Growing in Maturity in Christ Primjer

Five Phases of Spiritual Growth: Children

To see your children interact with their own children is a pretty cool thing to behold.  I enjoy watching our daughter, Hannah, as she interacts with, loves on, and raises her own children.  (I am so proud of Hannah and Jeffery and the great parents they are!)  Every child born in this world deserves to have loving parents who will nurture them and help them grow.  

Every new follower of Jesus also deserves to have those spiritual parents in his or her life who will nurture them and help them grow into maturity as well.  Too often this is where we in the church drop the ball.  We present the gospel with much fervor and passion and even lead people to pray to receive Jesus as their Savior and Lord, and we should absolutely be doing this wonderful work of evangelism.  However, we should also exhibit the same passion and fervor when it comes to helping these new believers grow in their walks with God.  

I still remember to this day when Gene Nolan lovingly corrected me for my not so wholesome language.  I was about 10 years old and in Gulf Shores, AL on a Royal Ambassadors (my Southern Baptist friends will get this!)  I had eaten a wonderful dinner at Wolf Bay Lodge and was just being a kid and said something that I should not have said.  Mr. Nolan kindly confronted me and suggested I not use those words but try more wholesome words instead.  Here I am 45 years later, and I still remember this!  It made a wonderful and positive impression on my life.  Oh, how the church today needs Mr. Nolans, men of God who care enough to disciple children in the faith.

Jim Putman writes, “Don’t mistake Bible knowledge, years of church attendance, physical age, education, and so forth for spiritual maturity.  A person’s physical maturity is easy to identify.  Not so with a person’s spiritual maturity.  Some spiritually immature people have been in church for sixty years or more.  And some spiritually mature disciples have been Christians for only a few years.”  (Putman, p. 49)

I love the way Paul relates to the believers at the church in Thessaloniki.  He reminds them that he and his missionary colleagues ministered to them with the utmost integrity.  He also tells them how they exhorted, comforted, and charged them like a father does for his own children.  Paul tells these believers that they challenged them to have a walk worthy of God.  When followers of Jesus mature in their faith and look more and more like Jesus that brings honor and glory to God.  But this maturation does not happen by osmosis.  It takes intentional effort on the part of both the person discipling and the one who is being discipled.  

Growing in Christ is not easy.  That is why so many Christians remain in their immaturity.  Perhaps this is why so many lost people are not interested in the Christian faith.  They see little difference in their lifestyles and those in the church.  

How do you know a person is a spiritual child?  They tell you with the very words they use.  Here are some of their phrases from the stage: “I believe in Jesus and my church in the woods, just Him and me.”  “Don’t branch my group into two groups.  It is comfortable for me right now.”  “I didn’t like the music in church today.  If they only did it like . . .”  (Putman, p. 50)

Are you older physically but still a child spiritually?  So many are in our day.  Would you like to grow out of adolescence and become a mature follower of Jesus?  You can!  Read the next two devotionals and learn how you can grow in Christ and have a walk worthy of God.