Milk part 2
Strong healthy teeth and bones, right? Bones help you stand tall, and teeth help you eat. Let's look at eating today. Because once you get those strong teeth--that foundation of righteousness... that you ARE the righteousness of God in Christ--that's when you can move onto something more substantial. The verse we looked at yesterday, Hebrews 5:13, "For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe," almost seems like it has a negative slant. Look at it in the NLT, "For someone who lives on milk is still an infant and doesn't know how to do what is right." But while some of the Bible seems to be written as letters scolding people, you know that's not my heart. I see this as a starting place. Of course you can't live on milk. "But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God" (Matthew 4:4). You can't live on bread ALONE. Jesus is the bread and the wine, right? Communion? But the Bible speaks of living water. The Bible speaks of eating a lamb (Passover). You need a balanced diet, if I can say it that way, because you are what you eat. So its not a bad thing to use milk. Like I said, it goes great with cookies. Or cereal, for that matter. There's nutritional value there. But you can always go deeper. I've found that the deeper you go, the deeper you can go. Because when you start with that strong foundation, you can build something magnificent. Jesus was a carpenter, right? A builder? So don't despise small beginnings, I guess I'm trying to say. Don't feel bad if you're at the point in your life where you're focusing on the basics. Probably more often than I'd like I need to recalibrate things in my own life and "get back to basics." Because its easy to get off track. To get caught up in things. Like Jesus asked Peter when Peter was walking on the water, and started to drown because he shifted his attention to the things going on around him, "...“Faint-heart, what got into you?”" (Matthew 14:31 MSG). We let stuff get into us, instead of letting what's inside us come out. We are so concerned with what's going on around us, or what we think we need (but think we haven't got) that we lose sight of what's really important. We lose sight of what's good for us. Look at Philippians 4:8, "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." What you magnify is what manifests in your life. What you feed is what will grow. Again, you are what you eat. So if you want to be able to mature in the things of God--and I say "things" but really its just the one thing: LOVE--you need to start somewhere. You need to start with the milk that is the righteousness of God. Because there's nothing more righteous than loving people. That's the whole point of the whole thing: Loving others with the love that God loves us with. Receiving and releasing His love. So drink it in, man. Let what's inside come out by knowing and believing its in there. By filling yourself to overflowing with what you've already been filled with!