When I was a kid in my preteens, my life was great.  Play outside all day long, rain or shine. Build forts in the woods, explore, gather with my tribe of other preteen friends and run the neighborhood until curfew.  We were rulers of our own destiny. Carefree. Ambitious. Energized.

When food reserves ran low, the tribe would peddle our BMX bikes and invade one of our houses and inevitably the menus were all the same.  Out came the bologna, the American cheese, mayo, iceberg lettuce and of course the Wonder bread. It was a great time to regroup and plan the upcoming afternoon adventures as we consumed processed calories that would get us through until supper time.

It’s funny, but sometimes I actually get a craving for a bologna and cheese sandwich on white bread.  Sometimes, that craving even gets so intense, I act upon it. As I carefully craft a sandwich masterpiece, I will usually pair it with Frito’s for the full affect.  With that first bite, reality sets in and a culinary bubble bursts right before my eyes. It is here I am suddenly reminded about the actual nature of a bologna sandwich.  It’s a blah, bland, stick to the roof of your mouth, bite of nothingness. At that moment, the same thought always goes through my head… Why am I eating a bologna sandwich?  That is quickly followed by the realization that it is not the actual sandwich I am craving, but the carefree, ambitious, energized days of youth.

Here’s another example.  Not long ago, I decided to watch the original Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Back in 1981, the theaters were packed and I was awestruck! It was great!  Challenging adventures just kept coming for Indiana Jones and at every turn, he met them with an all or nothing attitude, and that whip!  Oh, how I had to get a whip!

Yet a funny thing happened while I was rewatching it.  Something had changed. The first thing I noticed was the acting.  Let’s just say it was not as I remembered. And the plot just didn’t hold my attention like it once did.  As I sat there watching with my bologna sandwich, I thought to myself, is this really worth 115 minutes of my life?  Once again, Raiders was just a reminder of what I really missed.

There is a wonderlust of childhood that should never be lost.  Those memories are meant to be cherished. However, there is also a danger of giving those childhood experiences to much leverage in our life.  Paul, in 1 Corinthians 13:11 says…

“ When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”

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God created us to grow.  He created us to mature. He created us to have experiences, failures, trials, good times, and memories.  In His ultimate wisdom, He desires His people to learn from our past years and not live in them.

There are no Peter Pan’s when it comes to our spiritual life.  I would even argue the same point when it comes to our emotional and physical life as well.  The latter is somewhat easier to understand. Our emotional state matures in a way that equips us to rationally deal with the ever expanding challenges of life.  Wisdom comes through our experiences of success, as well as failure. We come to the realization that just because we can, doesn’t mean we always should.

We can learn a lot from our bodies as well.  As our physical life changes, it teaches us what our individual physical state is capable of, as well as its limitations.  As we continue to age, these factors become even more realized and relevant, some positive, some negative.

So what about our spiritual life?  Too often as a pastor, I see Christians hanging onto the child side of their faith.  Although they have had the time and ability to grow in their walk, they have chosen to stay a child.  They have opted for a lifetime of immature faith, over an equipped, emboldened, mature man or woman of God.  I say all this not to condemn, but rather to encourage. Anything that stays where it is stagnates and rots. I can only appreciate those days of bologna sandwiches and 80’s movies because I have grown out of them.  They are a great memory, one that I have learned from and those days were an integral part of who I am today. I do those memories (and my taste buds) a disservice when I refuse to grow, to mature, to become who God desires me to be.

Each one of our salvation stories is a unique and beautiful thing.  Those new days of living for Jesus are special. It is a time of freedom in Christ, as well as a season of carefree, ambitious, energized growth.  However, if we choose to live there, we miss out on so much.

I have so much fun with my first grade daughter.  But how and what I can do with my teen aged boys is on a whole different level.  It has everything to do with the ability they have gained through their maturity.  We miss out on so much when we refuse to grow into the person God desires us to be.  He has plans and opportunities that can only be accomplished through us when we give up our childish ways.  It is time for the Church as a whole to resolve to move into maturity and chase after the heart of God.