Spiritual Growth - A Christian Perspective

April 27, 2006

Spiritual Growth A PDL meditation by Rick Warren

Does spiritual growth just happen?

Many people act as though spiritual growth is automatic. They may have a plan to save for retirement. They may have a plan for sending their kids to college. But they don't have a strategy for enriching their souls. They leave the single most important facet of human existence to chance!

But a soul doesn't automatically grow to maturity any more than a baby automatically grows to physical maturity. You've got to have a plan for feeding, exercise, education - and especially potty training - if a child is going to grow up healthy, strong, and mature.

A baby left on its own withers and dies. The same thing is true of your soul. Our world is full of people who have grown older but are still babies when it comes to spiritual maturity.

Spiritual growth is not automatic even for people who have opened their hearts to Christ. The writer of Hebrews sadly noted, "... though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again." (Heb. 5:12)

Millions of Christians have grown older without ever growing up.

Spiritual growth must be intentional

The truth is that growth in the human soul requires a commitment to grow. A person must want to grow, decide to grow, and make an effort to grow..

Spiritual growth begins with a decision. It doesn't have to be a complex decision, but it does have to be sincere. When Jesus' followers decided to choose his Way, they didn't understand all the implications of their decision. They simply expressed a desire to follow him, and that was the beginning of an exciting journey of the soul. Jesus took that simple but sincere decision

and built on it.

In Philippians 2:12-13, Paul to people who are already saved about their spiritual growth: "... continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose."

Notice that it says "work out" - not "work on" - your salvation. There is nothing you can do to save yourself spiritually; Christ took care of that by his life, death, and resurrection. The important thing to note is that God has a part in our growth - but so do we. We must make an intentional effort to grow.

Spiritual growth is the result of the commitments we make

We become whatever we are committed to - without a commitment to grow, any growth that occurs will be circumstantial, rather than intentional. Spiritual growth is too important to be left to circumstance. It needs to be intentional, not incidental.

Spiritual growth that leads to maturity begins with the kind of commitment described in Romans 6:13: "... give yourselves completely to God - every part of you - for you are back from death and you want to be tools in the hands of God, to be used for his good purposes."

Spiritual growth is not a private matter

Some of us hesitate to commit ourselves to developing an intentional plan of growth for our members because we believe spiritual growth is a personal and private matter. Rather than interfere, we choose to allow each person to develop in his own way at his own rate.

This is an aberration from the truth. The idolatry of individualism has influenced even the way we think about spiritual growth. So much of the teaching on spiritual formation is self-centered and self-focused without any reference to our relationship to other Christians. This is completely

unbiblical and ignores much of the New Testament.

The truth is that Christians need relationships to grow. We don't grow in isolation from others. We develop in the context of fellowship. Over and over again in the New Testament we find this basic truth: Believers need relationships with each other to grow!

Hebrews 10:24-25 says, "Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another .." God intends for us to grow up in a family.

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Aum Amriteswarayai Namaha!