Milk or Strong Meat

  Okay, so it's a little hard to hear me on this video, so I'm putting up the scripture I used here as well.  It's Hebrews 5:12-13:

   "For when for the time ye ought to be teachers,
ye have need that one teach you again
which be the first principles of the oracles of God,
and are become such as have need of milk,
and not of strong meat.
   For every one that useth milk
 is unskillful in the word of righteousness,
 for he is a babe."

   I don't actually think this scripture is talking about the benefits of meat over milk.  In my New Testament class this week, we were talking about the controversy over whether or not Paul wrote this epistle to the Hebrews and who exactly the Hebrews were that he was writing to, but I think by reading Hebrews, you can understand that what it teaches is true, whether Paul wrote it or not.

  This scripture caught my attention because it reminds me of the first time I really remember thinking about the extra blessings and comforts from the Lord I could have if I was really doing more of what He asked me to do.  My dad was teaching some of the youth from church, which included me, and he introduced the idea to me of how much more joy or help we could be experiencing if we were just working a little harder than we were at the moment.  It was an interesting thought to me, and it sort of reminded me of those computer games where you try to collect as many of something as you can, like gold coins or something.  I mean, I know that it's impossible for me to collect all those gold coins, even if I try my hardest, but that doesn't mean I couldn't be collecting more gold coins if I didn't try just a little bit harder.

    So, for this group of Hebrews, instead of getting the blessings of being able to teach other people about the truth of the Church and about teaching the commandments, they still needed to be treated like babes in the gospel.  I assume they'd be taught, been given time to practice those principles, but not taking advantage of that time meant they couldn't be the strength to the church that they would have been.  They still needed to be taught the fundamentals.  There is something to be said for always going back to the fundamentals, that God loves us, that we need to keep the commandments He has given us, that Christ suffered for our sins and loves us too.  We should be grounded in those fundamentals so that when there comes an opportunity to teach someone something we know or be an example to them, we don't miss the opportunity to do so.

   I know the Lord works with us, and I know that we're all going at our own pace in this life.  There is a different amount of knowledge that each person has at one time, and we should act as best we can on the knowledge we have.  Once we're given the opportunity to learn something good about the gospel, or even in school, let's be ready to practice it so that we'll really know it.  When the time comes, we can be there to teach someone else about it.