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Babes Need Care
Our past mistakes have contributed to an anemic, dwarfed discipleship. The saddest mistake of all is baptizing a believer in Christ and then leaving him to struggle with temptations and perplexing questions alone. That is nothing short of cruel and inhuman treatment.
Our society rises up in arms when it hears of starving children, terrorists' bombings and violations of human rights but Christians dispassionately watch new-born babes in Christ slowly die from malnutrition or suffocate from the stifling smokescreen of error and pacify their conscience by saying, "Well, I guess they just were not the proper kind of soil."
It is not enough to cause a person to be drawn to God by teaching (John 6:44-45; 2 Thessalonians 2:14) and then think that that new-born babe in Christ can grow without the sincere milk of the word and our personal nurturing (1 Peter 2:1). Would we ever be so hard and cruel as to expect an infant to come to the table and eat with the family? Would we ever say to a baby, "The food is HERE, come and get it?"
The analogy is not perfect but is that not what is done when we say to a new convert, "You are now supposed to come to Bible study and assemble with the brethren to worship," but we deny him the needed daily care and feeding essential to his existence and growth? Surely, he needs to worship with the saints (Hebrews 10:25; Acts 20:7; 2:42), but he needs the daily care and feeding supplied by ALL the disciples as well.
There can be no substitute for the caring, sharing and feeding when the spiritual appetite is strong, fresh and keen. However, if the new-born brother experiences instead, indifference and negligence, BEWARE, for he will become like the examples he sees -- what a pitiful state to wish upon anyone. May it never be so!
Each brother and sister in Christ has a responsibility to help the weak -- "We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification," (Romans 15:1-2). The paradox is that the more we care, encourage and teach new converts, the stronger we become as well, for spiritual strength on the part of all grows as it is nurtured ...DAILY. -- Jim R. Everett
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