Mangrove Christians

Have you ever met someone who re-dedicates their life to Jesus after living a life of sin, yet again? It appears that they sincerely give their life over to Jesus; they have this amazing emotional experience and become caught up in the redemptive work of Christ. This last for a few days, then the worries of this world and the temptations of this culture begin to do its evil work at drawing this person away from the Lord. Do we blame the world and the culture? Or do we blame the person? Let’s see what Hebrews 6:1-8 has to say about this person:

Therefore let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God, instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And God permitting, we will do so. It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age, if they fall away, to be brought back to repentance, because to their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace. Land that drinks in the rain often falling on it and that produces a crop useful to those for whom it is farmed receives the blessing of God. But land that produces thorns and thistles is worthless and is in danger of being cursed. In the end it will be burned.

To answer our question of who do we blame, I think we blame the person. Too many Christians today fall away from God so easily. They seem to need a constant experience in order to stay focused or committed to God. They need someone to hold their hand and keep them on the straight and narrow path. They blame everyone for their failure: their life's problems, their parents, their church, their Pastor, their family, their friends, etc.

However, it is their immaturity that cripples their growth. They only focus on the elementary teachings of Jesus. They only know the simple message of salvation. They never dig deeper in the Word; they don’t study their Bible; they focus only on the surface of their faith, keeping them ensnared in defeat; they don’t fully understand the power that lives inside them. They know the traditions of their faith, yet they don’t recognize the God ordained authority they hold in their soul: The Holy Spirit.

The warning in all this is that these people have definitely tasted the heavenly gift of salvation; they have shared in the power of the Holy Spirit. They have even experienced the goodness of God’s Word and the power it holds for their life. These are not unacquainted individuals. They are fully aware. But they are people who do not produce the fruit of righteousness, because they go backward in their faith instead of full-fledged forward in the power of God’s spiritual maturity that is offered to them. Two things happen to this person:

1.They are unable to be brought back to repentance. For they are in a trounced cycle of failure. They are so used to their ways, they can’t move forward. But this is not the real reason they can’t repent fully.

2.They continue to crucify Jesus. Their immaturity costs Jesus’ His reputation and their ability to be an influence to others in His name. Every time a person falls away in the same area of sin, they put Jesus back on the cross. Look at a picture of Jesus on the cross and tell me if putting Him there, yet again, is fair? Of course it is not; it’s wickedness to say that Jesus’ suffering was not enough to keep a person from sinning.

Those who fall away become like fine roots of a plant; a fine root is short lived and succumbs to an ongoing root turnover. Not much different than the immature Christian who experiences constant turnover in their faith. Their life as a Christian is filled with thorns and thistles, rendering them useless and ineffective.

However, the Christian who becomes more like the prop root of a plant grows deep down into the ground, drenched under water. They are known for supporting a heavy plant like a mangrove:

These Christians are drenched in the Word of God and are tapped completely in surrender to the Power of His Spirit. Daily you will see this person lay their wills down and pick up the Spirit of God inside them and live forward in God's will. They suddenly have the wisdom and knowledge needed to see fruit in their own lives. They grow deep and wide: deep in Jesus and wide in influence. They support a heavy weight of suffering in their lives and truly count it all joy. They can carry the worries of others and provide words of wisdom and knowledge that truly lift up a desperate soul.

These Mangrove Christians experience the fruit of being grown up; they see so much more than doctrine and elementary teachings, they see the power of God at work through human flesh! Why would these Christians ever turn back? They wouldn’t. There is nothing in this world worth having in place of this kind of Spirit-filled, power-fueled, and growth-maturing life! Stay the course my fellow Mangroves and to all that are fine roots, get on board, will you?