Before I became fully immersed in Messianic Judaism, I’ve attended quite a few Christian churches in my time and the one thing I’ve noticed about most of the lawless congregations is they’re really only concerned about two things.
Avoiding hell after death and getting blessed by the Lord while living out their lives on this planet.
And that’s really all the gentiles churches seem to care about.
Walk down the aisle, get saved and then hope to get all their desires met by the Lord such as being free from sickness and disease and getting lots of money.
Beyond that agenda, the church doesn’t really have much content to offer, which is understandable.
Because once you trash the Torah which contains God’s instructions for living, you know longer have er…instructions for living.
However, the Scriptural reality portrayed is quite different.
This is a point I mentioned way back when I first started blogging through Genesis.
The Scriptures liken our salvation to the growth process from child to grown adult.
When we’re first born again, we’re still very immature and gullible.
Metaphorically speaking, we may have left Egypt but there’s still a lot of Egypt left inside of us.
It’s gonna take time to iron out all of those bad habits and ungodly mindsets.
The Lord expects us to grow and over time give up acting like a child pulled every which way by the YETSER HARA (if you don’t know what the YETSER HARA is, I can already tell you’re a toddler in your faith).
Sure, in the beginning, we’re told to come to Him as a child but we’re not supposed to be wearing diapers for the rest our lives.
Unfortunately, a lot of folks end up never graduating from diapers to slacks and die as spiritual infants.
They never grew in their faith.
In the beginning we are cared for lovingly by the Lord and will be for the rest of our lives.
But eventually, as we grow strong, we should transition from student to teacher and from one who is always being cared for to caring for others.
When I speak of one still being a child in the faith, what specific characteristics am I talking about?
The first thing that comes to mind is one who never prefers to leave his comfort zone.
He prefers to be comfortable in this life and seeks the approval of society more than God’s will.
A spiritual infant is also very unstable in his faith.
He is pulled left and right by every sort of doctrine being peddled out there and mixes his faith with worldly or New Age teachings.
He has no foundation and this is especially true of the church since they’ve thrown the foundation of God’s Word in the trash.
Make no mistake about it.
Moving from spiritual infancy to adulthood will be one of the most challenging things you will ever experience in your life.
You will be put in uncomfortable and downright embarrassing situations.
You will be forced to make difficult decisions that may put you at odds with your family.
Remember Abraham took his wife and left behind everyone he knew when the Lord called him.
The 12 apostles also left behind their comfortable lives to follow after Yeshua.
However, if we are ever to move on and accomplish the great things Hashem has planned for us, we HAVE TO leave behind the days of our spiritual infancy and transition from spiritual milk to heavenly meat.
It ain’t gonna be easy and our digestion system may go into shock when it’s suddenly fed something it’s never before been exposed to, but it’s necessary if we’re ever gonna grab hold of the abundant life the Lord has in store for us.
I can promise you two things.
First, growing in the Lord can be scary as all hell but it will be more than worth it.
You will experience real satisfaction and a higher level of inner joy you had never before experienced.
What’s the second promise?
The second promise is…
…if you attempt to grow in the Lord minus knowing His Torah, you are doomed to fail…guaranteed.
Trying to lead a Holy life based just on the New Testament (which is NOT Holy Scripture) is as futile as it is laughable.
Alrighty, I’m done with this preachy as-all-heck little sermon.
Have a great day!
CONNECTING THIS TEACHING TO THE NEW TESTAMENT
To another he said,
“Follow me!”
but the man replied,
“Sir, first let me go away
and bury my father.”
Yeshua said,
“Let the dead bury
their own dead;
you, go and proclaim
the Kingdom of God!”
-Luke 9:59-60
Great as always. If we’re serious he’ll take us on that downward path until there’s no “I” left just “1”. One in Him and He in me. John 17