Hebrews 5:11 of whom we have much to say, and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. 12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. 13 For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. 14 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.
I. Intro – Got Milk campaign
a. Campaign started in 1993 and ran nationally from 1995-2014 Milk Life has replaced it now, but “Got Milk?” is still used in California.(use slides)
b. Basic food – all nourishment needed for infants, but they can only grow to a certain point before solid food is needed
c. Ability to go longer on the sustenance gained
d. Ability to grow and absorb more nutrients
II. Check your hearing. Dull of Hearing (pf. Act. Indic – “have become” slothful of hearing)
a. The Hebrew audience had not demonstrated that they are not ready for the in depth teaching of Jesus as Pastor John introduced last week as our “Awesome, Great High Priest.”
b. “have become” – present perfect tense=action started in the past with ongoing influence. At some point they started to become lazy in the Word.
c. He called them “dull of hearing” or literally “you have become sluggish/lazy (or hard) of hearing”
d. For this reason, the end of chapter 5 and through chapter 6 he is going to confront them with the expectation of Spiritual growth (to grow in Christ).
Ellingsworth Commentary:
p. 297 5:11-14 expresses the reasons why the author does not immediately go on to discuss Christ’s Melchizedekian high priesthood in greater detail. The teacing is difficult to explain, and the receptors are in danger of proving too immature and insensitive to accept it. Yet elementary, traditional teaching is not enough; the difficult teaching must also be given and, by implication, accepted.
III. Expect to move from milk to solid food. Expectation of Growth (v. 12) – By this time you ought to be teachers.
a. They have been living on the basics of Christianity
b. They enjoy “milk” –
i. ILLUS: infant moving to cereal, strained peas – cereals-help fill to sleep through the night at 6 mos, the need to grow into solid foods peas-I hate, baby food not even appetizing but full of nutrients, good thing baby taste buds are not fully developed. Eventually, they grow into fresh fruits and vegetables and meats, even pizza.
c. What they focused in the “first principles of the oracles of God” NIV “elementary truths of the word of God” These are explained in chapter 6. Take your Bibles and consider the description:
i. Repentance from dead works
ii. Faith toward God
iii. Baptism (literally washings-not the word for baptism)
iv. Laying on of hands
v. Resurrection
vi. Eternal judgment
d. These are the essential elements of the Gospel of Jesus – the things all believers hold to. I am going to do something the writer of Hebrews does not do. The writer of Hebrews does not go into the elementary principles since he moves quickly to challenge the recipients to Growth. But lets consider the gospel in terms of these six “elementary principles”.
e. EXPLAIN THE GOSPEL
f. These are “milk” – the basics. One is saved by the basics, but we need to grow beyond that. For that reason, we study the Bible in depth. We have Connect groups during the week and a class on Sunday morning where we can look at the detailed teaching of God’s word. We also preach through books of the Bible. In some ways this is easier in planning the sermons, but more importantly, it means we cannot skip the hard teachings. We need to provide solid food - or if you will, meat..
IV. Growth and skill comes from solid food. (v. 13-14)
a. Word of Righteousness - If we cannot explain it, the writer of Hebrews calls us “unskilled” in the word of righteousness.
i. Heb 4:12 – Word a double edged sword
ii. Eph 6:17 and take…the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God
iii. 2 Tim 2:15 Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.
iv. Word of righteousness=oracles of God=God’s communication to us. It has come in 3 ways:
1. Prophets
2. Written Word
3. Living Word = Jesus
v. Connect with Heb 5:13-14
1. Milk alone – unsckilled in the word of righteousness
2. Meat – requires constant practice
You can’t be lazy to take solid food
V. A diet that includes solid food (Growth) results in teaching and discernment.
Evidence for having a diet of solid food (lit “solid food, not “meat”)
A. Teaching (v. 12) = You ought to be teachers
Not trying to say they need to be a group of preachers. As we grow in Christ, we are all called to teach in some way.
1. Taught by God: 1 Thes 4:9
1 Thes 4:9 Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another 1 Thessalonians 4:9
2. Parents over Children
Deut. 6:6-7 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teachthem diligently to your children and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise.
3. Faithful Men: 2 Tim 2:2
2 Tim 2:2 and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. 2 Timothy 2:2
4. Women Titus 2:3-4
3 Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, 4 and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled. 6 Likewise, urge the younger men to be self-controlled. Titus 2:3-6
Individuals need to be
b. Rightly handling “the word of Righteousness” – we spoke about earlier
c. Able to discern good and evil
i. What does this discernment mean? It means what it says. We love to be able to simply follow rules. IT is much easier to follow rules. The speed limit is a rule. It is black and white. If you exceed a specific speed, then you are in violation.
ii. Jesus wants to to make a right judgment based upon a knowledge of God and His will
iii. Jesus example – stop judging on appearances and make a right judgment –
John 7:19 Has not Moses given you the law? Yet not one of you keeps the law. Why are you trying to kill me?"
20 "You are demon-possessed," the crowd answered. "Who is trying to kill you?"
21 Jesus said to them, "I did one miracle, and you are all astonished.
22 Yet, because Moses gave you circumcision (though actually it did not come from Moses, but from the patriarchs), you circumcise a child on the Sabbath.
23 Now if a child can be circumcised on the Sabbath so that the law of Moses may not be broken, why are you angry with me for healing the whole man on the Sabbath?
24 Stop judging by mere appearances, and make a right judgment."
On another occasion, Jesus pointed out the need for Spiritual discernment as it relates to the OT law.
Mark 2:23-28 23 One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grainfields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain.
24 The Pharisees said to him, "Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?"
25 He answered, "Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need? 26 In the days of Abiathar the high priest, he entered the house of God and ate the consecrated bread, which is lawful only for priests to eat. And he also gave some to his companions." 27 Then he said to them, "The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. 28 So the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
Only by growing in intimate knowledge of Jesus and knowledge of the Word of Righteousness can we expect to have spiritual discernment to address the tough questions being raised in our culture.
Our culture, like others that have gone before is confused over issues of right and wrong:
• Gender confusion
• Are the rights of the mother or unborn child more precious
• How do we handle immigration
• Do parents know what is best for their children or the “trained professionals?
Imagine, for example, if we could change the abortion issue by reducing the demand for the services because people know Jesus and individually can discern right from wrong in this and other controversial issues!
VI. Conculsion
a. WWJD
In the mid 90’s the slogan “WWJD was popular. And is a good way of thinking for believers, but I think that some who do not know the Scriptures might be surprised by some of the things Jesus would do.
Now it is true that Jesus is loving and showed compassion to the needy, but he is also one who Zealously stood for the Father and who would strongly confront those who should know better.
This is the same Jesus who overturned the tables in the sanctuary before his arrest and crucifixion
This same Jesus lovingly spoke to the woman at the well and later called the Pharisees “a brood of vipers” or compared them to a tomb “full of dead men’s bones”.
Jesus did these things in a way that was without sin. How can we discern what is right and wrong when every situation is not specifically covered in Scripture? It is by regularly feeding on both Milk and Solid Food. We must dive into deeper things of God’s word.
The writer of Hebrews is going to go into deep things concerning Jesus as a high priest. It is hard stuff, but it helps us know Jesus more. The more we know Jesus, the more we can discern right and wrong, Good and evil.
So, if you know Jesus, you can say “yes” to the question “Got Milk?”
If you have been a Christian for a while and have gotten a bit lazy over diving deeper; well, change course and get meat. When you dive deeper, it takes work, but you will get to know Jesus more, teach others and be able to discern good and evil in a world where the line can be confusing.
