Part of the reason we give up on God is we have trouble understanding His Word. He tells us, though, that we have grow in grace and knowledge through reading that Word. This devotion looks continues to look at growing our faith.
Nuggets
- When the Scriptures use the term milk, they are equating our spiritual life with that of a baby.
- Disciples are unskilled babes when we have given up reading God’s Word.
- The Bible tells us what our character should be like to grow us into a steak adult.
- There is no magical number to move to solid food.
To read devotions in the When We Give Up on God series, click the appropriate button below.
In the previous devotion, we talked about how the writer of Hebrews was biting on his readers for “…no longer [trying] to understand” (Heb. 5: 11 NIV) God’s Word.
At the end of Hebrews 5: 12, he wrote, “… and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat” (Heb. 5: 12 NKJV). He goes on to talk about that in the next two verses.
A Milk Baby
“For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe” (Heb. 5: 13 NKJV)
When the Scriptures use the term milk, they are equating our spiritual life with that of a baby. We can hook this verse to I Corinthians 13: 11. “When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child …” (I Cor. 13: 11 NASB). The goal is to grow up.
Saphir made an interesting comment. “The newly-converted man is born into the spiritual world, and from the first moment he sees and knows Christ, and has the mind of Christ, the Spirit, so that he can immediately understand all spiritual things. The milk of the Word, as contrasted with strong meat, does not refer to any real and inherent difference between the gospel first preached and afterwards taught. From first to last we present the same truth, the same circle of truths, the whole truth.”
I know. I’ve said a couple of times how my Ladies and I wish Paul would just speak English because we just don’t understand what he had written. I don’t see how Saphir can say, “… [we] can immediately understand all spiritual things.” There are some hard concepts in Scriptures.
But I Corinthians 2: 10 begins with past tense. “God’s Spirit has shown you everything. His Spirit finds out everything, even what is deep in the mind of God” (I Cor 2: 10 CEV emphasis added). We have the Spirit within us — because He helped write the Word — so we should be able to understand it.
But see. It then switches to present tense. “… His Spirit finds out everything, even what is deep in the mind of God” (I Cor 2: 10 CEV emphasis added). My English teacher friends would probably have a cow on that one.
Think about it, though. We’ve talked before about how God only reveals so much of Himself to us in the Scriptures. He reveals more and more of Himself as we grow closer to Him.
I take Saphir’s comment to mean that we grow by being more open to seeking. The understanding is there in our heart. We just have to access it. We have to have a child’s curiosity to learn so we keep expanding our knowledge.
But let’s look at it this way. The plan of salvation doesn’t change. The story of the flood doesn’t change. Stephen still gets stoned.
One of my Ladies made the comment that, yes, we reread the same passages. But we are different people this time. We look at it differently based on the situation we are in, or we have grown in knowledge, so it means something different.
Unskilled Babe
Okay, the verse goes “… unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe” (Heb. 5: 12 NKJV). We are going to tackle unskillful and babe before we get to righteousness.
Disciples are unskilled babes when we have given up reading God’s Word. We can’t find Ephesians (we won’t even go to Lamentations). We aren’t good at paraphrasing, let alone quoting. If we do paraphrase, we don’t know the address. Worse yet, we don’t know why we (are supposed to) believe what we believe.
How are we going to apply what we don’t understand?
Word of Righteousness
Righteousness means being right with God, being holy as He is holy. Righteousness is what comes out of being holy, having faith, and loving as Jesus does. Being holy produces the righteousness.
The word of righteousness is God’s holy Word. His Book is one of the ways He tells us how we become righteous,
Let’s think about God’s Word as righteousness a second. It tells us about the character of God. It shows us how we can live out that character in our lives through Jesus’ example.
Yep, we can think about examples where God’s Word was used as “evidence” for or against something God, in reality, isn’t for/against. We’ve heard/seen televangelists get rich because if their ministry.
The worst part is when every Tom, Sally, and Elaine doesn’t love as God loves. Pastor Chad has been preaching in First John. One thing he said Sunday was, “Do we love people enough to share with them, be kind to them in the midst of their brokenness, to be hospitable?”
Oh, yes, the worldview today is to be kind to everyone in the midst of their brokenness. But it is just a surface kindness. It is not a “bring you into my life so I can share the love of God with you” kind of love. It is more a “this is good enough then leave me alone to do whatever I want” type of love.
To read a related devotion, click the appropriate button below.
We need to approach God’s Word believing it gives us guidance as to how we are to live our lives. It tells us what our character should be like to grow us into a steak adult.
A Steak Adult
“But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil” (Heb. 5: 14 NKJV)
Our goal should be to “… when I became a man, I did away with childish things” (I Cor. 13: 11 NASB). That includes putting away the milk and feasting on the steak.
Let’s look at it this way. If knowing Jesus was a Man who did live — maybe even knowing He was a prophet — is the milk, knowing Jesus as our personal Savior and Redeemer is the steak.
Knowing Jesus died for our sins is the milk. Knowing His teachings so we can eradicate sin from our lives is the steak. Knowing how the Scriptures will build our character is being a steak adult.
Now, we are not talking about having to reach a magical number to move to solid food. I think we are talking about having the fullness of God’s love within us.
Use
Dad was a steak and potatoes kind of guy. He needed to be. Oh, he ate rabbit food. But he was a farmer. If rabbit food was all he ate, he wouldn’t have had the strength to deal with the animals, use and maintain the machinery, and lift and fix everything that needed lifted and fixed.
If we are just making a profession of faith just for fire insurance, we don’t need the steak. Well, truth be known, we don’t want the steak.
Didn’t we just look at that a couple of times? Professions have to be genuine. We can’t just give lip service that we believe in God and not change our lives to live the way He calls us to live.
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We need to use the steak of God’s Word so that we can grow to do His will for our lives. We all have jobs in His kingdom. We need to be prepared to do them.
Discern Good and Evil
Why is it important that we be steak adults? Satan is going to try to tempt us by making sin appear to not be sin. Milk babies may not be able to tell the difference. That may be up to steak adults to discern the difference.
We’ve talked before about who people try to rewrite Scriptures. Disciples need to know what the Bible says and what society is trying to change. We have to see what is good and what is evil.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
Okay, we’ve gotten through the verses. But what connections can we make. More importantly, how can we apply this so that we can go from a milk baby to a steak adult?
Come back for the next devotion and find out.
Father. We truly love You, Lord. We want to demonstrate that love by learning more about You and what You want us to be. We ask You for Your wisdom. Amen.
What do you think?
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