It is encouraging
to remember that from God’s perspective, we are all a work-in-progress.
It is even more encouraging to know that He wants to see us make as much
progress as we can and that He will do all He can to make that happen:
“I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper
you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah
29:11 NIV)
Here are five
ways that God helps us grow and mature spiritually:
1. Involve God
in the decision-making process. From the time we are small children,
we learn through parental instruction. Just so, we grow spiritually as
we learn to follow God’s instruction, as we turn to Him in prayer and
apply the spiritual principles in His Word to our decisions.
2. Exercise
faith. Just as we also learn through experience, through suffering
the consequences of wrong decisions and reaping the rewards of right
decisions, we grow spiritually as our faith is put to the test and we
see that it is the solution to life’s problems.
3 Give of
yourself. As we forget ourselves and focus on meeting the needs of
others and making them happy, we become conduits of God’s love to those
people. And as we pour out, God pours into us. “There is one who
scatters, yet increases more. The generous soul will be made rich,
and he who waters will also be watered himself.” (Proverbs 11:24a-25).
“Give, and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken
together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the
same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.” (Luke
6:38).
4. Recognize
and work on weak areas. We all have room for improvement. That’s a
fact of life that’s generally not too hard for most people to accept. It
gets harder when we get specific about our weaknesses, and it gets
harder still when others get involved. It’s humbling to acknowledge our
weaknesses, even if only to God and ourselves. But if we can humbly
acknowledge them to others and show ourselves open to their help in the
form of advice, reminders, and prayers, we find ourselves on the fast
track to spiritual progress.
5. Take on new
challenges. It’s human nature, especially as we grow older, to say,
“This is the kind of person I am” or, “I can do this, but not that,”
but when we do, we stop growing. When we close ourselves off to new
information and ideas, we stop growing intellectually. When we close
ourselves off from other people, we stop growing emotionally. But when
we close ourselves off to new challenges, we stop growing
intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. Again, each of us is a
work-in-progress, and we can only continue to make progress by moving
forward, and the way we move forward is by rising to new challenges.
God can help us become more like what we
want to be. If fact, He can do better than that! He can help us become
more like what He wants us to be. If we will do our part, He will bring
us along step by step because He loves us.
Author Unknown
Should
you find yourself the victim of other people's bitterness,
ignorance, smallness or insecurities; remember,
things could be worse. You could be one of them!
Learn
from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all
yourself.
|
Tim
|