The Lord Jesus said to a religious leader of His day: “Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3). All true Christians have been born again by the Spirit of God (Tit. 3:5). They are therefore the children of God (Rom. 8:16).

Children are a joy in any normal household, but it is a tragedy when a child remains a child, physically, mentally or both. It is a tragedy too, that so many Christians, truly born again, remain spiritual babes — they do not grow. They know that Christ died for their sins but have made no progress in grace or in the knowledge of the Word. To such Paul wrote:

“And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual [men], but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat; for hitherto ye were not able to bear [digest] it, neither yet now are ye able” (I Cor. 3:1,2).

Thus those who, spiritually undeveloped, were able to digest only the milk, or the simple things, of the Scriptures, were called “carnal” and “babes,” in contrast to those “spiritual” believers who had grown in grace and were able to assimilate the deeper, richer truths of the Word of God.

This is not a compliment to those who constantly boast that they are satisfied with “the simple things,” and fail to study God’s Word, as II Tim. 2:15 commands. To such Paul writes, by divine inspiration:

“For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again… and are become such as have need of milk… For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the Word of righteousness, for he is a babe. But strong meat [solid food] belongeth to them that are of full age…” (Heb. 5:12-14).

A new-born babe in Christ is a joy to behold, but every born-again Christian should grow through the study of the Word. I Pet. 2:2 says:

“As newborn babes desire the sincere [pure] milk of the Word, that ye may grow thereby.”

To the Reader:

Some of our Two Minutes articles were written many years ago by Pastor C. R. Stam for publication in newspapers. When many of these articles were later compiled in book form, Pastor Stam wrote this word of explanation in the Preface:

"It should be borne in mind that the newspaper column, Two Minutes With the Bible, has now been published for many years, so that local, national and international events are discussed as if they occurred only recently. Rather than rewrite or date such articles, we have left them just as they were when first published. This, we felt, would add to the interest, especially since our readers understand that they first appeared as newspaper articles."

To this we would add that the same is true for the articles written by others that we continue to add, on a regular basis, to the Two Minutes library. We hope that you'll agree that while some of the references in these articles are dated, the spiritual truths taught therein are timeless.

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