GROWING IN CHRIST

Growing in Christ We as parents have the privilege of watching our children grow and mature. Last Saturday, Malia and I took our oldest son Wade to look at a college. As I was driving, I began talking to Malia about how when he was a toddler I never imagined being at this moment. We have seen this young man grow from a baby into a rambunctious toddler and then into an energetic boy. At age six he accepted Christ as his Savior and then he continued growing. He has now grown into a young man. He looks at me eye to eye. We have adult conversations. He even is borrowing my shoes. Malia and I have watched him mature and decide what he wants to do with his life. It is an honor to know that he wants to spend his life helping those who may have great difficulties in their life. There have been many trials along the way but we have watched Wade get through each of them and come out a better man on the other side. We look forward to watching him turn into the adult that God has intended. Does God the Father look on His children and see us maturing in Christ? Or are we like the Corinthian church who when Paul wrote to them in 1 Corinthians 3 he wrote “And I, brethren, could not speak to you as the spiritual people but as to carnal, as to babes in Christ.” The cause of problems in the Corinthian church was more than external, worldly influence. It was also internal carnality. The pressures from the world were combined with the weakness of the flesh which made them as Paul would say “carnal”. The carnality of the believers was indicative of their immaturity. They had no excuse for not being mature, since Paul implied that he should have been able to write to them as mature, in light of what he had taught them. So what does maturity in Christ look like? Spiritual maturity is simply Christlikeness. We are as mature as we are like Christ, and no more. He was the only fully mature man. His character was complete, well balanced, and perfectly integrated. All His qualities and capacities were perfectly attuned to the will of His Father, and this is the model, the standard God has set for us. Philippians 2:11 “Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature[a] God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death- even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Aaron Hodges