We have a great deal to say about this, and it is difficult to explain, since you have become too lazy to understand. Although by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the basic principles of God’s revelation again. You need milk, not solid food. Now everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced with the message about righteousness, because he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature—for those whose senses have been trained to distinguish between good and evil. (Hebrews 5:11-14 CSB)

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My husband, and most of the men in my family, work in environments that require steel-toed boots. This has come in handy many times for all of them, protecting their toes from hazards like rolling equipment, dropped items, punctures, and even water moccasin bites (though that one was more the upper part of the boot). Yikes! Needless to say, the boots are necessary for the safety of their toes in these environments, and I’m glad we have them. But sometimes, we can develop a set of spiritual “steel-toe” boots too. We don’t want our toes stepped on by correction or a hard teaching, so we lean away from gentle correction from God. This can make it hard for us to grow and change as believers. Today’s key passage is the sort that will make seasoned believers want to strap on their spiritual steel toes. However, God gives us hard words sometimes because He loves us too much to sugarcoat what we could change with His help.

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In our key passage today, we find a sort of interruption of thought. The author steps away from introducing the ideas he’ll explore over the next several chapters about Christ as High Priest to give a word of warning to the Jewish believers. The CSB version says the believers had become “too lazy to understand,” but some translations say “dull or sluggish of hearing.” The idea here is not that they were unintelligent or hindered in understanding the teaching in some way, but rather, they had become lax, uninterested, or even careless in their faith journeys. The words “have become” are a hinge point here—they didn’t start sluggish. They had become apathetic toward their pursuit of God over time. This is one of the great potential temptations for long-time believers. We can lose our zeal for many aspects of the Christian life, including reading the Word, over time. Most areas of our spiritual life take time and effort to develop. They’re not magically bestowed in fullness as soon as we get saved.

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The author of Hebrews describes the folks he’s writing to as spiritual babies, akin to newborns who are still drinking milk instead of maturing to eat solid food. Spiritual milk is like the basics—the ABCs of Christianity, if you will. There’s nothing wrong with spiritual milk. In 1 Peter 2:1-4, Peter calls on believers to get rid of their evil behavior, and “crave spiritual milk” so they can grow in salvation because they have tasted that the Lord is good. Spiritual milk has a time and place, and it helps our rapid early development, just like a quality formula helps a newborn in their rapid growth spurts. We aren’t meant to be on milk forever, though. We would be concerned if a grown adult still needed formula for every meal. In the same way, believers are meant to grow beyond the basics into maturity. Paul echoes the same warning as the author of Hebrews in 1 Corinthians 3:1-3. He tells the Corinthians that he wanted to give them the solid food of deeper truths, but he can’t because they’re still spiritual infants who are pursuing worldly thought patterns and behaviors. Their immaturity isn’t accidental. They’ve grown lazy, uninterested in change, and dull toward the truths of God. Because they haven’t been stretching their spiritual minds and muscles, the author knows many of them will have a hard time understanding the deeper truths he wants to teach.

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One way spiritual immaturity can show up is in a lack of discernment. Just like babies will put anything they find on the ground in their mouths, spiritual babies will ingest whatever comes by and looks good. They can’t discern what should be digested or spit out when it comes to teaching. We’ve got a thorough system at ACF for how devos like these are written and checked before publishing, but that doesn’t mean you should automatically take anything I or any other writer says, just because it appears on a church website. We should all want to know the Word of God for ourselves so we can recognize when a teaching is sound and when it misses the mark. Discernment is one important mark of spiritual maturity, and without it, we can drift further than we realize.

Where do you feel you’ve become spiritually lazy or apathetic? Is there a part of Scripture, obedience, or correction you’ve been avoiding because it feels uncomfortable? Have you been strapping on your spiritual steel-toe boots, bracing yourself against loving correction God wants to use for your growth? It’s really easy to drift away slowly over time, as we continue to discuss in our study of Hebrews. There’s no such thing as status quo Christianity. We’re always moving in some direction, either forward with Christ or sliding back into our old ways and paths. Today, take a moment to pray and ask the Lord where you may be slowly sliding away. Repent, and ask God to renew your zeal.

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If you’re struggling with time in the Word, one of my favorite methods for reading through the Bible is the Cornerstone method. Here’s a link to a PDF that explains it: https://canva.link/4hbc5y0fj4uutjo.