God has placed before us a message of hope for the future. The message is Christ crucified. Yet too often we fail to hear this message over our self made noise of decline and defeat. We have allowed ourselves to talk about declining numbers, increasing irrelevance, dwindling finances and aging membership. Yet the message of Jesus is life where there was death and victory in the face of defeat. As followers of Christ it is our calling to stand and grow into his victory.
Over the past four weeks as I’ve preached about our congregation’s purpose of Growing Disciples who Exalt, Explore, Embody, Engage I have placed a challenge before each one of us. It’s a challenge that leads us into a deeper and fuller surrender to God. The point of the purpose and the nature of this challenge is not that we will ever reach the destination of full surrender to God. We won’t - at least not this side of the return of Christ. Our purpose statement is about the process of surrendering ourselves to God. The emphasis is therefore on the action of continual, ongoing growth.
Spiritual growth occurs along a continuum, like any form of growth. Imagine, if you will, a seed that is planted in the ground. Until it germinates it remains simply a hard, lifeless kernel. Life is contained within it, but that potential hasn’t been released. When the seed germinates, a seedling starts to grow. Provided that the seeding continues to receive the right amount of nutrients from water, soil and sun it will grow and keep on growing. It will continue to become bigger and bigger. It will produce more fruit/flowers/leaves whatever.
We have had planted within us a seed of faith. Given the right conditions to nurture it, our faith will continue to grow and transform the way we think, speak, act and show Jesus Christ to this world. In 2 Timothy 1:6 Paul encourages us to continue nurturing our faith. “For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.”
It is immaterial what our stage of faith development is at any point in time. What is essential is that we have become more fully devoted followers of Jesus Christ. Through the grace of Jesus Christ we each have the potential to grow further in our relationship with God. We can each love him more deeply and be amazed more fully by his grace. We each have the capacity to love our neighbours more diligently and serve them more humbly. We all need the transforming of our character and values to closer align with those of God’s kingdom. This growth in faith is always toward something better. Better for ourselves to experience more of God and better for our world so that the kingdom of God may shine through.
As we experience constant growth in our faith we will become more sure and certain that the message of Jesus is good news and will always overcome the message of defeat and despair that our world pushes our way.
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