We won this prize for "Team that raised the most money!"
My daughter, Kelanie, won a door prize!
For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you
again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food,
for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness,
since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature,
for those who have their powers of discernment
trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
Hebrews 5:12-14
This past Friday I ate dinner with two of my favorite people - my sister, Amanda, and my close friend, Melissa Powell. You can never be around Melissa without getting a good word straight from scripture. She was discussing the fact that Christians need to mature and grow. We can not be the same today as we were the day we were saved and be effective for the Kingdom of God. It is all about getting yourself into the Word of God and growing. AMEN! Trust me, she could preach it!
This morning I was thinking about our conversation. The truth of the matter is that a lot of Christians do exactly this. They are saved........and that is it. They believe in Christ, but never read and learn the Word for themselves. They are content to be on spiritual milk supplied to them Sundays and Wednesdays.
I will be the first to admit that I have been this childish Christian.
When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child.
When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.
1 Corinthians 13:11
I grew up in church. I knew Bible Stories that I learned in Sunday School. I memorized a few scriptures like Genesis 1:1, John 3:16, 1 Timothy 4:12, 2 Timothy 1:7, and a few of the verses from the Roman Road. I tried to start reading the Bible for myself when I was in high school, but my schedule was crazy with all my extracurricular activities and work (My thoughts on this is a whole other post! lol), and it had not yet become a priority. My reading was sporadic at best. Didn't I get the Word every Wednesday and twice on Sunday? Surely I was growing!
Since I got married at 19, I have done countless Beth Moore/Priscilla Shirer/Christine Caine Bible Studies. I have taken leadership classes at church. I am an avid reader and read books about Spiritual Growth that has tons of scripture. I read my Bible if I was studying something specific. And still, I didn't feel like I was growing to a maturity level I should be at for someone who was in leadership and had been saved practically my whole life.
I used the age old excuse that I wasn't educated enough to rightly divide The Word for myself. I needed someone to teach it to me. (Hello.....I have the same Holy Spirit as any other saved person. He is my teacher! Thank goodness, I know that now.)
It wasn't until about 2-3 years ago, that I became serious, I MEAN SERIOUS, about knowing the Scriptures for myself. I wanted to know what and why I believe what I believe about everything: marriage, children, abortion, modesty, finances, salvation, baptism, gifts of the spirit, etc. I became so convicted about what I had let become a part of my beliefs just because I was taught it and never looked it up for myself. I was amazed how much of my beliefs were solely based on what was the norm or acceptable in the culture. How scary!
I have grown up spiritually in the last few years. I am not easily persuaded to jump on any fad teachings or readily accept just anyone's teachings without lining it up with the Word of God myself.
Until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God,
to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,
so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by
every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him
who is the head, into Christ.
Ephesians 4:13-15
I am fully persuaded that there is an answer for everything in the Bible. Now, I do not understand how we (Christians) could look like the world AT ALL. I do not believe that in 1 Corinthians 9 when Paul says he became all things to all men, he meant that he started dressing like, listening to their music, use their slang, and rearrange what God outlined in the Bible so those people would come into the church. God's Word gives us clear guidelines for how we should dress, how we should govern our houses and finances, what our priorities should be, how valuable our children are and how we should disciple and discipline them. You name it, it is in there.
As I have learned to study the Bible, I have learned that I was not created to just live and get through life. I was made to live life with purpose - to live life intentionally. I learned my purpose in the Word.
I would like to encourage you, as Melissa encouraged me. Get in The Word of God! It is time for the Church to mature from milk to solid food! We need to GROW UP!
No comments:
Post a Comment