Walking amongst babes in Christ in their peril of not willing to progress!

According to the letter directed to the Jewish believers of the first century we see a similar pattern within the Church of Jesus Christ in all generations. Here in these very last days we can notice it all the more.

Men and women of faith who are refusing to go beyond the doctrine of justification and imputed righteousness. They remain very stubborn in growing above these two elementary steps of faith. Such are all who desire and can digest nothing but the doctrine of justification and imputed righteousness. In the natural in comparison the milk is a good source of nutrition and even strong men partake of milk, but do not make milk your chief, much less your only diet. This one will hurt you in the end. For every one that uses only milk is a babe. Just like those who only understand the A B C’s of Christianity who are only babes in Christ, like the babes whose food is milk only and are happy and satisfied by that alone. If a new born child is never introduced with other food they would never taste anything else, which would allow them to experience the goodness of the other necessary food. This very principal is very well applied in the Christian life and its intended purposes for our lives .Justification and the word of righteousness being imputed on a new born again believer is the beginning steps of all who come to Christ’s atoning sacrificial death and resurrection, but this should not be the end of their journey with Him. This only should bring us into a deeper understanding of this imputed righteousness and its fullness in our walk of faith. Why are we justified and what is the core meaning of our salvation? What is next in God’s addenda for us?

Some are not only joyful in their state of being just a babe , but they go on to the next step of their stagnancy  which is being complacent about their growth in faith, by this they are not willing or  wanting to grow out of their comfort zone.

 They do not completely want to understand the word of righteousness that shows them who they now are in Christ. This includes the understanding of the depth of the doctrine of justification and sanctification, including the first principles, as well as the perfection, of the doctrine of Christ: the nature of the offices and person of Christ as the true Melckizedeck, that is, the “King of righteousness” and our role in all of this as the ones who are to live with the principals of this new found identity while we are being sanctified through His grace. This means to leave our own self righteous ways for the Lord’s sanctifying work of redemption in us by acknowledging the measure and the

Stature of all of His deity, so we can allow Him to accomplish His rightousness in us. Not mixing our own works, but to be willing to die to our own human righteousness in all aspects of our lives and willingly allowing Him to work in us through His eternal High Priestly intercession before the Father. This meant even the first century Hebrew believers could not understand the doctrine of grace and His office as the High Priest in the order of Melckizedeck. Meaning they kept on adding their own works of self rightousness or the dead works of self justification before the Lord. Since they did not know who they were in Christ.

The 13^th verse of the letter of Hebrews is a very deep verse that it is easily misunderstood by many. The Hebrew believers of the first century could relate to this letter a lot better than us, since they were just freed from the works of the law. They were the ones to whom the oracles of God was given to Moses.

These were the saints who were meant to know about Melckizedeck from their Torah, about the King of Salem “King of Peace and King of righteousness”.

This is the whole depth and the meaning of our salvation or justification, that we would exchange our own righteousness with His.

Understanding of the High priestly office of Christ which meant He alone could present us spotless before God the Father.

Here is what Apostle Paul was saying in Philippians chapter 3 in regards to the righteousness that was of the law that he counted all as loss for the Excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus. For whom Paul said he had suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, that he may gain Christ, and be found in Him, not having his own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ. The righteousness which is from God by faith alone.

Apostle Paul after being saved through the dramatic conversion he had on the road to Damascus did not say I am going to stop and be comfortable here, because He saw that this initial work of justification and imputed righteousness needed to grow in him to bring Him the righteous life that is the true fruit of this faith. He in his pursuit of this new find identity saw that he has just walked the first steps unto inheriting what is promised to him in heaven and for this reason he needed to leave his own accomplishments and his own self righteous status for Christ’s. This mindset would place him in a new kind of faith, which would require him to start from ground zero. The very same thing Job had to discover in His life. Actually this also meant what Satan was doing to Job was to bring Him to the end of himself in his self righteous state. This new spiritual breakthrough in Paul’s life made him the enemy of the circumcision group who denied Christ.

The entire meaning of this statement is that in Hebrews 5:13 a man is a babe in regards to the word of righteousness when he still walks according to the flesh or in dead works trying to please God in His own good works. The author of the book of Hebrews was basically saying if you are born again and by faith in Christ are still trying to please Him by your own self efforts you have not understood, or are not willing to understand His High Priesthood for yourself. That is why in Philippians chapter 3 verses 10 through 16 we read the following amazing and most profound truth found in the New Covenant.  Here is what Paul says there “That I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already attained or am already perfected, but I press on to lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid

Hold of me.”

Here is the entire meaning of the fullness of our salvation. We must not live as babes and need to grow in the knowledge of the reason for which God has called us in Christ Jesus. We too must say I will count it all loss for the knowledge of the reason for me being a person who Jesus laid hold of me. I need to grow in finding all the fullness of the purpose of Him in laying hold of me. A babe is not interested in growing rich in the knowledge of this mystery. A babe is joyful and comfortable with the state of his infancy and that is very dangerous in the journey of faith.

Yes a babe is unskilled in the word of righteousness. A babe in Christ does not understand why he is saved and where he or she is going. They remain in the elementary teaching of their faith in Christ. A person who constantly wants to justify himself before God every time he sins is unskilled in regards to his position in Him as a blood washed saint.

Those who try to justify themselves and try to atone for their sin constantly before God they are babes and do not ever possesses peace. They are on the roller costar of being one day feeling accepted and another day condemned and doomed to Hell. This terrible cycle of the childhood ignorance takes the peace of salvation away from us and in our state of ignorance of the word of righteousness we keep on repenting from our initial state of salvation to a renewed futile self justifying work of salvation. In this we underestimate our initial work of justification by faith through the blood of Jesus Christ.

That is why the author of the letter of Hebrews says come out of this state and trust in the word of rightousness that was once spoken over you and begins to deny your own useless dead works. This is probably why Job’s continual sacrifices for his children’s sins did not keep them from perishing, since it was done in ignorance of this great eternal righteousness.

This is why seeing ourselves as God sees us would be a very important growth in our self-image. This new perception of our position in Christ would allow us to walk by faith in a higher abode in Him. Instead of self condemnation we will feel good about ourselves and therefore we will be willing to hear and accept His chastening and discipline as means to grow in the peaceable fruit of righteousness which would follow. In seeking His Kingdom and His Righteousness we eventually will arrive to a place of understanding of the reason for what Christ took hold of us.

This means we would no longer refuse His discipline and would not regard it as our rejection from Him, but as the only means of fulfilling His priestly calling on our behalf.

This growth in the knowledge of Him would give us daily strength to abide in Him knowing the purpose of our call. It would also help us escape the pain of our past sins.