Would you go ahead and join me this morning in the book of Hebrews chapter 5? We'll continue journeying through this book together. Hebrews 5, there's a medical condition that you may or may not be familiar with called gastroparesis, where basically the stomach stops working as it ought to. And in severe cases, a person's digestive system becomes extremely paralyzed. And basically, their stomach might go from one moment functioning at 100% and then drop way down to like a 10% function or something like that, and possibly even stay there. Well, if it gets that severe for a person, they're probably going to be in a lot of stomach pain, they're going to struggle to eat, and consequently, if that remains sustained, end up malnourished and start losing weight, which of course is a very scary trajectory. Because a digestive system that's functioning at a minimal level, that is not going to sustain life once it's below a certain threshold. I think we all know that for anything living, if life is going to continue, then there must be nourishment. The Bible makes clear that you and I can have a spiritual condition that's very similar to the physical condition that I just described. That we could be people who become very malnourished Many professing Christians are simply not healthy and though their digestive systems may have been functioning well at one time, maybe they were healthy at one point. You might say that they've regressed. It's almost as if things start trending the other direction. And now they're functioning at a small fraction of their capacity. They're being nourished at a small fraction of what they should be. And to be more specific, you might even say that they're checking out spiritually. They're not particularly mature, at least not at the present moment. Again, maybe they were, but not presently. Hebrews chapter five, verses 11 and following function in many ways like a massive speed bump in the book of Hebrews that should cause all of us to slow way down and see if we're sick like that. From Hebrews chapter 4 verse 14, which we considered over the last few weeks, from that point all the way on through chapter 10 verse 39 in the book of Hebrews, the writer of this book takes up the topic that Jesus is our high priest. He is the best priest, the last priest, the only priest you will ever need. And he wants to park there and just build that out. our amazing high priest, Jesus Christ. So what's happened at this point in the book, the writer has taken up this topic, and it's like he's cruising down the road with that topic, and then all of a sudden, he slams on the brakes, comes almost to a complete stop, and he makes an accusation. You are not healthy, and your digestive systems are not functioning properly anymore. And basically, he's saying to the recipients of this letter, I cannot feed you any more of this amazing meat, this amazing food, until something changes with your health. So as I said, this text should be like a speed bump in your life, causing you to slow down for a moment and just start examining your health to see if you are spiritually healthy. Is your spiritual maturity and growth regressing? Or are you stuck? Are you healthy? And how would you know? Well, a healthy Christian, I think we could say this, has a hard-working digestive system, that it's always working hard, it's constantly feeding and processing, and the body's getting nourished. While physically we may eat with our mouths and digest with our stomachs, spiritually we actually, we don't eat with our mouths, we eat with our ears. And then we digest with our minds and with our hearts. Okay, so with that in mind, let's jump into this text. It's Hebrews 5, we'll pick up in verse 11. About this, and the idea is about Jesus being our high priest after the order of Melchizedek. About this we have much to say, and it's hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food. For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment, trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. Therefore, let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. And this we will do if God permits. Before we jump into this text together, I want you to give some thought to the kind of people this text is addressed to because they're being accused in a very, very serious way. Who are they? Well, it might surprise you. If you look over at chapter six, verse 10, here's a little snapshot of the recipients of this letter. Chapter six, verse 10 says, for God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love that you have shown for his name in serving the saints as you still do. These people had a history that continued into the present of working for the Lord. They had a history of demonstrating their love for each other. They have this history of serving the saints. They're far enough into their Christian life at this point to have a track record like that. And as you look at it, you go, wow, it's relatively rich. But they are among those here that the writer of Hebrews is accusing of not being healthy. And if you flip over to chapter 10, verse 32, we'll get another snapshot into their lives. Hebrews chapter 10, I'll read verses 32 to 34. And you tell me, what do you think of when you think of these people? Hebrews 10, 32 to 34. But recall the former days when after you were enlightened, okay, so after their relationship with Jesus began, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings. sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property. since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. If you ask me, these are some fairly remarkable Christians. Top tier Christians that would probably put most of us to shame. They've suffered for their faith in Jesus. They've suffered shame, imprisonment, of the confiscation of their property, which we read that they endured that with joy because of their relationship with Jesus. These people are good people who have been through a lot, and the chinks in their armor are starting to show. It's like they're starting to break down under all the weight and all the pressure, and they're living now in a state of real spiritual danger, and they're among those here receiving this accusation, which I think clues us into one of the chief concerns of the writer of this book. He's not particularly concerned with how healthy or mature you were yesterday. or last week, last year, or even 20 years ago. In many ways, that's irrelevant at this point. He keeps drawing your attention to who you are today, and he's asking, okay, can you focus your attention right there for a moment? Today, where you sit, how healthy are you? Don't fly over this speed bump. And what this text is gonna do, it's gonna make two calls. to you, and here's the first one. Take the time today to do a health check. Look at verse 11. About this, about Jesus being our great high priest, we have much to say, and it is hard to explain since you have become dull of hearing. The writer of Hebrews has so much to say about Melchizedek, and we don't even know much about him yet, but the writer of Hebrews says there's so much he wanna tell you about him and how Jesus is a priest like that. I wanna tell you about the high priestly ministry of Jesus, but there's a problem that's keeping me from doing that. And did you catch what it is? He said, here's the problem. It's Melchizedek, the high priestly ministry of Jesus, it's hard to explain. Why? What makes it hard to explain? Is it the nature of the subject matter? Well, it's kind of, you know, it's complex, it's at a high level, and that's what's making it hard? Or is it hard to explain because of lack of skill on the part of the writer? Sometimes it can be hard to articulate ourselves and say things clearly. Is it a lack of intelligence on the part of the recipients? You know, maybe they're just really basic people who don't think in complex ways. None of those are the real issue. The writer of Hebrews tells us what the problem is. Here's the reason why he can't go into this with these people at this time. He says it's this, because you have become dull, the idea is slow or lazy of hearing. There's the accusation and there's the heart of the problem. So, would you take the time today to do a health check-in and wrestle through some health questions this morning? I'm gonna give you four of them that I think flow from this text that will be helpful for you. Four health questions, here's the first one. Have you become dull of hearing? The word dull is translated in chapter six, verse 12, as sluggish. You could have ears that are really very sluggish. You may have lots of God's truth coming into your ears, but very little of it is being digested and processed. The concern here is not primarily about how much Bible knowledge you have. You could get information in and there you go, you've got this knowledge in your head. The recipients of this letter had a ton of that. All kinds of Bible knowledge, but they weren't digesting it. Your heart must absorb it, and you must believe it, and you must apply it. That's the problem here. Some of you may have a food intolerance, like gluten or dairy. Years ago, I was traveling with a guy, I was maybe early 20s, and I didn't know this guy very well, but we were on this trip together, and we wanted to stop. I don't know, we got hungry and we started talking about food, and Wendy's Baconators came up. I think the Baconators had just come out, and we were like, ooh, you know how you start thinking about food, and something comes up, and then it's on your mind? I think I need one of those. And that's what happened as we're driving along, it's Wendy's Baconators, we need to find a Wendy's and we need to stop there and we need to find one soon. Well, as we talked, he told me, he says, well, I have celiac disease. And he's the one talking about how we need to go to Wendy's and eat Baconators. And I didn't really know what celiac disease was, but he said, well, I'm not supposed to eat stuff like that. But sometimes I get so frustrated with it, and I just cheat, and then I pay the price. Well, that doesn't sound very nice. But in that case, the issue is not that you can't consume gluten, right? We sat down at Wendy's, and he put a Baconator in his mouth. It went in. It's what your body does after you do that. For someone with celiac disease, the immune system then attacks the intestines in response to the gluten. The body's not gonna tolerate that and digest it. And that could be you. You're sitting down and you're eating. The word's coming in. God's word's coming into your ears, but that's not the issue. It's what's happening with that truth. It may not be being received. And your intolerance of God's truth, it may not be flagrant or antagonistic. It may not be really outward and, no, I don't want that. It may not be that way at all. But you're sick, and even though all this truth is coming in, you're not getting it. And you might not even see that you're sick, which is why we're being invited here to slow down and take a health check. Take the time today to do that health check and wrestle honestly with this question. Have you become dull of hearing? Maybe some diagnostic type of questions that might help you. When you read your Bible, is your heart warmed and moved? Are you having those moments when you're saying, oh, that tasted good? I really, really needed that. And I think for any of us, as we look at times when we know we were healthy in our Christian life, we were having those moments regularly with our Bible where something was happening as we were reading between us and God and His Word. Do you find yourself stopping as you read because you want to chew on it more? Maybe you've read through something and something caught your attention and you didn't quite process it, but you're thinking, there's something here that I must get. And so you slow down and you try to process it because you know you need whatever is there for you. When you hear preaching like this, are you taking it in? Or are you too hard and callous to hear and get anything out of it? It's almost like you walk in, you sit down, you go out and nothing really happened. Is your heart full of doubts as you listen or criticism or something else? Or could it be that you're not taking much time to feed at all? You know, as a church, we offer multiple opportunities throughout the week beyond just a worship service like this. Are you taking advantage of those? As an individual, are you setting aside time to read your Bible for yourself? Yes, to gather like this with us and hear God's word preached and hear God's word read, but also on your own to read it for yourself. Have you become dull of hearing? And you may sit here and you go, well, I don't know. I'm actually not sure. Maybe. I just really don't know. And I think that the next few questions will help clarify that for you, because in verse 11, here comes the accusation. You're dull of hearing. But then verses 12, 13, following, they become all the evidence for that. And so we have some more questions coming. Health question number two. Are you teaching others as you ought? Look at verse 12. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles. That's a word that refers to the words of God. You need milk, not solid food. You ought to be teachers. If you are a Christian who has been given the opportunity, the time and opportunity to learn, you then have a moral obligation to transfer truth. And you don't need some type of formal teaching position to do that. But the point here is that healthy Christians teach. Truth doesn't die with a healthy Christian, but rather it's dispensed by healthy Christians. Unfortunately, some Christians are like truth traffic jams, where all the truth stops with them and gets backed up behind them. They're like the stalled car. I remember one year, my friends and I were driving home from university, and we were going down this major multiple-lane highway. And you know how this can be, where you're cruising right along, and then all of a sudden, you're kind of maybe not even fully dialed in, because you're just going. And then all of a sudden it's like, whoa, you slam on the brakes, you're coming to a complete stop. And that's what we did. We came to a screeching halt and for the next two to three hours, we literally crept forward inch by inch by inch. You almost could have got out of the car and run laps around it. Cars were backed up for hours behind a few broken down or crashed vehicles. Maybe God's truth is coming to you, and that's where it all stops. You are a truth traffic jam. In comes the truth, and it just parks. Why might that be? If you are a Christian who is not sharing God's truth with those who don't know it at all, you're not telling others the good news about Jesus' death and burial and resurrection, Or you're a Christian who is doing very little to pass God's truth on to other Christians and help them grow and learn. The reason may be this. It may be that the truth of the gospel doesn't mean very much to you anymore. Or as verse 12 puts that idea, you need someone to teach you the basic principles of the oracles or words of God. You need milk, not solid food. The writer of Hebrews is saying, you've reverted back to infancy in some way, shape, or form. And I would argue that the form that he is saying that has taken is the gospel means almost nothing to you right now. Remember, the Hebrews were thinking about abandoning Jesus. Life has got really hard, and there's this pressure to turn back to Judaism, to their old Hebrew way of life, and leave Jesus behind. Well, Jesus is the foundation of the entire Christian life. They needed to get that sorted out and clear in their heads and hearts if they were going to move forward. At the foundational level, at the basic level, they needed to get something straight. And those facts of the gospel needed to warm their hearts again. You know, if Jesus, our high priest, if we think of him like a diamond, why would you turn that diamond and look at it and all of its intricacies and the light from every different angle and marvel when you're actually thinking about taking that diamond and throwing it into a gravel pile and then walking away? You're not sure you need the diamond at all. And that's the people in this letter. They once cherished Jesus and loved him and joyfully accepted the confiscation of their property for Jesus and now they're like, I don't know, maybe we're done with him. Maybe you become dull of hearing because the gospel has become dull in its significance. Maybe the truth is stopping, the reason it's stopping with you is because the truth doesn't amaze you or compel you anymore. It's become dull and it's become cheap. And that's what had happened with these people. And so the writer here says, you need someone to rehearse to you again. The ABCs of the gospel and its indispensable significance in your life because you've forgotten. You've become like a baby who doesn't have teeth to chew on and process and meditate and marvel on that anymore. Healthy Christians keep digesting the gospel. They keep letting it change them. They keep applying it to their lives. They don't get over how amazing and awesome it is. They hear and digest truth and then they pass it along and they help others digest it because it's so alive to them. Unhealthy Christians, in many ways, can be kind of like beavers. In the 1990s, some Idaho ranchers near Bigwood River blamed an upstream beaver pond for holding irrigation water back during drought years. Leave it to the beavers to cause the problems, right? That's what beavers do. Whatever's flowing, it stops at the beaver's house and it goes no further. Unhealthy Christians become like massive log jams with God's truth. The truth can be flowing and it just stops with them. Healthy Christians, on the other hand, you might think of them much more like bees, right? When you watch bees, they're moving. And what are they doing? Well, bees pollinate. They're pollen movers. They're transferring pollen from here to here to here. One plant to the next, which is essential for many plants to reproduce and grow. And that's what Christians do with truth. They move it. And of course, this is the heartbeat of a healthy Christian in the Great Commission. We make disciples and we take God's truth and we transfer it and we pass it on and we do that throughout the entirety of our lives. So, take the time to do this health check and wrestle honestly with this question. Are you teaching others as you ought? And maybe to think of a few realms, you could think of the home, the church, the world. Let's start with the home though. Are you teaching the people in your home? For those of you who are parents and grandparents, are you diligently transferring truth to your kids? You can't control their reception of that truth per se. Or are you faithfully dispensing it to them? Are you transferring to think outside the home? And I think for those of you sitting here, maybe your family's young and you have kids, so much of your time is focused on the home as it should be. But I think we need to think outside of the home as well. Are you transferring truth to people in your church? I'm the one sitting right here in this room. Do you have any investment, discipleship, relationships like that where you're saying, hey, I'm a Christian who maybe, maybe I'm not as far along in my Christian walk as I wanna be, I'm still growing, but here's a Christian who's maybe younger than I am, and I'm trying to help them. I'm trying to help them understand God's truth, and I'm trying to walk through their Christian life with them, with our Bibles in hand, and help them grow. What about the world? Are you taking God's truth to the world, the gospel, family, friends, and coworkers? We talk about pregnant mothers eating for two, and I think that's what disciple makers do. They eat for two. In other words, they read their Bibles, and they listen to sermons, and they're never just eating for themselves. And consequently, they listen to sermons so much differently. A disciple maker does not listen simply for himself. He certainly does that, but he's also listening for others. Before we move on to the next question, I just wanna pause for a moment because I think we hear about needing milk, or needing milk instead of solid food. And we tend to think that that must be light teaching versus heavy, robust teaching. Or we think that that must be complex truth versus simple truth. Which often leads people to the mistaken assumption that spiritual maturity is equated with what you know and what topics you enjoy discussing. But here's the thing, you can love discussing the intricacies of complex doctrine and you can have crazy amounts of Bible knowledge and be terribly immature and ungodly. The issue this text is driving at is not first and foremost about knowledge and information. These people know truth. They knew the ABCs of the gospel, that wasn't the issue. And the author actually, what we'll find here, he's not gonna go back and review their ABCs with them. And in fact, the first five chapters of the book, he has not been speaking to them at a low milk kind of level, nor will he do that in the chapters that come. He spent the first five chapters giving them solid food, and that's what he's gonna continue to do. The real issue is that a person could be like a baby, again, without the teeth, without the stomach, without the appetite for digesting and being transformed by the truths of Jesus. The gospel has grown cold in their hearts. Let's move on to a third health question. Are you unacquainted with and unskilled with your Bible? Now look at verse 13. For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he is a child. The criticism here is that these people were unskilled in the word of righteousness or the word about righteousness, which could be a reference to the Bible as a whole or maybe to the gospel specifically. This book shows us how to be right with God and how to live rightly. But perhaps you're a Christian who has become unacquainted with and unskilled with your Bible. Maybe you were before, but you're not now. Maybe you and your Bible used to be very close acquaintances, but now your Bible's like this long lost friend. You've regressed back to infancy and you have become super rusty. And this is, again, not a question first and foremost about how much Bible knowledge you have in your head. but the degree to which you've digested, applied, and employed it in your life. The degree to which it's really making a difference. I started taking euphonium lessons in elementary school, I think maybe grade five. and continued through the end of high school. A lot of people don't know what a euphonium is, but it's basically like a small tuba. You know, tubas are big, so why not put it in smaller form? But it's got like the range of a trombone. And through all those years, starting in elementary school, all the way through high school, I played my euphonium and practiced it multiple times a week, except for summer break came and I was like, eh, okay, not doing that. But all throughout the school year, I was playing it. Well, high school was a while ago now, and I've hardly touched that instrument since, maybe just a few times, literally just a few times. You could say I'm a little bit rusty. If I pick that thing up now, it's almost like a foreign object. And it doesn't really matter what I could do with it yesterday or 20 years ago. Today, I'm very unacquainted with it. and unskilled with it. But the head knowledge is still there. I actually still know how to play it. I just can't, if you know what I mean. It's a proficiency issue. The proficiency is gone. And maybe that's where you're at with your Bible or the direction that you're trending. And if so, that says something about your spiritual health that the writer of Hebrews is trying to draw your attention to here. Take the time to do this health check. Are you unacquainted with and unskilled with your Bible? Have you become very rusty with it? Do you regularly take the time to read it or would that be something rare? And does your heart get watered kind of in little sprinkles and droplets or does it experience heavy rains of the word of God? But those questions don't go far enough. Is the word of God an instrument or tool that you're wielding and actually using in your life? Is it getting applied to your life basically like all the time? And one more health question. Have you lost your moral bearings? Look at verse 14. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. Healthy Christians are able to distinguish good from evil. They always have their moral bearings about them, and that really tends to show up. You see it by a stability that's in their lives, and you see it by stability in their behavior. And this ability to always have your moral bearings comes really through training your powers of discernment. And that's done through regular practice. You become accustomed to constantly bringing the word of God to bear upon whatever situation you're in, and then taking your cues from the Bible. Professional athletes have practiced and practiced and practiced. They didn't get to the level that they're at without lots of time in the gym, nor do they stay at that level without continuing to practice. And that's what Christians do with the word of God. They spend a lot of time with it, and they learn how to bring it to bear upon their thinking and actions. Okay, whatever's going on, whatever I'm thinking through right now, okay, what does the Bible say, and how does that work with all this? And they learn how to make their decisions based upon that. And consequently, we might say their compass is always turned on, and it's always registering, it's always pointing north. They maintain their moral bearings. And when you become hard of hearing, when the things here in verses 11 to 14 start to show up in your life, you start to lose that. And you start making poor and sinful judgments between right and wrong. I mean, we're all battling our sin all the time, and any Christian is having to constantly confess sin and repent and return to the Lord. But this idea that you start making sinful judgments consistently between right and wrong, and you start saying things and thinking things and believing things and doing things that when you were healthy, you simply would not have done that or been okay with that. Often before I leave our home and I'm going somewhere, I'll get my phone out and punch an address into Google Maps, into my GPS on my phone before I drive off. And I found that something happens somewhat consistently. When I turn left out of our driveway, all of a sudden it's like my GPS goes totally haywire and it will say signal lost. And you know, you're watching the little blue ball or whatever bounce over here and bounce over there in this direction. It has no idea where I'm at. often saying I'm somewhere that I'm not. And you're asking, okay, well, where's north? Well, nobody knows. And where am I? Who knows? I mean, my house is right back there, but my GPS has no idea where I'm at. Which way should I go? Who knows? It's trying to figure that out. It's calculating. Many Christians have lost their bearings like that because their inner being has stopped perpetually calibrating itself back to the word of God. And you need to take the time to do a health check today and wrestle honestly with that question. Have you, have you lost your moral bearings? Are you starting to see a pattern of a lapse of moral judgment? Maybe you've done some really stupid or foolish things recently. Or have you made peace with certain sins? Your tolerance level for them has gone way up and you're comfortable with that. Maybe it's the consumption of inappropriate content or just tolerating slander and gossip. Sure, I'll listen to that and I'll listen to some more and that doesn't bother you. Maybe it's the neglect of spiritual priorities. I mean, you could skip church and you could neglect your Bible and you could do that and do that and you feel fine. Maybe another really helpful litmus test would be this. Have you had a sustained bad attitude about something? and you've just parked there with that bad attitude. Maybe it's some kind of unrepentant disposition or harboring sin in your heart. Those who have their spiritual bearings about them never park with a bad attitude because the Bible won't let them do that. Do you feel lost in your Christian life right now? Big picture, a healthy Christian has this hard working digestive system that's always taking God's word in and digesting it and it's getting into them. Do this health check. Don't go flying over this speed bump. Slow down. And if you've gone through these four questions and your answers to them were not good, well then 99% chance you have become dull of hearing. And that's what the writer of Hebrews is trying to help these people see. Because apparently they don't see it. What did this health check reveal for you? And maybe the results came back really positive. Actually, I think I'm in a good season right now. I'm growing, I'm feeding, it's good. Okay, well if that's the case, you want that to continue, which isn't gonna happen by accident. And if the results came back negative, then something obviously needs to change because you're not gonna float closer to Jesus and drift across the finish line. The writer of Hebrews does not believe in neutral. He presents it like you're going forward or you should be horrified. In fact, you should be warned over and over and over again. He doesn't have a category for perpetual spiritual infancy or neutral. If you imagine yourself rowing a canoe upstream, if you stop rowing, you're going the other direction. If you're on a bike and you're riding and you stop pedaling, you're gonna fall off and crash. And those are very uncomfortable metaphors, but the writer of Hebrews says things like this, for we have come to share in Christ. Basically, we are Christians if, not because, but if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end. True Christians keep clinging to Jesus. That's what they do. A genuine Christian will not stay in neutral or stay in infancy or regress back to immaturity and just stay there. Christians move and God won't let his true children just stay put and starve. Regardless of what this health check revealed for you, whether it's positive or negative, this second call is relevant to you. Call number two, we'll just hit it quickly here. Decide today that it's time to move forward. Look at verses one to two of chapter six. Therefore, let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands and the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. If you're unhealthy right now, you need to agree with the word of God and the accusation that it's making against you here, that you've become dull of hearing, you're not spiritually healthy, your digestive system is not working properly, and your life is in real spiritual danger. You need to agree that there's a problem and then you need to make a decision. It's time to move forward. At this point, you might be listening for some action steps. You know, if you go to the doctor, the doctor says, OK, you're overweight. You go, oh, thanks for telling me something I didn't know. But he tells you this, and now you're waiting for the action steps. And you're waiting for him to give you the list. And maybe it's something like this. Exercise every day. Count your calories. Make sure you get a good night's sleep. And he's basically looking at you saying, I can't fix this for you. You go do it. The ball's in your court. But with this particular issue, basically, this text takes us to the doctor and says, hey, there's a problem, but it's a huge mistake to assume that we can fix that problem ourselves. If you're looking for a checklist of you need to go do this, this, this, and this, you're not thinking right. you need to shift your thinking because the call in verse 1 is this, let us go on to maturity. The word translated go there is typically translated as to bear or carry. So let us carry on to maturity. But here's the big catch, the verb is actually passive, which is why the NIV transits this way. Let us be taken forward to maturity. Let us be taken there? Who takes us there? Well, the Lord Jesus Christ takes us there, our great high priest. And that's why the writer of Hebrews is so down. You will never go forward to maturity until you realize you need this priest. He must take you there. And so with that, at the forefront of our minds, we must press on toward maturity, understanding that we need God's help if that's ever going to happen. We can't just do this for ourselves. Yes, you need to put effort in, but you need God to do something for you. And according there to verse one, pressing on towards maturity means leaving, not abandoning, but building upon the elementary message about the Messiah. And we're given a sampling of what that elementary message includes in verses one and two. Things like this, repentance from dead works and faith towards God. Okay, well repentance and faith, that's the beginning of the gospel. Instruction about washings and the laying on of hands. Early in their faith, these Jewish Christians would have learned how all these Jewish washings and rituals pointed forward to the great washing of sins and cleansing that comes through Jesus Christ. And the laying on of hands, all these symbols in the Old Testament where hands were laid on animals and people were appointed to roles like priests, all of that points forward to God appointing His own Son to be our Savior. And the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment and the end, there's gonna be a great resurrection and there will be an eternal judgment. And the writer of Hebrews is saying that's all foundational. And you need it, but you need to build upon it. As a Christian, you must get Jesus and the gospel settled in your mind and heart and move forward. And rely on God to help you. If you look at verse three, it says, and this we will do if God permits. Again, this reminder that you need God's help, and God's going to give it to you. In fact, his help will come to you right here in this book as you look at Jesus, your great high priest. Next week we'll see that he really slows down. If you won't hear this passage, then crazy warnings come your way. But after that, he says, let's go back to Jesus. You wanna move forward? Well, let's talk about Jesus. Let's talk about your great high priest. God will help you move forward by feeding your soul with Jesus. And as soon as the gospel starts to burn in your heart again, and those fires get lit, and you're looking at Jesus, you will grow and you will move. A healthy Christian has a hardworking digestive system. Wherever you've been and however unhealthy you've become, you're being invited today to make the decision that today it's the time to move forward and you're gonna do that. It's time to look at Jesus and to marvel at him and to rejoice in him and to celebrate the gospel again and recognize that your only hope is found in him. And so if you see a problem here today in your health, what should you do? It's not, well, I need to go do this, this, this, and this. No, I think there's one simple thing that you should start with, and that is prayer. Start there. This is a simple step that you can take right here and right now where essentially you pray to God and you say, God, okay, I'm getting a glimpse of my health that I hadn't really seen, but I'm seeing it now. And it's not good, it's not okay. I'm not healthy, and I wanna ask you to forgive me. And I don't wanna stay like this. I can't stay like this. You didn't design me to stay like this. I'm unhealthy, and I'm tired of it, and I do not wanna be here anymore. God, please forgive me. And the flip side of the prayer, God, will you help me? I need your help. And what I need you to do for me is I need you to show me Jesus again. Cause my heart to beat for the gospel again. It's become dull to me. It doesn't mean much to me. Will you show me my great savior? And on this foundational level, I would just ask you, this is the foundation that's being spoken of, it's Jesus Christ. Have you ever began a relationship with him? And Jesus came from heaven to earth to die for your sins, the Son of God, to die for your sins and pay for them in full. And God's salvation's a free gift where all your sins can be forgiven and washed away through Jesus. But what Jesus calls you to is to repent, to acknowledge your sin, to confess it and say, God, I am broken and I am sinful and I need a savior. Jesus, will you save me through your death and resurrection? Will you wash me? Will you make me clean? I'm yours. And if you haven't even begun the Christian life at that foundation level there, then that can happen today if you just cry out to God and say, Jesus, will you save me, a sinner? One more thought as we wrap up our time this morning. I think a text like this, if we step back and we just see it as a model, is a reminder that we need to be people who help others. That's what the writer of Hebrews is doing with these people he's writing to. He's a helpful model for us on how we help others who are struggling. You need to do for others what the writer of Hebrews did for them, and you need others to do that for you. What's that? Well, you need to have loving and frank conversations with people who are unhealthy. When you see fellow Christians who are unhealthy and they become dull of hearing, you need to talk to them. And that, of course, needs to flow from a heart that genuinely cares. The reason I would go talk to my brother or sister is because I love them. And they're not doing well right now, they're not feeding, they're not being nourished, and they are going to starve. and God's put you in their life to go lovingly talk to them about that. And of course, that needs to be thought through, and it needs to come from a heart that's willing to help. I love what the writer of Hebrews says here in chapter six, verse one. He's not saying, he makes the accusation, but then in verse one, let us move forward. Let's do this, and let's do it together. I like what one person has said, the church must be a dangerous place, a vulnerability, where love demands more than the guarding of personal ego, and truth looms larger than peace. Yes, pain plays a part in this indispensable activity of authenticity, yet this pain can be remarkably productive. What if we're a people who just always want to keep the peace, and when we see problems in each other's hearts, we'd rather save face than love our brother and sister enough to have those conversations? That is dangerous and that is scary. But what if on the flip side, we're loving enough to say, hey, are you okay? I'm concerned about you. Can we talk? We want to make sure we all have hardworking digestive systems. For anything living, if life is to continue, there must be nourishment. Will you feed on Jesus Christ?