In the earlier chapters we have studied some wonderful passages about the Saviour’s divinity and humanity and His wonderful fitness to be our merciful and faithful High-priest. Now we are going to move on to some rather difficult or unpalatable passages. It is tempting to skip these, but they are very important. We can’t live in a fantasy world, can we? The Bible certainly does not encourage us to do so; strangely enough it is very down to earth!
This book helps us to take stock of our lives to see where we are going through five warnings that challenge any complacency. The first was against indifference and neglect (2:3); the second against unbelief and disobedience (3:8-4:13). The third deals with something so dangerous that it can prevent progress in our Christian life, make us incapable of enjoying and sharing gospel truth and its blessing, in other words – make us completely useless!
The author has dealt with what he considers were elementary truths and, as he moves on to higher teaching on the heavenly priesthood of Christ, he clearly worries that many of his readers are incapable of following or appreciating such truth. What about us? How have we developed since we were saved, or in the last year? Are we progressing or are we, like many of those Hebrew Christians:
• dull of hearing – v11
• needing to be taught elementary truth again – v12
• wanting milk, not solid food, like spiritual babies – v13?
Why were they like this? Why is it so often true of us today?
Spiritual deafness
Few people become deaf overnight, it happens gradually so we don’t notice it. Increasingly people raise their voice when talking to us and we get upset because they are shouting. We don’t realise that they have asked us the same question 2 or 3 times already! This makes deafness hard to live with. Sandra often complains that I have the TV on too loud; this may be old age, but I think it is just that the adverts are so much louder than the programs! We would do anything to turn the clock back – apart from actually wearing a hearing aid – even if we already have one!
Of course deafness is not just a problem of old age. Children can be quite deaf – particularly when you want them to do something like washing up or tidying their bedrooms. Strangely they tend to make a miraculous recovery when the conversation moves on to chocolate or ice cream!
Noise is another cause of deafness. HSE spends a lot of time and effort getting machinery made quieter or persuading people to wear ear muffs when there is no other solution. People don’t like to wear ear muffs because they are uncomfortable and they don’t understand the damaging effect that noise (including from loud music) has on their hearing, because it involves such a gradual deterioration.
Teenage girls rarely hear bills and tax forms that drop through the letter box, then one day she strains to hear the postman and keeps going to check if the post has come. Finally a nauseating love letter arrives from some freckle-faced boy. Can you imagine her putting it with the pile of junk mail to read in a month or so – when she has time?
I don’t think so! She’ll take that letter and run off to her room – slamming the door behind her. Then she’ll tear it open and read it. If you have bugged her room effectively you’ll hear her say things like: "That’s sweet, did he really mean that? Oh, how wonderful." Then she’ll read it again and again until she has almost memorized the letter and you’ll get even less sense out of her than normal because she keeps thinking about it. Why? Because it’s a love letter.
What about us Christians? How is our spiritual hearing? Has exposure to noise from the World made us deaf to God’s voice? Turning off the TV is often the best solution
In Greek mythology, the Sirens lived on an island and lured mariners to their destruction on the rocks by their beautiful singing. To avoid this danger Odysseus had his sailors stuff their ears with wax. On an earlier occasion Orpheus heard the singing and immediately realized their peril. He took out his lyre and sang a song so clear and ringing that it drowned the sound of those beguiling voices.
The same options apply to Christians today. Sometimes we can’t silence the noise of the World and just have to stick our fingers in our ears and press on! Perhaps Orpheus provides a better example. If we are taken up with the beauty of the Lord’s voice then all the Sirens of this world will not cause us to be distracted from His service.
Do we take time to read God’s love letter? When we do, does it produces any passion in our heart. Do we cherish it? Do we read it over and over to grasp every nuance? If not our love has faded and our spiritual hearing is getting dull. The solution is not a hearing aid, but having our ears syringed to clear out all the sin and other gunk. But don’t forget to soften the wax with a liberal application of confession and prayer first. In severe cases radical surgery may be required, but it is surgery on the heart, not the ear that we need, as we shall see later.
In the parable of the Sower Jesus warns us: take heed how you hear – Luke 8:18 for there is none so deaf as those that don’t want to hear.
Childishness
There is nothing wrong with babies drinking milk. But God, like all good parents, wants us to grow up and become mature: that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men – Eph 4:14. Sometimes we claim to have 10, 30 or even 50 years experience, but it would be more accurate to say, as one preacher put it, that we have one year’s experience 30 times! It is as though we have never progressed past the lessons of primary school.
We all want our children to grow and develop don’t we? Do you remember reading the books about what your baby should do when he/she reached whatever age:
At 3 months, most children...
• Lift head when lying on tummy
• Smile when talked to
At 9 months, most children…
• Say "mama" and "dada"
• Crawl
At 7 years, most children can...
• Demolish anything
• Take over the world
Do you remember how proud you were when your child did something earlier than the book said they should? Even doting grandparents want the baby to grow up – eventually!
If my children, David and Hannah, were still in their prams and only drank milk something would be very wrong! I want them to grow up, though if David grows much more we shall need to raise the roof! But this is not just a matter of physical growth. I want them to grow intellectually and spiritually as well. Once I wanted them to learn to talk; now I sometimes wish they would be quiet! I am delighted when I see evidence that their understanding and reasoning processes are developing – even if a rather strange, though strangely familiar, sense of humour is sometimes evident!
The apostle John felt the same way about his converts: I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in truth 3Jo 1:4. So where do we stand? Are we maturing as Christians? Do you need to be served with the Bible and its teaching pre-digested or in a puree or do you enjoy a nice juicy spiritual steak?
I worry that we are turning into a race that doesn’t want to think. TV and the media in general seem to be dumbing down. I also fear that the same thing is happening in the evangelical church. People want to be entertained. They want short sermons that make them feel good – not sermons that make them think or go away and study further at home to gain a better understanding.
This is the fast-food mentality applied to the Bible. The meals are pre-prepared and can be reheated in 5 minutes without any thought or work. They are high in fat, salt and preservatives, but low on nutrition. To get the best food you have to be ready for some work to study the recipes, lovingly prepare the vegetables and add just the right herbs. You need to be patient, cooking can take hours, but the results make it all worth while. The same is true of Bible study. It takes time and effort.
Many of us are content to come to Church services and enjoy the thought of pardon and hope of heaven. But do we have a real hunger for the deeper truths of God’s Word? At a funeral service the minister, leant over the pulpit, gestured to the coffin, and solemnly said: "This corpse has been a member of my church for ten years." I hope we have no corpses here today!
The heart of the problem
But although this was a criticism of the Hebrew Christians’ lack of understanding it does not mean that the answer can be found in theological knowledge. The writer is not complaining that their education or mental powers were not sufficient. We can advance tremendously in our knowledge of truth without making equivalent spiritual growth and becoming more like Christ in practice. This warning has much more to do with the heart than the head, for only a perfect heart can make a perfect – better, mature – child of God. Spiritual maturity does not come with years, but by yielding to God with a heart that thirsts for Him. As Jesus promised: Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, For they shall be filled. Mt 5:6
Do we hunger for God and His righteousness above all else? Do we really grasp that it was our sin that nailed Christ to the cross? Do we understand that when we sin as Christians, it is as though we are taking the whip or hammer from the solders and beating His torn back or driving in the nails ourselves? How can we hurt the one that we claim to love above all else? How can we show such base ingratitude? Yet we do!
You don’t normally have to help babies to grow, it comes naturally. You may have noticed the subtle signs when they are hungry! They are incredibly focused until their need is satisfied. The same is true of their intellectual development. You don’t send babies to language school so they can learn to talk. It just happens. They are programmed to learn. The problems come when they are malnourished or intellectually starved. Mix their milk with water or whiskey and they will not grow up properly. Sadly that is exactly what is happening in many Churches today.
Someone put it like this:
“The startling truth is that, if you stumble over Melchizedek, it may be because you watch questionable TV programs. If you stumble over the doctrine of election, it may be because you still use some shady business practices. If you stumble over the God-centred work of Christ in the cross, it may be because you love money and spend too much and give too little. The pathway to maturity and to solid Biblical food is not first becoming an intelligent person, but becoming an obedient person. What you do with alcohol and sex and money and leisure and food and computer have more to do with your capacity for solid food than with where you go to school or what books you read.”
What about us? Do we have a real hunger for God and His pure Word? If so we shall grow; if not we shall be content to live on milk rather than solid food. This will stunt us in our spiritual growth and, like little children; we shall be taken up only with ourselves – our needs, our wants. Does that sound familiar?
Teachers
The Hebrews had been Christians long enough for them to have been helping and teaching others. Instead they still needed someone to teach them the first principles again. So too, many Christians never get beyond the stage of being fed; they never progress to feeding and helping others. They don’t really apply God’s word to their own lives and so are never strong enough to help others to grasp its truth and apply it in turn.
Of course God doesn’t want us all to be preachers, we are not all gifted in that way. But in other, less formal settings we are all expected to be teachers. One of the most important spheres is the home. God commanded the Israelites to teach His Words diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up – Deut 6:7. Crucially the previous verses say: 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. 6 And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. If we are to be effective teachers at home what we teach must come from the heart and be confirmed by our actions, or our children will instantly see through our hypocrisy. That is why this is infinitely more difficult than preaching in the pulpit.
In Titus 2:3-5 older Christian women are told to teach the young women to love their husbands, to love their children; never was there a greater need for this. And we must all: Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord Col 3:16. How different we would be if this was the focus of our conversations.
Let us go on to maturity
• Let’s study the Word of God for ourselves – don’t always expect to be spoon fed.
• In the wilderness and the garden of Gethsemane, when faced with temptation, Jesus prayed. So let’s pray for wisdom to recognise sin or coldness of heart and strength to resist.
• Let’s share the truths that we understand with others. The act of teaching will help fix them in our minds and our hearts.
• Put these truths into practice. There is a big difference in understanding the theory of heart surgery and being a good surgeon! The same can be true theologians and disciples of Christ.
May God give us a real desire to know Him. By His indwelling Holy Spirit, may He help us to live a loving, holy life, recognising sin, and doing whatever pleases Him – particularly helping and encouraging our brothers and sisters.
