1 John 2, verses 1 to 14. My little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin, but if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. And by this, we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments. Whoever says, I know him, but does not keep his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word, in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may know that we are in him. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. Beloved, I am writing to you no new commandment, but an old commandment that you had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word that you have heard. At the same time, it is a new commandment that I'm writing to you, which is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing away and the true light is already shining. Whoever says he's in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. I'm writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for his name's sake. I'm writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I'm writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, children, because you know the father. I write to you fathers because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you young men because you are strong and the word of God abides in you and you have overcome the evil one. So reads the eternal, infinite, inerrant, infallible word of God. Please be seated. Have you ever started an intense conversation with someone and you're kind of going a mile a minute? Maybe it's over the phone, maybe it's face to face, more and more now it's digitally and you have a lot to say. And all of a sudden you realize, wait a second, I've got to hit the brakes. I don't even know if they understand what I've been up to yet. You want to make sure that the person on the other end, especially now with digital means, is hearing your heart and knows your intentions. I'm sure we've all been there at one time or another. You know that you both need time to reflect on everything that's just been said. Sometimes, some of us can be like a verbal machine gun, you know, just go, go, go, go, go, go, go. It's up to you to decide, spouses, which one of you is which in that conversation. But John has a lot to say in this first chapter and leading up to chapter two, verse 12, an awful lot to say, kind of a verbal machine gun, and it's just packed. And all of a sudden, If you look in your Bibles here, there's a pause. And it's a poetic pause. We'll talk about that in a moment. I think he realized that he had a lot to say in a short amount of time. Now it's time to process. And that's just what I want us to do tonight. John's pastoral heart comes out in these three verses and shines through. He's going to take a time to reflect And as I mentioned, it's a poetic pause. And he's gonna essentially say, how we doing? Spiritually. So as we consider what I'm calling a reflection tonight, I want us to consider, we're gonna get right, and this is a very small porch, right? This is your introduction. Because I wanna get right to business. I want us to consider three aspects this evening. of John's reflection. And these three short verses here, a lot in there, I've probably read, I don't know, 50 to 75 different pages of commentaries. There's so much packed in here just on these three verses. And so the three questions I want to answer tonight, or at least look at, begin to unpack, is number one, in these three verses, What was John's reason for the pause, the reflection? Why'd he do it? Why'd he stop here? Number two, who's John addressing in these three verses? Because that's up for debate. And number three, what are the details? What does he have to say? Once these individuals are identified, what's the message? So let's get right to work here. First, the purpose in John's reflection. The purpose in John's reflection. Thank you, Carmelinda, for helping get the outline out there in a form that matches my shirt. That's intentionality. If I know my wife, that was on purpose, as we talk about purpose here. The purpose in John's reflection. Why is he reflecting? It's three verses. Before we even get to that though, I could have gone all the way back to chapter one. What is John up to in this letter to the church in Ephesus? So I wanna go a bit broader than just these three verses. John's purpose in this letter, as we've looked at before, to the Ephesian church is twofold. First, he aims to provide genuine Christians with a deeper understanding, an understanding and an experience so that they might experience the fullness of the certainty of salvation. Remember, John says explicitly, I want you to have an assurance. I want you to know that you know. In simpler terms, he wants genuine Christians to be assured of salvation. Second, he's concerned about those who believe They're Christians. Some people out there have an assurance of who they are, but they're not. And he wants those people who are false Christians, he wants to prevent them from having a false assurance, basically pointing out the error of their ways, that they're actually not saved. So put very crudely, perhaps you've heard this terminology before, am I a saint or am I an ain't? Are you a saint or an ain't? As we've come to find out in the first four messages, there are kind of these built into John's first letter here, his first epistle. There are actually nine different litmus tests, and we'll go through all of them, but we've already covered four of them. In our first four messages, we've seen some of these statements like the if statements. You'll remember I handed out a little resource that talked about all the ifs, if this, then this, and there are some whoever statements that he uses as well. But very quickly, we'll just go through the tests that we've gone through thus far. There's gonna be another one next week, Lord willing, next Sunday morning. But very quickly, there is first the light test. You remember that one. 1 John 1, verses 5-7, this is the message that we have heard from Him and proclaim to you that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, see there's the if statement, but if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus, his son, cleanses us from all sin. So are you walking in the light? Are you a light walker? Next, there was the confession test. So chapter one, verses eight to 10. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. Have you confessed? Have you acknowledged, not only acknowledge the sin in your life, but then confess that before the Lord? And we talked about specificity in all of that. I think it's very important when someone's new coming to the Lord and they're They're turning from their sin in repentance and turning to Jesus in faith. It's very important to get specific. I think we talked about sometimes people like to sin in retail, but confess in wholesale, right? 1 John 2, verses three and four outlines the obedience test. We just read about it. By this we know that we've come to know him if we keep his what? His commandments. Whoever says, I know him, but does not keep his commandments is a liar. And the truth is not in him. And then the last test that we covered was the love test. 1 John 2, 9-11, whoever says he's in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness. And he does not know where he's going because the darkness has blinded his eyes. So do you love your brothers and sisters? Because if you hate them, there's a problem. Have you passed all the tests? Do these tend to shake you even just a little bit? They're sobering, right? A few weeks back, Andrew, I hope you're okay with me sharing. I meant to reach out to you beforehand. Kelly got, or not Kelly. Stephanie got me a shirt not too long ago. It's this warning. It says something like, warning, pastor, anything you say may end up in a sermon illustration. So here we are, Andrew. A few weeks back, Andrew Nealon shared a Tinder story with me about his journey through. He said this is, if not one of your favorite books of the Bible, maybe your favorite, right? He said he loves it, that it holds a special place in his heart because he's got some history with it. He remembers his reading 1 John as a young fella, and he became very quickly concerned. He really felt like he wasn't making the mark, that he wouldn't make the cut given some of these litmus tests that we've just talked about. And he told me that he actually got on the phone with his dad. It troubled him so much. I don't know if this was your doing, Heather, But he got on the phone with dad, dad's at work at the time, and Pastor Kevin over the phone read the entire book, all five chapters of 1 John to his son. So that he could get the full picture and reestablish some level of assurance, right? Isn't that a powerful story? That's so special, Rev Kev. That's a, good job, well done. That's a model of maturity there. I believe that Pastor Kevin's heart with his son that day is the same heart that the beloved disciple John has for the believers in Ephesus and by implication, each one of us this evening. See, John acknowledges that achieving, so there's kind of this two-fold thing that we talked about. John acknowledges that achieving both of his goals in the book simultaneously calling out the people who aren't really believers and assuring the people who are believers, simultaneously doing that can be a difficult task. It's like a balancing act of sorts. Remember, the first aim was to see to it that genuine Christians were assured of their salvation, and the second aim was to prevent the fakers from having that false assurance of their salvation. So he understands, does John, that by exposing the false salvation of counterfeit Christians, there's a risk of true believers becoming insecure. or uncertain about their own hearts and their own salvation. So remember at the beginning of the book, John makes it clear that there are certain false teachers who are disturbing the congregations to whom he is originally writing. We call them the Gnostics. And this is kind of the beginning of this movement that's going to take root. Paul talks about them as well. and it continues on into the second and third century, and it becomes a problem, but this is really kind of the genesis of all this. These false teachers see themselves kind of as super Christians, Illuminati, if you will, people that have a knowledge that the rest of us mere mortals could only hope for and don't have. These folks believe that they have a knowledge that even the apostles don't have. They're defying the teaching of the apostles. Their thought is that they can lead you into a deeper Christian life. And in some ways, it ends up being a Jesus plus. In many ways, it's subtracting Jesus out of the equation altogether. And John, in large measure, writes this book in order to make it clear that not only are those false teachers not super Christians, they're not Christians at all. And so he gives these hallmarks, these litmus tests, the doctrinal, the moral, and the relational marks of Christian experience, precisely to show that these false teachers are not actually Christians. So like young Andrew, maybe they hear these first four tests, the light test, the confession test, the obedience test, and the love test, and they see some chinks in the armor. Maybe some deficiencies. Perhaps there were some moments of straying from the light path. Maybe there was a season of failing to confess. There was a recognition that they weren't always obedient and maybe they fought with their brother a lot. I don't know. That they struggled to love some folks, even Christian folks. And I think that's the reason for the pause. He doesn't wanna lose his intended audience. The purpose of this reflection in verses 12 to 14, I believe that's what he's after. We're seeing an abrupt pause, but it's a tender pause. It's John's pastoral heart. He takes a moment to reflect and offer an essential message of assurance to the humble and faithful believers in this congregation. So that's number one. That's John's purpose in these three verses. Number two, the people in John's reflection. Who's he addressing? There are, in this text, some really hairy, interpretive difficulties, issues. One commentator described this passage, as I started reading it, I just laughed, as a tangled web of difficulties. Just three verses, a tangled web of difficulties. And I mentioned reading so many pages, oh my goodness, there are 300 people and 600 opinions commenting on this. One of the interpretive difficulties relates to the people that are mentioned in the brief poetic interlude. Who is John describing in these verses? And you can look at it just at a cursory glance and you say, well, that's pretty easy, but who is he implying they are? We can look at the labels, let's do that. Verse 12, you see little children, don't you? Verse 13a, fathers. Verse 13b, you see who? Young men. 13c, back to children. 14a, fathers again. And then finally, John uses that same young men label one more time. The interpretive question is, who's he describing really? Very few have suggested that he's using the titles that are bound to literal children, fathers, and young men in the physical sense that we would think of in our families. These are familial terms, masculine for the most part. Most would agree that these are the descriptors of positions in the spiritual realm, the spiritual aspects of those positions in the home that map onto positions in the physical realm. So the controversy comes when we try to pin the tail on who each of these labels describe in the family of God. Who are they in our congregation right now in the church of God? Some have suggested that the introduction of little children is just a general overarching term of endearment for all believers. And there's a good case for that. John is addressing without regard to their spiritual maturity. Adherence to this position would point out, I think rightly, that John uses that same term elsewhere in 1 John. In 1 John 2, even, just the beginning of this chapter that we just read, my little children, he starts out and he's addressing who? The flock, right? He says, I'm writing these things to you that you may not sin. John, after all, is an elderly man. by this time, and most people are like children to him in some way in his advanced years. This suggests to me that he's up there, right? He does this over and over again. I remember Pastor Larry, some of you remember this as well, even some white-haired folk would walk in and he would say, hello, children of the Lord, or something to that effect, and it's like, wow, those folks are old enough to be my parents, and he's calling them children, and I think it's the same sort of thing going on with the beloved disciple here, perhaps as old as in his, he might be upwards of 90s here, but at least in his 70s at this time. So elderly man, that position would then say that John regards children as believers in general, right? but that there's a differentiation between fathers and young men then somehow, and who are they? Another position holds that there is no significance in the differences in labels at all. In other words, all of us in some ways are fathers, and all of us in some ways are young men, young people, and in some way we're all children. These folks would say that all of the elaborations include qualities for believers regardless of levels of maturity. And I'm not persuaded by those arguments. Instead, I am convinced that these three titles are intentionally distinct, and that John is trumpeting the graces that are associated with these different levels of maturity. Let me show you why I've come to that conclusion. If you look at the passage now, here in your Bible, in many of your translations, you're going to, not in all of them, But you're going to notice that verses 12 to 14 are inset. Very similar to what you would see in Proverbs or Psalms or Song of Solomon or the Book of Job, right? Hebrew poetry. There's a recognition it's poetry and so the editors delineate that by the inset there, right? The reason the translators, translation teams, and the people that edit these, the reason that they do that is because they want to denote that, hey, this is a form of poetry. And that's really what John's doing here. He is waxing poetic here. He, it's not roses are red, violets are blue kind of poetic. It's not like a Broadway musical thing, sorry, Jaden. It's not the Broadway musical either. It's not just breaking out in song all of a sudden. But what it is is a certain type of poetry that we see over and over again in the Old Testament called parallelism. It's a literary device called parallelism. So take a look at the outline that's on your handout there, your outline. And I believe I've got one for the overhead as well. for those of you online and for those of you that didn't get a handout. You're gonna notice that there are six sentences in these three verses. Each sentence has a corresponding parallel. Do you see that there? Each sentence begins with, I am writing to you or I write to you. So the first three start with I'm writing to you. Four to six begin with the words I write to you. It's worth pointing out here that no other book of the Bible uses that expression as many times as 1 John does. For some reason, John wants to make this personal. I am writing to you. He does it 13 times in this short letter. And six of those times are right here. It's, and you'll see that they're in parallel there. It kind of goes in this order. One goes with four, two goes with five, and three goes with six. You see the connections there? Little children in verse 12 corresponds with children in 13C. Fathers in 13A corresponds with fathers in 14A. Young men in 13b corresponds with young men in 14b. We see something like that even in the opening of the Bible, don't we, with the days of creation, if you've ever noticed that. There's a correspondence as well. John is mapping onto a similar tradition of parallelism here. Remember, John's a Hebrew. He's a bonafide Jew. He cut his teeth on Hebrew poetry, which features this parallelism stuff. And another feature besides poetry. is addressing people in the family economy or even the economy, the local economy of what's going on. We read about in Paul's epistles, right? Addresses to fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, masters, servants. This is very common stuff. And I believe that's exactly what John's doing in a parallelistic form here, in a poetic form, And in doing that, he's doubling down on those, in Hebrew parallelism, part of the point of it is to elaborate and make the point even stronger. Hermeneutic students, you remember this, right? We talked about the different parallelisms. and what they're intended to do. And I think that's what John's up to here. What he's doing is he wanted to express the varying levels of maturity that are found in the church and give assurance to those folks based upon their level of maturity. And I believe we have all three levels here present in this congregation tonight. These are maturity matters, as the title suggests. Not only are these matters, though, of maturity, I want to impress upon you, as I believe John does, that maturity matters. Right? The work of sanctification, God's work of sanctification in us is such that he wants us year after year, week after week, month after month, year after year to look more and more like Jesus. He doesn't want us to stagnate, and I think this can be a prompt for us as well. What are the three levels then? What are the three stages? One pastor put it into three categories, and I'm stealing it. I find it helpful. There's an infancy stage. That's the children. or little children, as it were. There's an intimacy stage, that's the father's. By the way, the gender-specific names in this culture, that extends out, male and female. In a patriarchal society, that just extends out, right? We have to deal with that. Don't get mad about it. The gender-specific names are meant to cover levels of maturity, not specific biologic sex. In other words, father is generically mature. The last stage mentioned was what I'd like to call the infantry stage. Why? Well, the moniker for young men, the young men that were really fighting age. That starts at 20 in the Hebrew world. And so that kind of 20 to 40 age range. So think that through, think that level of maturity in your minds. So we have spiritual infants, children, spiritually intimate fathers, and we have spiritual infantry, the young men. So now we're gonna transition into the particulars. So we've identified these three different levels of maturity, these three peoples, and then now into number three, the particulars. We're gonna get into the meat of it now, of John's reflection. What does he have to say to these different levels of maturity? What does he have in mind is, I think he sensitively pauses for understanding so that these believers in these different stages might have assurance in their walk. Let's go through these three verses. We're gonna look at them, so you can look in the little outline that I gave you there, because I wanna look at each one of these with its parallel, because I think that's what John has in mind. So first then the spiritual children, infants if you will. Verse 12, I'm writing to you little children because your sins are forgiven for his name's sake. And then see the parallel there? I write to you children because you know the father. It's interesting to note that the two different Greek words are that there are two different Greek words that are are used here in these parallel passages. And some would say then, well, that means they're talking about two different groups here. But if you know Hebrew parallelism, and this is not Hebrew, but you had a Hebrew man doing it, oftentimes different words are used to make the point even stronger. And I think that's what John's up to here. Both mean children, but there is a nuance of definitional precision between the two terms. Technia, And verse 12 is a broad term that's used for little child, and it's typically used in the sense of a dearness. If you have this endearing relationship with someone, you know the sense. When you say of a young child, I just love that little guy or that little gal. I thought of that this morning when I saw a little barrel. I just love that little guy. The other term in verse 13c is paideia. And I want to give you a couple of examples of where this is used elsewhere, this term paideia, in the New Testament. Matthew chapter two, verse 13. So again, this is birth narrative stuff. Now, when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph, this is Joseph and Mary, of course, in a dream and said, rise, take the paideia, the child, and his mother, so think of the age there, and flee to Egypt and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the Paideia to destroy him. Luke 1.59, and on the eighth day, this is now John the Baptist, on the eighth day, they came to circumcise the Paideia, and they would have called him Zechariah after his father. Hebrews 11, verse 23, by faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents because they saw that the Paideia, the child, was beautiful and they were not afraid of the king's edict. Matthew 18, and calling to him a child, same word, he put him in the midst of them and said, truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. It's that same word each time. Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, but whoever causes one of these, here's a different word he uses now. Micros, these little ones. You hear the word micro in there. Little guys, little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Why do I bring these details up? I think John's intimating that this group, this level of maturity is descriptive of spiritual newborns. spiritual toddlers. They're spiritually new creatures. They're subsisting on milk. We see that illustration used by Peter, the writer of the Hebrews. John wants to be especially gentle with them. And you have these Gnostics in the church who act like they're the Illuminati, as I mentioned, like they have insider knowledge that no one else has. And they're misleading people left and right. Who do you think's most vulnerable? these ones, right? These new believers are especially vulnerable to the hucksters. So John very carefully is going to present those hallmarks, the litmus tests for a saint or an ain't. And how do you think these young believers are feeling about this time? They're stirred up. They're concerned. Perhaps like Andrew was that day when he called his dad. So John keeps it real simple. He says, you precious little guys and gals, you know our father. Remember, you're safe because you're his. Your sins are forgiven for his namesake. That can be a little confusing, that namesake thing. In other words, you're forgiven on account of what Jesus has done. For the sake of that great name, this is the ground level. Pastor Rich reminds us the ground level is level at the foot of the cross. Hear that over and over again. There's no one who is more saved in this room than anyone else, agreed? The only thing that we contribute to the cross and our own salvation is our sin. Remember this, God's forgiveness of our sin must be forever detached from our merit, from any merit. Literally in Greek, John's saying, your sins have been forgiven. He uses that perfect tense which conveys the notion that your sins have been once and for all forgiven and will never be brought up before God again. And this is listed first by John because forgiveness is the fundamental experience of the Christian life and the condition of fellowship with God. This is the message he's trying to get across to these spiritual newborns, these spiritual toddlers even. Forgiveness of our sins is the one thing that we all have in common. So you're in the family. Remember that you're in the family. We sang a beautiful worship song this morning. The powerful chorus by Sovereign Grace Worship before the throne of God above this morning. When Satan tempts me, to despair and tells me of the guilt within. Upward I look and see Him there who made an end to all my sin. Because the sinless Savior died, my sinful soul is counted free. For God the just is satisfied. To look on Him and pardon me. To look on Him and pardon me. See, the maturity level of little children is precious, but it's so fragile, isn't it? Little children need reminders. Yeah, you're in the family, you're adopted. Pastor Kevin mentioned tonight, here I am just bringing up all your news here. Pastor Kevin talked about, maybe I'll preach on adoption here when you guys are off at snow camp. That sounds wonderful. Little children are easily encouraged, aren't they? For the most part, sometimes mom and dads, it's tough for us to bring our kids out of a funk, but oftentimes, It's like you just need a little bit of redirection and you got a new kid now. But if you think of children, they're typically pretty flappable, excitable, very feelings-based, aren't they? John's telling the children to take refuge in Christ. He's reminding them, you know the Father. He's teaching them to go ahead and rest in that sanctuary. Now, for some reason, which I don't know for sure why, don't have it all figured out, don't claim to, John transitions from those spiritual children, the infants, he goes from the least spiritually mature to the most spiritually mature. You would think that he'd build up, but for some reason he didn't, okay? John's had at least 50 years of fellowship in Christ himself by the time he writes this letter, and he relates to fathers as those who know him, who is from the beginning. Do you see that in the outline there? Same exact statement twice. because you know him who is from the beginning. The beloved disciple John, of all people, has come to know Jesus most intimately. He knew him intimately in those three years of his earthly ministry and came to know him in an even greater way, I'm sure, through those years as he ministered. But of these three levels, the fathers know Jesus best. Charles Spurgeon wrote about an occasion when he was a young preacher. He was talking about forgiveness in his sermon. And his grandfather was also a preacher. His grandfather happened to be present in that meeting. And so Spurgeon asked his grandfather to close the service in prayer. The elder Spurgeon, Grandpa Spurgeon, came forward. He put his hand on young Charles' shoulder and said, Charles can tell you about it, but I've lived it. Mature Christians consistently say, the longer I serve Him, the sweeter He grows. You preached about that this morning, Pastor. The sweetness gets sweeter and sweeter. Like John, they have walked through those death shadow valleys, and they have the long game in view. They see things from the eternal perspective, knowing Him who is from the beginning, knowing Him intimately, This is the intimate piece. They're not easily shaken because they've seen a lot. They may not be old men or women. They don't have to be chronologically old, but they're definitely mature in their faith because it's been tested over and over. Spiritual fathers are old disciples, if you will. Spiritual fathers have seen God's faithfulness. They've proved over and over that Jesus is true. They've seen his patience in their ignorance. They've seen his graciousness even in seasons of sin. They've seen how Jesus has provided for them in times of need over and over and over again. The spiritual fathers have had a prolonged time in the scripture. It's an old friend. They've sailed through many storms. They've probably endured persecution, various kinds. They've defended the faith. They've paid for it in many instances. And they've spent times on the front lines of ministry. Listen, nobody starts here. We aspire to that, but nobody starts here. And that's why Paul, when he talks about eldership, says that overseers should not be new converts. The spiritually, and so, yes, everyone's in the door, but there are these levels, and they do matter. The spiritually mature, the intimate level folks, like Spurgeon's grandpa, have grown, and they've weathered many years in the faith. The final parallel involves the young men. This is what I've called the infantry level, as we read in verses 13b and 14b. I'm writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. And then again, in verse 14, I write to you young men because you are strong and the word of God abides in you. And again, you have overcome the evil one. See the parallel? These are not spiritual children, spiritual babes as before. These ones are not in diapers. They're not sucking their thumbs. These are late adolescent to college and career age, if you will. They advanced to the front lines of battle. These young men, these young people are maturing. They are the contenders for the faith in the culture. They're ready to tear down strongholds. They're mighty in prayer, intense in action. They are bold in their testimony and strong and stronger, growing stronger in Christ. Not that they're infallible, not that they don't fall. But these folks are in the trenches, they're ready even to destroy secular ideologies. They're boldly flying their flag and they're quick to resist and overcome not only sin, but as the text here suggests, the enemy of our souls. They may fall from time to time, but they get back up and fight because they've experienced the thrill of victory before. These are overcomers. It's that word from which we get Nike, Nikeo, they're overcomers, they're conquerors. These spiritual infantrymen and women are growing by leaps and bounds, they get stronger, and why? What does the text tell us in verse 14? Because the word of God abides in them. They're being fed. I think of being over, at Nolan's house in Cheyenne. They have, I can't remember where it's at in your house, but they have this, these places where over the years they've taken down, some of you have done this with your children, to mark how much people grow. And I just think of their family and some of the other families in our church, Neelan's and other Brasington's, that have growing boys. And during these certain seasons of time, you're literally just pouring food into them. And that's what's going on with these who are on the front lines, these soldiers, these infantry men and women. They're being fed in that same way, but they're being fed in such a way that this is actually feeding on Christ, as you mentioned this morning. They're feeding on Jesus. They're feeding on the word. The word isn't just something that they know up here, but now, As they mature in their faith, it's becoming part of who they are. And they've learned the power of not just hearing the word, but doing it and living it. These infantrymen and women are not seasoned like the fathers are, but they're getting there. Well, here's the thing about this maturity business. Don't we all wanna be at the next level? Think of that for my wife and I were talking about this. The kids always want to do the maturity thing at the next stage. And we want to do that. But you got to spend your time in the trenches, don't you? And you have to get out of the gate. And you have to be potty trained to get out of the baby stage. And you have to get rid of the binky. And there comes a time where mom and dad aren't going to burp you anymore. We all want to be at that. But it takes time. It takes experience. It involves suffering too. We don't like that, but suffering is often the teacher that takes us from one level to the next. Some of you veterans out there have lost limbs. I look at you over there, Pastor. You've lost a lot of limbs over the years, spiritually speaking. Been through it. Any body of believers has spiritual infants, intimates, and infantry, children, fathers, young men. We're all present here tonight. All three levels are represented in this room, hallelujah. Every church needs that. should have that. I think you're an anemic church if you're slanted in one way or the other. But I want to expose some vulnerabilities very quickly that occur with each of these three maturity levels. Spiritual children are prone to make too much of what they feel. Spiritual young men and women, the infantry, are prone to make too much of what they do. Spiritual fathers are prone to make too much of what they know, because they've been there and done that, right? And there can be some discouragement, I believe. You mentioned it again, I'm just bringing up your message again here, Pastor, this morning. I sensed the heartbreak in your heart as you talked about those who, perhaps they were believers, perhaps they weren't, but the number of folks who don't continue on in the faith into the college years and beyond. So we have to be careful, right? There's some exhortation built into these spiritual maturity levels, right? We want to move on to the next level. And beloved, God wants us to level up too. And he's gonna work that out. Maturity does matter. Sometimes believers, unfortunately, remain spiritual babes for way too long. And believe it or not, some of those folks can end up in ministry leadership positions. Even, Pastor Rich, you've seen it. Others of you have seen it. We've seen it in our nation where spiritual babes end up, whether it's a parachurch ministry or whatever it is, you get somebody that moves up way too quickly and they're still a spiritual babe, right? I was up in the fellowship hall a few weeks ago. I walked up there. And sometimes, and my kids are just as guilty as anyone else's, so don't hear me pointing fingers or anything. I went up there in the fellowship hall and sometimes their kids just go, when they know there are no adults around, they just go absolutely nutso, right? Like scream to the top of their lungs, like what can I do that's most inappropriate right now? So I go upstairs and there's a kid and he's up on, so I already gave away gender, but he's up on a table And he's like doing this and he's just screaming at the top of his lungs. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, okay, settle down. This is age appropriate for this young man's age. It's not appropriate, like I'm going to redirect this individual and say this is not appropriate, and I did. But that is consistent with the age, right? Now, if I got up there and Steve, can I pick on you for a moment, Steve Hovander? If Steve Hovander, is up in the fellowship hall, on top of a table, screaming at the top of his lungs, something's wrong. We laugh at that. We laugh at that. But beloved, that happens all the time in the Christian world. You have people who get to first base and they stay there. May it not be so. It's not cute when you've been a Christian for a decade or decades and Pastor Rich has to burp you on the way out of church. Or your older brothers and sisters constantly have to change your diapers. It's not cute. It's time to grow. The writer to the Hebrews says it this way. Chapter five, verses 11 to 12. 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. Where are you tonight, Christians? Infants? Infantry? Or deeply intimate? You wanna level up? Listen to his word. Hear it. Study it. Memorize it. Meditate on it. Obey it. That's the hard part, isn't it? Obeying it. Have close communion in prayer. Feed on the Lord Jesus. Stay in fellowship. Find your Titus. One of the things I've been really encouraged about of late, and this has been standard in this church for all the time I've been here, I've seen a lot of Titus 2 that goes on here. Older men and women mature in the faith, mothers and fathers in the faith, taking under their wing the younger ones. So if you're younger, and you're wanting to grow, look to an older brother or sister. I think that's where we go wrong so often. That's how we end up with an older man screaming at the top of his lungs on top of a table upstairs. That's how that happens, is because they've never been shown what right looks like. They've never come across an apostle Paul who says, follow me as I follow Christ. So if you're an older brother or sister, look to your fathers and mothers. Stay in close fellowship. Let people speak into your life if you're younger. Give them permission to say hard things. That's how you're gonna grow. Let's pray together. Before we pray, I just wonder tonight, before God, this is living word. exposes our hearts, lays them bare. If there's anyone here that would say, I've never even walked in the door. I'm not even a spiritual babe yet, and I want to know more. If there's anyone like that tonight, if you'd raise your hand, I would love to have a conversation with you. We're small enough tonight, we can figure that out. And I won't embarrass you in any way, but you just want to have a conversation about what it looks like to walk in the door, even to become a child in the kingdom. Is there anyone here like that tonight? Maybe you're here this evening and you would say, well, I recognize it's time for me to level up. And I'm ready to do business with God. It's in one of these areas, don't have to know where, but I'm feeling, I'm sensing the Holy Spirit who wants to take me to greater heights for His glory. Is there anyone in here that would just confess that's my need tonight? Lord Jesus, we do love you. We thank you tonight for an opportunity to study. Lord, some of us, some folks in here perhaps, or some listening are just worldly, not Christians, have values, attitudes, actions, and reactions that are not of you. They're opposed to the things that are in these litmus tests. They're not biblical. They're not right. Some are just immature. Maybe there are people that should know better, just don't have any discipline or consistency. Lord, we pray that you would give grace for everyone. All of us here want to level up. Help us to make that progress by the power of your spirit. Some of us, God, in this room are newer Christians, fired up, excited, hopeful, but flappable. Lord, keep them learning. Bring men and women of God into their lives to mentor. We pray, Lord God, You who have begun a good work that you would complete that into the day of Christ, even as you have promised. Lord, there are a lot of people in this room tonight that I know personally who are growing, they're maturing and they're making progress. And Lord, their lives are coming together. Their hearts are right and they're in the right place. Desires are going to great places. Lord, they love you. Lord, I see them fighting. It's such a good thing. It's an encouraging thing. They're strong. Lord, I pray that you would really encourage your flock tonight. Lord, I pray that you would let the believers in this room look back on the last year or two and see all the good things that you've empowered them to do and to resist and to overcome and to accomplish and give you all the glory. Lord, there are some here who are mature and I pray that they wouldn't denote themselves that way in pride, but simply just recognize that you love them. We know that they love you. They've walked with you for years, they know the Bible, they know you. Use them, Lord, for your purposes. They have good things to say, they have good ways to lead, and they have good lives to share, so help them to share those lives with others. Encourage them, plug them in, Lord, in ways that they never thought possible in this flock and beyond, and in greater ways that they might even multiply to your glory, for it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.