Growing Up - Hebrews 6:1

Growing Up

Hopewell Baptist Church

September 8, 2019

Opening Illustration:

In 1952, in an essay on writing for children, Author C.S. Lewis wrote, “Critics who treat 'adult' as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adult themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence. And in childhood and adolescence they are, in moderation, healthy symptoms. Young things ought to want to grow. But to carry on into middle life or even into early manhood this concern about being adult is a mark of really arrested development. When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”

“Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,”

Just as childhood and adolescence are the foundations of adulthood and our physical lives, so faith in God and repentance from dead works and sin are the foundations of our spiritual lives.

I. The elementary doctrine of Christ…of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,… – The gospel

a. We are saved by Jesus’ life

i. He lived a life, filled with suffering and sorrow (), yet is without sin. He was tempted as we are (), yet is without sin.

b. We are saved by Jesus’ death – God is Good, we are sinners and we deserve a punishment that we cannot bear, So Jesus bore it upon Himself that we might become the righteousness of God.

i. Jesus died as the perfect sacrifice, the unblemished Passover lamb (), to bring God’s people out of slavery to sin and into a right relationship with God by substituting Himself to take our punishment (, )

c. We are saved by Jesus’ resurrection

i. Jesus becomes our High Priest, offering prayers and intercessions, even know on our behalf at the right hand of God. ()

d. We are saved by Jesus, God the Son, the second person of the Trinity.

i.

II. Therefore let us leave…and go onto maturity…not laying again a foundation…

a. We need not lay that foundation again. Who, upon laying the foundation for a house or other building, lays that same foundation again, on top of the first one?

b. We are called to mature and grow

i. (emphasis on )

ii.

iii. (even the disciples wanted to grow in their faith, and they asked Jesus for help!)

c. Growth doesn’t happen when you just do the same thing over and over and over.

III. Application

a. Mature in truth – we must spend time in God’s Word. CH Spurgeon is attributed to have said, “Visit many books, but live in the Bible.”

i.

IV. Invitation

a. If you’re here and you’re a Christian, but you’re not sure about how to mature, I would love to talk with you about that, meet with you regularly even to help you. I’ll be up front to talk to…

b. If you’re here and you have no clue what I’m talking about, but you feel convicted about your sin…you understand that God is good and we are sinners…, I urge you to call out in the name of the Lord, for all who call on the name of the Lord shall be saved..etc….