Somebody trying to rub it in? All right. The title of the message is TIME
TO GROW UP. It's time to grow up. We are
given some insight into this problem that was going on with
the Hebrews right here in these few verses. THEY WERE IMMATURE
WHEN THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN SPIRITUALLY GROWN UP, BUT THEY WERE STILL
BABES. BABES ARE ADORABLE! THEY ARE
ADORABLE, AREN'T THEY? ALL OF THEM! When they are babes, they are
adorable, but not when they are adults acting like a babe, acting
like a child. There is nothing uglier than
an adult acting like a child, is there? That's not cute, it's
a tragedy, it really is a tragedy. Many believers remain in spiritual
infancy long after they should have grown up, they should have
matured. They became, these Hebrews here,
they became complacent. They became, and I have no doubt,
entangled with the things of this life, the affairs of this
life. And they could not, some of them could not let go of that
old covenant of works, they were struggling with it. And I have
no doubt that their family members were putting a lot of pressure
on them. But their ATTENTION, like the
church of Ephesus, left their first love. Can that happen? It can happen. We are given this
in the Word of God. You know, in verse 10, Paul introduces
Melchizedek. And what a glorious subject he
has here in Melchizedek comparing him to Christ. And we will deal
with Melchizedek later on when we get to chapter 7, I believe
it is, but not right now. But he pauses here, he takes
a pause. And here's why. Because the listeners,
the ones he's writing to, had become DULL of HEARING. DULL of HEARING, that s why.
And because of this, they couldn t handle the meat of the Word. They couldn t handle SOLID TEACHING. They couldn t handle it. You
know, Paul dealt with this problem over in 1 Corinthians. Turn over
to 1 Corinthians chapter 3. in 1 Corinthians chapter 3 verse
1, And thy brethren could not speak unto you as unto spiritual,
that is, unto spiritual men and women grown up in Christ, but
as unto carnal, even as to babes in Christ. When they should have
been grown up, they had not grown up. And here's the whole problem. and this problem right here is
the reason why the Holy Spirit moved him to write to the Hebrews. He says here that you have become
dull of hearing, there in verse 11, of whom we have many things
to say concerning Melchizedek, hard to be uttered, not on his
part, Not on his part, he understood exactly what he was saying. He
understood the reference between Melchizedek and the Lord Jesus
Christ. He understood it, and it was
not hard for him to communicate, but it's hard to communicate
to somebody that's dull of hearing. They're not listening, uninterested,
uninterested. It's amazing TO THINK THAT CHRIST
DIED FOR ME, HE SUFFERED THE HELL OF GOD'S WRATH THAT I DESERVED
AND HE TOOK IT, AND I HAVE THE FORGIVENESS OF SINS, I'M JUSTIFIED
IN HIM, I HAVE ETERNAL, RIGHT NOW, THIS IS HARD TO COMPREHEND,
BUT RIGHT NOW I HAVE ETERNAL LIFE, I HAVE THE LIFE OF GOD
IN ME, AND TO BECOME UNINTERESTED Isn't that amazing? He said here, Seeing ye are dull
of hearing. Now we understand why in the
previous verses He warns them not to neglect, He warns them
to strive to enter into the rest lest they fall after the same
example of unbelief. He warns them and here's the
reason why. YOU'VE BECOME DULL OF HEARING. That's sad, that's
sad. Listen, there's a difference
between being HARD OF HEARING and DULL OF HEARING. HARD OF
HEARING is a PHYSICAL PROBLEM. I AM BECOMING HARD OF HEARING.
Dull of hearing is a spiritual problem, it s a spiritual problem
and we are being warned about it. The problem wasn t the difficulty
of the subject and him dealing with it, it was the spiritual
laziness of the hearers. They were just spiritually dull,
uninterested, lazy. Lazy listeners. That's what they
became, lazy listeners. And notice here he says, you
have become dull of hearing. Meaning at one time they were
quick to hear. They were quick to hear when
the gospel was preached. But something happened. Something
has happened. THEY HAVE FALLEN INTO A SPIRITUAL
STUPOR. LIKE THE CHURCHES OVER IN REVELATION,
THE ONES THAT THE LORD WARNS IF THEY DON'T STRAIGHTEN UP HE'S
GOING TO REMOVE THE CANDLE STICK. BECOME IMPLIES A SLOW DECLINE,
THAT'S WHAT IT IMPLIES. YOU HAVE BECOME, DOLL OF HEARING. THIS HAPPENED OVER TIME. OTHER
THINGS TOOK THEIR INTEREST. They were having a difficult
time, no doubt as I said, with their family, and they were giving
less and less attention to the gospel they had HEARD and BELIEVED
and REJOICED in, and now they don t rejoice so much. They don
t find seeing in His praises so heartfelt. Dole of hearing They've become
that way. One time they were quick to hear, but now they're
slow to hear. Other things became more important. The Greek meaning for dull is
this, for this word here. It means sluggish. It means slow. It has the meaning of lazy in
understanding. You're lazy in understanding. They didn't meditate on the Word.
They didn't take the Gospel they heard preached, just like you're
hearing right now, just like you're hearing right now, and
leave and think upon it, meditate upon it, pray about it. Lord, don't let me be dull of
hearing. Lord, open the Scriptures to my understanding. I told someone
this the other day, he was talking to me. I said, Ask the Lord to
open the Scriptures to you, don't just read them. Ask the Lord
to open the Word of God to you. If you really want to have fellowship
with God, God must open the Scriptures to you because it's through the
Scriptures that we have fellowship with God by His Spirit. We don't have fellowship apart
from the Word of God. You take what you're hearing
right now, I mean, God speaking, I read you the Word, didn't I?
God speaking. God's speaking to us. He's warning
us. He's warning us. Don't become
dull of hearing. Don't become sluggish and slow
and lazy in understanding. James says this, Be swift to
hear, slow to speak, but be swift to hear. Be ready to hear. When you come here on Thursdays
and Sundays, be ready to hear from God. God will speak to you,
He'll speak to your heart if you are ready to hear from Him. That's so, if you're ready to
hear from Him, He'll speak to you. These believers had lost their
spiritual hunger hunger and thirst. If you're
hungry and thirsty after Christ, after the truth, God will fill
you up. He said He would. They lost their appetite, listen,
they lost their appetite for the bread of life. What did the
children of Israel in the wilderness say about the manna that was
from heaven? light bread. It became light
bread to them. They got tired of it. They wanted
some meat. They got tired of it. Christ
is our meat and our drink. He's our bread. He's our sustenance. When Christ quits becoming that
to me and you, we're in trouble. We're in deep trouble. THEY LOST
THEIR APPETITE FOR THE BREAD OF LIFE! And let's be careful
that Christ does not become light bread to us like it did to the
Israelites. And here He expresses His expectation
of them. He says, YOU SHOULD HAVE GROWN
UP SPIRITUALLY. In verse 12, FOR WHEN FOR THE
TIME YOU OUGHT TO BE TEACHERS, You ought to be teachers. He
said, you've been in this long enough. This is evident that
they have been believers for a number of years. But you don't
become a teacher overnight. I mean, Paul was on the backside
of a desert for three years. He said, you should be teachers. You should be able to take the
Old Testament and preach Christ from it. You should be able to
take the Passover the tabernacle, the priesthood, you should be
able to take all of that and preach Christ from it, but they
couldn't, they was having trouble with it, they was having trouble
with it. For when for the time you ought
to be teachers, but now they should be teaching others, they
should be example to others, but instead they're in spiritual
kindergarten, they've never got out of kindergarten. That's what
he's saying. You know, it's a sad sight when
the body grows, but the mind doesn't. That's sad when the
mind doesn't grow. The heart doesn't grow. They needed to learn the basics
all over again. He says here, the first principles
of the oracles of God, you have to relearn them all over again. You know, and THIS is what he's
saying. It's like you have to learn the ABCs again every year. Just think when you were going
through school that at the beginning of the school year you had to
learn your ABCs every time. That's their situation. He said
you're having to learn the first principles of the gospel. And he'll get to that here in
a minute. THEY KNEW CHRIST TO BE ALL THEIR
SALVATION, BUT I BELIEVE NO DOUBT THEY WERE HAVING A HARD TIME
LETTING GO OF THAT OLD COVENANT AT WORKS. YOU SEE, THEY GREW UP WITH THAT
STUFF. THEY GREW UP ON THAT. AND THEN THE GOSPEL CAME ALONG,
THE TRUTH CAME ALONG, AND PAUL PREACHED, I'M GOING TO SAY
PAUL PREACHED TO THEM, WHOEVER IT WAS THAT PREACHED IT, PREACHED
THE GOSPEL TO THEM. And no doubt preached all those types and
pictures just like Philip did to that eunuch of Isaiah 53. And now they're struggling again
with it, they're struggling with it. Now I blame some of this,
now listen. A man can preach powerfully,
God can enable him to preach the gospel powerfully and there
still can be people in the congregation that have become dull of hearing
because they get so tangled up in other things. But there's
a real danger when the pastor becomes dull of hearing and his
preaching becomes dull, lifeless. And I've heard preaching that
was just lifeless. Not enough power in it to blow out a candle. And that's a real problem. Because
if you have that kind of preaching, you're sure going to have a whole
congregation of dull hearers. So you pray for me. You pray
for me that I don't become that way. Because I'm a man of like
passion, I'm just like everybody else. I'm a sinner just like
everyone else. And I need your prayers as much,
if not more than anyone, because I have no doubt Satan targets
the pastor. If he can get to him, he can
get to the rest of the congregation. And then he makes you listen
here. Here's another point, I want to make this point. I THINK THEY
MAY HAVE ENTERTAINED FALSE PREACHERS TOO MUCH, AND THAT WILL HAPPEN
WHEN YOU BECOME DULL OF HEARING. AND I THINK THEY ENTERTAIN BAD
COMPANY TOO MUCH. THAT WILL MAKE YOU DULL OF HEARING.
WHAT DOES IT SAY ABOUT BAD COMPANY? EVIL COMPANIONS DO WHAT? CORRUPT
GOOD MANNERS. THEY CORRUPT GOOD MANNERS. Now he makes a contrast here
between milk and meat. Milk and meat. Milk is for babies
for a while, but then you have to start feeding them baby food,
then solid food. I mean, you can't leave a person
on a baby on milk forever. There's got to be some solid
food there. Well, the same thing in spiritual. There are babes in Christ, there's
young men in Christ, and there's old men in Christ. Old men and
women, babes, youth. There's a spiritual PROGRESS. There's a spiritual GROWTH. I asked myself sometime ago,
I said to myself, John, do you know Christ more today than YOU
DID WHEN YOU STARTED? DO YOU LOVE HIM MORE TODAY THAN
WHEN YOU STARTED? ARE YOU MORE INTERESTED IN KNOWING
HIM TODAY THAN WHEN YOU STARTED? I ASK MYSELF THESE THINGS, I
DO. These believers had stayed in
the stage of infancy far too long, making no spiritual advancement. meat that is solid food is for
the mature those who've grown in understanding you know paul
prayed that over in ephesians that you would grow in understanding
and in knowledge of god that was paul's prayer for the church
at ephesus they would grow in understanding they would have
a clearer understanding of christ A DEEPER FELLOWSHIP WITH CHRIST!
That happens when you grow in understanding, you have a deeper
fellowship with Him. But here listen, those who are
fed meat and are able to digest it, they are able to eat it,
they are those whose faith is exercised by reason, it says,
of USE. use it's like searching the scriptures
like the Bereans they search the scriptures to see if those
things are so don't take for granted that i'm that i'm always
right search the scriptures i pray that i am right but and i believe
i am but search the scriptures take what you've heard tonight
and go home and read the word of god DON'T GO HOME AND THROW
THIS BOOK OVER ON THE COFFEE TABLE OR WHATEVER AND THEN NOT
PICK IT BACK UP UNTIL YOU COME BACK. DON'T DO THAT. YOU WILL BECOME DULL OF HEARING. We cannot, listen, we cannot
neglect the means of grace and grow in grace and in knowledge
of Christ. I don't need to talk about growing
in grace and knowledge of Christ if I don't avail myself of the
means that God's provided. This is one of the means. Reading
is one of the means. Prayer is one of the means. Fellowship
with one another is one of the means. Don't neglect those things. in verse 13 those who live only
on milk are he says here are unskilled in the word of righteousness
they are unskilled and it's interesting that he uses the here the word
of righteousness that's another that's another name for the gospel
the word of righteousness it's the gospel he's talking about
you're unskillful in the gospel UNSKILLED IN UNDERSTANDING CHRIST
AND HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS, BECAUSE THE GOSPEL IS THE GOSPEL OF HIS
RIGHTEOUSNESS. IT IS THE GOSPEL OF THE RIGHTEOUSNESS
OF GOD IN CHRIST. And then verse 14, he says here,
in verse 14, let me get back here and listen here. It belongeth to them that are
of full age, those who are grown up. They've grown up, they've
matured. They've matured through habitual
study. This is how they've matured.
They've matured through habitual study and listening to God's
Word, and by doing so, THEY CAN DISCERN GOOD AND EVIL. THEY CAN DISCERN THE GOOD MESSAGE
AND THE GOOD MESSENGER AS OPPOSED TO AN EVIL MESSAGE THAT CAN BE
SO CLOSE THAT EVEN THE ELECT OF GOD WOULD BE DECEIVED IF IT
WERE POSSIBLE. THAT'S WHY THEY WERE HAVING SO
MUCH TROUBLE. No doubt some of them were very close. But close doesn't get it, does
it? We don't preach a gospel that's close. We preach the gospel
that's of God. And all other gospels, I don't
care how close they are, all other so-called gospels, however
close they are, is not the gospel. And those who have their senses
exercised through the reading of the Word, through prayer,
and through study they can detect when the gospel of Christ is
being preached and when it's not, and when it's not. But those who are dull of hearing,
they don't catch it, they don't catch it. They'll think a man has preached
a good message just because he's close. The message is no good if it's
not the message. If it's not the gospel. I don't
care how close it is. How many times have you heard
this? I've heard this so many times. They say some good things. How many times have you heard
that? I've heard that so many times. I've heard that so many times.
They say some good things. You think Satan doesn't know
the Word of God? You think his ministers are not ministers,
they've turned them into ministers of righteousness, which is self-righteousness,
Paul said. They're angels of light, they've
turned themselves into the ministers of self-righteousness. It's not
the righteousness of Christ, but they're the moral majority. They're the ones going down the
street. They're the ones who are parading
down the street holding up signs for the morality. Well, we OUGHT to be moral! Anybody
who's got any sense of stepping out of the rain knows that. But
Satan is a MASTER of confusion! He's a MASTER at confusion! He'll
have you looking one way while he's doing his dirty work over
here in another way. and master at it. But those who
have their SENSES EXERCISED, their SPIRITUAL SENSES, well,
you know, if something stinks, you can smell it, can't you? Somebody starts preaching and
you're like, well, that don't smell right. There's something
that stinks about that message. And sometimes you can't put your
finger on it at first. It takes a little while sometimes.
Sometimes you've got to hear somebody a few times before you
There it is. There it is. But you have your
senses, your sight, your spiritual sight, your spiritual taste. You know when Christ the Bread
of Life is preached, it tastes good. And you know when something
tastes bad, it doesn't taste right. You think, well, that
tastes like it's spoiled. You know we have, you know God
has given us all these examples in nature and even in our physical
makeup that has spiritual applications. You smell, you sigh, you're hearing,
you're touch. He's given us those things. Now
those who've had their spiritual senses exercised You know when
something's not right, but if you're dull of hearing, you've
lost your interest, you're caught up in other things, somebody
can stand up here and get close and you'll never know it. And
eventually the gospel will be gone from here. It'll be gone. THROUGH HABITUAL STUDY AND LISTENING
TO GOD'S WORD AND PRAYER YOU LEARN TO DISCERN GOOD AND EVIL. THE WORD OF GOD MUST BE, LISTEN,
IT MUST BE A DAILY DIET. WE EAT FOOD DAILY, DON'T WE?
I DON'T THINK ANYBODY HERE MISSES A MEAL UNLESS YOU DO IT ON PURPOSE. YOU AND I DON'T MISS A MEAL.
Well, the Word of God should be a daily diet for us. It should
be more than our necessary food. That's what it should be. It
should be more than our necessary food. And it takes SPIRITUAL
DISCIPLINE to do this. You know, we're so full of sin
it's easy to become sluggish and slow and interested in the
things of this life because you know we're born into this world
we have we have a strong attachment to it and God has to wean us
from it that's what trials do they wean us from the attachments
to this world. Discernment is not natural it's
learned through the hearing and exercise of the truth and then
the call here he says he gives him a call Let us go on to maturity. Don't you like the way he says
this? He didn't say you all need to
go on to maturity. This is a lesson for me as a
pastor and for all pastors is to include yourself. He says,
Let us, come on. It's like he puts his arm around
them instead of being hard and in their face. He's already given
them some rebuke here. You've become dull of hearing.
But now he puts his arm around them and he says, Now, come on,
let's let's let us let us go on to maturity. That's what he's
talking about in Hebrews 6. Therefore, leaving the principles
of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection as maturity
not laying again the foundation you know if you keep laying a
foundation you can never build can you if you're laying a foundation
if a foundation is laid down today and then you tomorrow you
tear it up and lay another one then you lay another no you you
can't continually be laying a foundation if you're going to build on it
if you lay a good foundation you can start building on it
and he's going to give us six principles that we can build
on You know when he says here about LEAVING the principles
of the doctrine of Christ, he's not talking about FORGETTING
them or PUSHING them aside, he's talking about BUILDING on them.
That's what he's saying. You're going to build on them.
Here's why I'm going to give you some things to build on. These are
the foundation. These are foundational truths
and we're going to build on them. And I'm going to try to cover
them briefly. He says here, the first one here He says here,
Let us go on unto perfection, not laying again the foundation
of repentance from dead works, in a faith toward God, of the
doctrine of baptism, of laying on of hands, and of resurrection
of the dead, and of eternal judgment. And this will we do, if God permit.
Now let's look at them a little bit here. I can't go in real
depth on them, but let's see what we get. First of all, REPENTANCE
from dead works. Repentance first and foremost,
you know, usually when somebody thinks of repentance, they think
of mourning. There is such a thing as mourning
over your sins. But the key, the principal part
of repentance is a change of mind. That's what it is. It's
a change of mind. You see, the Hebrews, they thought
God was, He said, You thought I was like yourselves. You think
I'm like you. That's the way they thought.
THEY THOUGHT THAT THEIR SINS WERE PUT AWAY BY THE BLOOD OF
THE BULLS AND GOATS. THEY THOUGHT GOD, THEY WERE ACCEPTED
BECAUSE THEY WERE ABRAHAM SEED, AUTOMATIC. THE WAY THEY THOUGHT
OF GOD AND SALVATION, HE SAYS YOU REPENT, YOU CHANGE YOUR MIND.
THERE'S A COMPLETE CHANGE OF MIND AS TO HOW YOU THINK OF GOD,
SIN, CHRIST, AND YOURSELF. COMPLETE CHANGE OF MIND. Look over in Hebrews chapter
9. It's a change of mind about self-righteous efforts, about
doing things. You've got to do something, no
you don't. You bow down, you bow down and you receive the
Lord Jesus Christ. Hebrews 9, look in 13 and 14. For if the blood of bulls and
goats, and of goats, and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling
the unclean, sanctified to the purifying of the flesh, how much
more shall the blood of Christ," You see, He takes them back to
the old ceremonies, the Old Testament, and He lifts out the blood of
the bulls and goats, and if they sanctify to the purifying of
the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, the Son
of God, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without
spot to God, purge your conscience. from dead works to serve the
living God. PURGE! NO! The blood of any bull or
goat never purged anybody's conscience. The only thing that can give
me a clear conscience before God is the blood of Christ. And
if I'm dull of hearing, I don't really, really understand how
that is. If I become dull of hearing,
I lose the sense I LOSE THE SENSE OF THAT TRUTH! HIS BLOOD WAS
SHED TO PUT AWAY MY SINS! HIS BLOOD ANSWERS TO THE LAW
FOR MY SINS! THAT'S WHY THERE IS NO CONDEMNATION
IN CHRIST JESUS! THERE IS NOTHING THAT I CAN DO,
THERE IS NO EFFORT THAT I CAN DO THAT PLEASES GOD! here he calls them dead works
anything done to to add or to improve upon the christ finished
work is a dead work they really believed that what they did had
had some weight to it before god that it really did make them
accepted in god's sight and a thing i do makes me accepted in god's
sight not a thing My relationship to Christ has a lot to do with
what I do, but it doesn't make me accepted. And then he says,
Faith toward God. Where there's true repentance,
there's always true faith. Faith in Christ, who is God? But it's faith toward God. Repentance without faith in Christ
is no repentance at all. It's a false repentance. You know, if you repent, if you
truly repent, at the same time, you're going to look to Christ
for forgiveness, for your forgiveness, for your pardon, for your justification,
for everything you're asking God for, you're going to look
to Christ. You're not going to, you know,
repentance is just not asking God for forgiveness and He forgives
me. There is faith in Christ or there's
no repentance. WE DON'T UNDERSTAND THE GOSPEL
IF THAT'S SO. I've told you this story before
but I'm going to tell it again because there's always somebody
new watching. But my aunt said to me once, she called me Johnny,
she said, Johnny I repent and I've asked God to forgive me
but I can't get anywhere. And I said, I said, the Word
of God says repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. You're missing faith in Christ.
You're asking God to forgive you, but you have no grounds
on why He can forgive you. Jesus Christ is the foundation
for God's forgiveness of my sins. And then he says, here's the
doctrines of baptism in verse two. There's spiritual baptism
in Christ. We are baptized in Christ by
the Holy Spirit. And then we're baptized in water
as identification of Christ. Anybody that really believes
the gospel, if they believe on Christ, they're gonna follow
the Lord in baptism. You just mark it down. They're
gonna follow Him in baptism if they really believe. You know
why? The Lord said so. The Lord said
to. My Lord said to do that. I'm
gonna do it. He that keeps my commandment, the Lord said. shall
be my disciples." We don't pick and choose what we want to do
and not do. It's a PUBLIC CONFESSION OF IDENTIFICATION
WITH THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. And I tell you this, when God
saves a sinner, and every one of you who the Lord has saved
you, YOU WANTED TO CONFESS HIM, DIDN'T YOU? YOU WANT THE WORLD
TO KNOW I'M HIS AND HE'S MINE. When I baptized my granddaughter
several months ago, she said to me afterwards, she said, I
could do this every week. I could be baptized and identified
with Christ every week. You could, couldn't you? But
we don't need to do that just one time. Then the laying on
of hands, you know, back in the Old Testament, it symbolized
the transference of sin. The high priest would put his
hands on the head of that goat and he'd confess the sins of
Israel. And that's what it represents,
transference of something to another. Although we don't practice
this today, what it does represent is unity and approval. They did
that in the early church, but we don't do that, but we do show
approval, we do do that. Then the Resurrection of the
Dead. This was the Apostle's Message
in the Book of Acts, wasn't it? It was the Resurrection, that's
what it was about in the Book of Acts. But there's three Resurrections,
did you know that? There's three. Christ rose from
the dead. We are raised from the dead IN
Christ, and then there s the resurrection of the body. And
he says here that we were going to deal with these things. These
are foundational truths. This is what we build on. And then eternal judgment. Eternal
judgment. going to talk about our judgment
that fell on Christ in our place, the Lamb of God. They understood
what the Lamb stood for, they understood that. And Paul is
saying here that judgment fell on the Lamb of God, but then
there s another judgment That's the judgment of the wicked, the
unbelieving world. It calls it here eternal judgment
because when judgment is passed, it's forever. You see, God's
not going to judge Jesus Christ for my sins and then judge me
for them later, not for any of them, not for any of them. Christ died for every one of
my sins. I'm going to commit every one He died for. It says
He was delivered for our offenses. He didn't die for something I
didn't do. He's going to die for everything I've done, doing
and will do. But then there's an eternal judgment.
There's that lake of fire. It's very, very real. It's very,
very real. And this will we do if God permits. We're going to build on this
foundation if God permits. And what he's saying here, we
remain dependent on God for spiritual growth. Don't presume upon God's
mercy. You're dull of hearing, He might just turn you out. He
might leave you alone. He might leave you alone. Don't
presume upon it. He said if God permit our spiritual
growth, He could leave us alone or or he can enable us to listen
and grow and Lord help me to listen help me to grow help me
to know you give me a real let this interest i have in you grow
i mean let it turn into a flame let this interest i have turn
into a flame to where everything i have is dedicated to you everything
i am is dedicated to you don't you don't you want that
when as we get older you know we're getting older someone's
really getting older we gotta die it'd be it would be i think
it'd be one of the most i'm careful using the word wonderful because
his name's wonderful so i'm careful when i use that word wonderful
his name's wonderful but it would be one of the greatest blessings
that we could really come to the place to say, for me to live
is Christ, to die is gain, to die is gain. You know, I went to one of the
doctors today, you know, I told him about my eye, and going blind
last week, and he was like, he was getting on to me for not
already going to have it checked out. he was saying don't you he said
man you don't you want to live i'm like oh yeah but not here
it's it it's here's what's interesting if you really grow in christ
and in knowledge of christ if we can grow in grace and knowledge
of christ letting this go is becoming easier it really is
it's becoming easier And that's what I want for myself
and I want for every one of us, every one of you here. I want
us to be able to use this world, use the things God's given us
and not be used of it. And when it's time to let it
go, let it go. But in closing, you cannot remain a babe forever,
not in life and certainly not in your walk with the Lord Jesus
Christ. The time has come. It's time to grow up. It's time
to grow up. Let us lay aside spiritual laziness,
get in the Word of God, and press on to maturity. Paul said, Oh,
that I might know Him and the power of His resurrection, that
I might know the power of His resurrected life in me. Let's
press on to that. Let's press on. The church needs
strong DISCERNING BELIEVERS, NOT SPIRITUAL INFANTS CLINGING
TO MILK, DULL HEARERS. CHRIST SAID, TAKE MY YOKE UPON
YOU AND LEARN OF ME.