Hebrews 5:11-6:12

Where are you at in your Christian walk? Let's compare it to reading. As we begin our lives, letters have no meaning to us. As we become toddlers, we start to understand that letters have meaning, but we are still dependent on others to teach us. As we start elementary school, we are starting to understand letter sounds and combinations enabling us to read small, simple words. As we progress through elementary school, our word knowledge grows. We become proficient at reading and begin to move on to comprehension and spelling. In middle and high school, the words get longer, the spelling gets harder, and our vocabulary expands.

Faith in Christ follows the same pattern. When you become a Christian, you are just beginning to understand who God is and what it's all about. You know that God is good, that you are a sinner, and that Jesus died for your sins. As you move into the elementary portion of your Christianity, you learn the basics of faith:

• the importance of faith
• the foolishness of trying to be saved by good deeds
• the meaning of baptism & spiritual gifts
• the facts of resurrection and eternal life

Many people never go beyond a basic understanding of these tenants of faith. They stick with a preschool understanding of God, relying on someone else to continually feed them simple helpings of the Scripture. The author of Hebrews urges us to move beyond this preschool faith. Read your Bible, spend time in prayer, get to know Jesus. As you move deeper in your faith, life becomes easier. Your confidence grows, you gain the ability to correctly judge right from wrong & avoid falling into the traps of temptation. And you learn to discern good teaching from bad. Preschoolers are easy to lead, easy to fool. Don't be a preschooler.

The final verses 4-8 speak of superficial believers. Those who talk the talk, but never walk the walk. They have a preschool understanding of God & investigate who He is for a while, but then they turn back to their old ways. These people have tasted a little of what God has to offer & then they harden their hearts, reject the Bible, and return to the place in which they started.

So, be diligent in your faith. Dig deeper, learn more, grow in your relationship with your Heavenly Father.