New Monmouth Musings: Measuring Your Spiritual Growth

Dear Friends,



We have a cottage on Lake Ontario in northern New York, and one of our most significant annual family traditions was to measure the annual growth of our children. One of the first actions they would take after our five-and-a-half-hour pilgrimage to the lake would be to run into our bedroom, where Jean and I would measure them to see how many inches they had grown over the previous year. I remember how excited they were to be measured. They seem to take competitive pride in noting who had grown the most. Those growth marks are still penciled on the wall of our bedroom. This past summer I was once again reminded of these visual growth testimonies, and I thought to myself how grateful Jean and I are that all of our children are healthy and still growing-albeit not in the physical sense as measured by some old pencil marks on a wall, but in the spiritual sense of maturing in their understanding of who they are as children of the King. There is no stunted growth in any of their lives. 

The Apostle Peter reminds us that we are to "grow in grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ". (2 Peter 3:18). "Like newborn babies, crave spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good" (1 Peter 2:2-3).   Growth like children is not automatic for as Tennessee Ernie Ford used to say (I know this reference really dates me) "Too many people start out at the bottom and sort of like it there."  How sad that many of our lives are spiritually stunted, maybe we stopped growing many years ago, and sadly we are now learning that death begins where growth ends. 

I don't remember who said it, but many years ago I copied a quote that I have never forgotten, the writer said, "When someone misses the opportunity for growth and improvement, he may feel regret. If he goes long enough without growing, he begins to feel he has had an unused life. And that is not unlike an early death". 

How unlike the words of William Barclay, the author of one of the best New Testament commentaries ever written who said, "We should count it a wasted day when we do not learn something new and when we have not penetrated more deeply into the wisdom and the grace of God."  

It is easy to be like the child who decided he would quit school. He said "I hate school; it is an awful place. All they do is ask a lot of questions. I can't write. I don't know how to read, and they won't let me talk. There is nothing to it, so I quit."  "But son," the dad said, "you are only in kindergarten."  And there are some who still may be at the kindergarten stage of their spiritual development. They haven't gone far enough for the fun. They are spirituality stunted, stagnant saints who have never learned that death begins where growth ends. 

Only toadstools pop up overnight. Growth takes time, it takes effort, and it takes a steadfast commitment to daily self-improvement. One of my favorite writers was the legendary basketball coach John Wooden who once said, "It is what you learn after you know it all that counts." 

So, my encouragement to all of us, myself included, is to find that spiritual wall in your home and see how you measure up. Are you growing and if not, why not? Today can be the start of a new commitment to spiritual growth, and a good place to begin is at Genesis 1:1 and a wonderful place to end is Revelation 22:21. I promise if you read everything in between you will be a different person, maybe becoming a spiritual giant in comparison with what you were a few years ago. Let me encourage you to join a Bible study or a small group or a Sunday school class. Look for a place to serve, commit to worshipping weekly, giving generously, and serving passionately.  Make a difference in someone else's life, and you will make a difference in yours as well. 

I end with the words of a senior saint who ends his correspondence, with these closing words: "Yours at 83 and still growing." 

May each of us capture his spirit.

Yours in faith and friendship,
Pastor Tom