✝️ From Sponge to Stone: When Familiarity Replaces Wonder

Good morning, my brothers! Remember that fire you had when you first encountered Jesus? The hunger for His Word, the wonder at His grace, the eagerness to learn everything about this God who saved you? Somewhere along the journey, many of us lose that childlike amazement. We mistake familiarity for maturity and stop being surprised by the very truths that once captured our imagination. Today we explore why the old priest Eli couldn’t hear God’s voice while the adolescent Samuel heard it clearly … and how we can recover the wonder that makes our faith come alive again. Let’s go!

This week’s manly topics (6-min read):

🔎 PERSPECTIVE First-century church father Polycarp claimed to have walked with Jesus 86 years. You may not have eight decades under your belt but you’ve walked with Christ for quite some time. Let’s talk about a danger Christian guys face as they “mature” and what to do about it.
📰  NEWS Tired of the lower back pain and stiffness that make just about everything less enjoyable … if not downright miserable? Try this 10-minute routine you can do seated to restore your back and hip flexibility.

PERSPECTIVE
From Sponge to Stone: When Familiarity Replaces Wonder

Do you remember the moment you first gave your life to Christ?

I do. It was a Saturday morning in November of 1991. I was alone in my apartment, kneeling on the floor, elbows pressed into a fake blue velvet couch (it was the 90s!) Outwardly, my life looked fine. Inwardly, I was unraveling. I was tired of pretending. Tired of performing. Tired of trying to hold it all together.

My prayer was simple: “God, I’m making a mess of my life. I can’t do this anymore. Come into my life and take over. Please.”

No fireworks. No angels. No one there to hug me or high-five me. Just silence, tears, and a quiet shift that changed everything.

In the months that followed, I was on fire. I couldn’t get enough of Jesus. I devoured Scripture like a starving man at a buffet. I asked questions about everything. I showed up early to church and stayed late. I was a sponge: humble, hungry, wide-eyed with wonder. I didn’t care that I didn’t know much. I just wanted to know Him.

But somewhere along the way, something changed.

From Wonder to Routine

It didn’t happen overnight. I was still reading the Bible, still going to church, still serving. But my posture had shifted.

I started comparing myself to newer believers who asked the same questions I’d once asked. I began to think I had the basics figured out. I stopped being surprised by familiar verses and started reading them like I was checking boxes. Prayer became more a routine than an enjoyment of His presence. I wasn’t a sponge anymore. My intellect was hardening my heart.

Jesus warned us about this very thing. When His disciples got caught up in their own importance, arguing about who would be greatest in the kingdom of heaven, He didn’t point to the most seasoned teacher or the most consistent churchgoer. He called over a child.

“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3-4).

That verse hits differently when you've been walking with Jesus for decades. Because the longer we’re in the faith, the easier it becomes to forget what it felt like to be new. To be small. To be teachable. To be amazed.

The Illusion of Spiritual Maturity

Just like the religious leaders Christ rebuked, we mistake knowing about God for knowing God. We confuse theological correctness with spiritual vitality. They had every detail of their theology nailed down to tithing one-tenth of their herbs but they missed God when He stood before them.

Paul, one of the most brilliant theological minds in history, never lost his sense of wonder:

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!” Romans 11:33

That’s not a man who thinks he’s figured it all out. That’s a man still on his knees, overwhelmed by the mystery and majesty of God.

And God Himself reminds us through Isaiah: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts” (Isaiah 55:8-9).

If we really believe that, how could we ever stop learning? How could we ever stop seeking? How could we ever think we’ve graduated from wonder?

Signs You Might Be Slipping

Spiritual dullness doesn’t always announce itself with fanfare. Sometimes it looks like wisdom. Sometimes it seems like maturity. But underneath, it's a slow hardening of the heart.

Here are some signs I’ve had to watch for in my own life:

• You stop asking questions. You assume you already know the answer, or that your understanding is complete. The curiosity that once drove you to dig deeper has been replaced by confidence in what you already know.

• You compare more than you confess. You notice what newer believers don’t understand more than what God is still teaching you. The speck in others’ eyes becomes more obvious than the log in your own.

• You’re more interested in being right than being transformed. Theological precision matters more than spiritual formation. Correctness, rather than understanding, is the priority.

• You’ve lost your capacity for surprise. The gospel doesn’t move you like it used to. Familiar verses wash over you without impact. You’ve heard it all before. You’ve been there and done that.

A Tale of Two Listeners

Consider this Old Testament case study: In 1 Samuel, we meet two men at opposite ends of both physical and spiritual life.

Eli was the high priest of Israel, a man with decades of ministry experience. He’d overseen countless sacrifices, delivered innumerable blessings, guided the spiritual life of an entire nation. By any measure, he was a spiritual giant.

But by the time we encounter him in 1 Samuel 3, his physical eyes “were becoming so weak that he could barely see.” More troubling, his spiritual perception had grown equally dim. When his sons corrupted their priestly duties, stealing from offerings and sleeping with women at the temple, Eli’s response was weak and ineffective. He knew what was happening, but he “failed to restrain them” i.e. to remove them from their priestly offices.

Then there’s Samuel, a young boy serving in the temple under Eli’s guidance. Scripture tells us “Samuel did not yet know the Lord; the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him.” By every measure of religious experience, he was a beginner, a novice.

But when God called his name in the night, Samuel’s response was immediate and eager: “Here I am!” Even after running to Eli three times thinking the old priest had called him, Samuel remained alert, teachable, ready. When Eli finally recognized what was happening and instructed Samuel how to respond, the boy obeyed perfectly: “Speak, for your servant is listening.”

The irony is stunning. The experienced priest had to tell the inexperienced boy how to hear from God … because the priest himself had stopped listening.

God spoke to Samuel, not Eli. The fresh ears heard what the experienced ears had grown deaf to. The untrained heart received what the trained heart had become too “knowledgeable” to notice.

The lesson for us is sobering: spiritual experience doesn’t automatically equal spiritual sensitivity, vitality and usefulness. Often, it’s the opposite.

Returning to Childlike Faith

The antidote to spiritual dullness isn’t more knowledge. It’s more humility. For me, it’s remembering that Saturday morning on my knees before that cheesy couch. The tears. The desperation. The hunger.

It’s choosing to be a student again. To admit we don’t know everything. To open the Bible not to confirm what we already believe, but to be surprised by what we’ve never noticed. To pray not with polished phrases, but with honest need. To worship not out of habit, but out of awe-inspired gratitude.

It’s asking God to restore our wonder.

Jesus didn’t say we need to become like seminary professors or seasoned pastors to enter the kingdom. He said we need to become like children: curious, humble, easily delighted, quick to trust, slow to assume we know better.

That’s my prayer for us. That we’d return to the posture we had when we first believed. That we’d become like children again: eager to learn, quick to forgive, easily amazed by grace.

This Week's Growth Work

1. Read Matthew 18:1-4, Romans 11:33-36, and Isaiah 55:8-9 slowly. Ask God to show you where familiarity or pride may have crept in.

2. Reflect on your early days with Jesus. What did your hunger look like then? Where have you grown? Where have you hardened?

3. Repent of any pride, comparison, or complacency. Ask God to make you teachable again.

4. Reignite your pursuit. Pick one area (prayer, Scripture, worship) and approach it like a beginner. Ask questions. Seek help. Be a sponge again.

5. Reach out to a brother in Christ and ask him what God’s been teaching him lately. Listen. Learn. Let iron sharpen iron.

Let’s not settle for being men who know a lot about God. Let’s be men who are still in awe of Him.

Let’s be men who never stop learning, never stop growing, and never stop seeking the One who saved us.

Let’s be men who never “grow up” and who preserve a childlike wonder at the mystery of God’s grace.

THIS JUST IN
📣 NEWS FROM AROUND THE WEB

Training
“For physical training is of some value ...” 1 Timothy 4:8

Let’s build on what we learned about flexibility training in MTM #6 and take action to push back on the painful petrification that threatens our backs and hips. Try this 10-minute routine 3-5x/week:

1. Seated Cat-Cow: Sit tall, hands on knees; arch back on inhale (lift chest), round on exhale (drop chin)—loosens spine.

2. Knee-to-Chest: Pull one knee gently to chest; eases lower back/hip tension.

3. Seated Twist: Cross leg, twist torso with opposite hand on knee; improves rotation.

4. Pelvic Tilt: Tighten core to flatten back; stabilizes core.

5. Hamstring Stretch: Extend leg, lean forward; relieves leg-back pull.

Breathe deeply and hold each stretch (or, in the case of the pelvic tilt, contraction) for 10 seconds building up to 30 seconds as your endurance increases. Stop if you feel sharp pain and reduce the range of the stretch. Build range over time.

Nutrition
“... your bodies are the temples of the Holy Spirit …” 1 Corinthians 6:19

Since our dives into intermittent fasting for metabolic strength (MTM #4) and brain health (MTM #23), new 2025 research amps up the case for this powerful tool. A Nature study shows alternate-day fasting slashes Parkinson's-like brain damage in models, boosting cellular cleanup and cutting inflammation. This is great news for guarding your noggin as you age. Another report in Aging Cell reveals 16:8 time-restricted eating extends lifespan and heals the gut without sapping strength.