Spiritual Growth

1 Corinthians 3:1-2 And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. ² I have fed you with milk, and not with meat (solid food): for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.

In the spiritual realm, as well as in the physical, everyone loves a baby. But the joy that fills the hearts of loving parents is turned to bitter sorrow and disappointment if their babe fails to grow. The latter condition is as unspeakably sad while the former is joyous.

Just so it is in the realm of the spirit. The “carnal” (fleshly) Christian is one who is “yet carnal” (1Cor 3:3 below) and has failed to grow. He continues in a state of protracted infancy, still a lover of “self” and the things of “this world (Gk. aion, age),” the things of this corrupt age. Paul says such a one must be kept exclusively on a babe’s milk diet because, though perhaps a saved Christian for years, he is still unable to “bear,” or digest, solid food, still also unskillful in the Word” and needing to be taught the elementary things.

Retarded spiritual growth is evidenced in many ways, all of which come under the heading of carnality or fleshliness. The Corinthians, so sternly rebuked for their carnality by the Apostle Paul, are said to have been careless about morals (I Cor. 5:1), puffed up (1 Cor. 4:18; 5:2), inconsiderate of each other (I Cor. 6:1-7; 8:1,9,12), stingy (2 Cor. 8:6-11; 11:7-9). While possessing the “Spirit of Christ,” they yet walked in accord with the desires of their sinful “flesh.”

One of the most marked indications of retarded spiritual growth is self-interest and divisive strife, as seen in the case of the Corinthian believers (below). They were spiritually small and petty, so that the Apostle had to write to them:

“For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men? “For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?” (I Cor. 3:3, 4)

Thus Peter’s exhortation to “newborn babes” to “desire the pure milk of the Word” that they may “grow thereby,” is prefaced by the words: “Wherefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings” (1 Pet 2:1). The carnal nature is not appropriate soil for spiritual growth.

The “pure milk of the Word” is the food and sustenance for all believers for their everyday diet. But eventually then they may progress to the “meat” or the solid food of the Word of God that they may grow thereby. It is a shame that the members of “the body of Christ” today are so poorly fed by the religious systems of the church at large. Their appetite has become so tainted with the artificial sweeteners of false “feel good” teaching that attracts and feeds the fleshy soul-self. They are starved of the nourishing truth of “the Word.” It is “the god of the world” (Satan) attracts men, including believers, with and to the things “of this world.”

2 Corinthians 4:4 In whom “the god of this world” (Satan) hath blinded the minds of them which believe (trust) not (in the Lord), lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.

Ephesians 2:2 Wherein in time past ye (believers at Ephesus ) walked according to the course of this world, according to the “prince of the power of the air” (Satan), the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:

The wisdom to be gained of the Lord via His written Word is able to save us eternally and also save our lives daily in such a way that we may live with rest and peace in our hearts

1 Corinthians 3:19 ^For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.

1 Corinthians 2:6 Howbeit we (Paul and his associates) speak wisdom among them that are perfect (complete): yet NOT the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought: