17/02/2024
DIVINE DEVOTION.
18th FEBRUARY 2024.
"SPIRITUAL GROWTH."
"SPIRITUAL MATURITY!"
Praise the Almighty God. After being Trained in Righteousness, the Spiritual Teacher desires to see your Spiritual Growth..... As the parents desire to see their sons and daughters coming to maturity physically.
To live with babes is not a joke, you have to be there always, taking care of them.... but it is acceptable if they are just Babes because of being born (recent spiritual encounter) at that period of time.... However, if these Babes refuses to grow mentally, but grow physically, these will be a burden to the parent as they must be taken care of the time they need to have matured and take care of themselves, as they nurture other Babes.
In the other devotion we quoted:
Luke 6:40
[40]A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone who is perfectly trained will be like his teacher.
If through perfect training you become like your teacher, this means you will teach and nurture other Babes after acquiring the necessary spiritual skills, being skilled in the Word of Righteousness, knowing what is right to do, and avoiding evil acts.
The danger lies where one refuses to grow spiritually, and now and then disputes with the teacher about ethical issues; filled with bodily passion and lust, such a believer always doing wrong and blaming the feelings of his or her body, being held captives to do the Devil's bidding!
Such a believer never come to maturity, as he becomes unskilled in the works of Righteousness; for how can he nurture and counsel others on the matters that he or she has not been able to overcome.... Or how can such remove a speck in other people's eyes, when having a log in their eyes?
The Hebrew writer complained of these type of spiritual Babes, who even after a long period of Training, they never come to spiritual maturity...... The type that even in their old age, the time they ought to have been nurturing Babes, need still to be nurtured as new born Babes, partaking milk (being taught always the basic principles of Christianity; the do's and don'ts).
Hebrews 5:12-13
[12]For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food.
[13]For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.
Such immature believers were also in the Corinthian Church, and Paul logding his complains plainly told them:
1 Corinthians 3:1-3
[1]And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ.
[2]I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able;
[3]for you are still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal and behaving like mere men?
Imagine a child past six months..... even going to 12yrs...... 30yrs..... 49yrs... e.t.c and cannot partake solid food? Will they not have Re****ed Growth? Will they ever come to maturity?
What a Sorrow Paul sayings he fed Corinthians with Milk, for they were not ready for Solid Food.... And yet, even that time after several years of teaching, they were still not ready for the spiritual solid food (the complex teachings of the scriptures)!
When shall the overstayed Babes come to maturity? When shall they mature enough to be teachers of others? Do they know they lack spiritual inheritance as long as they remain Babes?
Galatians 4:1-2
[1]Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, does not differ at all from a slave, though he is master of all,
[2]but is under guardians and stewards until the time appointed by the father.
That Appointed Time by our Father in Heaven, for anyone to receive Spiritual Inheritance, is the Time we Become of Age Spiritually; the time we are taught, understand and follow the complex teachings of the scriptures (the solid food).
The Hebrew writer spoke of the Solid Food and those who partake it:
Hebrews 5:14
[14]But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.
If you come of spiritual age, you will have spiritual encounters with God, Jesus and angels in different spiritual levels..... and you become a master of spiritual wars, doing combats and lodging attacks to the Satanic Words, delivering those who are hell-bound; those marked by Satan for destruction, having captured their mind to do his evil bidding!
I LOVE SPIRITUAL WARS BECAUSE THEY MAKE SOMEONE, A GENERAL AND A COMMANDER IN THE SPIRIT..... FOR IF BABES TRY TO FIGHT SPIRITUALLY, WE BETTER REMIND THEM OF THE SEVEN SONS OF THE JEWISH CHIEF PRIEST, BY THE NAME SCEVA:
Acts 19:13-16
[13]Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists took it upon themselves to call the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “We exorcise you by the Jesus whom Paul preaches.”
[14]Also there were seven sons of Sceva, a Jewish chief priest, who did so.
[15]And the evil spirit answered and said, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are you?”
[16]Then the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, overpowered them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.
IMAGINE SEVEN AGAINST ONE EVIL SPIRIT?
THINK OF THE DEVIL RIDICULING YOU AND TELLING YOU: JESUS I KNOW, YOUR SPIRITUAL LEADER I KNOW...... BUT WHO ARE YOU?
IMAGINE MENTIONING THE NAME OF JESUS AND THE EVIL SPIRITS LAUGH AT YOU?
THAT IS THE DANGER OF REMAINING A BABE SPIRITUALLY; THE DEVIL STRIKES YOU MERCILESSLY, TEAR YOUR CLOTHES (Mock your Righteousness), LEAVE YOU NAKED, WOUNDED AND ASHAMED!
MAY WE ALL COME TO SPIRITUAL MATURITY; BECOMING GOOD SOLDIERS OF CHRIST JESUS, WAGING WAR AGAINST OUR ARCHENEMY, THE DEVIL, FIGHTING AND RESISTING HIS CONTROL, UNTIL HE FLEE FROM OUR PRESENCE. SHALOM!
~Peter Wahome, Apostle.