How Can Christians Grow in Discernment?

Most of us are indecisive. The reason is not hard to find. When we step into a gas station, for example, we are greeted by fourteen different varieties of chewing gum. With so many options, indecisiveness is the inevitable result.

A uniquely modern problem arises here. The myriad options most of us enjoy lead us to seek quick answers so we can get on with life. In less than a nanosecond, we can get answers to all our questions, trivial and consequential, via the devices most of us always carry on our persons. It’s a trite observation, but smartphones have made us, well, less smart.

There is a great need in our day for Christians to be discerning. Never has more information been more available to more people more readily than the current moment. If we fail to be discerning, we leave the door of our minds wide open for a host of ideological charlatans to take up residence.

As we would expect, God addresses the issue of discernment many times in His Word. But let’s focus on just one verse, Hebrews 5:14: “But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.”

The author of Hebrews is likely writing to a group of Jewish Christians in danger of apostasy from the gospel. Therefore, as a good pastor, along with encouragement, he includes several warning passages, one of which is where our verse is found. He tells them in Hebrews 5:11 that they had become dull of hearing. Their dullness in hearing resulted in spiritually immature lives.

How does the author define a spiritual grown-up? Those “who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.” He gives us a blueprint to construct a life of discernment, a life of Christian maturity.

First, he tells us that we have “powers of discernment.” In the original language, this phrase refers to our faculty of perceiving things (our “senses”). But this is a good translation because it highlights his overall point. A life of Christian discernment is the equivalent to a life of wisdom outlined in Old Testament books such as the Psalms and Proverbs. In both Testaments, the wise person is someone who fears the Lord (Prov. 1:7) and lives accordingly. So, to possess “powers of discernment” is to possess God-given wisdom.

Second—and this should be really good news for us—these powers can be developed. It’s not as if some Christians are born discerning while others are not and their respective courses are fixed. All of us can become discerning. No Christian is excluded.

How do we grow our powers of discernment? By “constant practice.” All of us can become more discerning, but none of us becomes an expert overnight, any more than the person who picks up a golf club for the first time and makes a few swings can expect to hit drives like a professional right away. As with any skill in the physical realm, spiritual discernment takes time and practice to cultivate into expertise.

Now the author gets specific. He says we need practice “distinguishing good from evil.” This is a broad, but stark, way of saying, “understanding God’s will from His Word.” We need to learn what pleases the Lord as we study and put into practice what He tells us.

So then, how can Christians grow in discernment? I’ll suggest three ways based on what we’ve learned from this verse in Hebrews.

1. We must recognize that not all information is created equal.

Just because you saw it online, caught it repeated by a popular influencer, or even heard it from an influential pulpit doesn’t make it true. We must test all things and hold fast what is good (1 Thess. 5:21). We test all the information we ingest by doing the hard work of comparing it to what Scripture says explicitly or what may be deduced by good and necessary consequence from the biblical text (see Westminster Confession of Faith 1.6).

2. We must spend more time reading books.

Yes, old-fashioned, paper-and-ink books. Why? Because the digital world is ephemeral and, sooner or later, the information we glean from it begins to seem as fleeting as the medium by which we received it. I think Christians woefully underestimate how much the medium shapes the message when it comes to how we receive information in the AI and social media age.

By contrast, books quite literally stay with you. Their presence provides a kind of stability a tab or reel or post never can. Moreover, the very action of turning pages, reading lines, and taking notes with a pencil forces us to slow down. The regular practice of reading real books will make us more discerning.

3. Not only do we need to read books; we need to read good books.

The Puritan Richard Baxter’s maxim is urgent for us today: “It is not the reading of many books which is necessary to make a man wise or good, but the well-reading of a few, could he be sure to have the best.” More good news: We live in a time when ministries have made it easy to find the best books. Buy them. Read them. Mark them up.

Above all, let us read the best of all books, the Bible, constantly. Let’s commit to spending five minutes reading the Bible for every one minute we spend on a smart device. If we do even a percentage of this suggestion, our discernment will improve, our attention spans will grow longer, and, most importantly, we will glorify the God who made us to be discerning creatures.