Time to Grow Up — Anton Bosch

Hebrews chapter 5, and I'm going to read from verse 8 through verse 14. Hebrews chapter 5, reading from verse 8 through verse 14. But we're going to deal with verses, essentially verse 11B, the second part of verse 11 onwards.

So let's read Hebrews 5 verse 8. Though he was a son, yet he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. And having been perfected, he became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey him.

Called by God as high priest according to the order of Melchizedek, of whom we have much to say and 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 first principles of the oracles of God, and you've come to need milk and not solid food.

For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. 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.

Hebrews 5–7 and the Structure of the Argument

Now, as we said last week, chapter 5 verse 12 through the end of chapter 6 is in parentheses. It's added in. His thought continues really from chapter 5 verse 9 or verse 10, the first part of verse 10, and then it continues in chapter 7 verse 1.

But he has this piece in between, and what he is saying is that it is hard for me to speak about Melchizedek or about Jesus in his Melchizedek priesthood because you are hard of hearing. And he's now going to deal with this issue of being spiritually immature, the foundation of the faith, and the consequences of not growing in the faith.

And that is chapter 6. Now, I've written a book on these exact verses from chapter 5 verse 12 through chapter 6 verse 8. It is available here for those who are online. It is available on Amazon all over the world—Japan, Europe, America, Australia—called Building Blocks for Solid Foundations.

And this deals with exactly what we're going to be dealing with word for word going through those verses. I'm advertising it not because I don't like to make business out of the things of God, and I make no money out of these.

I get about 20 cents a copy. But it's a very useful manual on the basics of the faith, on solid foundations. And there are quite a few churches that use this as a manual for their Sunday school or their Bible studies.

So for those who are watching online, that is available. It's called Building Blocks for Solid Foundations. All right. So let's get into the text, then. Verse 11 is where we left off last week, of whom?

That is of Melchizedek. But remember, it's not just about Melchizedek. It's about Jesus after the order of Melchizedek rather than the order of Aaron. And he says, we have much to say concerning Melchizedek and Jesus, but it is hard to explain since you become dull of hearing.

It's not because it is hard to explain. It is because the hearers are dull of hearing. For a preacher, the preacher can only go as fast as the congregation is able to assimilate, is able to understand.

And if the congregation is slow or the individual is slow, well, then it's pointless going further. It's hard to explain complicated things to people who have not come up to speed. When it comes to technical things, someone who doesn't know the first thing about a motor car, to try and explain how the transmission works or how the ignition works or how various parts work, it's just impossible.

It's hard. How do you explain how these things work if the person doesn't even have the fundamentals of mechanics or of electronics or of the things that are the fundamentals, the basics of that particular thing?

And he is saying these guys don't even have the basics. So he says, how do I speak about the deep things of God when you don't even understand the basics? And so they are hard to explain since you become dull of hearing.

Dullness of Hearing and Spiritual Comprehension

Dull of hearing. The word dull of hearing, the idea here is really, I think the most best modern translation for that, and I haven't found a translation that says that, but in our colloquial language, we speak about someone who is slow.

I think it's the same here as it is in South Africa. When we say someone is slow, what do we mean? Well, we mean he's mentally really not up to speed. He's slow to understand. He's slow to comprehend.

And that's really the word that he is using. You are slow of understanding. You are slow of hearing. And of course, that is on them. It's not on the preacher. Of course, it's easy to say, well, you know, the preacher, you know, he went over my head.

Well, maybe it's not the preacher who went over your head. Maybe it's you who are not up to speed. That is not at the place where you ought to be spiritually in order to understand what is being said.

So he says, there are deep things I want to share with you. But he says, I can't do that. Paul uses exactly the same words in the book of Corinthians. Now, because, 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.

So he is not saying by this, for though by this time, in other words, the people, he knows the people he's writing to. He's not writing this to people who are babes in the sense that they've just newly saved.

And so when someone is newly saved, well, you understand. They don't really know. You have to go slowly with them. You have to go step by step, line upon line, precept upon precept, until they understand, and then you're able to go a little deeper and a little faster.

But clearly, the people he is writing to have had more than enough time to have learned the fundamentals of the faith, the basics of the faith, and yet they haven't. And remember the background. The reason that they are thinking of forsaking Christ and going back to Judaism is because they are spiritually immature.

They may have matured at one point, but they have regressed possibly. And so they don't understand Jesus and how wonderful he is, and so they're saying, well, you know, the persecution is too hard. We rather would go back to Judaism where it's easier.

And so the problem is that we'll see later on in chapter 6 is this very, very serious warning that if we fall away, it would be impossible to renew such a one to repentance again. And so there's a very real problem.

On the one hand, there is a goal that we should attain to. There is a place where God wants us to be individually, and obviously it's different for each one. Each one grows at his own pace, but there is a place where God wants you to be right now, each one of us.

And the question is, have I attained to where he wants me to be? Or am I slow? Am I way behind the program? We know that many kids during COVID and because of distance learning and not being able to be in person have fallen behind.

And so they should be here, but they're here. And the question is, can they catch up? Now, of course, that's a serious thing when it comes to our children's education. It's even more serious when it comes to our spiritual welfare, when in fact we should be at a particular point and we're not there, we're lagging behind.

And the problem, as I said, if you're lagging behind, the potential then of falling away becomes real. And I know that this raises red flags for those who believe that once we're saved, we will always be saved.

We'll deal with this in detail when we get to the latter part or the middle part of chapter six. So he says, at this point, you should be at the level of a teacher. Now, he is not saying that we are all to be teachers.

We know the New Testament is very clear that in Ephesians chapter four, in fact, we're going to look at a few verses later than verse 11 in a moment, but verse 11, he gave some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers.

So there are some who are teachers. There are others who are pastors and so on. So not everybody is a teacher, but we should be at a point where we are able to teach others the foundations. He's not speaking here about teaching through the New Testament.

He's not saying that you need to be able to teach about the Trinity or about election or about the complicated things of the faith, but he says that you need to be taught the first principles, the basics.

So every one of us must be able to teach the basics to other believers or to our children. And of course, that's a test. And the question is, do you even know what the basics are? Can you even recite them?

Repentance from dead works, faith towards God, and so on. And we're going to spend time, and it's going to take us probably at least 10 weeks to get through this section through the middle of chapter 6.

And so each Christian must know the basics of the faith, because if you don't have that foundation, and he calls it a foundation in chapter 6 verse 1, if there is no foundation, well, then obviously you cannot build the building.

You need to have the foundation before you can get anywhere. And so you ought to be able to teach these things, but you have need that someone teach you again. So they had been taught, but they didn't retain it, or they didn't learn it.

And I'm not talking here about learning things in an academic way. This is more than an understanding and being able to, in some traditions, to have gone through catechism and to pass the test and say, well, you know, I know these things.

Teachers, Learners, and the Practical Foundation of Faith

This has to do with a practical outworking of these things in our lives, as we'll see in a moment. So when you need to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again what are the first principles. Now, immediately again, and this is something that I really, really struggle with personally, is when people don't understand, when people don't get it, I search my heart and I say, God, and at this point of my ministry where I've come to almost the end of it, I question myself and I say, did I fail as a teacher?

And I know there are other pastors who ask the same question. Did I fail as a teacher to teach the Word of God? Because people don't seem to get it. And clearly what the writer here is saying is, no, it's not on the teacher, it's on the learner who didn't learn the lessons.

And that's the problem. You see, it's easy because we like to find someone else to blame. Oh, well, he didn't explain it very well. Well, it's not up to just the teacher. You have the Word of God, and we'll see that in a moment.

We'll come back to that idea in a moment when it speaks about the milk of the Word. Each one of us has the Word. Each one of us has the milk of the Word. We can be taught. We are taught by teachers. We thank God that that is God's order, that he provides teachers, but he also teaches us through his Spirit and through his Word.

And so you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God, of the voice of God. Now, I'm not going to deal with that part because I'm going to come to that next week in chapter 6.

So we're going to come back to that concept of first principles. And you've come to need milk and not solid food. So now he's drawn two comparisons, and there's going to be at least three more. You should be teachers, but you need to be taught.

You should be eating solid food, but you still need milk. And of course, now he's drawing the picture of a physical baby. And we know that babies begin with milk, and they progress to solid food. Now, of course, the picture he's drawing here is of those, because he says, you ought to be...

In other words, he says, you ought to be grown up. And he's going to use that term in the next verse. You should be grown up, but you're still on the bottle. Now, I mean, can you imagine such a situation?

Here's somebody who's 30 years old, 40 years old, and they just drink the bottle. I'm not meaning the whiskey bottle, I mean the baby bottle, milk. And they never progress to... There's something wrong, because associated with the idea of the bottle is they're still in diapers as well.

So here's somebody who should be feeding others. And here's the idea, because he's going to speak about being babies. Babies need to grow up, and it's a disaster if you have a baby and it never grows.

But he says that as a baby progresses, and remember that there's stages in the development of a child. It's a big day for the parents when the child begins to eat its first solid food, or semi-solid food anyway, being put in the blender and all of that.

And maybe the next big milestone is when the kid begins to feed himself. Now, most of it, we know, ends up on the face and on the floor, but they begin to feed themselves. But that's not where it needs to stop.

The time comes when that child should become an adult and begin to feed their own children. And so instead of being grown up and having your own children that you're feeding, you're still in fact needing—never mind being fed, you still need the bottle.

That's what he's saying. And of course, that's a terrible situation to be in. So you need milk and not solid food. And obviously he's contrasting because he's saying, I can't give you solid food. I can't speak to you about the deep things of God because you don't have the basics.

You haven't passed the milk stage. Now verse 13, for everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. He is spiritually immature. Remember that when it comes to our physical growth, there are very clear milestones.

When James and Michelle's new baby is born, they'll be taking it to the doctor every now and then, and there are certain milestones. At this age, it should weigh so much, it should be this big, it should be able to do certain things.

And even as you go through school, there are certain milestones. At 10, or I don't know what it is these days, 5, they should be able to count. I guess at 3 they should be able to count. At 5, they should be able to at least recite the alphabet and be able to read basic stuff.

And so there are milestones. By the time they're 18, there are a certain level that they should have achieved, both in physical and emotional and in spiritual development. And so it goes on. Now when it comes to spiritual things, we don't have milestones like that.

We can't say, well, he's been saved for 6 months, so at this point he should be at this level. He's been saved for a year, he should be at this level. Because each one grows spiritually at a different pace, at a different rate.

But there are still general milestones, if you will. There are still general ballpark where you should be at. Certainly if you've been saved for 10 years, one expects a certain maturity at that level.

If you've been saved for 20 years, one's expecting a different level of maturity. And so he's saying you should have been grown up, but he is still a babe. Now, for everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness.

He is untrained or unskilled in the word of righteousness. So clearly we need to be skilled in the word. Remember, the idea of being a teacher means that you are skilled. You can't have an unskilled teacher.

The problem is many Christians want to be teachers and set themselves up as teachers, but they're unskilled. So they're spiritually babes, but they set themselves up as teachers. And many try and do this, they do it on the internet.

There are pastors who have big churches and big ministries, but when you listen to their preaching, they are unskilled in the word of righteousness. You can hear they are spiritually immature. They don't understand the deeper things of God.

They have a very shallow reading and understanding of the scriptures. And so this is a terrible place to be in. So they are unskilled in the word of righteousness. And it's interesting he uses that word righteousness.

What does he mean by righteousness? And you should know by now that there are two different kinds of righteousness. There is what we call a forensic or a accounting righteousness, in the sense that we are accounted righteous because of what Jesus did at the cross of Calvary.

So when God looks at us, he says he is righteous, not because we are inherently, not because we are of ourselves righteous, but because he declares us righteous. He makes us righteous by what he has done.

And I suppose that that's part of what he has in mind, but clearly that's not the main idea, because what does that have to do with the whole issue of growth? He's dealing with the issue of growth. If I'm saved, I'm righteous.

If I've been saved for 20 years, I'm righteous. If I am a spiritual babe, I'm righteous. If I am a spiritual giant, I'm still righteous. So that has nothing to do with spiritual growth. So clearly he's speaking about the second form of righteousness, which is a practical righteousness, a real righteousness.

In other words, the way that we live our lives, the way we live our lives. So here he's now talking about fruit. So not about the theory of that or the idea, the theology that I'm righteous because of Christ, but here he's talking about how do I live my life?

Do I live my life in a righteous way? Am I practically righteous in my decisions, in my actions, in my reactions, in the way that I do things? And of course, again, here is a sign of spiritual maturity.

We expect of children, physical children, to be somewhat unruly and naughty and undisciplined. That is just the nature of a child, to be rebellious. But we expect of an adult to have outgrown those things and to act in a mature way, to make wise decisions, to not just pull out a gun on the freeway and shoot somebody because they cut you off.

And of course, we see this happening all the time, and what is that a sign of? It's a sign of immaturity. It's a sign of someone who has never grown up emotionally. And so there's a need then for us to grow into this righteousness.

So as much as physically or in the natural, a child needs to learn to act in an upright way, in a good way, to be a good citizen, to be a good family member, and those kinds of things. The same is true of a Christian.

Young Christians make a mess. They do the wrong thing, they say the wrong things, they get themselves into all sorts of trouble. But as we grow, one of the signs of maturity is that we make wise decisions spiritually, that we check what we say.

Children just say anything. I think we all remember that show, what was the show? Kids say the most darndest things or whatever it was. Yeah, and we think it's cute because it's a kid. But if an adult says the same thing, it's not funny at all.

It's sad when an adult says the things that we think are cute in a kid. And so the same is true of us spiritually. As new Christians, there are things that we say, there are things that we do that goes with being spiritually immature.

But we need to come to a place where righteousness becomes a practical outworking, where our speech is seasoned with salt, where our actions and our reactions are marked by maturity and by the fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, and peace, and so on.

Carnality and Spiritual Infancy in 1 Corinthians

All right, so everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. Now, I want to look at a few other scriptures, and we'll come back to Hebrews. So in 1 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 1,.

And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual people—people as in italics, so originally it just said, as to spiritual. Can you see the similarity between Hebrews? Hebrews says, I wanted to speak to you about the deep things of Melchizedek, but I couldn't, because you're slow of hearing.

Paul writes to the Corinthians the same thing. He says, I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. So Paul is writing to a totally different group of people. The Corinthians and the Hebrews are two different ethnic groups, and so they're clearly not the same church, the same group of people, but the same problem existed in both these groups.

And the same problem exists in most churches today as well. And so, I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal. Now, here's a word which is not included in Hebrews, but you'll see that he says, as to babes in Christ.

So here's another word, carnal. So we should be teachers, we need to be taught again. We should be grown up, but we are babes. We should be spiritual, but we are carnal. And remember that word carnal, and we don't have time to get into it in great detail, but it is soulish.

That's the literal word, psychikos, soulish. In other words, you are controlled by your fleshly nature and your fleshly desires. The guy who pulls out a gun on the freeway and shoots someone who cut him off, he is acting carnally in a sense.

He's acting according to his base nature, his lowest aspects of the human nature. Now, he says, and of course, those who are carnal, we normally say, well, people who continue in sin are carnal, they are fleshly, they are soulish.

Yes, that is true, and that deals with the issue of righteousness that we've just seen, practical righteousness. But this goes beyond just that. This has to do with the way we understand things. Do we understand things from a human point of view, or do we understand things from a godly point of view, from a carnal versus a spiritual point of view?

Are our reactions fleshly, carnal, human, or are our reactions spiritual or godly? And so I could not speak to you as to spiritual, but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ. I fed you with milk. Can you see exactly the same ideas?

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. Exactly what the writer to the Hebrews says. He says, I wanted to speak to you about these things, but you were slow of hearing, dull of hearing.

And so Paul says to the Corinthians, you're not able to understand. Verse 3, in fact, most of chapter 3 of Corinthians deals with this, and we're only going to look at these first three verses. For you are still carnal.

And here's the proof of their carnality. For where there are envy, strife, and division among you, are you not carnal and behaving like men? And so there was apartheid amongst them, a party spirit. I am of Paul, some said.

I am of Apollos. I am of Peter. He says, because there is these divisions, and those divisions result in strife and envy. And remember, the envy here, we dealt with this in the book of Corinthians, I know it's a long time ago.

The envy here is not over somebody's new motor car. The envy here is over someone's spiritual attributes or where someone else is in their spiritual growth. And particularly what happens is when someone outgrows us, so somebody gets saved.

We've been saved for a long time. Somebody new gets saved, and they grow beyond us. And we say, well, who's this Johnny come lately? I've been around for 20 years. And we become envious of others' spiritual gifts.

We become envious of others' spiritual growth. And of course, this party spirit finds itself in churches as well, where people group together, and there are certain groups of people who will associate together, will only talk amongst themselves, will only socialize among themselves, and they don't socialize with anyone else or talk to anyone else.

It's the same carnality. It's the same fleshly things. I'm not going to allow my kids to pray with somebody else's kids in the congregation, because we're different, we're better, we're whatever it is.

This is the same carnality, where there is any form of division in the church, whether it's based on ethnicity, whether it's based on economic status, whether it's based on education. It doesn't matter what it is, whether it's based on theology.

It doesn't matter what it's based on. If there is division and strife and envy amongst Christians, it's a sign of carnality, Paul says. That's the end of the story. There's no ifs, buts, or maybes. Spiritual people are not carnal, and spiritual people don't entertain these fleshly forms of division.

And we've dealt with this in great detail. We know there are things we must divide on, heresy, we cannot tolerate that. There are things that does result in divisions, but outside of that, there is no room for division in the body of Christ, because that is simply a sign of carnality.

The Pure Milk of the Word and Spiritual Growth

Now Peter, in 1 Peter 2, and you should remember this because it wasn't so long ago we were in Peter, says the same thing. Therefore, laying aside all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking.

So remember, Paul said that the signs of carnality is envy, division, and strife. Well, Peter has a slightly different list, but you can see it's the same idea. Malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, same word as in Paul's list, and evil speaking, strife.

So he says we need to lay these things aside as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word. So you can see again he's associating these divisions and arguments amongst the Christians with being carnal, with being new babies.

Now what he says we need to do is we need to grow. They desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby. You know, one of the things is that when we have children, and the children don't make the milestones, we get very worried.

And even if they just miss the milestone by a fraction, and the doctor or the nurse says, well, you know, they should be weighing so much, and they're weighing one pound too much or one pound too little, we get ourselves into a state.

When the kid doesn't start talking when they should be talking, when they don't start walking when they should be able to walk, we get very, very worried. And yet, Christians can go years and years and miss every milestone in the book, and we just say, well, that's just the way it is.

And the problem is it's not just, I'm not talking about us judging one another, but judging ourselves. And, you know, there are certain, because here's the thing. You alone know where you ought to be right now.

I have an idea, but nobody else has. But only you and God knows where you ought to be on your milestones. And if you're not making those milestones, you ought to get worried. And that's the point that Paul is making in Hebrews, Peter is making the point here, and the writer to the Hebrews is making exactly the same point, and that is that you're not making the milestones.

You're not growing, you're not where you ought to be. And if you're not there, what you need to do is fix the problem. If the doctor says your kid is overweight, well, then you've got to fix it, change the diet.

If the kid's underweight, fix it, change the diet, do something that will remedy the problem. And here, Peter says, here's the answer. It is the milk of the word that is the answer, the pure or the unadulterated milk of the word.

Now, I said to you before, what you're getting from the pulpit here is not the pure milk of the word. And I'm not suggesting that what I'm preaching is contaminated with poison, but it is watered down, because I'm taking 45 minutes to deal with four verses.

So does it take 45 minutes to read four verses? No, obviously not. So I'm putting a lot of water with it to make it palatable, to make it understandable. But at the end of the day, the only pure unadulterated milk of the word is the word itself, is the word itself.

No preaching is the unadulterated word, because by definition, preaching contains, I don't know, 10 percent of the word and 90 percent of my words. And my words really may be helpful, but they're not really what's going to make you grow.

It's the word itself that's going to make you grow. And so desire the pure milk of the word. Notice that word desire. Now, one of the things about carnal Christians is that they desire all sorts of stuff except the word.

They desire entertainment, they desire whatever the world has to offer, but not the word. We need to desire the pure milk of the word. And of course it's not— and I'm sure we've all seen when feeding time comes for the baby and you present the bottle, the hands go out and the hands grab that bottle and they pull it into their mouth, because this is sustenance, this is what is good for me.

They know instinctively that that is good for them. When you see little birds in the nest and the mother brings the food, immediately they all come up and their mouths are open. They're desiring that food, and there needs to be a desire for the pure milk of the word, because that is how we grow.

Maturity, Unity, and Stability in Ephesians 4

Ephesians chapter 4 says the same thing. Remember I quoted verses 11 and 12, when he ascended on high he gave gifts to men, some to be apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, until we all come to the unity of the faith.

What did he say was the sign of carnality? Division. Here he's saying until we come to the unity of the faith, the positive side of division, the opposite, and of the knowledge of the Son of God. What did the writer to the Hebrews say?

I can't speak to you in depth about Jesus, because you are carnal. But he says, and Paul says, we need to come to the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man. We're going to come to that word in a moment in the book of Hebrews, to a perfect or a complete or a mature man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

I'm not going to analyze these verses in detail, but verse 14, that we should no longer be children. So you see exactly the same idea. We need to become a complete mature man, no longer being children.

Here he's giving another sign of being spiritual children, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting.

Immature Christians are blown about. They are blown about, according to this verse, by every wind of doctrine. Today they latch onto this preacher, and tomorrow they want to promote that book, and tomorrow it's this idea, and the next day it's another idea.

And so they are blown around by everything that's going on on the internet, every YouTube preacher that's out there. And again, I've warned over and over, I'm going to warn again. It's so easy to get caught listening to the wrong kinds of preachers.

Sometimes, and I'm doing it less and less because I'm finding it really not beneficial, but a lot of time in the evenings I will listen to messages being preached on YouTube, and I will select who I want to listen to, and I listen in my shop while I'm doing something else.

But when that video has come to the end, YouTube will line up the next guy, and because I'm busy or I get caught up, and you start, but this guy's talking nonsense. But if you're not being discerning, you'll keep listening.

And you say, oh, it's not a big deal. It is a big deal, because nothing that goes into this thick skull, unfortunately, just disappears. It sticks there. And while we may be slow of learning, and the problem with being slow of learning is that we can't put it into practice, but it's still there.

And all of these false ideas get lodged in our minds, and the devil uses that. And so, they are tossed to and fro. There is not a week that I don't get an email from somebody somewhere in the world saying, I found this preacher, and I think he's wonderful.

What do you think? And most of the time, the answer is bad news. No, I don't think he's great at all. I think he's terrible, because his doctrine is not right. But they are tossed to and fro. Instability.

But this is not just spiritual or theological instability. It's emotional instability. That's what happens to children. We all know what children do. One moment, they're laughing their heads off, and everything is wonderful.

And literally, just like that, the next minute, they're crying. That's just the nature of children. And I'm not saying that's bad. That's fine for children. But it becomes a problem when we're an adult, and we're emotionally unstable.

And of course, for a Christian who should be spiritually and emotionally stable, this is a real problem. All right, let's get back to Hebrews as we begin to draw to a close, I hope. All right. Verse 13, "...for everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.".

We need to grow by the milk of the word. Now, verse 14, "...but solid food belongs to those who are of full age.". Solid food belongs to those who are full age. You can't give a one-week-old baby a T-bone steak.

It just doesn't work. They don't know what to do with it, and if you force it down their throats, you will hurt them. 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.

Exercising Spiritual Senses Through Practice