As we mature in faith, certain perspectives we had about God often do develop, but the spiritually immature are marked by instability. With each new book or blog post they read, they change their views whichever way the wind is blowing. As we grow up in that gospel, the waves and winds of weird doctrines don’t knock us down as they once did.

Faithfully going to church doesn’t automatically make you a mature Christian. I’d never discourage you from being in church every Sunday, but hearing the word isn’t the same thing as heeding it. I fear that some believers, despite their ability to articulate true things about God, are not progressing in Christian maturity. Real gospel growth depends on a right understanding of God, and it manifests itself in the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-24). It is possible to be in a church with sound teaching for many years and have stunted growth, though. The author to the Hebrews lamented that after several years of solid biblical teaching, his audience still had not progressed much in their Christian life. He wrote,

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, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil. (Heb. 5:12-14)

Picture a grown man, who should be teaching others, drinking out of a sippy cup and re-enrolling in pre-school. Spiritually speaking, that’s how the author to the Hebrews described the recipients of his letter. They had been under the ministry of the word for a long time, but tragically they remained children. Has the same thing happened to you?

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