We are in the fourth week in our 40 Days of Community, we have been focusing on God’s #1 reason for placing us here on earth. What on earth are we here for? To love God and to love each other. Unfortunately, we don’t naturally do this. We don’t naturally love God or other people all the time. We might have our good moments but we don’t consistently do this, particularly with those we are close to, our spouse, our children, our coworkers. Which is why we need Jesus, we need a Savior, not only to forgive our past sins and failures to love, but to defeat our self-centered sinful nature, so we can follow God’s Spirit and behave more like God, loving people the way God does.
Just becoming a Christian does not mean we will automatically love others in all situations, in case you haven’t discovered that already. God changes our nature to reflect his but we still have our "old habits, patterns, and practices which need to be removed and replaced," so that we might reflect Jesus as this passage from Rom. 8:29 reminds us: "For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn, with many brothers and sisters (NLT)."
It says here that God’s plan from the very beginning of time was that every person who would become a Christian would also become like his Son. God wants us all to be like Jesus. He wants us all to have his character; that we would love like Jesus, we would act like Jesus, we do what Jesus would do in every situation if he were in our shoes. God doesn’t just want believers who get saved and then live the rest of their lives the way they want, he wants disciples, committed followers who have a close personal relationship with Jesus, and therefore walk as Jesus walked (1 Jo. 2:6).
* We Need to Grow Spiritually so that Our Life Reflects Christ.
Obviously this process is not yet complete in us. In order to get rid of our old self-centered habits and develop new godly habits which in turn forms our character, we need to grow, spiritually I mean not in the waistline. The Biblical word for this the process of becoming more like Jesus is sanctification. God expects us to grow. The Bible says when we become a Christian we are like spiritual infants, we are babies, and we are expected to grow up, to mature, to learn to love and be kind, and to obey God, but growth doesn’t just happen automatically with time, just because we get older doesn’t mean we are maturing spiritually. We can be a believer our whole life and still be an infant, spiritually speaking. Paul actually criticized a whole church for their failure to grow:
NLT 1 Corinthians 3:1 Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you I couldn’t talk to you as I would to mature Christians. I had to talk as though you belonged to this world or as though you were infants in the Christian life. 2 I had to feed you with milk and not with solid food, because you couldn’t handle anything stronger. And you still aren’t ready,
Paul was obviously upset because the church in Corinth was still living like the world rather than like Christ. They hadn’t matured, there weren’t loving each other and living in harmony, they were divided. They hadn’t grown up. The problem with staying a spiritual infant is that we need everyone else to serve us and we want everything our way. We ask "what can the church do for me," or "what can God do for me," or "why isn’t this done my way." That’s spiritual immaturity. But the Bible says we need to mature. As we mature, we realize our life is to be poured out as an offering to God. We find our meaning and purpose not by what we want to do, or what others do for us or having our way, but by loving and serving God and each other.
The measure of our maturity is not how long we’ve been a Christian, how often we go to church, how well we know the Bible, or how correct our doctrine is, or how much we give to the poor. These are important means to help us mature, but we can do all of these and still miss the mark. We can still be self-centered, still be uncaring, still unkind, still fall into temptation. The real indication of our maturity is how Christlike we are, including the fruits of God’s Spirit beginning with love (joy, peace, etc), and it is also our obedience to God (Jesus perfectly obeyed his Father).
Maturity or spiritual growth is a gradual lifelong process based on a series of decisions and commitments we make. We make the choices on whether we will grow up spiritually. In our Methodist tradition we believe we grow when we regularly practice what John Wesley called the "means of grace." They are the habits we choose to do which make us receptive to God’s grace to continue the growth within us. We don’t change ourselves, God changes us. The inward habits: spending time with God in personal prayer and corporate prayer (praying with others), fasting, studying and meditating on the Bible. The outward habits: attending worship, receiving the sacraments (baptism and communion), fellowshipping with other Christians (which means spending time with and caring for other Christians), works of mercy like caring for the poor, justice, being the voice for those who are marginalized without a voice. When we do these habits, they don’t make us grow, but they make us available to God, and God does the work in us. God puts the ball in our court, we make the decision whether we will practice the means of grace, and then he starts to change us, but we must first take the steps of faith. Some people choose to grow, while others remain like infants.
* We Need Others to Help Us Grow
During our 40 Days of Community we are being reminded that we aren’t meant to do this Christian thing alone. We are better together. We need other Christians to help us grow spiritually. NLT Ephesians 4:16 Under his direction, the whole body is fitted together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.
The church is a body, we are connected together in Christ, and as a body each one of us is responsible for one other. Therefore we need to help each other grow spiritually. Since the goal of growing is learning to love and care for other believers, we can’t completely learn this lesson on our own. We need other Christians, who can help us learn to put it into practice.
For the rest of our time we are going to focus on how we can help each other grow spiritually.
We Help Each Other Grow By:
1. Surrounding Ourselves With Godly Examples
While Jesus is the model for our life and we can read about his life and even talk with him now through prayer, we also need tangible models for what the mature Christian life looks like. We need those saints who are ahead of us on the journey, who have been there and done that, and have grown from their experiences. We need to learn from their example. Look at what the Apostle Paul wrote:
NLT Philippians 3:17 Dear brothers and sisters, pattern your lives after mine, and learn from those who follow our example.
NIV 1 Corinthians 11:1 Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.
I know Paul sounds a bit arrogant here, but his point is still valid. We need other people to pattern our lives after, to learn from their example as they follow Christ. Some of us grew up in wonderful godly families, and we had parents or grandparents who were great examples for us and perhaps still are. Unfortunately, not all of us had that advantage, and so God gives us a church family with saints whom we can surround ourselves with so we can learn from their example. We can talk to them and find out how they got through difficult situations in their life, how they have strong relationships and marriages, and how they matured in their faith. If I try to go it alone without examples the chances of maturing are pretty slim. They are a valuable resource to help us grow in our faith. You’ve heard the phrase you can’t soar with the eagles if you’re hanging out with the turkeys. Who you surround yourself with will determine who you become.
Which reminds me of the story about the guy who entered his mule in a horse race, and people were asking him why did you place a mule in the race he can’t keep up with all those thoroughbreds, he’ll never win? The man replied, ’I thought the association would do him well.’
Who are you spending time with who is more spiritually mature than you are? Who exhibits the character of Christ to you and how are you learning from them? Whose life are you investing in who may not be as far along in their faith as you are?
2. Praying For One Another’s Growth
We usually pray for people’s needs, they have health needs, and financial, relationship needs, and we should pray for these things, but how often do we spend praying for one another’s spiritual growth, that God would change our character. Our character will last forever while our physical body will not. Paul wrote at the end of his letter to Colossians 4:12 Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.
Rather than complain about your spouse’s flaws pray for their spiritual maturity. Pray for your children’s spiritual growth. Pray for the people in your small group’s spiritual growth. God gives us a community of believers to help us grow, and since God is the one who grows us, we can ask for each other.
Perhaps one of the reasons we don’t grow is we don’t know what to pray for. How do I pray for somebody’s spiritual growth? Well fortunately, the Bible is filled with verses about how to pray for somebody to grow spiritually. In fact, the next four verses are prayers for people’s spiritual growth and... I’ll tell you what. Instead of me reading these and telling you what they mean, let’s spend a few minutes just doing what these verses say. There are people in your life that you’d like to pray for their spiritual growth, people in your group, your family, your friends.
As I share these verses with you, perhaps God will bring someone name to mind and in your mind you agree in prayer saying, "Yeah God, they could use that. Help them in that area." For instance look at this first verse from Ephesians 3:18 and 19. "I pray that you’ll be able to feel and understand how long, wide, deep and high Christ’s love really is and to experience this love for yourselves." Who could you pray this verse for?
Or how about this next one, Romans 15:13, let’s read this together, "I pray God who gives hope will fill you with much joy and peace while you trust in him." Who wouldn’t like some hope in their lives? Who doesn’t need more joy, more peace in their lives? If you noticed these last two verses are the first three fruits of the Spirit (love, joy, peace).
Last week we talked about being authentic and honest in order to cultivate real community, sharing what is really going on within. So this week I am going to ask you in your small groups or with another person to share what fruit of God’s Spirit you need to grow in, where do you need to mature, and then pray for each other in your group.
Hebrews 13:21, "I pray that you’ll always be eager to do what is right." Parents wouldn’t you like to pray that for your kids. I mean really that they not only do what was right, grudgingly but they’d be eager to do the right thing. We’ll pray for them right now, or some friend, or somebody at work. God give them integrity; just bring their name to mind, "God I pray for them."
If you or someone you know has a hard time getting along with other people you could pray Romans 15:5, "May God develop maturity in you so that you all get along with each other as well as Jesus gets along with us." Notice that the test of maturity is relationships. If you don’t get along with one another, it says one thing, you are immature. If you’re always worried about other people, if you’re always threatened by other people, if you can’t get along with other people, you have an immaturity problem and you need to grow up. God says as he develops maturity in us, we get along with each other, just as Jesus gets along with us. Now that’s why we’re doing ’40 Days of Community.’ That’s why we’re doing small groups. The purpose is to learn to get along with each other. The purpose is to learn to build relationships, learning how to love.
3. Encouraging Each Other’s Commitments
The last way we can help each other grow is by encouraging each other’s commitments.
The Bible says in First Timothy 4:7, "Keep yourselves in training for a godly life." Now how do you do that? How do you stay in training for a godly life? To stay in training means we consistently keep at it, it means there is an ongoing work. Let’s say I was to get serious about my physical fitness decided to do something and start training. And I make a commitment of riding my bike for 20-30 min. three days a week. My first day is a beautiful sunshiny day and I go out and ride my bike hard for 20 min. How long will I keep at my commitment , eventually because of weather or just feeling tired or unmotivated, I will probably cut back to two days a week, and then one. Unless you are a driven person, if you want to succeed you get a training partner. You need someone to train with you. It’s always easier to work out when you’re with somebody else. The same is true in your spiritual life, in order to keep our commitments we need to get a spiritual training partner, a person or a group of people who will be on the journey with us. How many times have you showed up at something just because you knew someone else was going to be there and they were going to ask you why you weren’t there?
By the way, nothing affects your life more than your commitments. Tell me what you’re committed to. I’ll tell you what you’re going to be in 10 years, 20 years because you are becoming whatever you’re committed to. Your commitments shape your life; and if you’re not committed to anything, than you are allowing other people to shape your life for you.
The Apostle Paul told us we are to be mutual encouragers.
NLT Romans 1:12 I’m eager to encourage you in your faith, but I also want to be encouraged by yours. In this way, each of us will be a blessing to the other.
We have asked you to be in home groups during our 40 Days of Community so that you might encourage each other’s commitment to spiritual growth. Because if we don’t have someone else, chances are we are not going to keep our commitment. It will be like most of our New Year’s resolutions that we make and then break within 2-3 weeks into the New Year. First: you need to make commitments to all the habits we talked about before: pray, Bible reading and study, but you also need someone to help you encourage your commitment. But without accountability you will not keep your commitments, and without keeping your commitments you will not grow.
I can remember in my early twenties desiring to read through the entire Bible, a noble goal, and a very large goal, and most of the time it never made it past a thought in my head. Other times I started reading. I began with Genesis, and by about Leviticus or Numbers I was done. Then I joined a Bible study at my church called Disciple Bible study group in which our goal was to read and study almost all of the Bible in 34 weeks. It was a lot of work but I kept my commitment and read almost the whole Bible because I had other people to encourage me, and hold me accountable.
We want people to encourage us in our faith, but the problem is we don’t want anyone to encourage us in our commitments, to hold us accountable, so we can do whatever we want. If we miss our commitment for a day, a week, a month, it’s no big deal because no one will ask me about it. And pretty soon, months go by, years go by, and the commitments have gone out the window, and our spiritual life is stagnant or declining.
Who is your spiritual training partner(s)? Who helps encourage you in your faith and help you grow and keep your commitments, particularly commitments to your spiritual habits or disciplines, spending time with God in prayer and reading his Word, using your time and abilities to serve one another. To reach out and share the love of God with those outside the faith?
