That's true in the Old Testament. How much more true is it then of the wonders that God has done in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ who was crucified for our sins and raised from the dead that we might know the hope of eternal life? Like, these are the things we need to teach our physical children and our spiritual children and the children of the congregation. We're to teach them well the psalmist, not slackly or kind of half-baked, but well. Other people have other good things, but what's distinct about the people of God is he's given to us his word. And so we're to heed it, and we're to pass it on, and we're to treasure it. What a gift we've been given in God's word. So I forgot to do the memory verse, so if you look to your bulletins there, And the memory verse is 1 Kings 8, 23 at the bottom of the verse of the week. Let's just say it together then. Oh Lord, God of Israel, there is no God like you in heaven above or on earth beneath, keeping covenant and showing steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart. First Kings 8.23. Amen. So our text this morning is Hebrews chapter 5.11 through 14. It's the first of a series of Warnings in chapter five and six of page 1,190 of the Bible's in your seat. So let's hear the word of God, Hebrews chapter five, 11 through 14, shorter reading this morning, where he says, about this, we have much to say and it is 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, or the little words 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. Amen. Those teachers who are observant can note when students look up with glazed eyes and looks You're probably quite glad my eyesight's not wonderful. Maybe I'd be discouraged by some glazed looks. Or maybe I'd be encouraged by the bright eyes as I can see that you've had that eureka moment, that aha, I've got it. It may be that the topic that the teacher is going through is displeasing or, as sometimes happens of course, maybe too often the teaching method is bland or laboured or heavy going and the congregation is suffering from a bit of spiritual indigestion. Or the practical relevance of the message is just lost. A good teacher will pause and stop. I remember Stuart Olliot one time, my daughter Rebecca was attending a French Reformed Baptist camp and the room was hot. It was 35 degrees, not as humid as it gets on the east coast here, but it was humid and hot and sweaty and he had been preaching for about an hour and Stuart Oggin is a master preacher with economy of expression, but people were drowsy. that had their food and they were falling asleep and he just stood up and he clapped his hands and everybody looked up as a few of you looked up there just to grab attention. That's what a good teacher will do. It's not that he's trying to be spectacular or aggressive or anything like that. He just wants the people to benefit from what he's hearing. There's no point you sitting there and me standing here and it being a wasted exercise. So a good teacher will do that kind of thing. The context of these verses is the mention of Melchizedek. My late father, whom I deeply loved and admired, he mentioned Melchizedek in his wedding speech, and nobody had a clue what he was talking about. But I knew, and we had that Lincoln Bond But the teacher has mentioned Melchizedek. He's quoted an obscure Psalm 110. I guess Psalm 110 is not your go-to Psalm. It's not the kind of thing, what's your favourite passage in the Bible? Ah, Psalm 110, because it speaks about Melchizedek. It's Psalm 23 or Psalm 100 or Romans 8 or something. Those are go-to passages, but not this one. And so he's aware that there may be puzzled looks. Melchizedek? We know our Old Testament, but Melchizedek? That's kind of vague. It's not a go-to passage. Because he's raised the bar to a level of teaching, I guess, that there may be seventh graders under now going to 10th grade material. And he realizes that these Hebrews who've begun to drift from the Lord Jesus Christ through difficulty or just through apathy or carelessness or some stress or pressure or whatever it was, he's raised the bar to a height and they're struggling to jump it. They can't get over it. It's too high. It's beyond their reach right now. And it seems, as he goes on and explores their hard-of-hearing condition, that even the gospel ABCs and the rudiments, the first principles, I think he's talking here about the New Testament as opposed to the Old Testament, Commendators disagree a little, but even these gospel basics, the fundamentals we might say, the foundational truths have slipped or are slipping from their grasp. And so to mention Melchizedek at that point, he's got to pause. He wants to cure their learning lethargy, And so he pauses to clap his hands for a moment, figuratively speaking, and to wake them up and give them a spiritual jolt so they then can press on. With this teaching, you'll remember on the high priesthood of Christ, which is kind of unique in the New Testament. There's no other letter that deals with this in this way to this extent. It's a book of the priest. and the priesthood of Christ, and he knows it's a bit of a stretch, and so he needs to wake them up and give them a jolt, because it's important. It's high teaching, but it is heavenly, holy teaching, and it's helpful teaching, and it's the medicine they need. And so they need to hear it, and they need to study it and think through it. So I'm going to make four points here. They all have a practical slant because it's a section of practical application. So the first thing is that we're to note our deafness. were to note our deafness. In verse 11 he says, about this we have much to say and it is hard to explain. Since you have become dull of hearing, a number of months ago, I woke up and I'd been sleeping on one side and I guess I must have had a little bit of a wax plug in my ear and I couldn't hear a thing on one side. I was almost totally deaf on that side. Hazel spoke and I didn't respond. Or there was something I was listening to and I couldn't hear it. I was deaf to it. I'm thankful for her medical skill prescribing oil drops. And then we went down to CVS, I think it might have been Walgreens, and we got the little rubber balloon with the spout and filled it with warm water. And it took a few blasts, but eventually out came the plug of wax. and I could hear the bird song in the mornings, it was lovely. But I'd become hard of hearing. It's bad, I guess, as we get older, to lose our physical hearing, but our spiritual hearing, that's a serious matter which needs remedied. You see, it's hard for this teacher to explain and unpack the helpful, healing truth that he wants to teach, not because of his teaching method so much, or because of the high topic taught. It's not that he's saying this teaching, it's so high, nobody can make sense of it. He's not saying that. He's saying it's on account of their dull spiritual state. These are hard-of-hearing, wax-in-the-ear saints. And that's why they're not licking their lips, spiritually speaking, at this feast of helpful holy truth. That's why they don't love her. the word, because in the Bible, hearing always has to do with doing. James says, don't just hear the word, do the word, because the Hebrew verb, shamah, buh, always means obey. Hear, O Israel, means obey, O Israel, hear that you might put it into practice. How do you react to sermons that you hear. You know the ones, especially when the conscience is pricked. Or, by God's grace, a little area of your life that has been subject to spiritual neglect, by the Spirit, the Word puts God's finger on it and you kind of, ow. I didn't like that. That was challenging, or I feel undone by that sermon. Or what about the passages you read? I've been in a congregation and I've seen people in anger, publicly do that. Like when Stephen spoke. What did they do? They gnashed their teeth and they put their heads over their ears. Don't speak. I don't want you to say anything more. I'm not going to listen. We can all do that at times, don't we? I guess that's why with young people, who've been brought up in Christian homes, and they've listened to things, and then as they grow up and begin to dabble in the world, how do they get rid of God's discomforting voice? Well, the Bible goes from their, what we would say, bedside table, but you would say nightstand, and it goes up to collect dust on the shelf. You see that physical move which speaks spiritual volumes. I don't want to hear God speak. Hearing and heeding are scripture Siamese twins, you know the conjoined twins that come out and they can't be separated except by surgery. hear and heed. I wonder as God speaks and as you read and as even your parents say that's not right what you're doing or that's the wrong way to think or that's a bad set of values. Are you eager? Are you clear of hearing? I'm not saying... Physically, big ears are a good thing. I think I've probably ears on the larger side, but... But spiritually... If we could all have big ears... Have you these, like, microscopic ears? Are you quick to learn or slow to learn? Do you read and do you mark and do you learn and do you inwardly take in and digest into your soul the word of God that speaks? And eagerly, swiftly, enthusiastically repent and change your course? You know, the Christian life is basically going down and up again. It's death and resurrection. It's repentance from our sin and rising in new life of Christ. Not just at the start of our Christian lives, but through the entire course of our Christian lives. And we're meant to be quick. I guess like a diver diving in a pool, swimming a front crawl. Gotta go off the, bored into the water, a quick kick and up, and finish the race. Of course, it was Christ who always had open ears, wasn't it? He prays through the prophet Isaiah about his ready and open ears. Morning by morning, his ear is open to the voice of God, his father. And so he gives us the grace He suffered for our deafness to give us good hearing and to improve our hearing so that we're quick to respond to God when he speaks. Know your deafness, firstly. Secondly, admit your delay. Admit your delay. Look at... the 12th verse of Hebrews 5. Hebrews 5, chapter 12, where it says this. 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. Mothers get a little bit anxious. Grandmothers as well, I guess all doctors as well, pediatricians as well, get anxious when milestones of newborn infants are not reached on time. It's a kind of the alarm bells ringing sign. Something's wrong. Something's wrong. They haven't reached the stages that you might expect of a newborn who's growing healthily and thriving. If the baby fails to fix and follow and then roll and crawl and start to speak and articulate, then it signals developmental arrest. And if that's true, physically of human life. Spiritually, of course, when there's a delay, it also sounds spiritual alarm bells, which are actually more serious. These saints could or had drunk milk. I remember a number of years back, I decided to give up the reduced fat milk. I thought, well, The cow is being made to give whole milk. I'm not saying, I'm not commenting on food. If that's your preference for low-fat milk, that's grand, but... So our boys, to my surprise, started drinking pints and gallons of milk each week. I hope they don't get kidney stones from all the calcium, but they drank the milk down. That's what these Christians, these Hebrew Christians, were like at first. They loved the word. That's a sign, actually, of spiritual revival in the soul, a hunger for the pure milk of the word of God. That's a sign, actually, of a person who's been brought up in a Christian home. Aunt has been a stranger to the Lord like Samuel was until he called. Remember it says Samuel, until the Lord called, hadn't known God. He didn't know Him personally. He knew about God, he was serving God, he was in God's house, but he didn't know until God said, Samuel, Samuel, and he had to run to Eli. He hadn't a clue what was happening. And Eli said, say, Lord, speak, your servant hears. That's a sign of the new life of God in the soul. Hunger for God's word. But these Christians had drunk milk, and you might expect the next milestone was, well, you'll introduce solid food as a mother will to the child. Solids, as we used to call Rebecca's growing diet, Rebecca's solids. She got her solids. And the meat, moving on to meat. Because if saints drink milk and then can't take meat, or find that by a certain stage in their walk and discipleship, they can't even pass on to others the spiritual ABCs. You've got stunted growth. You've got arrested growth. You've got, spiritually speaking, and I mean, no offense, dwarfed growth. Short stature. and there should be growing stature. Look what it says, for though by this time you ought to be teachers, not meaning pastors who stand at pulpits necessarily, but those who just have enough knowledge of the gospel to pass it on to their children and their husbands and wives and neighbours and friends and colleagues or people that they meet in the street who show an interest in God's word. By this time, you should be able to do that. You see, all true believers, after a short time, if they have been taught well, and they're not always, I guess, pastors and elders have to hold their hands up to a certain extent, that they don't always teach the basic steps of discipleship well. We aim to. pray for us that we would do so faithfully and be mindful of the stages that different believers are at in their walk with God. But all true believers can be taught, with maybe some exceptions of course we understand that, to teach others the basic steps of the faith He goes on in chapter 6, and I think this is what he's referring to, in verse 1b, not laying again the foundations of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God and an obstructions about washings or baptisms and laying on of hands the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. That's what he's talking about the rudiments of the Christian faith. We should be able to tell people they need to repent, to have a change of heart, to have a change of conduct and behavior, to turn away from their sin. We should be able to teach repentance towards God, faith in Jesus Christ, that you need to turn if you want to be saved and to trust in to place all your hope on the Lord Jesus Christ as the only saviour, the only true saviour and hope of heaven after death. We should be able to teach that he died a Calvary and bore the guilt and the anger of God that fell upon him that we might be freed from our sins. We need to be able to teach people that on the third day, according to the scriptures, what happened? You know this because you can do it. He rose from the dead and appeared to, what was it, in 1 Corinthians 15, over 500 witnesses at the same time. On one occasion, we need to be able to tell them that God will judge the world in righteousness as the psalmist predicted and the prophets foresaw by the man he has appointed, Jesus Christ, and has given proof of this by raising him from the dead, breaking the powers and the bond of death and the grave, and offering to his people the hope of eternal life. We can do that, can't we? Jesus died and rose. And our little aides can help us. You just get a page of letter, paper, and use big letters and words, and do a five minute or a two minute testimony. Not to go into detail about your own badness, but to show forth how God has saved you from your sin and show people his goodness in your own walk and life, how kind God was in saving you. I'm not what I once was, I'm not what I should be, but by the grace of God I am what I am. We can all do that, can't we? That's one aid. We can use a little tract. the Roman road or something like that. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. God has presented Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement if we believe we will be saved and so forth. We can learn the Apostle's Creed, can't we? I believe in God the Father and so forth. We can learn the Ten Commandments, or at least an outline of them. Thou shalt not remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not steal in no particular order. But we can learn that, the basics of the faith. And we can learn, well, Surely, we know it by now, we can teach people how to pray. Oh, I don't know how to pray well. Jesus has given us a prayer, the Lord's Prayer. And here, it's a kind of outline of the things you want to bring to God. Forgiveness of sins, putting his kingdom first, et cetera, et cetera. I wonder, are your milestones timely? Or is there any cause for concern in your life of developmental delay? Sometimes we can move forward at great pace and then something happens and we fall back a little. That's what happened to the Hebrews here. Is there someone here this morning, and you've been a Christian for 20, 30 years, And the word that the Spirit brings to you this morning is, by this time, you ought to be a teacher. And you're still in milk. I guess that can be said to us all at various stages. Let's humble our hearts and say, Lord, the time of this past, It's been wasted, relatively speaking, helping I use the remaining days I have. It's not what Moses says in Psalm 90, and he's reviewing all the mistakes of the past of the wilderness generations as teaches to number our days aright that we may gain the heart of wisdom. And then he prays that the Lord would establish the work of the people's hands as they move into the land. Maybe that's a prayer you want to say this morning to the Lord. Admit your delay. Third thing is change your diet. Change your diet. Recently, I've cut out a number of things. Bread at lunchtime is just bad news for me. If I have bread then I eat throughout the day and I gradually put on weight. I eat my meal at tea time and then nothing after seven, well, Usually not. I'm a little bit bold. But I've had to change my diet. Because I want to be healthy. So here in verse 13 we see, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness. It's referring to the ability to make good decisions and choices about your conduct as a Christian. I think that's mainly what it means. It certainly means the ability to tell the difference between bad a doctrine that hurts and wounds a Christian, and a healthy, life-giving doctrine of the Word of God. There's doctrine, but there's also then direction. These two things, the Word of Righteousness, are doctrine and direction. So you're able to discern. I shouldn't have watched that. I shouldn't have said that. That was a harmful thing to do. I need to use my time better. Need to read stuff that's going to help and not hurt my mind. Or music. There's one. Learning to discern. For newborn infants, solids are introduced after a brief initial phase of colostrum. That's the stuff with all the antibodies in the first part, like the cream on the top of the bottle of milk. Really important. Then breast milk or formula feeds. All of that's vital, but then there must be a moving for healthy growth onto firmer and finally solid foods. Because disciples, like children, thrive on regular feasts of doctrine and direction in the gospel. For everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness since he's a child, but solid food is for the mature. Maturity here signifies a stage in Christian growth where the character is well rounded and grown up, I guess. We would say adult Christians instead of baby Christians. You would say adult Christians. But there needs to be spiritual growth. It's not that we ever arrive. But there are stages in the Christian life. Milestones to reach and solid food is important for that. So it is good to get a little milk each day. I still enjoy my I have to cut back a little bit, but my half pint of milk, I love cold milk. It's good to be reminded of the need for repentance, as I've said, and faith, of the death and resurrection of Christ. But think of it, the kind of unsightly thing, I'm not sure if this has ever been seen, but can you imagine a 10 year old still being nursed by its mother at the breast. We would just say, please grow up. This is not the right thing. There needs to be growth. So if you want to grow up, you must regularly eat the nourishment and the meat of God's word so that you're able to apply it to everyday situations in life. That's the problem for the Hebrews here. They're being blown about and shifted from their foundations because they haven't received the meaty truth to help them stand firm on those foundations. So, I wonder, does the word come to you this morning? The milk's good, but what about the meat? About the Bible class? About the evening service? So you might have meat as well as milk. And then, fourthly and finally, seek your diligence. seek your diligence or improve your discernment, maybe in 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. Oh, that all sounds a lot of hard work. And it is. But it is important. Spiritual training, I know that One of the members spent a lot of time in the navigators, and the navigators train. And it's hard work, but it brings stability and strength in the long run, and they know that. It's a truth in sport or science of every type, or other subjects as well, of course, where skills are acquired and honed with constant practice, with hard work, with effort. I see recently, was it last night, that some education board, was it in New Jersey? I'm not sure. The parents and the teachers have said, we don't want any more homework. And the response was, you've got to teach them. You need to be solid in what you know. There must be training and learning. All ethical and moral and Christian behaviour, the faculties and the spiritual senses are built up. How? By constant exercise. That's how they bulk up. That's how they get fine-tuned. And the word here suggests that it's only when we're pumping iron day by day in the gymnasium of Christ that we'll be able to distinguish between evil and good. When I was at college, in med school, I was a little naughty. I kind of selected out the lectures that I thought were boring. But I went to the gym and I pumped iron. It's amazing how you can go from, let's say, 200 pounds of being relatively well toned to 240 pounds of strength in about five weeks. It's surprising the effect that good training can have. Maybe if I'd paid more attention to the lectures and trained that set of skills, I would have had a broader medical knowledge. Little children, of course, haven't yet reached the age of discretion. Little ones How do they do what's right and wrong? Well, they've got this voice, this parent, this teacher saying, don't do that. No, stop. Or, no, this is, let me show you what to do. Someone else is teaching and training, and they haven't yet learned to think. No, this is a good thing. And this is a harmful or bad thing. And the only way you get that knowledge spiritually is by practice in the Word of God. A scripture skill set through the training of God's Word, putting it into practice, a practical training, not just the study and theory, but the practice of it, into the practical situations you encounter day by day in your workplaces, in the church, and in your homes and relationships, putting the Word of God into practice in those concrete situations, so that we might grow and learn to think, speak and act in a way that's pleasing to Christ. All of that is hard effort and there's no shortcut. But where there is pain, there will be gain. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. So in conclusion, if you have been dull of hearing or deaf to obey, will you come to Christ today, confess your guilt, and have your hearing cleared by all the oily drops of the spirit and the syringe of rebuke? Don't put it off. Do it now. As you consider how long you've been a Christian, Have you grown to the point that you can now dispense with milk and don't have to be told by someone else? Or have key milestones been missed or forgotten? You may need to admit you're in a kind of undergrown, unhealthy state, and then, as the writer does, swiftly move on to meat. Pray for help. Are you still craving and hankering after the gospel basic ABCs and saying, well, I'm not quite sure about the death of Christ and the resurrection of Christ and the need to repent and the need to believe? Still on the rudiments, or are you able to pass on personal testimony using the Westminster Shorter Catechism, key memory verses that we're learning week by week, and you're able to help people turn from their sin and to trust in the saviour that you love and know, and to rattle off the apostles' creed if they say, what does a Christian believe? And if you're able to work out every day on the word and exercise with a walk in the word, Are you honing your skill sets of scripture to tell the difference between right and wrong in the increasingly complex set of circumstances and choices we face in this strange 21st century with all its confusion? Are you able to see clearly this is the way, which is pleasing to Christ, walk in it? May God give us open ears and ready feet and skilful judgment and learning hearts. In Jesus' name, amen, let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for its warnings, its rebukes,