Category: Key Growth Posts

listening, contemplation

God Wants To Bless You In Receptive Prayer

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I’ve read that in conversations we should find ourselves listening as much as talking. Of course, this just makes sense – it would be selfish if we were in the habit of listening 30% of the time and talking 70% of the time. But does this apply to our conversations (i. e. prayer) with God? Sure. God wants to do good things for us. He wants to speak his words in his way. He wants to continuously transform us into the image of Christ. So wouldn’t God want us to spend time listening for him, or at least being in a receptive mode so we could receive anything he might want to do? That’s why the image for this post is someone listening to headphones: they are in receptive, listening mode. It is common to think of prayer time as a time when we talk the whole time. We thank Continue Reading →

spiritual growth

Four Stages Of Christian Maturity – Considering Where We Are

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Over the centuries many Christian teachers have outlined what it looks like to become a mature Christian. These outlines, or guides, are helpful because they help us see what we are “aiming” for in our Christian life. In other words, they tell us what it means to become a mature Christian. The New Testament speaks many times about what it means to be “mature” or “complete” (sometimes the word “perfect” is used but it means complete in the Greek.) This idea that Christians grow spiritually and that we can describe what this looks like along the way is referred to as “stages of growth”. We could also refer to these stages as phases or processes. These stages are supposed to encourage us because they describe the good that is ahead for us. In other words, we know what to look forward to. The clearest descriptions in Scripture of some stages Continue Reading →

what should we be doing?

What Are We Supposed To Be Doing?

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What is the Christian life all about? Sometimes we find ourselves wondering “What am I supposed to be doing in my Christian life?” Who can deny that it is important to have a general idea of what discipleship and spiritual formation are all about. What are we supposed to focus our energies on in the Christian life? And what is spiritual formation according to scripture? One place we can find this in scripture is in Paul’s prayers for the churches. One particularly helpful prayer for spiritual growth is at Philippians 1:9-11: “And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” (NIV) Continue Reading →

exercise

Activating Our New Will

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Do you find that you lack willpower to make the godly choices you want to make? Do you find yourself repeating the same fault over and over? Perhaps your willpower needs some exercise. When God gave us a new birth this included a new will. Just as our new mind and new affections should grow spiritually stronger so too should our new will. Every part of us should grow more Christlike. If we sharpen our resolve to overcome the Enemy and to control our destructive desires, then we will soon find victory over temptations to our flesh. In this battle it is helpful to avoid wasteful activities and instead make good use of our time by pursuing activities that edify ourselves or others. Also, spiritual disciplines will produce solid growth of our new will. But we must remember to depend on the Spirit as we exercise our new will (Rom. Continue Reading →

eye

Transformed By Continuously Beholding Jesus

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Do you want your daily words and actions to be more Christlike but you find that you can’t seem to get the right attitude throughout the day? You may want to consider learning to consciously focus your heart on Jesus. We call this “contemplating Jesus” because it is not meditation (i.e., mulling over, reflecting, gaining understanding), which is important for devotional times, but rather we just gaze on, behold, or give attention to Jesus. Contemplation is just a fancy word for these simple activities. The most profound passage on contemplating Jesus is II Corinthians 3:18: “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.” Notice that it says “beholding” not “having beheld”. In other words, we are to continuously behold the glory of Jesus and the Father. But the fantastic promise is that Continue Reading →