Tag Archives: spiritual growth

August 21, 2014 · 7:37 AM

Little Things Make Big Messes

I always thought I was a person who had been faithful in the little things until I read the final chapter in “Good to Great in God’s Eyes” by Chip Ingram. The last chapter is about developing great habits and in it he lists six great habits to adopt. One of which is “Do your own dishes – The principle of responsibility”. He wrote about putting up your folded clothes instead of leaving them out, washing your dishes instead of putting them in the sink and putting your dirty clothes in the hamper instead of on the floor. Each one hit home because I’m guilty of all of them.

If that wasn’t enough, he then wrote, “We usually don’t make a conscious decision to expect others to clean up our messes. It’s a habit. But behind that habit is an assumption that it’s up to someone else to make our life work.” Subconsciously we leave things out, put dishes in the sink and throw our clothes on the floor in hopes that someone else will do it. When they don’t do it, we get exasperated and huff and puff while we have to do it. Am I the only one like this?

These small examples are part of a bigger problem. The attitude of expecting others to make our life work bleeds into our spiritual life too. We expect our pastor to be in charge of our spiritual growth. We expect them to read the scripture to us instead of looking it up ourselves. We get upset when we don’t get anything out of the service, yet we put nothing into it. All of these are “little” things, but they prove to God that He can’t trust us with the big things. We can’t grow because we don’t have any roots.

Zig Ziegler once said, “If you take care of the little things, the big things will take care of themselves.” There are so many little things in our lives that we’ve left undone. When they become big things, we wonder where God is in our mess. We expect Him or someone else to come save us because we’ve come to expect others to clean up our messes. We are the ones who made them, yet we feel it is God’s responsibility to clean them up. Then, when it’s not cleaned up immediately, we get upset with God for not answering.

Our messes are our own responsibility. We create them because we haven’t learned to be faithful in the little things. Today, look at your life to see what little things need your attention. If you’re in a big mess, trace it back and you will see that it started with something little. Once we learn to do the menial tasks, God can trust us with more important tasks. I know I still have lots to work on in this area myself. I can’t expect God to do more through me than He’s doing right now until I learn to take care of the tasks I thought didn’t matter.

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August 20, 2014 · 7:13 AM

Spiritual Improvement

We’ve been doing some home improvement projects lately. Some are small and some are large. In either case, I’ve found that it costs money, time and effort. In some cases it requires the help of others to get the job done right. I look at what it takes to do the improvements sometimes and I try to convince my wife that everything is fine. She looks at them and wants to make them better. I’m learning that we will never be done improving and changing things because as time goes on, we have to keep updating to keep it from falling apart.

Our spiritual life is very similar. We must constantly be working on improving it. There is always room for improvement and growth. None of us are where we want to stay, but many of us don’t want to do the things necessary to improve. We make excuses as to why we can’t find time to go to church, read the Bible or pray. We know we need to, but we lack the drive to make those things happen. In doing nothing, we run the risk of falling apart. I’ve heard it said that a Bible that’s falling apart typically belongs to someone whose life isn’t.

Spiritual growth will cost you. It’s not cheap to improve. You’re going to have to invest in books and seminars. You’re going to have to get up earlier. Stay up later. You’re going to have to do things differently than you’ve always done them. If you want a different result in your spiritual life than you’ve been getting, you’re going to have to do things you’ve never done. You’re going to have to force yourself to get up early to pray and read the Bible. You’re going to have to turn off your phone in order to give God 100% of your attention. Growth always costs something. It just depends on how much your willing to improve.

Next, it requires time. Each of us only get 24 hours in a day, 1,440 minutes or 86,400 seconds in a day depending on how you look at it. How you invest your time says a lot about what’s important to you and also determines your future. How much time do you spend playing games, watching TV, following the lives of others, reading the Bible, praying, spending time with family and friends or surfing the internet? Just like anything else in life, where you invest (sow) your time determines what your return will be (reap). If you want a deeper, more meaningful time with God, invest more time in the relationship.

Growth will also require the help of others. You do not have to walk this road alone. There are others around you who have the skills you need for improving your spiritual life. They know the scriptures that will point you in the right direction. They know how to overcome the situation you’re facing because they’ve been there. It takes you being humble enough to say, “I’m struggling with this and I can’t do it. Can you help?” For some of us, that’s easy. For others, that’s the hardest thing in the world to do and accept. If we are going to grow, we are going to need the help of others.

Where do you fall in all of this? Are you content with where you are? Do you feel like you need to grow or improve, but aren’t willing to put in the work? Maybe you want to, but just aren’t sure where to start or who to ask. Start with getting up an hour earlier each day just to spend time with God. Look around at the people God has placed in your life. Who is it that is further along than you? Ask them to help hold you accountable as well as to help you grow. Ask them what works for them. Growth and improvement isn’t easy or cheap, but the rewards are incredible. Ask God for direction and He will show you.

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August 1, 2014 · 8:00 AM

Grow Down To Grow Up

Have you ever grown a tomato plant? I haven’t since I was younger, but I remember that when the tomatoes started growing we had to brace the plant. Sometimes we drove a stake into the ground and loosely tied the plant to it. Other times we made a round cage from chicken wire and put it around it to help it. While it’s body is strong enough to hold the tomatoes, it’s not firm enough to hold them up. The more it produces, the more help it needs.

The same thing is true in businesses. The larger they get, the more structure they need. If they grow too quickly without the right structure in place, they’ll fail. It can also happen in our spiritual growth. The more we grow in Christ, the more structure and support we need. Colossians 2:7 says, “Let your roots grow down into Him, and let your lives be built on Him. Then your faith will grow strong.” Paul knew that as we grow, we need deeper roots to support us.

If you want to grow in your relationship with God, you have to let your roots go down first. You can’t grow up until you grow down. Your success in your ability to stay strong as you get closer to God depends on your ability to grow your roots. A big tree is easily blown over if it has shallow roots. The top side can be healthy, green and growing, but of it doesn’t have deep roots, it will get pushed over by the first storm that comes along.

The foundation for a skyscraper is a lot different than the foundation for a house. A shallow foundation on a large structure will crumble. Our foundation has to be built on Christ. Colossians 2:2 in the Amplified says, “That they may become progressively more intimately acquainted with and may know more definitely…Christ.” We are to progressively know Him more. We are to continue growing beyond our initial salvation experience. We are to move from milk to meat. The only way we can successfully grow more is to put down deeper roots.

We put them down by progressively spending more time in the Bible and in prayer. Your growth is directly tied to how much time and effort you put into it. I’m talking about after your salvation experience. Christ does that work because we can’t. Our growth comes from actively seeking Him. It comes from putting structure in place to help you grow. It comes from reading books on faith, having people in your life who are stronger in their faith than you so they can help you and from having people around you who are weaker do you can help pull them along. Your roots are key to your growth.

In Ephesians 3:16-17, Paul says that he prays that God would empower us with inner strength through His spirit. Then, after Christ makes His home in our heart, our roots will grow down deep into Gods love and keep us strong. The more we trust on Christ, the deeper our roots will grow. The deeper our roots grow, the closer we can get to Him. If your desire is to grow upwards in Christ, spend time working on your foundation. Do the things that will give you a clearer understand of who God is and build on that foundational knowledge of Him.

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January 31, 2014 · 1:56 AM

No More Plateaus

It’s Free Friday! Today is the day you let go of the things in your life that keep you down or hold you back. To celebrate, I’m giving away a copy of “Fresh Air: trading stale spiritual obligation for a life-altering, energizing, experience-it-everyday relationship with God” by Chris Hodges. Keep reading to find out how to enter.

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Two years ago, I was losing weight. I had adopted a better diet, began to exercise more and controlled the portion size of the food I ate. For weeks, the pounds came off. Five pounds. Ten pounds. Fifteen pounds. Twenty pounds. Twenty pounds. Twenty pounds. I got stuck. I couldn’t lose any more. I hit a plateau at twenty pounds lost. I wanted to lose more, but nothing I did pushed me past it. I are healthier. I exercised more. I ate smaller portions. Nothing worked. I was stuck. Eventually, I quit trying. I adopted the mindset that this was my ideal weight.

It wasn’t long before I allowed junk food to slowly enter my diet. I began to exercise less. Holidays came around and I justified the larger portions. I put on one pound. Two pounds. Four pounds. I began to drift backwards. “When I get to ten pounds, I’ll go back to that healthy lifestyle,” I told myself. I became stuck in this limbo of wanting to lose weight, but not really doing anything about it. I plateaued again.

I find that the same thing happens to us spiritually. We desire to have more of God in our lives. We want to be a stronger light for Him. So we read our Bible more, pray all the time and find ways to share our testimony. We make a difference in one life. Two lives. Five lives. Ten lives. Ten lives. Ten lives. We hit a plateau in our spiritual growth and the lives we influence. We read more. We pray longer. We look for more people to talk to, but nothing changes. We then adopt the idea that this is where God wants me to stay.

It’s not long before we read less, pray few times a day and quit looking for opportunities. We get caught in a spiritual limbo. The problem is that checking off spiritual boxes like reading and praying will produce some growth, but not a sustained growth. We’ve got to break down scripture into bite sized chunks to understand it deeper. We’ve got to spend silent time in prayer listening to the voice of God to communicate with Him. We’ve got to do things differently than we’ve done them if we want to break through those plateaus.

We’ve got to quit settling for where we are spiritually if we really want to grow. We’ve got to change how we study and pray to get to that next level. We’ve got to get to past living a life of rules and checked boxes if we truly want to experience who God is. Sustained growth comes from the inside out, not the outside in. You’ve got to want it more than anything else and then make the sacrifices that will produce the results you’re looking for. “Draw near to God and (then) He will draw near to you.” You’ve got to make the move first. You’ve got to do the work that draws God to you. His desire is to be constantly moving closer to you. Break free of the plateaus today and climb that mountain. You will experience new life and fresh growth if you do.

If you would like to win “Fresh Air” by Chris Hodges, all, you have to do is go to my Facebook page here and “like” it. I will randomly pick one person tomorrow (February 1, 2014) who has liked my page. If you have already liked my page you’re already entered. If you enjoy reading these daily devotionals, please invite your friends to like my page so they can receive encouragement from God’s Word too.

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