Hebrews 5-6
Notes
Transcript
Hebrews 5-6
Hebrews 5-6
Hebrews 5:11–14 “On this topic we have much to say and it is difficult to explain, since you have become sluggish in hearing. For though you should in fact be teachers by this time, you need someone to teach you the beginning elements of God’s utterances. You have gone back to needing milk, not solid food. For everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced in the message of righteousness, because he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature, whose perceptions are trained by practice to discern both good and evil.”
Exordium.
[Show a Curve]
Plateau Curve
Phenomenon where during the initial phases extraordinary growth happens.
At a certain point that growth starts to level out and stagnate
you might be familiar with this phenomenon, It’s called the plateau effect. And it occurs every where in almost all aspects of life.
If you’ve never noticed it, I want to give you some examples, and then I promise you’ll start seeing it all over the place.
Examples
If you’ve ever gone on a diet, it’s been proven that the first 5-10 pounds are the easiest to lose.
most people, unless you have a medical condition or extenuating circumstances, can lose 5 to 10 pounds in couple of months, just by eating healthy, cutting calories, and getting some exercise.
What happens after about the second month, is that weight loss starts to slow down
Your body is getting used to the new diet and exercise, and it’s not having as great of an effect as it did before.
If you’ve ever heard of the term “yo yo” diet. yo yo dieting is really just this curve, but when people stop seeing the results they kind of give up, they get frustrated, and they quit dieting and exercising, and lose all of their progress.
When a new restaurant opens the plateau effect happens
After the grand opening, everyone in town is curious, they want to go to the new place
Restaurants usually have really good business for the first few months of being open
there’s a line out the door, business is going great.
But after a while the new car smell wears off, business starts to drop off, and that growth starts to slow down.
Pesticides, when you spray for weeds, if you use herbicides, usually the first couple of seasons herbicides work really well
but if you keep using the same one year after year, the weeds start to become resistent to them
and the rate at which the pesticide is effective plateaus
The plateau effect is everywhere.
learning a new skill, picking up better habits, television shows, exercise, If you’ve ever tried to learn a new language...
Part of the reason the plateau effect exists is because human beings are very adaptable. We react very well to change in the short term
But what we’re not very good at is long term continual growth.
Because we are designed to want to be in that comfort zone, that sweet spot.
If it’s learning a new skill, your brain is very adaptable to handling new information, but very quickly it adapts to the point that you just don’t learn as quickly as you did when you first started
Exercise and diet. Your body gets used to the new normal, and you don’t see the fast results that you saw when you first started.
But one of the most dangerous places we can experience this plateau effect is in our spiritual lives.
New Christians usually have a zeal, a fervor for God
Because it’s new and it’s exciting, and there’s so much to learn, and so much bible to read, and spiritual disciplines to practice
When you’re a new Christian you’re dropping old habits, you’re praying more, you’re in God’s word more.
But after a while, and it happens to virtually everyone, that spiritual growth starts to stagnate.
if you’re stagnating in your diet, that’s one thing.
If you’re stagnating in a new skill you’re trying to learn, that’s not that big of a deal.
But spiritual stagnation has the potential to be extremely dangerous.
Narratio
As we open up to hebrews 5:11, the author of this book is taking a pause, a digression from what he’s talking about, to address a group of people who had fallen into a spiritual plateau.
Over the last couple of weeks we’ve mentioned this idea that Jesus is our High priest.
But in chapter 5:11, the message takes a little detour.
and he was designated by God as high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
On this topic we have much to say and it is difficult to explain, since you have become sluggish in hearing.
You’ve become “dull of hearing”
I wish I could go back and be a fly on the wall during this message.
We don’t know who the human author of Hebrews is. Some say it was Paul, Others say maybe barnabas. It’s the only book in the new testament that’s anonymous
We know it was a sermon based on the linguistic style, and some of the phrases that get used that were typical of sermons.
It seems like at some point the written version of the sermon was packaged up and distributed as a letter.
But I have to imagine there being this point where he’s saying
Jesus Christ is our high priest, and we need to follow him in obedient faith
Don’t be like the israelites who disobeyed God
Instead follow him in faith, approach the throne of grace
Because Jesus is a High priest in the order of melchizidek.
And maybe, there was a point where he’s looking at the congregation, and they’re just not with it.
Like he’s trying to make this grand point about Jesus and he looks up and there’s someone sleeping.
someone else is staring out the window
everyone’s distracted, they keep looking over at their sundial to figure out when this is going to be over.
And he’s like, look.
I really need you to get this point I’m trying to make, but you need to fix this. You’ve become sluggish in your hearing
For though you should in fact be teachers by this time, you need someone to teach you the beginning elements of God’s utterances. You have gone back to needing milk, not solid food.
Why do I come here week after week, and teach the same things again and again.
You’ve all been here long enough, you should be up here teaching.
But instead here I am yet again going over the same old things.
You’re like little babies who never weened off of milk
And we know that they had spiritual ferver at one point, because in chapter 6 verse 10 he says
For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name, in having served and continuing to serve the saints.
You started off really strong, but then you reached a plateau
You went from eating nothing, to eating milk. That was a great start
For everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced in the message of righteousness, because he is an infant.
But solid food is for the mature, whose perceptions are trained by practice to discern both good and evil.
You’ve reached a plateau.
You’ve stagnated spiritually.
It’s time to move on.
You’ve lost 5 pounds because you started eating salad and going for a jog twice a week. But that’s not going to cut it anymore.
That was your initial training, but if you never progress beyond that, then you’re never going to get to where you want to be.
In the next few verses in chapter 6 he talks about what exactly it is that they stagnated on. And I want to break these down a little bit.
Therefore we must progress beyond the elementary instructions about Christ and move on to maturity, not laying this foundation again: repentance from dead works and faith in God,
teaching about ritual washings, laying on of hands, resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.
This list he gives, depending on what translation you use can look a little different
The first one, Repentance from actions that lead to death, or your bible might say “dead works”
A lot of people are tempted to say that “dead works” is another way of saying salvation based on works as opposed to salvation based on faith.
But Nowhere in scripture are you ever told to “repent” from doing good works.
Really what this is, these “dead works” is another fancy way of saying “sin”
Works of death. Death actions. The things that we do that are sinful that lead to death.
Faith in God, Teachings about washings.....
This one, most translations are split between the word “washings” and the word “baptisms”
Baptismos is the word he uses, but the word “baptismos” literally just means “immersions” baptisms. it’s in the plural.
there’s two or three different ways you can read and understand what this means, and I’ll tell you what I think, but you need to know that it’s just my opinion, because you might be able to understand it differently.
Immersions, baptisms, “washings” might be referring to the ritual washings that jews practiced. In Mark 7, it talks about the pharisees and their practice of “washing” or literally “baptizing” their hands before they eat.
And jesus say that they are replacing the doctrine of God with the doctrines of men.
So he could be talking about teachings about the foundational teaching of not doing these ritual washings.
He could be talking about actual baptisms, and the reason it’s plural is because there’s a foundational teaching of “baptisms” and the need to distinguish from John’s baptism of repentance, and Christ’s baptism for the forgivness of sins, and the receiving of the holy spirit.
Or, it could just be “baptisms” in the plural, meaning, “this is the way you do baptisms, how you baptize people, plural.”
I tend to think it’s the last one. But again all three make sense in the context.
And then he says “laying on of hands, resurrection from the dead, eternal judgement.
The reason I think it’s the last one, or possibly the second one, is because every single one of those things in that list are things that people did when they first became a Christian.
If you read Acts, every time someone converts to christ, the way the bible describes becoming a christian,
Repent from sin, you put your faith in Christ, you get baptized, the person who does the baptizing lays hands on you,
laying on of hands is something we don’t put as much emphasis on, but if you go back and read the conversion accounts of acts, it’s there just as often as baptism is, and it’s always a part of the process, laying on of hands, and praying over that person when they come to Christ
and you receive the gift of salvation, resurrection of the dead, and you escape eternal judgement.
The thing that each one of these have in common is that they are all things associated with conversion. Becoming a new Christian.
And they’re all great things, and things that should be taught…to brand new Christians.
infant Christians. Who need milk.
But this crowd that’s being talked to in Hebrews…they’re not brand new Christians.
He’s telling them, Why are we still talking about “what must I do to be saved” when you’ve been a Christian for years now.
You did great at the initial teachings, but you’ve got to move on
And this is what we intend to do, if God permits.
Because spiritual plateaus are dangerous.
You think yo-yo dieting is bad, where you see a lot of growth, and then you plateau, and then you gain the weight back?
For it is impossible in the case of those who have once been enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift, become partakers of the Holy Spirit,
Who have seen that initial growth curve
tasted the good word of God and the miracles of the coming age,
and then have committed apostasy, to renew them again to repentance, since they are crucifying the Son of God for themselves all over again and holding him up to contempt.
(Apostacy)—or Fallen away.
This verse is a little troubling, but I want to break it down.
The reading in the greek here, because the greek language works differently than english, the words “since they are” are what’s called supplied words.
It literally reads it’s impossible to bring them to repentance, crucifying the son of God, and holding him up to contempt.
There’s no connecting word there. And so you have to add a connecting word and it can either be causal...
As in they can’t be brought to repentance BECAUSE they are crucifying the son of God
Or it can be tempral
As in, they can’t be brought into repentance SO LONG AS they are crucifying the son of God.
so I just want you to know, that that understanding of the text is there.
if you’re worried about whether or not you’ve “fallen away too far” A really good rule of thumb is that if you’re worried about it, it means you haven’t.
The fact that you’re asking the question tells me that your heart is still pointed toward god.
It’s the same thing with the verse in Matthew 12 about the blasphemy of the holy spirit.
If you’re asking the question “did I blaspheme the holy spirit,” and you’re concerned about it, it means that you didn’t
Because people who truly fall away don’t care enough to even ask the question.
The broader point here, though, is that this plateau zone, is dangerous. Because it doesn’t take much for this flat curve to turn into a downward curve.
If you stop producing fruit, you’ll have the tendency to dry up
For the ground that has soaked up the rain that frequently falls on it and yields useful vegetation for those who tend it receives a blessing from God.
But if it produces thorns and thistles, it is useless and about to be cursed; its fate is to be burned.
But in your case, dear friends, even though we speak like this, we are convinced of better things relating to salvation.
For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name, in having served and continuing to serve the saints.
God’s not going to discount all of this work at the steep part of the curve
But the plea is that
But we passionately want each of you to demonstrate the same eagerness for the fulfillment of your hope until the end,
so that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and perseverance inherit the promises.
Partitio
Everybody in their walk of faith is somewhere on this curve.
You might be clear out here. on this flat part.
You plateaued a long time ago, you’ve just been coasting along.
The message of scripture here is clear, you need to do something to jumpstart that growth process again.
Maybe you’re here on the steep part.
You need to understand that that plateau is coming. you need to be ready for it and watch when it comes.
Because it will come.
Or maybe you’re here. And this is the critical junction. This is the point in the curve where a decision needs to be made, before the stagnation happens.
This territory (flat part) is dangerous.
This territiory, where you’re just starting to see the effects of the plateau kick in, this is where you want to be making spiritual changes.
this is the point where something needs to happen to kick start that curve again.
If I may I want to share three ways in which you can turn around spiritual stagnation.
These work, by the way not just for spiritual stagnation, but this is helpful to combat the plateau effect in all aspects of life.
Confirmatio
KIDS COME UPSTAIRS AT NEXT SLIDE
Try something different
That’s the plea of Hebrews 6:1 .
let’s move on to what helped you grow at first
the message of repentance and faith, and baptism
But the thing that caused all of that growth isn’t going to sustain you
Milk is great when you’re an infant. It’s a super food for babies
but if you don’t introduce something new, you’re not going to see growth.
You have to maintain the original growth. You can’t do away with the foundation you built on, otherwise you go right back to the yo-yo
But you have to try something different
A perfect practical example straight from our passage?
For though you should in fact be teachers by this time, you need someone to teach you the beginning elements of God’s utterances. You have gone back to needing milk, not solid food.
How are you serving? We have a children’s ministry that needs teachers, we have a door that needs someone to hold and welcome people, we have songs that need to be sung,
And maybe you did that at one time…but after a while it kind of slowed down, and it wasn’t fulfilling, and it kind of just stopped being as important
That’s because you hit a plateau. And instead of continuing that growth, you plateaued out and dropped off.
Number one, try somethign differnt
Don’t get comfortable
That’s the root of it.
We like being here. We like being in that flat spot, where we’re not challenging ourselves spiritually
Because it’s hard
Spiritual growth is a lot like exercise
It’s hard. Forgiveness, forgiving other people, that makes you sore
Reading scripture more, setting aside time to pray, coming in early to serve.
It’s work. It’s like spiritual fitness.
And as we grow on this curve and we start to feel like “ok, I think I have a handle on this,” as you start to approach that critical point, there’s almost a craving to get comfortable.
I can stop growing now, and I just want to coast, I just want to be comfortable
Becoming “comfortable” can very easily turn into complacency.
And complacency can very easily turn into backsliding.
1. Try something different. 2. Don’t get comfortable
Give yourself permission to stutter
I know I drew this line like a nice straight curve.
But on a day to day basis there’s a lot more ups and downs that happen.
It looks a lot more like two steps forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step back
And the worst thing you can do, when you have that little stutter, that little stumble, is to assume that your progress isn’t working and to give up.
You might be trending up, but you have a little stutter in the curve and you’re like oh man, this isn’t working
And then you get discouraged, and you drop off.
Give yourself permission to have a bad day, knowing that tomorrow you’re going to climb back out of that hole and take two steps forward.
Look at Peter
Peter was the king of two steps forward and one step back
One moment he’s walking on water, the next he’s sinking.
One moment he’s saying “Lord I’ll do anything for you” and the next he’s trying to stop jesus from going to the cross. Cutting off ears.
One moment he’s proclaiming Jesus is the son of God, the next he’s denying that he even knows him
Where would we be if Peter would have said, you know what, I’m not cut out for this whole disciple thing. I think I’m just going to go back to my fishing boat.
He was the rock Christ built the church on.
1, Try something different, Don’t get comfortable, give yourself permission to stutter
Bonus fourth one
Don’t go it alone
Everyone experiences this
We need each other
We need the church to help us when we’re becoming stagnant in our faith, to spur each other on.
Peroratio
This curve is an important thing to know about
I hope that you undertand it, I hope that you are able to recognize it in your spiritual life
Or even in your non-spiritual life, I hope that you’re able to see it, and continue to progress.
when you hit that critical point, know that it’s time to make a change, to point yourself up again.
And pursue it with
But we passionately want each of you to demonstrate the same eagerness for the fulfillment of your hope until the end,
Pray