Maturity

How many of you would say you are maturing in Christ? How do you know?

About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. 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 5:11-14

A lot of people quote this passage thinking that they need to be taught more solid food. But think about it, solid food is cannot be pre-chewed, if you are requesting that someone else (pastor, teacher, books, commentaries) give you solid food, what you are saying is simply an oxymoron. You have already missed the point of this verse.

Interestingly, there are not many passages that says that our encounter of God's Word is about figuring Him out, or figuring predestination out, or figuring whether someone can lose their faith. Apostle Paul often describes God, and Jesus' redemption of us on the cross, something that surely we should have figured out, as a mystery.

Solid food is for those who practice righteousness (What if the Parable of the Talents applied to the knowledge of God?), to discern and to recognize God's voice and kingdom better.

Ultimately we are to know the shepherd's voice. And who’s our shepherd?

I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd.

John 10:14-16  

That’s Jesus’ voice, not some other "leader" sheep (thanks Jo for coining that one). I am a sheep, Dom is a sheep, Paul is a sheep, Al and Greg are sheep. Jesus is the shepherd, and we are to know his voice.

I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

John 16:12-14 

That is such an intimate idea to me, that my connection with God is not through some other person, that beyond the great help I'm receiving from fellow brother's and sisters, I am being shepherded by Jesus, and He wants me to know His voice, and that has to mean that He will be speaking to me.

That he does not intend to set up this hierarchy like I have at work where a manager talks to a sub-manager who talks to a sub-manager who talks to me, and like most of the message is lost on the way, and I just end up with a heartless command. If he wants me to know His voice that must mean He will be chatting with me, calling to me. That I will hear Him. And that is genuinely awesome.

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:2  

A lot of people quote this passage as the reason why teaching and understanding is so important, but let us read past the first half of the passage. What do we do when we encounter things that are pleasing and perfect? We pursue them, we do them, we go after them. Maturity is when we begin to recognize God's voice, direction and His working around us everyday, and we go after it, however upside down it seems, because we truly see His will is good pleasing and perfect.

This is probably a bit of a relief to some of you who just aren't that theologically inclined, and I want to tell you maturing in Christ isn't about how much theology you know or how much doctrine you can understand, so even though you are in school does not mean you have to get an A in Christianity. For some of us who love to speculate and postulate about the in's and out's of God, and I’m one of those, this is rather a challenge. Because the measure of our being more like Christ, of our maturing in Christ is not whether we can have a spiritual explanation for all the situations we encounter, or think we will possibly enounter, or what we think other people are encounter. Our maturity whether we live our lives in mimcry of Christ's love, tangibly, every day. Loving the walk is way harder than learning about it, but that is real maturity.

Prince of Egypt

Since my car broke down over the weekend, I had Monday off waiting to have it fixed, and was reflecting on the life Moses, a life that we’ll be wrapping up in this week’s bible study, which we saw so vividly imagined in the movie Sunday night.

Not sure if any of you noticed, but I was nearly in tears when Moses wrestled with his newly realized identity (not biblically accurate I know, but quite moving none the less):

I’ve had those same sentiments. I have a graduate degree, a sports luxury sedan, a relatively secure job, a wonderful girlfriend, a great church-y life even. This was all I’ve ever wanted. While I was never a prince, I’ve lived most of my life in convenience and luxury, rarely if ever in truly desperate want. For so many years, and with embarrassing frequency even today, even while I proclaimed myself a Christian, I took this earth as my home, my blanket of security and comfort.

Yet in a single moment, from a single stanza of a lullaby that has been present in his heart since his birth, all that Moses knew came undone. All that was once alluring and prized now felt cheap and pretentious. What was once normal bondage now felt like a crying injustice. A burning, uncontainable desire welled within him to discover and pursue who he truly was. He abandoned his old identity of wealth, power and comfort and embraced a life of simplistic perspective and clear conscience. The majesty of God met him and he was sent on a mission to redeem HIs people.

Does that sound strikingly familiar?

We were born into this world of prestige and prosperity. Remember, regardless of where you were born in the developed world, you are amongst the top 5% of the wealthiest people on earth. We are indeed princes/princesses. The whole world around us, the normal around us, teaches us to attain more, consume more. But Christ saved us, the Holy Spirit entered us, a desire exploded within us to embrace the grace-filled love of Jesus, and we began to discover what the world looked like to His eyes. As 1 Peter 2:9 says, God “called you out of darkness into his marvelous light”. Jesus restored to us our identities as children of God (John 1:12). Apostle Paul says our “citizienship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20), and Jesus sends us out on the earth so that we could be part of His continual kingdom work, to “set the oppressed free” (Acts 1:8, Luke 4:16-21).

Let’s reflect on that. How many of us, like Moses in the movie, have spent time truly wrestling with the fact that we don’t belong here (1 Peter 2:11)?

Has the new identity from our salvation really manifested in us? Is it even there? Especially those of us who’ve heard this stuff all our lives (Hebrews 5:11).

Are you living the new life that God gave you? Has the old gone? Has the new come? (2 Corinthians 5:17) The life of  simply obeying Him, through the usually difficult, sometimes painful and frequently ridiculous instructions of His Kingdom, spoken so obviously through out the New Testament?

Are you seeing it all joyfully (James 1:2) through heaven’s eyes?

Ultimately, have you had the majesty of a burning bush, and the joy of the cross (Psalm 51:12), replace the allure of being an earthly prince/princess?