Becoming Full Grown

A couple of weeks a go I attended an event for our local Southern Baptist Association and the speakers topic caused me to do a lot of thinking and research. He talked about becoming a man and what different cultures did to transition someone from being a child to being an adult. Then he said that in our culture and in our churches we don’t have manhood test or ceremony and we don’t have a good way of knowing when someone becomes an adult and he related that to being a mature christian. I thought of course we know when someone becomes an adult, but then I thought what is that way, how do we know.

He gave an example I won’t use about becoming a man but I found some even weirder than the one he used. A tribe in the amazon jungle has a rite of passage that involves a particular kind of ant known as the bullet ant. The sting of this ant is so painful that it throbs and aches for over 24 hours, it is said to be the most painful ant sting in the world. The natives have a way of putting the ants to sleep and then they weave a mitten out of grass and weave into this mitten several of these ants with their stingers pointed inward. A boy desiring to be a man must put his hand into the glove and endure these stings for 10 minutes without making a sound or showing pain. The ordeal will leave the boy temporarily paralyzed and leave him shaking for days afterwards. this must be repeated until the elders are satisfied that he is a man.

Closer to home there is an american Indian tribe whose manhood ceremony involved cutting slits in the boys chest and putting sticks through those slits so that the ends of the sticks protrude on either side from a strip of flesh in the boys chest. Cords are then put on each end of the strips and the boy is raised into the air and hung by these strips. He is left there until he passes out and then lowered. When he wakes he has the smallest digit of his left pinkie finger cut off and then runs round a ring of men who try to rip the sticks out of his chest. Once they are ripped out, if the boy has not cried out in pain he is considered a man.

In our modern world street gangs have an induction process. Several gang members surround and beat a prospect until almost unconscious threatening that if he betrays the gang or leaves the gang it will be even worse. After the beating he is in the gang. For a young girl they are often required to sleep with several members of the gang sometimes the number is determined by rolling dice before they are considered part of the gang.

These ceremonies are designed to test a prospective member for the traits most desired for life in these violent societies. Bravery and toughness. But what about our society, we don’t make our living by making war anymore.

I believe that we do have a rite of passage to be considered an adult though. It is not your driving license or turning 18. It is a test of maturity and ability to survive. When you can support yourself and your family and no longer have to depend on your parents or someone else to support or raise you then you are considered an adult. Some reach this point pretty quickly and some a little slower.

So what about moving from a babe in Christ to a mature Christian. At one point in the middle of closing his first letter to the Corinthians Paul says

1 Corinthians 3:1–2 NASB95

And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able,

This statement began Paul’s teachings against divisions in the church, later in the closing of the same letter Paul urges:

1 Corinthians 16:13 NASB95

Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong.

There are lots of passages about being a babe in Christ and even more about becoming spiritually mature. It is obvious that we are not supposed to remain in the same state we are in when we first get saved any more than we expect a baby to stay a baby forever. It is natural and expected that we would grow and learn and mature.

Now in our natural life we have a pretty good idea of what that looks like. At birth someone has to feed us and clothe us and change us and take care of all of our needs. As we grow we learn more and take on more responsibility. A toddler learns to go to the bathroom and to then later learns dress themselves.

First our food is in a bottle held by someone else, then we are taught to hold our own bottle and then to chew food fed to us. Later we learn to feed ourselves and hopefully we eventually learn to cook and prepare our own food.

In the beginning our parents provide everything for us and do everything for us, but as we grow and mature we take on more and more of that responsibility ourselves with the goal that one day we will not only be able to care for ourselves and provide for ourselves but have our own children and be able to care and provide for them as well.

We know that some people never learn how to cook and some never learn to stand on their own two feet and take care of themselves but these are usually frowned upon unless they have some sort of disability. To be an adult one needs to learn to care for and provide for themselves and their family.

It is the same in your Christian faith. The passage from childhood to adulthood has less to do with age or completion of school or some other rite of passage than it does with becoming mature and taking on responsibility.

Paul’s letter to Timothy takes into account the fact that Timothy is young and may be ministering to and pastoring those older than he is when Paul says

1 Timothy 4:12 NASB95

Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe.

That does not mean that age and experience have no value since Peter says

1 Peter 5:5 NASB95

You younger men, likewise, be subject to your elders; and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, for God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.

Rather than being a statement about what age is the best age it is meant to let us know that it is not age that makes someone mature or immature but it is their actions and their character.

1 Timothy 5:8 NASB95

But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

Obviously Christians are to care for themselves and their family but what does it mean to grow from a babe in Christ to a mature believer. One step is to physically care for yourself and your family. To become someone who doesn’t just let everyone else provide for and care for them but learns to care for and provide for themselves and their family. It is the same with spiritual maturity as well.

When you are a babe in Christ you are like an infant, someone else has to care for you and meet your spiritual needs because you don’t know how and you don’t yet have the maturity to do so. But as you grow spiritually you should begin to take on more and more responsibility for yourself with the goal of eventually being able to serve others and take responsibility for ministering to them.

The author of Hebrews interrupted his teaching about Jesus to talk about spiritual maturity, the him about whom we have much to say is Jesus

Hebrews 5:11–6:2 NASB95

Concerning him 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 have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil. Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, of instruction about washings and laying on of hands, and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment.

This passage reminds us of the words of Jesus to his disciples just before ascending into heaven

John 16:12 NASB95

“I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.

The point is there is progression to spiritual maturity just like there is progression in physical maturity. No matter how hard you try or how much others help you you will not be very successful at finding a job and providing for yourself until you first learn to dress yourself and comb your hair. In the same way the deeper things of spiritual maturity cannot be fully understood or practiced until you put into practice the earlier things and put aside childish things. Paul put it this way

1 Corinthians 13:11 NASB95

When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.

If you just do the basics, come to church and come to Sunday School and listen and then go about your life you will never become more than a babe in christ any more than a child who just shows up at the table and opens their mouth to be fed will ever grow up. You must move beyond hearing and being taught into applying and using what you have heard.

A child who just watches others feed them, dress them and comb their hair may understand the concepts but they will never gain the skills until they try to use a spoon, put on their clothes or comb their own hair. Some things require you to practice in order to master them. Once these things are mastered they are ready for more involved things.

In the same way you cannot hear enough or be taught enough about ministry and about christian service to master it. No matter how much bible you know you will never be teacher until you teach. No matter how much you have been taught about service and about loving your neighbor you will never scratch the surface until you serve, you will never love your neighbor until you act.

In Christianity there is a lot to know and a lot to understand. There is a lot to learn about God, about the church, and about ourselves. But at its heart Christianity is not a cognitive exercise, it is not about what you know but about who you are and what you do.

How do we know when a person is an adult, when they act like an adult and take on adult responsibilities. How do we know when a Christian is mature, when they put into practice what they have been taught, when they begin to pray themselves, read and study for themselves, when they no longer expect some other human to meet all their needs but learn how to go directly to God themselves to get their needs met, then they are starting to become a spiritual adult.

The next step is to take what they have learned and practiced and use it to take care of someone else, that is spiritual maturity. To leave behind the idea that it is up to someone else to meet my spiritual needs and learn to seek God for myself, and then to help others do the same.

We need a call today for the church to grow up and become an adult. That doesn’t mean that we never need help or never call on an expert. It doesn’t mean that we stop benefiting from the ministry of others but it does mean that we take responsibility for ourselves rather than allowing others to be responsible for us, and , as we grow into it we take responsibility for helping others to do the same thing.