Hebrews 6:1 (New Living Translation)
So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from evil deeds and placing our faith in God.
The doctrines or principles mentioned here in Hebrews are very important. God will grant us repentance and forgive us through the blood of Jesus Christ. What good news! But it is not the good news. It is the principle: Being granted repentance and having faith in and through Jesus Christ are good news, but the result of those things is the real good news. It is the culmination of the process—”let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding.”—that is the good news.
What if the gospel concentrates on the Messenger rather than the message He brought? If it focuses on the greatness of the Messenger, all of the good news about Him, and His importance to the process, His significance actually begins to diminish. If one concentrates on the Messenger, he will believe that salvation comes merely because he believes in the Messenger (see Matthew 7:21). Further development of that human being stops because he has made the wrong choice. That is the problem with concentrating on the Messenger, as important as He is.
The gospel does not specifically concentrate on Christ, yet we do not want to denigrate the major role He plays either. The process pivots around Him, though its ultimate purpose will end when He delivers the Kingdom to the Father (I Corinthians 15:24). The Messenger became the High Priest, and we are saved through His life. Christianity has to go beyond the fact that He was the Messenger. Now He is the High Priest in heaven. And though he is High Priest, we still have choices to make in relation to the Kingdom of God.
That is why Hebrews 6:1 says, “So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding.” As we go through the process that the Messenger went through and begin to experience what He accomplished, He is magnified in our eyes, because we try to do what He did and realize how awesome and difficult what He did was. While we try to imitate Him, the process of creation is going on. If we stop trying to imitate Him, He becomes diminished. That is why we have to go on to perfection, to completion, because the process is not complete with just believing in Jesus Christ. We must become become the people of the Kingdom.
Hebrews 6:1….. Oh how love the in your face politeness of the author…. I remember the first time I read that verse with understanding. Imediately I envisioned a multitude of foundations as if someone had started building a subdivision, but stopped at the foundation. Here and there I saw a few structures being built. If we don’t move into the maturity of being Sons of God, we’ll never build structures on our foundations. With no house built, is it any wonder we invite the world to look at our pretty foundations and they find us shivering in the cold & drenched in the rain with no cover for protection. No wonder the world wants little to do with our foundational lifestyle.