Growing up...

by Elizabeth Stewart

Our youngest grandson will be two years old next month, but until recently he was still clinging to a wee bit of babyhood.Throughout the day he would drink his water or other beverages from a cup, but he loved having a baby bottle of milk in the morning and one before bed. For some reason, he wouldn't drink milk any other time or any other way. Last week, his mama was finally able to wean him from his bottle.

Growing up isn't always fun. Like my grandson who didn't want to give up his baby bottle, growing up involves letting go of childish things. A child is self absorbed. They don't spend their days concerned about or caring for others, but a mature adult thinks of others. The body of Christ needs mature, full grown believers to help care for spiritual babies and children. The body of Christ needs spiritual mothers and fathers who are willing to "adopt" and mentor the spiritual orphans that are prevalent in our culture.

How do I help myself to grow in spiritual maturity?

It helps me to grow in spiritual maturity when I realize that I am enfolded in God's love. His love surrounds, covers and embraces me. When I am confident of God's love and care for me, when I am connected to Him as my source of love, then I can love and care for others without the childish refrain of "what about me?" dominating my thinking.

It helps me to grow into spiritual maturity when I allow the Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit, to show me the truth about myself. When I am confident in God's love for me, I can handle it when God shows me things about myself that need to change. I know that any correction He is bringing into my life is done from the heart of a perfect and loving Father.

The Holy Spirit also shows me the truth about God. He wants me to know Who He really is, without distortions that may have come from my own understanding or the influence of this world. As I grow and mature in Christ, I allow the Spirit of Truth  to help me to let go of my "I thinks" and embrace the truth of Who God is as revealed in His Word.

As I grow in spiritual maturity, I also grow in the fruit of the spirit of self-control. Instead of living and speaking out of my emotions, the Holy Spirit helps me to lovingly express truth and to speak truth to others, to live the truth out in my daily life and to be truthful in all of my dealings.

Physically, we come to an age when we have reached our full stature and we stop growing. But, spiritually, we should be in the continual progress of growing up. None of us have fully arrived. We are dependent on the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth to help us grow. Mere self effort doesn't make us grow physically, and neither does it make us spiritually mature. The Holy Spirit takes our willingness, yieldedness, obedience and cooperation and does His good work in us and though us moment by moment, day by day. "Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church." (Ephesians 4:14-15 NLT)