“When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”
1 Corinthians 13:11
Paul wrote about growing up. Maturing. Putting away childish ways of thinking.
I believe that applies to our spiritual lives too.
If I still believe everything exactly the same way my Sunday school teacher taught me decades ago, without ever examining it, questioning it, studying it, or growing beyond it, am I really growing spiritually?
If I accept everything a pastor, denomination, church, teacher, or ministry leader tells me without thinking critically about it for myself, is that spiritual maturity?
I don’t think it is.
There is a difference between having faith and simply believing whatever we have been told.
Maybe one sign of Christian spiritual maturity is being willing to ask questions.
The Bereans Didn’t Just Accept What Paul Said
Many Christians like to call themselves Bereans.
But the Bereans didn’t simply hear Paul preach and say, “Well, Paul said it, so it must be true.”
Acts 17 tells us that they received what Paul said, but then they searched the Scriptures for themselves to see whether those things were true.
Think about that.
This was Paul.
Yet they still examined what he taught.
And Scripture calls them noble for doing it.
Somewhere along the way, much of modern Christianity seems to have replaced that kind of searching with something closer to:
The pastor said it. The church teaches it. Our denomination believes it. Therefore, it must be true.
That isn’t necessarily education.
Sometimes it is indoctrination.
Have We Been Taught What to Think Instead of How to Think?
I am a former educator, and years ago I remember hearing teachers complain about something that was happening in education:
We were teaching students what to think, but we weren’t teaching them how to think.
In other words, students could memorize answers, repeat information, and pass a test, but they weren’t necessarily learning critical-thinking skills.
I believe the church system has often done the same thing.
We learn the church’s position.
We learn the pastor’s interpretation.
We learn the denomination’s doctrine.
We memorize the accepted answers.
But questioning those answers is often discouraged.
There may be little room for genuine discussion. And if you disagree too much, you may eventually receive what one famous ministry leader jokingly called the “left foot of fellowship.”
You’re shown the door.
But if our beliefs cannot survive honest questions, how strong were those beliefs to begin with?
I Used to Believe the People at the Top Had the Answers
For much of my life, I accepted what I heard from prominent preachers, pastors, television ministers, and Christian leaders.
They were successful.
They had large ministries.
They had the name recognition.
Thousands of people listened to them.
Surely God had put them in those positions because they had some kind of inside track on hearing God’s voice.
At least that’s what I assumed.
It was a little like being a child.
When you’re young, adults seem to know everything.
Then one day you discover something startling:
They don’t.
Adults can be wrong.
Teachers can be wrong.
Parents can be wrong.
Pastors can be wrong.
Authors can be wrong.
Prophets can be wrong.
And yes, I can be wrong too.
That realization doesn’t have to destroy our faith.
It can actually help us mature.
The War on the Moon
I remember being a child and hearing adults talk about Bible prophecy and the moon turning to blood.
At the time, the space race dominated the news. America and the Soviet Union were racing to reach the moon.
I remember hearing people speculate that perhaps there would be a war on the moon.
The Bible said the moon would turn to blood.
Blood meant war.
Man was going to the moon.
Therefore, perhaps there would be war on the moon.
It made perfect sense to people at the time.
Decades later, the interpretation changed.
Someone read the biblical references to the moon, discovered information about lunar eclipses and “blood moons,” connected them to prophetic passages, wrote books about it, and suddenly the Christian world was filled with teaching about signs in the heavens.
Blood moons.
Eclipses.
Planetary alignments.
Prophetic calendars.
And the familiar warnings began again:
Jesus is coming back soon. Hell is hot. The moon is red. Get right or get left.
The phrases change, but the urgency remains.
Then another blood moon comes.
Another eclipse.
Another alignment.
Another weather event.
Another supposedly prophetic sign.
And another prediction.
Yet here we are.
What Happens When Prophecy Doesn’t Match Reality?
Around the height of the blood-moon discussions, when I was still pastoring, I personally knew people who said God had spoken to them and told them that they would not die before the rapture took place.
I later attended some of their funerals.
That leaves us with a choice.
We can ignore what happened.
We can explain it away.
Or we can ask questions.
Does questioning those predictions mean I no longer believe Jesus?
No.
Does it mean I don’t believe Jesus will return?
No.
Does it mean I reject Scripture?
No.
It means I am willing to consider something that many Christians seem afraid to say:
Maybe our understanding was wrong.
Maybe the problem wasn’t Jesus.
Maybe the problem wasn’t Scripture.
Maybe the problem was our interpretation.
Maybe Our Teachers Didn’t Have Everything Figured Out
God bless Chuck Missler. God bless Tim LaHaye. God bless C. I. Scofield.
They influenced generations of Christians. But maybe they didn’t have everything figured out.
Maybe they understood a piece.
Maybe they saw certain things clearly and misunderstood others.
Maybe some of what we inherited as unquestionable biblical truth was actually someone’s interpretation of biblical truth.
There is a difference.
And maybe it is time for believers to grow up spiritually enough to recognize that difference.
Someone will immediately say:
“But truth doesn’t change.”
I agree.
Truth doesn’t change.
But our understanding of truth can change.
Maybe what we believed forty years ago wasn’t the whole truth.
Maybe it was partly right.
Maybe it was partly wrong.
Maybe it was the best understanding available to us at the time.
Paul himself wrote:
“For we know in part…”
Think about what that means.
If we know in part, then there is necessarily a part we don’t know.
That realization should produce humility.
Spiritual Growth Sometimes Requires Changing Your Mind
Was humanity going to the moon significant?
Absolutely.
Was there a war on the moon?
Not yet, anyway.
Are blood moons significant?
Possibly.
Maybe other celestial events are significant too.
Creation certainly declares the glory of God.
But acknowledging that doesn’t require me to accept every interpretation somebody attaches to every eclipse, moon, earthquake, war, election, or astronomical event.
There was a time when I would have felt uncomfortable admitting that something I had believed for years might be wrong.
I’m becoming much more comfortable with it now.
I’m not ashamed to say:
I used to believe that. I don’t anymore.
That isn’t necessarily abandoning the faith.
Sometimes it is maturity in action.
Changing Your Thinking Does Not Dishonor Your Past
Many believers seem to feel that changing their theology somehow dishonors the people who taught them.
I don’t believe that.
My parents’ generation lived through enormous technological and cultural changes. Things that would have sounded impossible when they were children became normal parts of everyday life as adults.
They adapted because they received new information and new experiences.
We do this constantly in nearly every area of life.
We rethink nutrition.
We rethink education.
We rethink medicine.
We rethink parenting.
We rethink technology.
We rethink history.
We rethink science.
Yet somehow when it comes to theology, we’re sometimes told that changing our understanding means we’ve become deceived.
Why?
Why should spiritual maturity require intellectual stagnation?
God Isn’t Afraid of My Questions
My views have changed over the years.
A lot.
I am a thinker.
Sometimes I sense God asking me questions rather than simply giving me answers.
Think about that.
Study that.
Look at that again.
Listen to Me about that.
And then I have to wrestle with it.
Sometimes I reach a conclusion.
Sometimes that conclusion changes later.
And I have come to believe God is okay with that.
I don’t picture God sitting in heaven anxiously watching me take some giant theology examination, hoping I circle all the right answers.
I believe He enjoys the relationship.
He enjoys the conversation.
He isn’t intimidated by my questions.
So why should I be?
Are You Willing to Question What You Believe?
Are you willing to question what you believe?
Not because you want to abandon Jesus, but because you want to know truth.
Are you willing to examine beliefs that don’t seem to align with reality?
Are you willing to reconsider an interpretation you’ve held for decades?
Are you willing to question a famous preacher?
A pastor?
A denomination?
A favorite author?
Are you willing to stop automatically believing a prophet who has repeatedly made predictions that didn’t happen?
I am.
That doesn’t mean I become cynical.
It means I become discerning.
If the You From Ten Years Ago Wouldn’t Call You a Heretic…
I once heard someone say something along these lines:
If the “you” from ten years ago wouldn’t look at the “you” of today and think you’re a heretic, maybe you aren’t growing spiritually.
I understand the point.
And, honestly, I have to agree with it.
I’ve been on roughly a thirty-year journey of questioning things I learned in Sunday school, church, Bible studies, conferences, books, trainings, schools, and sermons.
Along the way, I’ve discovered something important:
The Scriptures can be translated, interpreted, framed, and presented in different ways.
Sometimes the words are accurate while the conclusion being presented is still skewed.
You Can Use Accurate Facts and Still Create a False Impression
Years ago, I was a high school band director working with a band program that was rebuilding.
After a competition, I could take the judges’ scores and describe them in a way that made it sound as though we had almost won the competition.
Technically, every statistic I gave could be correct.
There was only one problem.
We had finished last.
The data wasn’t necessarily false.
The presentation created a distorted picture of reality.
People do the same thing with Scripture.
Choose these verses.
Leave out those verses.
Emphasize this translation.
Ignore another possible meaning.
Start with a conclusion and then gather the verses that support it.
Before long, we can make the Bible appear to say almost anything we already wanted it to say.
That is why critical thinking and spiritual discernment matter.
Sometimes We Don’t Want Truth—We Want Confirmation
This may be one of the hardest things to admit.
Sometimes people don’t really want to discover what is true.
They want confirmation that what they already believe is true.
We often choose churches that reinforce our existing theology.
We choose teachers who agree with us.
We follow ministries that validate our worldview.
We read authors who confirm our doctrine.
And then we call that “searching for truth.”
But what if truth challenges me?
What if Jesus leads me somewhere that threatens one of my cherished theological boxes?
What if the thing I have defended for thirty years turns out to be incomplete?
Am I willing to change?
That may be where spiritual maturity begins.
I Don’t Have All the Answers—and I’m Okay With That
I don’t have all the answers.
I don’t know everything.
Far from it.
The longer this journey continues, the more aware I become of how much I don’t know.
But maybe acknowledging that is part of growing up.
I am willing to ask questions.
I am willing to rethink.
I am willing to study.
I am willing to listen.
I am willing to admit when something I once believed no longer makes sense to me.
And I’m willing to say, “I might be wrong.”
That doesn’t frighten me the way it once might have.
Because my confidence isn’t ultimately in having perfect theology.
My confidence is in Jesus.
Maybe that is what putting away childish things looks like.
Not abandoning faith.
Not rejecting truth.
Not questioning for the sake of questioning.
But becoming mature enough to seek truth even when it challenges what we have always believed.
Growing spiritually doesn’t mean never changing your mind. Sometimes growing spiritually requires it.
