Are You Growing?

Growth of any kind is impossible without devotion to the means of growth.  Growth results when we are disciplined to practice the means that make us grow.  Here are some examples:

• If you want to grow healthy you need to eat healthy food. Eating healthy food is a means to health.
• If you want to grow stronger you need to exercise.  Exercise is a means to physical improvement.
• If you want to learn something new or simply do well in school, you need to study.  Your commitment to study is the means that will determine whether or not your knowledge increases.

You get the point.  On Sunday, Dr. Don Shoff challenged us to commit to some vital Christian Practices in 2014.  These are also known as "Christian Disciplines" "Spiritual Disciplines" and "Means of Grace.”  Reading God’s word and praying daily, sharing our faith, generous giving, fellowship and worship are the main means to Christian maturity.  You can listen to the sermon online at sermon.net/sdwchurch.

Growth will not and cannot happen without devotion to the means of growth.  We cannot become more like Christ, we cannot grow in our obedience to God's word, we will not be transformed, we will be weak in our individual faith and we will be ineffective in our mission unless we are devoted to the means God gave us to grow. 

This is how the church of Jesus Christ has always grown.  When God sent the Holy Spirit in Acts 2, the Apostle Peter preached a sermon and 3000 people believed and became baby Christians.  By Acts 11, even after great persecution, we find these Christians sending missionaries, teaching others, seeing needs, organizing into action and enjoying true fellowship among people who did not normally associate. How did they do it?

The answer is found in Acts 2:42-47.  They devoted themselves to the Word of God, they devoted themselves to fellowship, they devoted themselves to worship (communion), they devoted themselves to prayer and they gave and shared generously. Through these means of growth, God formed them into His children and into the church He called and created them to be in Christ.

Let’s go and do the same.