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Articles 2018-2020
The writer to the Hebrews wanted to give his readers some insight concerning the Old Testament king/priest Melchizedek, but he could not because they had become dull of hearing (Hebrews 5:11). So, for the rest of chapter 5 and all of chapter 6, he digresses from his theme and challenges them to respond to the Lord so that they can hear what He is saying and begin to grow spiritually.
For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles (Greek, PROTOS STOICHEION – first rudimentary elements) of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food.
God wants us to understand the elemental principles of His oracles, of His utterances, of how He speaks to His people. If there is anything that is clear from scripture, it is that He seeks relationship with us. And if we are going to understand this phenomenon, we must study His written word. Here we find the consistent and inerrant record of His repeated interruption of people’s lives as He spoke and commissioned His plans in and through them.
God puts before mankind the choice of learning and living according to the elementary principles of how He interacts with His people (coming into harmony with His initiatives) or of living according to how the world system works. One of these two choices is rooted in deception and bears the fruit of spiritual bondage/captivity.
See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles (Greek, STOICHEION) of the world, rather than according to Christ.
To live according to the principles of the world is to walk in harmony with its narrative. Every day, the world inundates us with its talking points – its priorities, its definition of right and wrong, what it considers to be truth. On the other hand, God has His own narrative – it is called the Gospel of the Kingdom. This good news contains Heaven’s wisdom about the real problem facing mankind, what its roots are, and about how God has not left us on our own to figure out how to fix either ourselves or our world.
In fact, He has taken it upon Himself to break into human history and specifically into individual peoples’ lives to commune with them and to show them the way forward – the way out of their sinful condition and the way into what was in His heart for them when He created them. The good news is that God has been and is also at this present time actively involved in His creation.
And He has words of life for those who do not know Him but who recognize that something is clearly wrong around them in their nation – who when they join the increasing cry for societal change begin to also notice an almost imperceptible whisper in the depths of their soul calling them to turn aside and discover Heaven’s invitation to an intimacy that they have never before been able to find.
Is our God in fact sending forth to the nations in these very days an increased summons demanding a response? Is what we are seeing across the earth in the growing intensity of dissatisfaction with the status quo a reflection of more than simply some people waking up to the flaws seen in history? Here is a thought to consider. God knows how to make people aware of their own emptiness. But some, in seeking to fill the great chasm in their hearts will wrongfully conclude that violence is the answer – physical force against anyone they perceive as standing in the way of their pursuit of progress and of their own fulfillment.
Clearly, there really is a place of fulfillment for the human soul. But it will never be found in trying to force change on people and on their attitudes toward others. (“When society changes, then I’ll be happy.”) Such an approach reveals the influence of a spirit of control. And it leads only to tyranny. On the other hand, seeking to serve others by offering God’s perspective from a genuine servant’s heart can open the door for the Lord Himself to bring needed internal and eternal change.
The root of injustice is easily identifiable. It is found in the corruption of the sinful human heart. And the greatest injustice in all of human history is the one most often unnoticed and when explained the one most often rejected. It has to do with the One we have most ignored, the One we have most severely degraded in our words and actions, the One who has the most right in the universe to be offended at our thoughts and deeds and to speak of the injustice of how His creation has treated Him. This very One has at the same time been calling us to turn from our ways, to receive His invitation into His presence, and to welcome His embracing heart of love for us. This is our amazing God.
While it is true that there has been much injustice in our societal and interracial relationships, it is also true that the greatest injustice of all has been in our expressing the hardness of our hearts toward the One who has loved us the most. And while the cry for justice arising in the earth is in some cases certainly valid, in the coming days we will hear another one – the growing desperate plea from hearts beginning to recognize their great need for mercy. O God arise in a mighty outpouring of Your Holy Spirit and invade the thoughts of multitudes who in their lost condition are crying out for one thing but at the same time revealing something else – a great emptiness in their own souls.
Justice is about getting what we deserve. But if we all got what we deserved, in the light of human corruption and of God’s holiness, there simply would be no survivors. The cry for mercy is humanity’s only hope. Can you hear the gentle whispered plea from God’s heart drawing you to see your own need for His mercy?
Again, the Church must be the place where people are learning the basic elemental truths (Greek, STOICHEION) concerning both God’s desire and then His activity of communicating with His creation. If we fall short in this process of discovery, we will be like those believers in the letter to the Hebrews who could only handle spiritual milk and not solid food. How then could they possibly have answers for their Jewish nation that was just a short season away from massive destruction by the armies of Rome? And so also, how will we be able to have clarity of thought and insight concerning Heaven’s work in our own nation in our own tumultuous times?
For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant.
It is not complicated. The nations need to hear the word of righteousness. That word is not a list of deeds to be done in order to earn God’s favor. Rather, it is a word bearing His presence – the One who is righteousness personified. The only ones who can speak such a word are those who He has both sent and then accompanied by the power of His Holy Spirit. It is then as the hearers come into harmony with Him that the fruit of righteousness can be born in them. The word that sets men free is not about their dreams, what they can attain, or what they want to achieve. Rather, it is the word bearing the power to change.
But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.
God has called us to discern good and evil. To succeed at this, we must pay attention as He articulates and defines good and evil for us through His word and His Spirit. He defines it; we discern it. Not the other way around. He has not called us to ascertain on our own what is acceptable to Him. That was the great sin in Eden. Adam decided that apart from God, he could make the determination about what was good and what was evil. And his approach brought death. For all of us. And mankind has reaped massive amounts of death ever since. Notice even today those who are only too happy to define for us according to their own changing evaluations what they deem to be acceptable/unacceptable. And the spiritual death is palpable.
The lives of those who walk according to the ways of Adam will always be marked by death – spiritual, relational, financial, emotional. But those who pay attention and listen carefully to Heaven’s new Adam, even Christ, will discover new expressions of life, simply everywhere. After all, Jesus came that we might have life and have it abundantly. The abundant life is not about having expensive cars and homes. It is about the abundant discovery of Him who is life itself everywhere He sends us. And as our spiritual senses are trained to discern Him – goodness personified, we will at the same time be quickly enabled to recognize evil – that which is not in harmony with Him.
For some people, life seems full of coincidence. But our years on this earth are not about happenstance; they are about strategy. And if we would but listen, we would gain precious insight into the heart of our God who is strategically at work among the nations according to His own eternally designed purpose.
Do you find yourself reacting to present societal upheaval? Or are you listening/watching for the Holy Spirit to bring further clarity into the apostolic vision He birthed in the hearts of the men He anointed to write the New Testament Scriptures? In these writings we will discover the basic principles accompanied by revelatory insights into His heart for communicating with us. These are not days for retreat, but for pressing further into the holy realms of intimacy with our God.
Donald Rumble – July 2020
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