Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,
Hebrews 6:1 NAS
The writer to the Hebrews makes no secret of the fact that Christians must take action in order to grow in spiritual maturity. Notice that he tells us that we are to “press on.” This means we are to be actively involved in our maturation process. It is sad to see Christians who believe that spiritual maturity is a process of osmosis. Those individuals believe that if they are faithful in their church attendance, read a chapter a day in their Bibles, and then pray before they go to sleep at night, then they will automatically grow into a mature Christian.
Here’s some bad news for those people – you don’t grow without being an active participant in what God describes as the process for growth. Here the writer to the Hebrews says we are to leave the elementary things behind. What things? He says the elementary teaching about the Christ. In other words, there is much more to learn and live about Jesus than that He died on Calvary’s cross.
It may be in vogue today to forsake theology in favor of the warm-fuzzies. But fuzzy thinking will not draw you closer to Christ and will not provide the impetus for spiritual growth of the kind the Bible describes. The “meatier” issues of the faith are not apprehended by a novel Christianity.
May we press on to break through the elementary teachings of the Scriptures to attain the status of workmen that are not ashamed!
Thank you for teaching through the meatier issues when the babies still desire milk. May God richly bless today and always Pastor Mike.
Dr. Spaulding,
A number of years ago I was teaching through through Hebrews and one person who had been saved for a number of years complained about the theological nature of the class. She wanted us to go back to doing a study like we had previously done on the Gospel of John. Like the readers of Hebrews, it was time for us to move on to the meatier portions of Scripture like Hebrews. If all we have is milk, this will leave the Body malnourished and not mature believers. Yes, we need to study parts of the Bible like John but eventually we need to move on to the meat.
Great post!