I’ve always enjoyed camping, especially when my entire family can go together. Being able to go to a place like Red River Gorge or Cave Run Lake (both here in Kentucky) and pitch our tent, kick back and relax, those are special times indeed. Times like that relax the mind and body, as well as the create memories that last a lifetime.
The idea of camping can also have a spiritual connotation to it. Most mainstream Churches have a Sunday message geared around the cross. I can understand why as Sunday is when guests might be in the audience and a pastor will want to give them a message tied to the very foundation of one’s journey. In churches like this, the message each Sunday morning might change, but the theme (the cross) will remain the focal point. In a sense, the cross becomes the place some churches set up camp.
Unfortunately, Christians that regularly attend a church who only hear crossed-centered messages, aren’t given the tools necessary to become the bible students the scripture calls us to be. How can you “study to show yourself approved, a workman unto God that shouldn’t be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim 2:15) when you haven’t been taught how to study? The bible as an entire book, is essentially the how-to-manual of God’s expectations for His people. Now you might be asking at this point, “What is wrong with the cross?” The answer of course, is nothing. There is, however, one caveat.
Our journey as believers in Yeshua begins at the cross, it doesn’t end there. His sinless life, death and resurrection are, together, the core belief that ties all of Christianity together as one. The problem isn’t the cross, the problem is, we aren’t supposed to camp there. Instead, we are expected to actually pick up the cross and begin a lifelong journey that includes being discipled (taught) on how God expects us to live. The cross is literally our first baby steps into the faith, but we can’t exist on milk forever. While the cross will always remain part of our identity, God’s expectations are that we submit to Him as Lord and begin living according to His will. Consider ….
Romans 14:8 For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.
When God begins tapping on our heart and we come in faith believing, we are to cease living for ourselves and instead live according to God’s will. When we don’t submit to Him, and live for Him, we don’t grow in any meaningful capacity. Nor I might add, are we pleasing in His sight. When I was on my first steps toward my life with God, I was in a bar talking to a friend from high school that had become a new but very outspoken Christian. I asked him about his faith and he sat with me for more than an hour sharing all he knew about the gospel. During that time, he drank 5 or 6 beers, bragged at times about women he’d been with, until I finally had to ask. “If he’s your Lord now, aren’t you supposed to live differently? What about all the drinking and women?” He smiled big and said, “That’s the best part Ken, because of what Jesus did, we can do whatever we want and he will forgive us!” I knew nothing about God and His plan for humankind. Nothing. But I knew what I just heard was wrong!
Part of why my friend held the belief that he did was because he attended a church that camped out at the cross. Again, the cross is spiritual milk and in saying that I am not demeaning it in ANY way. It’s simply the first spiritual food a Christian takes in making it by definition, milk.
The writer of Hebrews would agree, consider:
“Concerning whom we have much discourse, and hard to interpret, or to speak, since you have come to be dull in the hearings. For indeed because of the time you are due to be teachers, yet you need to have someone to teach you again the rudiments of the beginning of the Words of God, and you came to be having need of milk, and not of solid food; for everyone partaking of milk is without experience in the Word of Righteousness, for he is an infant. But solid food is for those full grown, having exercised the faculties through habit, for distinction of both good and bad. Because of this, having left the discourse of the beginning of Messiah, let us be borne on to full growth, not laying down again a foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, of baptisms, of doctrine, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of dead ones, and of eternal judgment. And this we will do, if indeed God permits.” (Hebrews 5:11-6:3)
The last few lines there are powerful! Repentance from dead works, faith in God, baptism, teachings (doctrines), and the laying on of hands, resurrection, and eternal judgment are things he is saying we shouldn’t have to go and lay down “again” a foundation for… because they are just that, a “foundation.” There is more food on the table that God desires for us to consume.
Please don’t misunderstand, I am NOT speaking against resurrection, baptism, or the laying on of hands. These are things we are to learn early and do as part of our walk, but our walk does not end at these things. They are to become part of the equipment, part of the armor or tools in our arsenal that we are to use as we are about the work of the Father. Yet, we are not to camp there. And do not walk away from this article thinking I believe you are lost because you camped at the cross! I don’t think you are lost, but I do believe you’re missing out on a greater understanding and perhaps some blessings. Remember, we only find when we seek and if we stop seeking and relax like when we’re camping, we won’t find anything more than what we currently have. Campers are content, relaxed, unchallenged. Don’t become a happy camper!
Very nice message.