Pastors are men atop a watchtower. They keep awake, while others sleep. The Holy Spirit has placed them there to oversee the church. They scan the darkness; they have a horn to alarm the people of noiseless foes and distant lanterns.

The good pastor descends from Ezekiel.

Son of man, I have made [you] a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you shall give them warning from me. If I say to the wicked, O wicked one, you shall surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from his way, that wicked person shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. (Ezekiel 33:7–8)

He alarms the people against their dearest enemy: their own sin. He alerts them of more than heresy and wolves and Satan, but of God. The Holy One is coming; are they ready? If the pastors blow no trumpet, how will those unprepared not die unthoughtfully in their sins? They were elevated to see and to speak and to give the alarm. When pastors tell them about what they do not wish to hear, we do so to save their lives (Ezekiel 3:18).

God branded this image of the watchman upon the apostle’s soul. In his farewell speech to fellow pastors in Ephesus, Paul lifts up his hands: “I testify to you this day that I am innocent of the blood of all, for I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God” (Acts 20:26–27). Paul did not shrink back from the hardest parts of Scripture. He stood up straight, and if anything would profit their souls, he taught it without apology (Acts 20:20). And as he did, he called his fellow pastors to the watchtower with him:

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. (Acts 20:28)

The Discomforter

Brothers in ministry, have we withheld some of God’s counsel to sinners and saints? I feel tempted to. How easy it is to downplay God’s holiness, evil’s contortedness, humanity’s sunkenness, sin’s deceitfulness. How subtle to laugh off death’s suddenness, hell’s foreverness, Christ’s exclusiveness, judgment’s nearness. How comfortable to never lay siege to flinty hearts; to leave the scalpel outside the operatory. Few will complain.

Though we desire to give hope, comfort, and satisfaction to our people, we must not do so unlawfully. We have different ministries, temperaments, and ways of saying things — but we preach the same Bible. The Holy Spirit who inspired the Scriptures is clearly not only a Comforter, but first a Discomforter. He convicts the world of sin, righteousness, and coming judgment when we faithfully preach his word (John 16:8–11) — his word that “is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16–17). And he charges his messengers not to shrink back.

Our focus is Jesus Christ — “him we proclaim . . .” And how do we proclaim him? “. . . warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ” (Colossians 1:28). Far from being irrelevant, warnings serve the church to present everyone mature in Christ. We want everlasting happiness and comfort and satisfaction in God for our people. And God has issued sacred cautions to help us all safely home.

Thornless Roses

The first way to deal falsely with souls, then, would be to withhold the warning to the wicked or the lapsing: “If you continue in this way, you shall surely die.” The second, more subtle way would be to yell indiscriminately from the tower, “You all shall surely live!” In other words, to hand out the conditional promises of God unconditionally. The first withholds rough words; the second hands out precious promises to anyone who happens to hear them.

Imagine you are assigned to preach the incomparable Romans 8:28: “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” How would you preach this?

This preacher would spend all his time tasting the honey. “All things work together for good. All things. Who has thought too much about this promise or flew above its clouds? Only begin to wrap your heart around the good that God is sailing your all things toward, and it would burst for joy.” The problem is not what he teaches, but what he does not teach. If his set pattern is to overlook the conditions, we have found a mortal wiser than God. In reality, he takes a knife to the promises and hands out thornless roses. Two thorns lay on the ground: “For those who love God . . . for those who are called according to his purpose.”

What does it mean to love God? Do I love God? He will not think to ask or tell. What is this calling and this purpose? He does not say. He skips ahead to the promise; he wants good for them, and he will hop the fence to give it to them. To him, the text simply says, “God works all things for good.”

A Book of Conditions

Despite our mixed motives, it is never safe to abridge God’s word. Such consistent oversight in your preaching will ring hollow for all students of Scripture and allow the enemy to smirk past your tower in broad daylight. Consider how many promises of our great inheritance post conditions at their gates.

“God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

To the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness. (Romans 4:5)

“You are my friends if you do what I command you.” (John 15:14)

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:3)

If by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. (Romans 8:13)

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked. (Psalm 1:1)

As a father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear him. (Psalm 103:13)

“To the one who conquers I will grant to eat of the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.” (Revelation 2:7)

[God will] present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel. (Colossians 1:22–23)

The promise that God uses all pains, groans, tears, setbacks, cancers, miscarriages, tragedies as winds to blow his people to the eternal harbor is not for mere sermon-hearers, nice neighbors, or religious hobbyists. It is offered to them through repentance of their sin and faith in Jesus Christ, but it is only possessed by those who love God and are called according to his purposes.

God Meets His Conditions

Does this make our salvation conditional? Some aspects of salvation are; some not. God elects unconditionally (Ephesians 1:4–5). He causes us to be born again unconditionally (John 3:7–8; Titus 3:5). Other conditions that we experience below — repentance, faith, love, holiness, and so on — God gives or empowers his people to meet.

And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ. (Philippians 1:6)

Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:12–13)

And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. (Ezekiel 36:27)

An ocean exists between preaching a works-based religion (a false religion) and preaching God’s utter, sovereign grace in our salvation along with his warnings and conditions. We must preach the latter. Everyone is not a Christian who sits in a pew; everyone is not on a Christian journey; everyone is not a child of God; everyone is not a recipient of every kind word of Scripture because they chose to come to church that Sunday. We must not lie and flatter, casting gospel pearls indiscriminately before swine.

Innocent

Charles Spurgeon once said from his own watchtower,

Our ministry ought always to be a killing as well as a healing one — a ministry which kills all false hopes, blights all wrong confidences, and weeds out all foolish trusts, while at the same time it trains up the feeblest shoot of real hope, and tends comfort and encouragement even to the weakest of the sincere followers of Christ. Do not, then, be needlessly alarmed about our ministry. Just give us plenty of elbow-room to strike right and left. . . . To our own Master we stand or fall, but to no one else in heaven or on earth. (The Weeding of the Garden)

Men of God, put forth the Lord Jesus Christ in all his beauty; lift their souls to the gates of glory. Be the man to tarry in God’s presence, a man who can train up the feeblest shoot of real hope, declaring, Behold your God! And love their souls enough, love Christ enough, love God’s word enough to wound proud unbelief, favorite sins, and respectable worldliness — to kill false hopes, blight all wrong confidences, and weed out foolish trusts.

You do not have to be your people’s best friend, but you need to be their pastor. You have a high and noble office. Do not shrink back because God’s remedies are sometimes rougher than you (and your people) would prefer. Handle the promises with care, speak plainly with them about sin as you point repeatedly to the all-sufficient Savior. And be free from assuming you’ve been arrogant because you find yourself asking Paul’s question, “Have I then become your enemy by telling you the truth?” (Galatians 4:16).

We are watchmen of souls. At times, we will misjudge or overreact or raise the alarm at shadows we thought were soldiers — ask for forgiveness. As far as it goes with you, perform the watchman’s work with joy and sobriety as those who will soon come down from the tower to give an account for how you kept watch over souls. May we be able to truthfully say on that day, “I am innocent of the blood of all.”

I was watching the Super Bowl this past February, expecting to see the newest commercials from Doritos and Budweiser and Coca-Cola, when this unusual music began to play. On the screen were still shots of kids doing adorable things — helping each other, hugging each other, wrapping arms around the family dog. At the end, the words came up,

Jesus didn’t want us to act like adults. . . . He gets us.

It was a heartwarming riff on Jesus’s teaching about being childlike. I liked it. This is the Super Bowl, with hundreds of millions of people watching, and a 30-second spot comes up commending Jesus. I love Jesus. I worship Jesus. Yeah, let’s commend Jesus.

Then another spot came up in the second half. Harsher music. Pictures of adults demonstrating manifest outrage and hatred, in each other’s faces. Sometimes it’s a physical altercation. All of it from the last three years. Then the message:

Jesus loved the people we hate. . . . He gets us.

And my response was, Ouch and yes.

The ads are from a non-profit looking to “put Jesus in the middle of culture.” They paid $20 million for the Super Bowl ads and plan to spend $3 billion in the coming years.

So, I’ve seen more of these “He gets us” ads in recent months. Sometimes, I like them. Other times, I cringe a little, concerned it will give a skewed impression of Jesus.

Jesus was judged wrongly.Jesus had strained relationships.Jesus welcomes the weird.Jesus was fed up with politics.Jesus invited everyone to sit at his table.Jesus chose forgiveness.

Then last week I took my twin sons to their first Minnesota Wild hockey game at the X, and now there’s a hockey “He gets us” on the thin digital screens around the side of the arena: “Jesus had great lettuce, too.” “Lettuce” means hockey hair. (I had to ask my boys for help on that.) I don’t want to be too picky, but I wonder if “great lettuce” might represent some mission drift for the “He gets us” campaign. Admittedly, it doesn’t speak to me personally like it would if it said, “Jesus was losing his hair, too.”

Hebrews 2 is a “he gets us” passage. But it’s also clear that he not only gets us, but he helps us. He rescues us. Saves us. Getting us is good; as we’ll see, that can lead to real, genuine help for us in our need. But getting us, on its own, doesn’t do a whole lot for us. Yes, he gets us. He really does. And this is a slice of what we celebrate in Advent. But there’s no real joy in Advent if he only gets us and doesn’t also help us, save us, change us, lift us up. In Advent, we celebrate that he became man, fully human like us, not just to be one of us, but to save us.

Our Pioneer and Champion

Hebrews 2:10 has a name for Jesus that I’ve come to love, and it’s hard to find an equivalent word for it in English. The ESV has founder: God “make[s] the founder of [our] salvation perfect through suffering.” Founder is a good translation, but I want to fill out the meaning for us a little bit.

The Greek word is archegos, and it’s built on the word archē, which means “beginning.” So archegos, we might say, is “the originator” or “the beginner.” The problem is we mean something else by “beginner” in English: “a person just starting to learn a skill or take part in an activity.” Jesus is not a “beginner” in that sense. Rather, he’s a “beginner” in the sense that he’s the leader who goes first and others follow him. Like a pioneer. This archegos, however, doesn’t just go first into uncharted territory, but into battle. So “champion” or “hero” could be a good translation of archegos as well.

Again, we don’t just stand back and watch this champion fight from afar. We’re connected to him and come with him. He doesn’t just fight for us; he leads the charge, and we follow in his wake. So, Jesus as our archegos, is both our hero and example. He is “the beginner” in that he births the people, and he leads us into the battle, and he rescues us through faith in him, and then he also inspires us as our model to follow. We benefit from what he does for us (and couldn’t do for ourselves), and yet in his work for us, he opens up a path that we might follow in his steps.

And Advent is where our “beginner” begins, so to speak. That is, Advent is the beginning of his humanity, and his getting us, saving us, and helping us. But Advent is not the beginning of his person. So, let’s walk with Hebrews chapter 2 through the Advent drama of our “beginner,” our “champion,” from the very beginning until now. There are four distinct stages here in the drama of Hebrews 2 — four movements in the story of Advent.

1. Jesus Did Not Start Like Us

Our champion, our “beginner,” did not begin like we did. His person was not created like ours. He is a divine person, the second person of the eternal Threeness. His humanity was created, conceived in Mary’s womb and born in Bethlehem, but not his person.

The book of Hebrews begins with glimpses of his godhood. Before any world existed, he existed and was “appointed the heir of all things” (Hebrews 1:2). Then through him God (the Father) made the world. “He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature” — he is distinct from the Father in his person and same as his Father in divine nature. “And,” verse 3 adds, “he upholds the universe by the word of his power” — as only God can do.

So, the story of Advent begins before time, before creation, before “the beginning.” Jesus himself is God, and if you have eyes to see his divinity, it’s all over the New Testament.

Greg Lanier, in his recent book Is Jesus Truly God?, shows how the deity of Christ shines on just about every page in the New Testament:

He is preexistent before Advent, and before creation.
He is the unique “Son” of the heavenly Father, eternally begotten.
He is called “Lord,” which refers to God’s Old Testament covenant name (Yahweh).
He receives worship.
He relates to the Father and Spirit in ways that reveal his person as one of the divine Threeness.

So, let’s get this clear before we talk about his humanity and how he gets us. In Jesus, a man did not become God. Rather, God became man. We say that Jesus is fully God and fully man in one person, but we do not mean that he became God and man at the same time. There is a profound asymmetry in the story of the God-man: he has been God for all eternity, and he became man at the first Christmas.

2. Jesus Was Made Like Us

Now we come to his first Advent and the first Christmas, when God made God in the image of God. Without ceasing to be God, God the Son took on humanity. He added humanity to his divine person.

Humanity, as a created nature, is “compatible” with the uncreated divine nature. Deity and humanity are not a zero-sum game. The divine Son did not have to jettison any eternal deity (as if that’s even possible) to take on humanity. Uncreated deity and created humanity operate at different levels of reality, so to speak. Without ceasing, in any way, to be fully God, the Son took on our full created nature and became fully human. As Hebrews 2:17 says, he was “made like his brothers in every respect.” Look at verses 11–14:

“For he who sanctifies” (Jesus) “and those who are sanctified” (us) “all have one source” (that is, one nature). “That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, ‘I will tell of your name to my brothers; in the midst of the congregation I will sing your praise.’ And again, ‘I will put my trust in him.’ And again, ‘Behold, I and the children God has given me.’ Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things . . .

We’ll come back to finish verse 14, but let me just say about these Old Testament quotations in verses 13–14 that Pastor Jonathan explained them so well in a previous sermon as pointing to Jesus’s solidarity with us in our suffering.

“Flesh and blood” in verse 14 refers to our humanity. We are flesh and blood, and so Jesus became one of us — to which Hebrews 4:15 adds, “without sin.” Sin is not an essential part of what it means to be human. Jesus was fully human, made like us in every respect, and “without sin.” So, then, what’s included in this “every respect” of our humanity? What does it mean for Jesus to be fully human, like us?

One of the biggest moments in the collective formation of early Christians in saying what the Scriptures teach about the humanity of Christ is a church council called Chalcedon in 451 AD. The Chalcedonian Creed says Jesus is “perfect in Godhead and also perfect in manhood; truly God and truly man, of a rational soul and body.”

Jesus has a fully human body. He “became flesh,” which means at least a human body. He was born and grew and grew tired. He became thirsty and hungry. He suffered, and he died. And his human body was raised and glorified, and he sits right now, on heaven’s throne, in a risen, glorified human body.

But becoming fully human also involved taking “a rational soul,” or “the inner man,” including human emotions. He marveled. He expressed sorrow. “He was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled” and he wept (John 11:33–35). And he rejoiced and was happy. John Calvin memorably summed it up, “Christ has put on our feelings along with our flesh.”

A “rational soul” also includes a human mind (in addition to his divine mind). So, Jesus “increased in wisdom” as well as in stature (Luke 2:52), and most strikingly, he says about the timing of his second coming, “Concerning that day or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Mark 13:32). With respect to his humanity, and his human mind, there are things he does not know. His human knowledge is limited, like all human minds. Yet, at the same time, for this unique two-natured person of Christ, he also knows all things with respect to his divine mind. As one-natured humans, this is beyond our experience and ability to understand, but divine and human minds are compatible. And this is no contradiction for the unique person of Christ, but one of his unique glories.

So too with his human will, in addition to the divine will. Jesus says, “I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me” (John 6:38). Jesus, speaking with respect to his human will, says that he came “not of [his] own will” but his Father’s. And that divine will, while not proper to his humanity, is proper to his person as God. When he prays in Gethsemane, “Not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39), he aligns his human will with the divine will, which also is his as God.

So, Jesus has a fully human body and emotions and mind and will. And verse 11 says, “That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers.” He is not ashamed to call you brother (or sister). Jesus could have been a brother in our nature, and yet ashamed to call us his brothers. But mark this, he is not that kind of brother. He’s not ashamed of his siblings. He’s not worried that our weaknesses and immaturities, or even our follies, will mar his reputation. He’s not stuck with us and embarrassed by them.

That’s not how Jesus is with me, and with us. I want to be like Jesus is with me. I want to be like this as a dad, and be like this as a friend, and be like this as a pastor: not mainly concerned about how others’ behavior reflects on me, but mainly concerned about my brother or sister in Christ, so that I can be loving, rather than self-focused — especially in the moments when love is needed most.

3. Jesus Suffered Like Us

Being fully human, he suffered both with us and for us.

Suffering is an important aspect of his being fully human, and saving us in his full humanity. If he was only God, he could not suffer. God is “impassible,” unable to be afflicted or be moved from outside. But not humanity. So, Jesus becoming fully human involved not only a human body and reasoning human soul, emotions, mind, and will, but he also entered as man into our fallen world, which is under the curse of sin. And even though he himself was not a sinner, he was, as a creature, susceptible to the afflictions, assaults, sufferings, and pains of our world. He entered into our suffering, and did so in two senses.

One, he suffered with us. He knows what it’s like to suffer in created flesh and blood. And verse 10 says that he was made “perfect through suffering.” This language of “perfect” or “complete” is important in Hebrews. Verse 10 doesn’t mean that Jesus was imperfect, or sinful, but that he was made ready, or made complete, for his calling, as our champion and High Priest, through his suffering. Having become man, he was not yet complete, not yet ready, but needed to be made ready, complete, “perfect” through suffering. Hebrews 5:8–9 says,

Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him.

Which leads, then, to a second sense in which he suffered: for us. Not only does he, as man, suffer with us, but he, as the God-man, suffers for us — in our place, in our stead. This leads us to the connection between suffering and death. Verse 9 introduces “the suffering of death” (of Jesus suffering and dying for us): “by the grace of God he [tasted] death for everyone.” Jesus not only experienced suffering with us but for us. He not only gets us, but saves us, and that “through death.”

Now look at the rest of verse 14 and verse 15, and two achievements of Jesus for us through this human suffering of death at the cross. Pick it up in the middle of verse 14: Jesus shared in our humanity “that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery.” The first achievement through his human death is that he defeated Satan. His suffering unto death conquers the one who had the power of death.

We should not forget this as a Christmas theme: “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8). How? “He appeared in order to take away sins” (1 John 3:5). They go together. Jesus destroys the devil by taking away sins. The weapon Satan had against us was unforgiven sin, “the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.” But through the suffering of death, Jesus “set [this] aside, nailing it to the cross” and in so doing, God “disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in [Jesus]” (Colossians 2:14–15).

So, the first achievement is destroying Satan, and second in Hebrews 2:15 is delivering us. How? We might expect what follows in verse 17, but not expect the next verse. Verse 17 gives us one reason that he had to be made like us in every respect:

so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

We had sinned and needed covering before the holy God. We had a “record of debt that stood against us” because we were humans with sin. So, to rescue us, God needed not only to become fully man, and suffer with us, but suffer for us, unto death, that his death might be for us, his brothers, the death we deserved for our sins. That’s what it means when the high priest “[makes] propitiation for the sins of the people.” The people’s sin against the holy and infinitely worthy God deserves his righteous, omnipotent wrath. And in becoming human, and suffering with us, and unto death, for us, Jesus absorbs the just penalty due us that we might be delivered from hell and the justice due our sin.

And verse 18 gives us one more reason, embedded in the first, for why Jesus was made like us, in every respect, including suffering and then dying in our place.

4. Jesus Helps Us Right Now

Verse 17 is amazing in that he deals with our sin, and gets us right with God, and verse 18 is amazing in that he’s ready and eager to help us right now. He both makes atonement for us in his death, and he rises again, and sends his Spirit, that he might help us in our struggles right now. Look at verse 18:

For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

Because Jesus suffered, he can help us in our suffering. That is, because he suffered unto death to atone for our sins, he is able to indwell us by his Spirit, draw near to us in our time of need, and help us in whatever tests and challenges and trials and temptations we face in the ongoing struggle of the Christian life. Jesus not only saves us out of sin’s curse, but also through sin’s temptations. He atones for our sins, and stands ready to come to our aid in temptation and in our own suffering. Having saved us from sin’s guilt, he is poised to save us from sin’s power.

So, as Hebrews 12:2 says, Jesus is not only the founder, the archegos, the beginner, the champion of our faith, but also the finisher. He’s not only the beginner but finisher. Our champion not only leads the way and goes ahead of us to face the foe, but he also doubles back to check on us, to help us, to keep us.

What Child Is This?

Let’s close, then, with this question: What help do you need this Advent? How are you suffering? What’s your present trial (or trials)? What’s testing your faith most right now? What’s tempting you to sin or give up? What’s your biggest need this Advent?

In Advent, we don’t just remember what he did in the past; we remember who he is in the present. Christmas is not only a was; it’s an is. Get his help. He not only gets us; he helps us. So, as we come to the Table, let’s ask for his help afresh. What need do you bring to the Table this morning? How do you need his help to persevere?

The one who meets us here is fully divine, the second person of the eternal Godhead, who in his happy, expansive, overflowing, gracious nature, took our full humanity to come rescue us. And he suffered with us — and for us unto death. He destroyed Satan, and he delivers us from our sins. And he rose from the dead, and ascended, and is now enthroned in heaven, where he stands ready, by his Spirit, to help us in the fight of faith.

Audio Transcript

We’ve been on the topic of lifelong learning and talking about your new book on the topic, Foundations for Lifelong Learning: Education in Serious Joy. In it, you talk about “the excitement of learning” and mention the joy of learning hundreds of times, implying throughout that there’s joy in discovery and a joy-aim in this discipline of lifetime learning. You and I both get fired up when it comes to new discoveries we find in the Bible or in old books by dead guys. We talked about this in our episode before Thanksgiving.

But speak to someone who doesn’t feel this joy of discovery, or people who don’t think of themselves as lifelong learners. Maybe they never liked school. Maybe they didn’t get very good grades in school. They’re not wired to be lifelong students, not naturally. Maybe they’re doers, very practical, and not drawn to read hard books, to the point that even your new book on lifelong learning would be a daunting, hard sell for them. What encouragement would you give to them?

I’m reading this question and thinking, “Whom am I actually going to talk to in trying to answer this question?” They’re probably not listening. There are more than just two kinds of responses to lifelong learning. There are five, ten, twenty, hundreds of ways people respond to things like lifelong learning.

Everyone is on a continuum, from the most academically accomplished scholar on one end to the drug addict or the mentally ill person on the street outside my house that I spoke to yesterday. This person, who cannot make an ordinary conversation, has no concept of (let alone interest in) the foundations of lifelong learning. Everybody is somewhere in between those extremes. I do talk to both sides, the educated and the broken (which, maybe, is just two kinds of brokenness). I care about them. I share the gospel on the street. I pray for them. I pray with them. I try to connect them with sources of help for their mental condition, their economic condition, their housing condition, their physical condition, their spiritual condition.

Probably neither of those ends of the spectrum is listening to this podcast. That’s why I’m thinking, “Whom am I going to talk to when I answer Tony’s question?” Realistically, you haven’t asked a stupid question. I know the kinds of people that you’re talking about.

Averse to Learning

Maybe the most realistic audience is ordinary members of our churches who graduated from high school. They were glad to get out. Maybe they did trade school, professional school, an apprenticeship, or some college. Maybe they even graduated from college because their parents wanted them to, and now they are glad to be done. Maybe some of them are not readers at all. They may be dyslexic.

I know people like that. They function just fine in their jobs. They find a way to make it work. They might have ADD but have learned to live productively with it. They simply do not approach the world as a place you’d want to squeeze meaning out of. Well, that’s the way I feel about the world — squeeze some meaning out of this experience today; dig up discoveries.

Many just don’t think that way. They’re mainly passive in the way the world comes at them. They deal with it when it comes. They do what they have to do. They don’t see problems as a puzzle to solve or as an exciting challenge, wrestling their way to some new solution and greater understanding. When they think of learning, it’s basically just figuring out what the next thing is that needs to be done.

“God may show you a way to grow in knowledge and grace that is totally surprising and totally enjoyable to you.”

They read instructions, or they may go to YouTube instead, to watch someone else do it. Maybe they try a new recipe. That’s what they do to learn: get a new fishing lure or find an apartment. Life is not for learning; it’s for living. I get that. I know some of these folks. I think a person with that kind of disposition can lead a God-honoring, people-loving life.

What would I say to them about lifelong learning? I think what I should try to do is relay what the Bible says about growth in words and terms that are not connected to school, academics, study, or even reading.

Grow in Grace and Knowledge

Let’s assume that you do not resonate with the phrase “the joy of learning.” It may be that when you say, “I don’t find joy in learning,” what you may mean is this: “I don’t find joy in the process of thinking, or the process of intentional study, or the process of reading, or the process of focused observation, or the process of pushing the mind, exerting the mind, in some endeavor.” What feels off-putting is not so much the discovery of something wonderful, but the discipline or process of study and reading and analysis and mental exertion.

If you’re a Christian, I assume there are things about God, Christ, and salvation that are precious to you. You know them, you hold fast to them, and they are a help in daily life. If someone could add another one of those wonderfully precious truths to what you already have, if somebody could add another truth about God or salvation that made you happy because it was such good news, you’d be glad. You wouldn’t say, “Oh, I don’t want any more good news. I don’t want to be happier than I am now.” Nobody says that.

It’s not the happy outcomes of lifelong learning but the process that leaves you cold. Study, reading, thinking, analyzing, mental effort — all these feel so contrary to your personality. It would be a huge thing to recognize that you and I both love many of the outcomes of lifelong learning.

We should linger here for just a minute. When Peter says that we should grow in the grace and the knowledge of Jesus, it’s a command (2 Peter 3:18). He said that we should grow, though he doesn’t specify how. If a person says to me, “I don’t really want to grow, I don’t want to know more about Jesus, and I don’t want to experience more grace,” then I would say we’re dealing with a problem of disobedience, not a problem of neutral personality issues. That’s a defect of love, not a personality trait.

So, I am assuming that our non-lover of the process of learning would love to know more about Jesus, would love to have wonderful things about Christ feeding his mind that he doesn’t yet understand, would love to taste and enjoy and experience more of God’s grace and goodness in Christ.

These people hear the call to grow, and they hear the prayer of Paul that we should increase in the knowledge of God (Colossians 1:9–10). They hear Hosea’s warning that people perish for lack of knowledge (Hosea 4:6). That’s why he says later, “Let us know; let us press on to know the Lord” (Hosea 6:3). They hear all this, and they want this fruit. They want the outcome. They want these results. They realize that not to want them is a lack of love for Jesus.

Pave the Way with Prayer

I would say to them that if study and reading and lifelong learning is not the path, then pray earnestly that God would show you what the path is for you, for your particular personality and your way. You may be surprised how he answers.

For sure he will say this: “Get in a good church, and sit under the preaching of God’s word.” I know he’ll say that. That’s in the Bible. Everybody should do that. Every Christian should be in a good church. If they can, they should be in a small group of believers who pray for each other and share thoughts about what they’ve seen in the Bible.

God may show you a way to grow in knowledge and grace that is totally surprising and totally enjoyable to you. Don’t stop praying until he does. Don’t pray for a week and then say, “Well, nothing happened.” No, pray for a year, two, three. Pray as long as you need to in order to obey the command to grow.

Find your way to grow, to go forward. If you’re not going forward, you’re going to go backward. That’s the way it is. We’re not in a pond; we’re in a river, and it’s flowing the wrong direction. If we don’t swim forward, we’re going backward.

Leave Room for Surprise

Here’s one last thought. I hated to read until I was in the eleventh grade. It was really, really undesirable. I remember in the sixth grade how I had to put a sticker on the board in front of the class to show how many pages I had read. I would look for the books with pictures. Then something happened. After the eleventh grade, I loved it (though I am a very slow reader).

I know a man who barely finished high school. His grades were so bad. Reading was torture. He went into the army, and when he came out two years later, something had changed. He applied to Bible college on his own and put himself all the way through.

“What was once boring can suddenly, and for no apparent reason, become a lifelong passion.”

Here’s the last illustration. I was having breakfast with a friend recently, and he told me about his son who almost dropped out of high school. He finished, but for several years he worked a minimum-wage job. Then he got married to a good woman, and this woman, to use his phrase, “kicked him in the behind.” He applied to design school because she kicked him in the behind, and he finished design school. Today he designs visuals for companies all over the world.

Now, if you would ask me, “What happened? What happened in all those instances, including yours?” I’d say, “I don’t know what happened. God just brought something into our lives. It was time something changed, and things changed.” What was once boring can suddenly, and for no apparent reason, become a lifelong passion. It happened to me. It might happen to you. Don’t be a fatalist. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. You might be surprised.