In other words, I don't ask a 10 year old what he/she perceives to be their wants or needs with respect to how the nourishment is to be administered. God's word directs us to what they need.
First to the general reader, at the risk that I don't add the 1,000,001 qualifications to my statement let me note, outright, that humility demands that we be mature enough to take criticism even when it is given to us in immature ways.
That said, I find this analogy to particularly apt.
Years ago I attended an OPC in SoCal and had very dear friends who just
loved the teaching of another OPC minister in the area. He was a hyper-BT preacher who had argued, in Presbytery, that the Preacher must
never give any application. Rather, the Preacher must only preach about what Christ has done and leave all application to the Holy Spirit.
Well, this couple would repeatedly complain about our Pastor's preaching and that he preached "the Law" any time he provided any application or admonishment or rebuke from the Word. His preaching was always capstoned by something to the effect of "...but remember that you will fail and Christ is your righteousness..." but to no avail. The damage was done because he had applied the Word to their lives and that was not the hyper-BT way.
Again, I don't say this because I disliked this couple. I loved them dearly and still do but I would urge repeatedly and gently that they consider that the Pastor was not doing what they said.
It was then that I realized that they didn't apply this same technique to their children. They didn't merely tell them that Christ had accomplished all righteousness and was a perfect child and allow the Holy Spirit to apply these indicatives to the hearts of their children.
No, they acted wisely and disciplined their children.
The problem is, I fear, that we (and notice I'm using the collective term because
we are striving together) are often under the illusion that we are the spiritually mature. A man who has only been a Christian for a few years may be chronologically mature but he is not spiritually mature.
Hence, I maintain, that the analogy is apt because children are not in a position to be lecturing adults about the proper manner of discipline. I simply do not tolerate my son telling me a Sermon is boring. He doesn't know what he's talking about.
Other spiritually mature individuals are good guides but is that not why we have a Session? Hence, I maintain, that a healthy balance is to not consider ourselves greater than we are and humbly remember our need for shepherding. Not blindly, because if we have a question we have a plurality of elders to take the issue to but our default position should not be to assume that our judgment of the matter is fully matured.