Good morning and good Thursday. Today we’re going to launch right into it. Hebrews chapter 5 is before us and what a great study it is. Let’s start it out with one word….Algebra. There, now I did it. I just sent you running from the room with screams of terror trailing behind you. Laptops were shut, monitors turned off and brains shut down at the mere mention of the word….Algebra. Let me give you brief history of Algebra and Dan Potter.
It started in Crandall, Texas in the 9th grade. Nowadays I think kids are studying algebra in junior high, but not so back then. For some reason they thought that this train wreck should be reserved for high school. (Like there’s not already enough mental trauma in High School) I sat through the first 6 weeks with a dull stare on my face looking for the hidden camera, thinking surely this was some kind of cruel joke. What was this stuff. What genius decided that math wasn’t hard enough and decided to put letters in with the numbers? I struggled through that year. I think it was the first “C” I had ever gotten up to that point and it was a grim foreshadowing of the many more ominous showdowns that algebra and I would have in the future. I somehow managed to plow through Algebra 2 in high school, although with a fair amount of mental scarring that shows up any time I see the letter x or y.
Fast forward a few years. The University of Texas at Arlington. A stark white classroom filled with students that all looked like they were about to get root canals with no Novocain. College Algebra I. Now let me just say this, I thought that just because I had 2 years of Algebra in high school that I would be prepared for the onslaught of algebra at the college level. Not so much. I dropped the class the first 6 weeks due to having a GPA that hovered near freezing. Ouch. I licked my wounds, gathered my strength and decided to go back in for round two next semester. Well, it went about the same, another dizzying array of numbers and letters and test grades that would ruin any resume. Algebra 2, Dan 0.
Fast forward 8 years, no college degree and of course no more college algebra. I was happy yet I was sad. I wanted to finish my degree passionately but what to do with College Algebra? I made up my mind. At 28 years young I was going back to finish my Senior year and in that, Freshman year algebra. At that time, I was living and working as a regional manager in San Angelo, Texas, the home of Angelo State University. I enrolled, one of the classes being algebra. I picked up my text book and dragged it home. Once home I sat it on the table and just peered at it. It was one of the best staring matches ever recorded. To this day I think it might be in the SCHOF (Staring Contest Hall of Fame) I stared that book down. It was him or me. I was determined, this time would be different. Something happens when you “make up your mind.” Something happens when you commit yourself, when you “make a decision.”
I applied myself greatly during those two semesters of College Algebra I and II. I did things with math that I never knew I could do. In fact, to this day, I have all of my tests in a box somewhere. I pulled them out when we moved to Hawaii and just gazed. It was so foreign to me. It made not one bit of sense. How can that be? I knew it well enough to get A’s in both classes at the time but now it was just as foreign as that Freshman year and the first time I had ever fixed my eyes upon the 'evil math.' I knew it and then over the course of life, the knowledge just faded away. Where did it go? I stopped studying and stopped practicing and the ability to solve complex equations, not being used, slipped away like a ship in the night.
By now, I know you’re all saying, “Dan has finally lost it. The 5MC is a Bible study and he’s ranting about Algebra like he’s lying on a couch in a shrink’s office.” Well hold on. There’s a tie in.
This morning in chapter 5 of Hebrews I came across this verse:
“We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.” Heb 5:11-14
Let’s break down this verse before we get into the tie in. Notice that it starts with “We have much to say about this .” Who is the We? Paul is writing this inspired by the Holy Spirit. Also in chapter 5 He speaks of Christ, the priest Melchizedek as well as all the priesthood. This is not one man writing his feelings or beliefs. He is writing inspired. Inspired by God and the men of God.
He goes on to say that it’s just flat out hard to teach them the Word of God because they’re just not even trying to understand it. The ESV version says they have dull ears. You see they were hearing but they weren’t…they had ear problems.
Drum roll…here comes the tie-in. Think back to Dan sitting in college algebra as a Freshman at UTA. I knew that I needed that class. I knew those credits were needed to ultimately get me my degree. But did I WANT to take the class. Oh, absolutely not! If you were to jump in a DeLorean and time machine back to that class, I could have easily named over 10,000 places I would have rather been. (#1 was on my awesome Jet-Ski!) You see the reason I didn’t pass those first two classes was not a head problem. I passed them later with an A. It wasn’t a motivation issue, I enrolled, payed hard-earned cash for the class and showed up on time. It was an ear issue. I was dull of hearing.
Know let’s do something fun. Let’s substitute college algebra with the Word of God. How do we approach the Word of God? Does any of my story ring true with your journey with the Word of God? I know it does with me. Since I got saved at 20, I have always had Bibles around. Somebody even gave me one with my name on the front....in gold. I have carried that thing around everywhere. In fact, I’m a little embarrassed to say, but I think that I have probably spent more time carrying it around than I have reading it. You see there’s a parallel between my Bible and my college algebra textbook. A parallel to that world famous staring match that took place years ago. We keep bibles close to us. We carry it to church and put it under our arm and walk all over the sanctuary, making sure everybody sees it. We have big fancy top grain leather bibles with our names or motivational sayings on the front. But is it a textbook to us? How do we feel about the contents? Do we look at it like algebra? Hard to understand, confusing and having little application in the ‘real’ world?
I know of so many, including myself years ago, that would work and play all week and then roll into church with my Bible and sit through the service with dull ears. Just like my early days in Algebra class. I was there because I needed to be, but I had an ear problem.
Paul moves on to rebuke the “dull hearers” and say that they should be teaching by now, but because of the ear problem they are stagnant in their growth in God’s Word. They are merely taking up a pew every Sunday. Instead of contributing they are simply existing.
Now Paul moves onto an analogy that is used in at least three different books in God’s Word. (1 Cor 3:1-2, 1 Pet 2:1-2, here) The believer and the food they consume. Babies drink milk, adults eat solid food. Little babies cannot handle anything but a liquid diet. Babies can’t feed themselves they need someone else to do it. They either have someone give them a bottle or somebody makes airplane noises as they coerce them into eating those last few bites of pureed carrots. (no wonder they wont eat it) Are you getting the picture here? Think about the Christians with dull ears, with ear problems. They are showing up to church on Sundays expecting to be fed. Fed by their Sunday School teacher, fed by their Pastor, fed by the church staff. And even in some cases if they don’t get what they want, they cry like babies! My friends, let me say this with love. You should be spending so much time in God’s Word through the week that you should be able to teach the Pastor something on Sunday mornings! You should have such knowledge and confidence in God’s Word because of your study time in it, that you should be able to teach the Sunday School class this Sunday, not sleep through it.
So, if you have this type of knowledge in God’s Word, guess what? Yep, you’re not on milk, you’re on the solid food of God’s Word. You’re eating a big thick porterhouse, not having someone give you a bottle. Paul in using this analogy, really hits close to home. What spiritual food are you eating today?
If you’re honest with yourself and say that you are not enjoying the diet of God’s Word that you should, you can change your diet today. Start with the way you view God’s Word. It’s not just a book. It’s not just stories, history and long, hard-to-pronounce names, its living. We saw just yesterday in Hebrews 4, that God’s Word is living and active, it cuts, it infiltrates our soul, spirit and flesh and discerns our heart. (Heb 4:12) It is the living Word of God and it can and will change your life.
Back to my algebra experience. Something changed within me when I changed the way I saw that textbook. I no longer just read it. I no longer just carried it to and from class. I STUDIED IT. My friends, if I could say one prayer for you today, it would be that you would stop reading God’s Word and start STUDYING it. If you’re gonna pass the algebra test, you’ve gotta study…hard. It’s no different with God’s Word. If you want to really know God’s Word, you have to study it.
Here’s another tie-in. This one is free, no charge. As I sit today and write this jesting look at my algebra experience, guess how much algebra I can do? Yep, that would be a big fat ZERO. I bet you I could barely even solve the simplest algebraic equation today. What happened? Well, I stopped studying it. When I passed the class, I sold my textbook to the bookstore (probably for $5) and I stopped studying it. It’s like the old saying goes, “if you don’t use it, you lose it.” If you say, “I used to study the bible all the time” or “I used to go to BSF every Wednesday”, let me say that if you’re not regularly studying God’s Word, the wisdom and knowledge within will slowly slip away just like my college algebra did. That’s life and that’s our brain. It’s how we’re built.
We are in the class of life and God’s Word is our textbook. Study it daily and when the tests and trials come, God will see to it that you pass with flying colors.
I pray that you are willing today to see God’s Word as what it really is. A living collection of knowledge, wisdom, peace and joy that can change your life, change your world and change your soul. All you need to do to claim these, is study it.
God bless you in your journey with God.
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