About an hour ago, the captain announced that we had leveled off at 36,000 feet. Flight has always amazed me and as I sit in this Boeing 737, it is amazing how far flight has come in one hundred years. The first powered aircraft flew less than the wingspan of a Boeing 747 yet that flight completely changed our world.

When I was eighteen years old, I rededicated my life to the Lord and He did an incredible work in my life. It was during that period of time that the Lord called me to the ministry. I had never known that God was able to speak to you or that He still performed miracles. Bear in mind, I grew up in a church where the pastor would not bring the elders to pray for my dying brother when I called and told him about what I had read in James 5.

James 5:14-15

    Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: [15] And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.

I was ecstatic when I read this scripture and just believed it meant what it said. But to my dismay, the pastor said, “Well, we don’t believe that.” I was floored!

I never even remember a sermon coming out of the book of Acts and it was during this time that I read Acts and was amazed at how many miracles happened at the hands of the apostles. What a shame for any minister or Christian, for that matter, to not believe in God’s miracle working power.

When we become believers in Christ, we call that being “born again”. That doesn’t mean that we have re-entered our mother’s womb but rather, when we are born, in the flesh, our spirits (the real us) are alive to God but there comes a time (some call it the age of accountability) when we become aware of sin and our spirits die. This does not mean a cessation of existence. Death always means a separation, physical or spiritual. So at that time our spirits are separated from God because of sin. When we accept Christ and believe in Him, our spirits are born again.

At that moment we are spiritual babies. When a physical baby is born, they are so helpless and all of their needs must be tended to but as they get older, they learn to crawl, then walk and they begin to speak. As they get older there is less caretaking required for them.

Just like how modern aircraft have come so far from the original Wright Flyer that flew on the sands of Kitty Hawk in North Carolina, hopefully you have grown in your walk with the Lord.

Unfortunately, many Christians don’t grow spiritually. They may go to church every week and hear wonderful sermons but unless they learn the Word of God their spirits remain as little babies.

For three or four years, I sponsored a Christian chat room. One day a man came into the room and asked me if I knew what the basic principles of the doctrine of Christ are. I asked him if he was speaking about Hebrews 6 and he was astonished that I would know what they are. Since that time, I have asked many believers the same question and very few of them know what the basic principles are or even where they are in the Bible.

Hebrews 6:1-2

    Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, [2] Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment.

When the author of Hebrews says, “let us go on unto perfection”, he means we should grow or mature in the Lord. He also says that we should not lay the foundation again. The problem is that many Christians have never had that foundation laid or established in their lives.

When the Lord called me to the ministry, thirty-three years ago at this time, one of the things He spoke to me was, “Build foundations in the people’s lives so they may be strong and stand, and not fall.” I have taken that calling very seriously and in any of my preaching or teaching or even just talking to others about the Lord, have tried to build foundations in their lives.

Over the next few weeks, I want to go over these basic principles so that if you have not ever heard them, you can learn what they are. If you have heard them, it might not be a bad idea to revisit them to see if you are walking in the light.

Hebrews 5:12

    For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat.

Even the author of Hebrews realized there were many believers that have not grown spiritually. Many of them should have been teaching the Word and spreading the very basics that they should have learned when they were young believers. He likens this to babies who require milk. If you tried to feed a steak to newborn, it would make him sick. There is nothing wrong with the milk of the Word of God but we need to grow where we can have steak!

No matter how many times you read John 3:16 for example, it will always read the same. One problem with some believers is that they get flaky and start thinking they have some new revelation from God that no one else has and they think that is the meat of the Word.

2 Peter 1:20

    Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

Peter addresses this issue. The Word of God is for everyone, not something that is magical and spooky and only given to someone who thinks they are spiritually above everyone else.

As I was meditating on this, I asked the Lord, “What is the difference in the meat and the milk of the Word?” The Lord answered me and said, “It is the person’s level of perception.”

Have you ever been reading something in the scriptures when, all of a sudden, it drops in your spirit and becomes alive to you? Using the example I gave of John 3:16:

    For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

You may have read this fifty times and heard it a hundred more times but one day it drops in your spirit. The Greek has two good words to describe this. Logos is the “written word” but Rhema is “the God breathed, God inspired word”. You can be reading the logos and then, in a moment, that logos becomes rhema! Those moments are what will cause your spirit to mature.

I truly enjoy a glass of ice cold milk and I also love a good steak. All of our lives there will be parts of the Word that are milk and parts that have become meat. We should strive to get into the meat of the Word and grow in God.

Another thing the Lord spoke to me the day that He called me to the ministry was:

1 Tim. 4:16

    Take heed unto thyself, and unto the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee.

This is what Paul was telling young Timothy; to pay attention to himself, the way he lives and what he studies, and the doctrine he learned and in return, preached. This is so important for all of us. We should all strive to learn the Word and then turn and teach that Word so that others may grow in the Lord.