Read: 1
Corinthians 2:6-3:4
And I,
brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat:
for hitherto ye were not able to bear
it, neither yet now are ye able.
1 Corinthians 3:1-2
As I write,
my second son Alex is just learning how to walk. It is funny to watch him
because his legs are still stiff and awkward, and his steps are very shaky. Any
noise that he hears while he is walking is a distraction to him and usually
causes him to lose his balance and fall. But, he is not quite one year old yet,
so I don’t expect him to be running around and doing back flips. As he grows and matures, however, I expect
that he will be like his older brother Jackson and be running through the yard
in just a matter of months. I would be very concerned if, a year from now, Alex
were still toddling around and barely able to walk. I would think that
something was wrong, and I would take drastic steps to correct it.
Too often teenagers are very much like
toddlers in their spiritual lives. Most get saved at a relatively young age,
and they begin the spiritual growth process. They learn Bible stories in Sunday
school and go to every church service. However, much like physical babies are
completely dependent upon their parents for their physical needs, they are
completely dependent upon their parents’ spirituality to grow in their spiritual
lives. They continue to toddle through their spiritual lives well after the
time they should not only have been walking, but taking great steps forward on
their spiritual journeys.
We would find it odd to see a physically
capable teenager crawling into school or around his house because he lacked the
desire to teach himself how to walk. How funny would it look If his mother
carried him into school each day because he had no desire to use his own legs?
Yet, the world is filled with teenagers who spiritually have not taken their
first steps years after they have been born again. Why do we not find this odd,
as well? It is certainly not from a lack of ability that they do not have a
walk with God. It can only be because of a lack of desire to move forward
spiritually.
In our verses today, Paul was chastising
the Corinthians because they were acting as spiritual babies. He wanted to give
them what they needed, but he couldn’t because they couldn’t handle it. Likewise,
we should be ashamed when we continue to live as spiritual toddlers, unwilling
to move forward for God.
Quote
of the day: “Spiritual maturity is not reached by the passing of years, but by
obedience to the will of God.” - Oswald
Chambers
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