good Jews hated the Samaritans for their rebellion against God, when the children of Israel rejected the former Ephraimites with a righteous indignation, even in these times, God came down to earth, a man, and did He pass around the country of Samaria with His jewish brethren? No, but He went to Samaria and He tried to teach the word of God there, just as He did in Jerusalem!
Know this: our God, Whom we serve, is righteous and holy and blameless altogether, not suffering evil and punishing unrighteousness in all; but He is a kind and loving God, eager to forgive those that will repent and slow to punish those whom He loves. He is not willing that any be lost, but that all should come to the knowledge of the truth.

In light of this marvellous love and unceasing faithfulness, we have to ask ourselves: what have I promised to God? When I took on baptism, when I entered my covenant with God, what did I promise to give Him? What did I promise to keep for Him and for Him alone? Did I promise to be pure? Did I promise to be righteous? Did I promise to be penitent? Did I promise to trust in God?
If I promised Him any of those things, then what must I do to be faithful to Him? If God treated me the way I treat Him, would I consider Him to be faithful to me?