Are You Teachable?

Are You Teachable?

O God, you have taught me from my earliest childhood, and I constantly tell others about the wonderful things you do.

Psalm 71:17

Intelligent people are always ready to learn. Their ears are open for knowledge.

Proverbs 18:15

Anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand.

Matthew 7:26

“Will you teach me?” Maybe you don’t say those words, but do you want to learn? Are you open to being taught? Are you a person who is teachable? Or are you satisfied with what you already know? Do you resent it when someone suggests that you might not know something or that he or she could teach you something?

Some people are too prideful to be taught. They don’t want to admit that there is something they don’t know, something they don’t understand or haven’t mastered. Some people simply stop being learners at some point along the way. They seem to suffocate any natural curiosity. Other people settle for filling their minds with insignificant things so that they have no hunger to think great thoughts or learn new things.

To be teachable requires a spirit of humility. For some people, pride gets in the way, and they remain stuck where they are. No one can become increasingly more like Jesus if he or she is not teachable. God gives us the Holy Spirit to lead us into truth. The Holy Spirit makes us willing to learn. And then God gives us so many ways to learn more about him, like the world he has made and his purposes in this world. We can learn from studying the Bible, from listening intently in church or youth group (perhaps by taking notes to stay tuned in), by observing others who are further along in faith, and by having conversations with godly people. All that is required is to be teachable.

DISCUSSION STARTERS

When you want to learn something (like how to throw a fastball, do algebra, remember people’s names, or cook), what do you have to do?

What people has God placed around you whom you’d like to learn from?

What thought patterns or sin tendencies keep us from staying teachable?