S13 || From Milk to Meat: Why Our Faith Shouldn’t Live on Baby Food || Hebrews 5:7-14 || Session 13

When the writer of Hebrews describes Jesus praying with loud cries and tears, he is revealing the beating heart of our faith. We meet a Savior who fully enters human suffering, stays faithful in agony, and finishes his mission so he can become the source of eternal salvation. That vision reframes our valleys: if Jesus Christ [Messiah] endured, we can endure in His strength.

We walk through Hebrews 5 to explore how the Son “learned obedience” and was “made perfect.” Not a correction of flaws, but the completion of His redemptive calling through real pain. We then address the tension many churches feel today: a hunger for comfort without an appetite for depth. The warning is blunt and loving—dull hearing keeps us on spiritual milk, while solid food is doctrine and theology that fortify our discernment. The payoff is practical: robust biblical teaching protects us from deception, anchors us when culture shifts, and trains our senses to distinguish good from evil.

Along the way, we ask hard questions about growth, courage, and responsibility. Why do so many believers remain infants when Scripture calls all of us toward maturity? How do everyday Christians become everyday teachers—guiding their family, friends, and small groups with clarity and conviction? We outline simple rhythms for moving from milk to meat: steady Scripture intake, honest prayer, intentional mentoring, and real-world obedience that turns knowledge into wisdom. You’ll leave with a clearer view of Jesus’ humanity and divinity, a renewed respect for theology’s role in daily life, and concrete steps to train discernment in a noisy world.

If this challenged or encouraged you, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs solid food, and leave a review to help others find these studies. Your support helps more people learn to reason through the Bible with depth and joy.

Chapters

• 0:20 Setting The Stage For Hebrews 5
• 1:16 Jesus’ Tears, Prayer, And True Humanity
• 3:13 Faithful Under Pressure: Gethsemane To The Cross
• 7:15 Learned Obedience And Perfected Mission
• 10:13 Faith And Obedience: Two Sides Of Salvation
• 10:39 Introduced To Melchizedek
• 11:01 Warning Against Dull Hearing
• 13:28 Milk Versus Solid Food
• 16:23 Why Leaders Must Speak Hard Truths
• 20:25 Every Believer As A Teacher
• 24:02 Desire For Solid Food And Real Growth
• 27:59 Doctrine As Protection From Deception
• 31:53 Training Senses To Discern Good And Evil
• 34:35 Practice, Perseverance, And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:20

We've been learning in the book of Hebrews that Jesus is both fully God and fully man. In today's lesson in chapter five of Hebrews, we're going to learn the implications of that and what it means for Jesus to be fully man and fully God. It's going to explore some wonderful teachings about our Lord, as the whole book does really. We are reasoning through the Bible. My name's Glenn. I'm here with Steve. We do verse-by-verse Bible study through the Word of God. If you're new to us, go to our website and you'll see their resources and all the other books that we do. We're here to train teachers so that you can go out in your small group and your church and teach others as well. So if you have your copy of the Word of God open to Hebrews chapter 5, starting in verse 7, Steve, can you read down to verse 10?

SPEAKER_01: 1:16

In the days of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his piety. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered. And having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation, being designated by God as a high priest according to the order of Melchizedek.

SPEAKER_00: 1:50

You know, there's some times in the Word of God where you're walking along and it's dry and dusty. Well, this is not one of those. This is one of those times where you're walking along through this section of scripture and it's so rich, the ground is so fruitful, and there's large gold nuggets just laying there in the pathway to be enjoyed and to be grasped. Let's go through this and you'll see how wonderful this teaching is. It starts out in verse 7 saying that Jesus, as fully human, then he can do things that only a human could do, loud crying and tears of supplication. Jesus was very emotional and passionate about what he was doing. So, Steve, when was Jesus in a position to offer up prayers with tears to the Father?

SPEAKER_01: 2:44

Well, this is speaking of his earthly life. Whenever he was here in the form of a fleshly body, that's the time period that he's talking about here. He was fully human and fully God. And in his fully human capacity, he had these types of characteristics and emotions where he was able to operate under.

SPEAKER_00: 3:09

He operated under these things his entire life because, again, he was fully human. But I always think of the night before he died, and when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane, he said, Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me in Matthew 26, 39. Remember, he was sweating blood during that time. He was in agony. He was in tears, lifting up supplications to the Father. Our Lord was passionate. He was emotional. He was fully human. He knew what it meant to cry in prayer to the Father. My friend, have you ever been at a low point where you're crying in tears to the Father? Well, Jesus was there before you. This is so wonderful. He can identify with us because he was there as well on his knees, crying in prayer to the Father. The writer here of the book of Hebrews knows the Old Testament, but he also knows the Gospels equally well. Apart from the cross, the night before he died in the garden was Jesus' most agonizing moment. In verse 7, it says he had loud crying and tears. Jesus experienced the depths of human agony. Steve, does Jesus know what it's like to feel our pain?

SPEAKER_01: 4:36

I think he absolutely does because of the description of what you just described in the Garden of Gethsemane. He was under such great stress that he sweated blood, which is a known condition under great stress that can happen to a human being. So I don't think there's any question that he knows and can relate to us in those times of stress and pressure and need that we have periodically in our lifetime.

SPEAKER_00: 5:04

The night before he died on the cross, he was in the Garden of Gethsemane. That was his most stressful moment apart from the cross. At his lowest moment, he stayed faithful. At his most agonizing time, he stayed faithful. Steve, when we are at our lowest moments, where can we get the strength to stay faithful?

SPEAKER_01: 5:27

Through Jesus' example, that's where I go to. And I see how faithful he was to the Father. And I also see how faithful he was to us to do that, to go to the cross and fully die for our sins and also be resurrected so that give us hope. That is the thing that I look to is Jesus' life, the message that he had, what he did and his death, burial, and resurrection on the cross, and the promises of eternal life that we have, all of those things just give me the ability to be able to go through those dark, dark valleys that we all sometimes go through. Again, I said, and that I have also faced myself on a few occasions. The highs of life are great, the mountaintops, but the lows are equally as bad as the highs are good. And being able to trust in Jesus Christ through both of those situations, to praise him on the highs and to go to him in supplication on the lows is something that is very comforting to the soul of a Christian.

SPEAKER_00: 6:39

As a human, he could feel the pain of humanity. My friend, I don't know what situation you're in now. Some of you out there, I'm sure, are in some pretty low times. My friend, as bad as it is, Jesus was there first. You have not suffered like he suffered, and he knows your pain. Go to him. He can help. He's the one that can help because he knows what it's like. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, whatever you're in now, you can stay faithful through that. How tremendous this is. In verse 8, Jesus says, learned obedience. So it brings up the question: how could Jesus learn anything? As God, Jesus could learn nothing, for he knew all things. God knows all things. As a man, Jesus could indeed learn things, such as what it is like to experience pain and suffering. As God, he knew everything factually there is to know about pain and suffering, but he could not know it as a man would. But when he became human, now he could experience it as a man would. Jesus knew all things as God, but only as a man could he experience things like a man would. Remember in Luke 2.40, it's speaking of when Jesus was growing up as a child, it says he grew in wisdom and stature. So even Christ could learn things, but he learned things in his human nature, not his divine nature. The divine nature was all-knowing, the human nature could learn things. Here it's really saying he learned obedience by completing it. Note that even Christ was obedient to the Father. We are asked to be obedient, and God asks no more of us than what Jesus did to submit and obey. Jesus knows about our human condition. But Jesus submitted and obeyed just as we should, and he's our example. Then in verse 9, it says, having been made perfect. Well, the idea here is the same as what we saw back earlier in the book. In Hebrews 2.10, it talks about the same idea. The idea is that Jesus, it's not that he was imperfect and then did something to make himself perfect. That's not the idea. The idea is that Jesus was made complete. He was made complete in the sense of perfection. Jesus' purpose was to come and die for our sins. So he was not complete until he actually did submit and die on the cross. Once he submitted and died, he completed or perfected his mission. How wonderful. Verse 9 also says that for all those who obey Christ, he is the source of our salvation. The question then arises: is it obedience that is the source of our salvation, or is it faith that is the source of our salvation? Well, the answer comes in comparing scripture with scripture. Hebrews 4, 3 says, We who have believed will enter the rest, which is our salvation. The crowd asked Jesus, quote, What shall we do so that we work the works of God? Jesus answered and said to them, This is the work of God that you believe in him who he has sent, unquote. That's in John 6, 28 and 29. Titus 3.8 says, quote, those who have believed God will be careful to engage in good deeds. And therefore we are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves is not alone. It always has works that follow it. We can rightfully say those who have believed will enter salvation, and those who obey will get the benefits of salvation because they go together. The saved people will obey. Then in verse 10, it mentions Melchizedek again. Steve, we're gonna meet this guy, Melchizedek, pretty soon.

SPEAKER_01: 10:46

Yeah, he's gonna come up over in chapter seven. There's gonna be a little bit more talked about by the writer. So we're gonna go into more detail when we get into chapter seven.

SPEAKER_00: 10:56

The next part of the chapter is still even richer ground. I'm reading in verse 11. Concerning him, we have much to say. That is Melchizedek. Concerning him, we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God. You have come to need milk and not solid food. For everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for the mature who, because of practice, have their senses trained to discern good and evil. Steve, what do you think of when you hear that passage?

SPEAKER_01: 11:48

I think of my children, and whenever they were young, growing up, the stages of their nutrition, where at the very first they drank milk, which was pure liquid, then it got into soft food where you would chop up or squish food into something that was very soft and palatable for them because their teeth were growing in. As that happened, then you would chop their food up so that they could eat it with their teeth that were coming in. Then you graduated to where they would actually bite into their food and get into this solid food for them to eat. That's what I'm thinking about there. It's a picture of a progression from very simple liquid form up into the very complicated situation of eating food where you have to cut it and bite into it and chew it up in order to then digest it and take it in and get the nutrition from it. That's what I'm think of whenever I see this type of a description.

SPEAKER_00: 12:59

He's very direct here with his audience. He's very direct and almost blunt writing to these Jewish Christians. Verses 11 and 12 is rather hard-hitting. And if we look at the end of verse 11 and end of verse 12, he gives some problems that this group has. What problems is he accusing this Hebrew audience of having?

SPEAKER_01: 13:23

He's accusing them of not progressing from the elementary principles which they have heard. And he says, you have dull hearing, which brings to my mind that they're hearing things, but they're not comprehending and they're not putting it into practice. Then he progresses into using the food analogy that I just spoke of. So he's accusing them of staying infants in the word of God, in the spirit, that they're not growing and maturing, so that they then in turn can teach their children or even other people about God and Jesus Christ in the proper way. It's not that they're just keeping it to themselves, they're just not progressing, they're not doing anything with it. It's almost like he's saying you're ambivalent to what you have and you're just kind of lazy and you're not taking it to the next level. You should be at this stage of teaching others, but you're not. The reason why is because you're dull of hearing, you're not taking it into action, and you're still at the milk stage of nutrition. You're not progressing to the other parts of nutrition to where you can really dig into the word of God and the concepts of Jesus Christ and who he is and what he's done for your life, so that you can pass it on to your fellow friends, neighbors, and the next generation.

SPEAKER_00: 14:53

Our translation has it here. You have become dull of hearing. Notice he says, become dull of hearing. The word there means sluggish or slow. What he's saying is that you have become lazy. You're not taking the energy into this that you should have. He's accusing them of being lazy in hearing the word of God. And the phrases he uses there is quote, need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles, unquote. Or the elementary principles are the first things, not the lesser things, but the elementary principles are just the things you learn first. They're still important. They're just the first things. These people had digressed to the point where they needed to go back and relearn the first things that they should have already learned a long time ago. They needed milk again because of laziness, because of sluggishness. He's trying to give them a hard, cold slap in the face to wake them up. Now, Steve, I don't see a whole lot of pastors today stand up on Sunday morning before their congregation and say, you guys are lazy and you're sluggish, and you should have been further along by now. And now I'm going to have to go back and reteach the things that you should have already learned. Now, why is it that we don't hear that message so much from our leaders today?

SPEAKER_01: 16:23

Possibly because they don't want to run the people off from their congregation, and possibly they don't want to diminish the giving on a monetary support that the people are to that congregation and to that church because you don't want to hurt their feelings. But really, if you want people to grow, just like you want your children to grow, you have to push them, you have to stretch them, you have to challenge them, and you have to point out to them the different areas that they lack judgment, skill, being able to make good decisions. If you're not doing that to the people that you're pastoring and shepherding and making sure that they're getting discipled, them just coming to services once a week and not getting involved in a small group or some of the other programs that you probably have in your church on midweek Wednesday, if they're not getting involved in that, then they're at risk of being like these Hebrews here, that they were dull of hearing, that they were lazy, and that they're staying in that milk stage. I can tell you that their life is not going to be one in which is going to be satisfactory to them. They're still going to have something that's missing until they realize I need to progress myself in my spiritual life. I need to dig into the word of God. I need to understand it better. And who better to push them that way than the pastors of our church and the people who are discipling them? So I'm not leaving it up just to the staff of the local church to do this on their own. We should be doing that because who is it that's closest to the people we are? We should be pushing and stretching those people that are out there and we can know are they getting into the word? Are they moving from milk into solid food or not? Are they having to go back and teach them again the elementary principles? Those are things that we can know ourselves, and we should not be leaving it just up to the staff of our local church. We should be engaging in that ourselves because we are part of the people that he's talking to here. We're the ones that should be taking this on to the next generation and teaching others.

SPEAKER_00: 18:54

These are indeed harsh words, but sometimes harsh words are very necessary. Sometimes harsh words are a needed and ultimately a good thing. If someone is ill and they go to the doctor, they need the doctor to tell them the truth. The doctor might have to look them in the eye and say, you are really in a bad spot and you need to change some things. You want that from your doctor. It's harsh words, sometimes painful words, but it's needed sometimes, raising a child. Sometimes we need to say harsh things to our child so that they'll mature. You don't want somebody 30 years old still acting like a three-year-old. In between there, in order to get them to act like an adult, you have to sometimes say some very direct things. Our pastors are not helping their congregation by failing to be direct about lack of spiritual growth. We need our leaders to be very direct. And this writer of Hebrews is doing exactly that. All Christians should grow in Christ and learn the deeper things about Him. We should not stay at the milk stage. The milk is quite important, especially to a young child, but you don't stay there. You move on to meat and potatoes and deeper things of the Lord. All Christians should meditate deeply on the word of God and learn the complex things that the Bible teaches. We should grow in Christ. Then in verse 12, they should have been more mature, but they've not matured. They seem to need to be taught the basic things over again. The writer's talking here about doctrine. He's talking about theology. Christians are expected to grow in the deeper knowledge of Christ. We should not always stay on the simple topics about Christ. He's telling the entire church that by now you should have been teachers. Now we contrast that with James 3:1 that says, let not many of you become teachers. Steve, in what sense should, like here in Hebrews, he said, you should have been teachers by now. He's saying that to the whole congregation, but in what sense should only a few be teachers? Well, the thing I think of is all of us should be able to communicate the basic things of the scriptures to a non-believer or to our family, should we not?

SPEAKER_01: 21:26

In the small group that I'm a member of, uh, a few weeks ago we were meeting, and what came out of that and the discussion that we were having was that there are a couple of other people in our classes that are having Bible studies that they're leading with other family members across the country via meetings online with just two or three or four people. They're members of our group, yet having these Bible studies with other people across the area. I think that's what he's talking about here and what you're alluding to. The teaching of other people should not just be limited to somebody in a formal sense or a formal setting. The teaching of a mature Christian is one of just passing it on to other family members or other people or local people. That can be done. That's considered teaching others. I don't think we should overlook the word that's used in verse 12 when it says, You have come to need milk and not solid food. That word need to me changes the latter part of this verse 12 in such a way that the people are needing milk. It's not just that they're drinking milk or taking it in, that's what they need. They're not getting to the point where they need solid food, meaning that they're not getting to the point where they're desiring solid food. They're just desiring the simple aspect of milk that they can just drink. It's easy to digest. They don't have to chew. They don't have to contemplate the word of God. They don't have to do anything. They can just basically sit and listen to it. He's saying that's what you need is that you're not getting to the point where you need solid food. We should be wanting that. We should be wanting to get to the point where we want solid food. We need that solid food. Why? Just as a body will be limited in its growth if it's only drinking milk or sustenance, juxtaposed to actually eating food, solid food, where the proteins are, where the body can actually grow and muscle can be strengthened, so is with us in the word of God and our study. We should be digging into more things of the word of God and looking into it. So if you're out there and you say, Well, I just don't understand the word of God. I don't understand whenever the pastor is up there preaching and what he's talking about, and I really don't understand what the teacher's talking about. Let me encourage you: the best way to study is verse by verse and also get involved with somebody. Take one of the other mature people in your class, maybe even the teachers in your church or in your class and ask them, hey, can you help me do some studying and meet with them? In our day and age, it's very easy to be able to do that. You don't have to meet in person. You can do it with both of you being in your home. The opposite side of that, if somebody comes and asks you, hey, can you help me kind of learn how to study something? Can you teach me how you do? Don't be afraid to teach them. Don't pass them off and say, Well, I'm not really qualified for that. You need to go talk to our class teacher. No, if somebody is approaching you, it's because they feel comfortable with you. They feel confident that you're going to be able to teach them something. And it's, I think, something that's being inspired maybe by the Holy Spirit for them to approach you. Don't turn it away, but embrace it and take them and say, This is what I do to study. It's only one way. There's other ways. Then that person as well, I'd encourage them maybe to go to somebody else and find out how they study. That is coming to a point where you need solid food. You're moving from the simple things of milk over into solid food and the study of scripture. I want to encourage the people that are listening and the people that are out there, move into the further deep things of scripture itself and study it. Our programs that we have here at Reasoning Through the Bible are really geared not just for other teachers to be able to teach others, but for people that can study on their own. We have study guides. You can go out, choose a book that you want to look at, and we go through our sessions and go through our study guides on your own. There's so many different ways that you can approach the word of God that are out there that if you're not taking advantage of them, then you're neglecting what's out there available to you. Just like the writer of Hebrews is giving to these people, he's giving them a cautionary warning. The same thing goes out to you if you're not progressing into the solid food of the Word of God.

SPEAKER_00: 26:36

In this section, he's contrasting the basic principles that he calls milk with the more advanced ones that he calls solid food. There's no doubt about what type of things fit into that category. It's the type of things that he's already been mentioning since chapter one, and the things that he's going to be mentioning later in this book. It's doctrine, it's theology, it's spiritual wisdom about the person of Jesus Christ, the theology about God and his nature and what type of work he does and how that interacts with people. It's learning about these deep things of the Lord. That's the solid food that he's talking about. He gives us a clue in the middle of verse 13 about what happens to people who only learn the milk teachings and don't get into the complex teaching. Steve, what does he say in the middle of 13 happens to those who stay in the milk stage?

SPEAKER_01: 27:40

He says that they remain infants, that they don't grow. Believe me, that's really not where anybody wants to be in their life, much less whenever they're trying to learn the things of God.

SPEAKER_00: 27:52

He says there they stay infants. And the exact phrasing he says is they are not accustomed to the word of righteousness. What you were saying a minute ago, Steve, is exactly true. They have come to need milk. And if you give them solid food, they can't digest it. They can't chew it. They should have been able to by now. It's like if you give a newborn baby really solid food, they're not accustomed to chewing it. They're not accustomed to digesting it. This congregation has regressed to the point where they can't digest the deeper things. Christianity is based on a simple childlike trust. That's the elementary principles it says. But we should not remain as spiritual babies. We are expected to mature and to learn the deeper things of the faith. And too many congregations stay at the milk stage. Too many teachers and leaders stay at the milk stage. Christians should spend the time learning the deeper concepts of the faith. The book of Hebrews has a lot of very deep concepts. Paul wrote deep theological truths in Romans and Colossians. These were written to every member of those churches, all of them. Every Christian is expected to at least be able to be in the process of learning the deep theological truths of the Bible. And yes, I know some of these are quite complex. You have to mentally wrestle with these things. That's what he's expecting you to do. Don't stay at the milk stage. Ephesians 4.14 says, quote, we are no longer to be children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness and deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into him who is the head, even Christ. Unquote. What happens to people? That are stuck at the milk stage. He told us there in that passage in Ephesians, you get blown around by every wind of doctrine. Somebody comes along with some new theological fad and you get deceived by it. The false teachers will trick you. Why do we have so many of our members of our churches that get sucked into the cults? Well, it's because they didn't get solid food in the church and they weren't taught the deeper things about Christ. They weren't taught doctrine, theology. Because, my friend, how do we keep people out of deceptive and heretical cults? We teach them doctrine, we teach them theology, we teach them the wisdom of the Christian life so that we know the difference between truth and error. A baby doesn't know the difference between truth and error, but a grown man or a grown woman should. Spiritual maturity will also include the wisdom of daily life that only comes from the scriptures and experiencing Christ. We are to mature in doctrine and theology, but sometimes we're to mature in experiencing him so that he can lead us through circumstances so that we know that he will be faithful and we know we can trust him in all of our actions. We should ask ourselves, each of us, am I mature in experiencing Christ personally? And Steve, here he contrasts in these verses, he says in verse 12, you have come to need milk again. And you should, in the next verse, be accustomed to the word of righteousness. He says how in the verse 14, he tells us how, the middle of verse turning, practice, have their senses trained to discern good and evil. How do we get to where we know the deeper things? It's by practice. Steve, how can we practice on solid spiritual food?

SPEAKER_01: 32:02

By getting into the word on a daily basis and not just doing it on one day of the week and maybe even two days of the week. Get into it yourself and learn it for yourself. The best way to be able to discern good and evil things to do is to get the word personally into you. And this goes back to what is he encouraging these people that he's writing to to do? They're getting pressure to go back under Judaism. In our case, as Gentiles in our day, the application would be for us to have pressure to go back into the worldly ways that we were once in. Going back is not good. Staying and going forward with the faith and the confession that we have made, as the writer has put before, and learning more, that's good. And that's how you do it. You can be able to discern going back is not good, going forward is good. The more you get into the word of God, the greater you're going to be able to have the confidence to be able to stay the course.

SPEAKER_00: 33:09

How does a professional athlete or a professional warrior get to be good at what they do? They get it by training. And that's what it says here in verse 14: because of practice, they have their senses trained to discern good and evil. How do you get to the point where you can not be deceived by false teachers? Well, it's by spending time in the Word of God, spend time learning more about the Word of God. You have to spend effort. 1 Corinthians 3 talks about a similar idea. There, Paul says, quote, I, brethren, could not speak to you as to a spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you were not yet able to receive it, unquote. That's 1 Corinthians 3, verses 1 and 2. My friends, we should all be spending more time training ourselves in the Word of God so that we can digest solid food, so that we're not blown around by every wind of doctrine, so that we're not deceived by false teachers, so that we know the deeper things and that we can train others in these things. My goodness, how profound these teachings are.

SPEAKER_01: 34:28

What's the old saying, Glenn, practice makes perfect or complete? That's what he's referring to here, I think.

SPEAKER_00: 34:35

We're gonna have to stop here because of time, but I trust that you will take all these things to heart. And we'll be back again next time as we continue to reason through the book of Hebrews. Thank you so much for watching and listening.

SPEAKER_01: 34:48

May God keep you and bless you.