Galen Call's Sermon Library
"The Cycle of Spiritual Growth" - September 7, 1986
As we come to this part of our service this morning, I'd like to ask those who are on the left ends of the aisles to reach underneath your chairs. You should find their stack of booklets, call fifty days to open my home to Christ. If they're not there, then I don't know what happened to them. Perhaps someone in the last session walked off with them, but they were to put them back underneath your chair. Now, would you look around and be sure that everyone has at least one to two persons? We can do it one to three. It's a little more difficult that way, but thanks for your help. We'll be referring to these a little later in the service, so you need not take time to read through it now. Our subject for today is the cycle of spiritual growth, living things grow and change, and it's fun to observe them, do that. This past summer, while I was on vacation with my family, the family farm in Kansas, I collected two wasp nests. One nest was that of a mud dober, which is a solitary wasp, that is, it makes its own nest out of mud with several compartments. In the compartments, it keeps its own larva as well as food for its young. Then I collected another kind of nest that of a pulistis or social wasp, which is paper-like. It's the normal nest that you think of with a wasp, the comb, as sometimes we call it, really made out of masticated fibers. Inside these little compartments, once again, the larva are kept. As I tore into the nest, it was interesting to me to observe the larva and the pupa observed in their various stages of development. Now, frankly, I did this to make it an educational experience for my children. I might have tried something else more successfully, but it was at least educational to me, and I enjoyed seeing the stages of growth that were involved in these insects. Now, whether it's insects we're talking about, or plants, or animals, or human beings, whatever is alive, grows and changes. That growth may be slow and imperceptible, like that of a redwood, or it may be incredibly quick, like some species of bamboo in tropical areas, which grows up to two feet in one day. The principle is the same that living things grow, as that is true in the realm of nature, so it is true also in the realm of the Spirit. Whatever is alive grows and changes. We who have been made alive in Jesus Christ through the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit grow and change. Sometimes the growth is slow, sometimes it is quick, but thank God he is not finished with us yet. What we are going to be, we are in the process of now becoming. We are in the developmental stages to become what God intends for us to be one day. We are all growing. In our text today we observe what seems to have been amazing growth on the part of the Thessalonians converts. Paul seems to express almost a surprise delight at the growth that he had heard about in them. Would you turn with me to 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 and verse 2 where we begin to read? We give thanks to God always for all of you, making mention of you in our prayers, constantly bearing in mind your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ in the presence of our God and Father, knowing Brethren beloved by God his choice of you; for our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. Just as you know what kind of men we prove to be among you for your sake. You also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Kia. And now turn over a couple of pages to 2 Thessalonians chapter 1. We will read verses 3 and 4. We ought always to give thanks to God for you, Brethren, as is only fitting, because your faith is greatly enlarged and the love of each one of you toward one another grows even greater. Therefore, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure. My theme this morning is this, that spiritual growth has a cycle or rhythm to it. That is something we all experience and I think it may be helpful for us to consider it more closely. Our text today gives us several pieces of information regarding spiritual growth. I'd like for you to note them. In the first place we observe from our text that spiritual growth is definable. It is not something that cannot be defined, but rather it is able to be defined in terms of certain spiritual graces that will be in the life of the person who is a Christian and growing. We see them back in our first text in 1 Thessalonians 1 very clearly, where the Apostle talks about their work of faith, their labor of love and steadfastness of hope, faith, love and hope. These spiritual graces define for us, at least in part, what spiritual growth is all about. The presence of faith, love and hope indicate growth and maturity. It would be good to define these terms that we are quite used to hearing. Faith may be defined as an attitude of dependence. That's where it begins with an attitude. An attitude of dependence, producing an act of obedience to God based upon His Word. I think that is a sufficient definition of faith. It is an attitude of dependence producing an act of obedience to God which is based upon His Word. Defined as an action of sacrifice for the welfare of another. Love cannot be defined merely in terms of romanticism. Love is not merely a sentiment that we have, but love is action. Love is a deed, it goes beyond the words to produce an action of sacrifice for the welfare of another, whatever the response and those last two words are key. Agape love, God's love does not expect anything in return. It gives simply for the welfare of that which is loved. The natural man is incapable of knowing and expressing agape. For the Holy Spirit sheds abroad in our hearts the agape of God when we're saved and then enables us by the production of His fruit in our lives to be filled with love as well as joy, peace, long suffering and so on. Agape love is God's love. It is an action of sacrifice on our part for the welfare of another, whatever the response may be. Hope then may be defined as the confident expectation of the future. We Christians may have our blue days, we may go through periods of depression that is a normal part of our humanity. But down beneath all of that and undergirding it and supporting it is hope. Hope that is a confidence in God, a hope that expects good in the future because that is what God has said. Faith, love and hope. I believe these are the marks of a Christian and will be observed in a growing Christian. That brings me to the second of the pieces of information that we gain from our text regarding spiritual growth. It's not only definable in terms of certain spiritual graces, but it's observable. Each of these graces produces results in the life. Of course he talks here about the work of faith. Faith wasn't something they just talked about, faith wasn't something they prayed for, faith was that which controlled them. It caused them to work. It was an attitude of dependence that produced in their lives actions of obedience to God. There was the work of faith observable. In love he mentions its labor. The word refers to the fatigue and exhaustion that comes with hard work. Love doesn't merely observe the need, it doesn't just talk about it, but love gets in there with its sleeves rolled up and does something. It labors. It's observable in the life. Thirdly he mentions hope which produces patience, the steadfastness, the patience of hope. Spiritual growth cannot be hidden. By its very nature spiritual growth demands exposure in the life. Where there is faith it will work, where there is love it will labor, where there is hope it will produce patience, it is observable in the life. The third thing that I think we learn from our text regarding spiritual growth is actually found most clearly in chapter 1 of 2 Thessalonians in the text we read there, the third verse. For he mentions that their faith is greatly enlarged and their love toward one another grows even greater. I observe from this that spiritual growth is measurable. By that I mean the progress or the increase of our growth can be determined. We can know that we are growing and others can know that we are growing. To Timothy the Apostle Paul said, "Let your spiritual progress be made known to all men." Spiritual growth is measurable. Paul says whereas one time their faith was here it is now greatly enlarged, he was able to measure it on some scale. He says at one point your love could be observed this way now is growing even greater than it was before. It's measurable. Now it's important and please hear me, it is important to understand what the proper measuring device is. The measurement of spiritual growth is not found in man-made rules and regulation. That is only legalism. Legalism and spiritual growth are antithetical. One can live up to a certain list of rules that man lays down and be a pygmy spiritually and never grow. We find the proper measuring scale in the Word of God. This is the measuring scale that tells us how much we are growing. It is our measuring standard. A fourth thing that I see in our text is that spiritual growth is predictable. Paul seems to say that here in the fourth verse in 2 Thessalonians 1. I think it is predictable in two respects. In the first place spiritual growth is always present in a true believer. As I said before, it may be achingly slow at certain points or it may be very rapid at another point, but that which is alive grows and a person who is genuinely saved will grow. It's predictable. He just will do it. Paul says knowing, brethren, beloved, your election of God, now what gave him that assurance is that they were truly God's children because of the work of faith, the labor of love, the patience of hope. Spiritual growth is predictable in the life of one who is truly one of God's own. But I think it is predictable in another respect as well. That is that pressure tends to produce growth. We can almost always predict that. Now when there is pressure in a person's life, it will produce growth. Now that may be an external kind of pressure. Like the Thessalonians were facing with persecution illustrated today in modern China. The missionaries left in '49 there were about 1 million Christians today. The estimates range widely, but the minimum you usually hear is 50 million up to 100 million Christians in China. In the midst of persecution, you see that external pressure produce growth in them. The pressure can also come internally. It can come from the inside of us. I would call this internal pressure discipline. That is we can discipline ourselves so that we grow spiritually. There are certain steps we can take in our lives that we can predict will produce spiritual growth. And so I say spiritual growth is predictable. And finally I'd like to point out that it's also cyclical. That is it runs in cycles. There's a natural rhythm to it. Spirts of growth are followed by periods of testing, proving, assimilating and incorporating. And it's that point that I want to focus on this morning. I want to talk about the fact that spiritual growth has normal cycles to it. Cycles are built into the very fabric of life. Solomon seems to say this in the third chapter of Ecclesiastes where he says, "There is time for every event under heaven, a time to give birth, a time to die, a time to plant, a time to uproot, to heal, or to kill rather, to heal, to tear down, to build up, to weep, to laugh, to mourn, to dance, to throw stones together stones, to embrace, to shun embracing, to search, to give up as lost, to keep, to throw away, to tear apart, to sew together, to be silent, to speak, to love, to hate, a time for war, a time for peace." What is Solomon saying? He's saying that life has its periods, its cycles, its own rhythms that are built into it by God. That's the way that life is. Now, as that is true in the natural realm of life, so it is true in the realm of spiritual things. It will help some of us if we can get our hands on that, and let me illustrate it. We would all desire to feel close to the Lord and sense His presence all the time. But the fact is that we don't, none of us do. At least we don't sense it always in the same way or in the same intensity. There are normal ups and downs in our Christian experience. There are times when we sense the Lord's presence. There are times when He seems far removed from our situation. I was talking to the dear brother Pastor in another state a few days ago, and he's going through one of those down periods, and he says that it seems as though God has removed Himself. Those God hasn't, just like you and I know that, but there are times it seems that way. That's simply a natural flow, a natural part of the cycle of our Christian experience. There are periods of growth that are followed by rest, and we should not feel guilty when we experience these. They are natural. They are normal to our spiritual experience. There are some of us who think we have to be up on a spiritual high all the time, intense. We can't be. We are not made to be that way. Our humanity cannot take that. Jesus took His three closest disciples up to the mountaintop and was with Him for a few short minutes and was transfigured. Some of them couldn't even handle it at all, and those three could only handle it briefly. Those are their humanity; they had to come back down from that mountaintop and were the same way. Spirts of growth are usually of limited duration, whereas they are followed by longer periods, usually of reflection and enjoyment, of learning to live out in our daily routine in the valley what we gained while we were on the mountaintop. I think that this idea of cycles, of rhythm in our spiritual experience is suggested even in the setting up of the annual feast days in ancient Israel as recorded in Leviticus 23. As you read about those feast days, and there were certain periods you would recall when Israel was to come together and worship the Lord, they were to observe certain festivals. As you read about them in that chapter and in other places where regulations were laid down, you are impressed by the fact that some of these festivals, these feast days, were somber, meditative, deeply spiritual times. Others, however, were celebrating exuberant and festive. They were not all of the same intensity. You see, God planned that into the very calendar of ancient Israel. Sometimes they were quiet, they were to be repentant, they were to think about God, meditate upon Him. At other times they were waving palm branches and joyous and festive in their mood. God seems to have built in a definite rhythm to our spiritual growth as well. We who are in Grace Church Roosevelt are on the threshold of an exciting opportunity for all of us. I would term it this way, it's a time of corporate accelerated spiritual growth. We've been calling it our fall advance, it is opening our homes to Jesus Christ. It is for 50 days of intensive concentrated discipline on our part to gain measurable spiritual growth. Now, I must say at this point that we're going to have a break halfway into this thing for our missions festival. For five Sundays beginning September 21, we're going to emphasize certain themes in conjunction with this, then we'll have two Sundays of break for missions and that festival is always a high for us. That's one of our celebration times. And then we're going to go back to this theme for three more Sundays, concluding on Thanksgiving Sunday, November 23rd, so it won't be exactly 50 days for us. So we're going to emphasize during these weeks, opening our homes to Jesus Christ, we are doing this in conjunction with the Chapel of the Air, a radio broadcast that some of you listen to. In the booklet it talks about listening to the broadcast because they will plan to talk about certain themes as we study them, however, that will be next spring. You see, we are one of 11 pilot churches in the United States doing it this fall. Now, as to our benefit, we're doing it first because then in the spring we can personally, if we wish, go back through it when thousands of other churches will do it. But right now there are 11 churches from coast to coast doing this, only 11. And we have the opportunity to do it first and then to give feedback to the Wheaton office of this broadcast so that they can better prepare materials, et cetera, to help those thousands of churches next spring. So in a way we're able to serve thousands and thousands of Christians all across the United States. And I think that in itself is an exciting aspect of this whole adventure. What a tremendous fall this is going to be. Now, on the one hand we recognize, of course, that all that God does in maturing us and in sanctifying us is by grace, Paul said to the Philippians, "That is God who works in you, both the willing and doing of His good pleasure." We recognize that, would never deny that. But on the other hand, we are exhorted to discipline ourselves unto godliness too. We are instructed in the Word of God to make particular effort in the direction of our own godliness and growth. Now we have an opportunity as a church to do that together. You say, "Well, how are we going to do it?" We'll open up to page three in the adventure journal that you have available to you, where we have listed the first of five disciplines. How are we going to have a time of accelerated spiritual growth together? By sharing together in one, two, three, or maybe even all five of these disciplines. The first discipline says, "Go on a daily god hunt." To put it briefly, what this involves is actively looking for and recording away in which the king has acted on our behalf in the course of the day. In other words, for these days, we are going to make it a point of disciplining ourselves to look for at least one way in which our king, the Lord Jesus Christ, has intervened on our behalf, either through a specific answer to prayer or some peculiar, unusual timing that only he could bring about in our circumstances, or in any way that we see it, we are going to be looking for the king. It's called a daily god hunt. Some of you are familiar with this already. That's one discipline. The second one is found on the next page. Face crises with the help of God's word. We do this by daily allowing our king to counsel us through his word. If you look back further in the journal, you will notice that there is a spot for daily recording of certain things, and in each of those spots there is a daily scripture reading along with just a sentence or two to provoke us to think about it. Every day there will be some passage from the word of God that all of us together who are participating in this will be reading. And we will be asking our king to give us direction, allowing him to counsel us so that as we face the crises of our days and we have them every day, we have his word to give us direction. What a great discipline that is. Some of us are already doing that personally in our times with God. Here's an opportunity for us just to shift gears a little bit if we've been doing it already and to do it with everybody else. Number three is on page six. To personalize the prayer of ownership. By daily praying the ownership prayer, recognizing his majesty's rights to our possessions, that's the prayer that I read earlier in the service. Boy, that's meaningful. As we pray that every day for fifty plus days in our case, as we pray that prayer, God is going to cause those words to sink into our hearts and become a part of us by the end of these seven weeks. That's another discipline I would encourage you to consider. Number four is found on page seven, to speak words of affirmation, how? By at least once a week, verbally encouraging at least four people, remembering our king's presence in all of our relationships. There's a place in the journal for you to write down the names of these people and to record each time during the process of these weeks that you speak an affirming encouraging word to these people. It may be your family, it may be your roommates, because you see even if you're a student or you're a single career person, you can join in this adventure. There's application for you to get involved. Speaking words of affirmation so often aren't our words to one another, neutral, tending toward negative, being critical, biting, et cetera, but here's an opportunity for us to learn some new habits in this discipline. Then discipline number five is to make Sunday the high point of your week by specific steps of preparation and then reflection that will focus on that Sunday and its particular emphasis. The theme is this theme on the front, but each Sunday for eight weeks, beginning September 21 with two weeks out, there's going to be a particular emphasis that we'll be talking about in connection with this theme. We want to learn to make Sunday the high point of the week. In the middle of the journal, the very center of it, you will find a revised calendar for 50 days. You will notice that Sunday is put at the center of the week at the high point and then following the Sunday, there's a place for you to write down and answer this sentence, "Jesus, here's what I'll carry in my heart from this last Sunday." In other words, we reflect on the theme from Sunday, and then in the last part of the week, we prepare for the next Lord's Day by saying, "I'll make this coming Sunday special for you, Jesus, by," and then we write in our answer. We do not want to become legalistic Sabbath observers, if we did, we'd have to start meeting on Saturday anyway, but I'll tell you one thing I've observed. That is that many of us don't consider Sunday special enough. We've really not considered carefully what rights our king has to this particular day of the week and how we ought to be preparing for it and then reflecting upon it. Now, if those five disciplines, or any one of them, any combination of them is not sufficient for you. On page 9, there are some alternative disciplines that you may want to consider, but my point is this. How are we going to grow together in an accelerated way? Well, part of the answer is that we will be observing these disciplines, whichever ones we desire to put into our lives, perhaps even all five of them, I would hope, but we'll be working on these together and then sharing together and encouraging one another during these weeks about what God is doing to help us to grow. Now, I can hear someone say, "Well, what if I can't participate?" And I recognize that could well be a response. What if I can't participate? May I suggest, first of all, that you see if your reason is really valid for not participating. If in fact it is, I want you to know that there is no pressure that we placed upon you to be a part of it. You will still benefit by coming here and weekly worshiping with us, but there will be no pressure on you to become an adventurer. But I hope rather your question would be, "How do I get involved as an adventurer? What do I have to do to sign up?" Now, how we're going to do it is by investing just two dollars in one of these journals. I can't let you do that this morning. In fact, I want you to pass them in before the end of the service to the person on the left end of the aisle, I'd like to put them back under the chair again. I can't give them to you today, but beginning tonight they will be available in the bookstore and you can get a personal copy. Now, two dollars shouldn't be too much of a handicap for us. That's only the price of a big mac and a drink. And you know, if we can't spend that much on a tool to help us grow spiritually, then we've got deeper problems than we know. That's right. So the cost of the journal is but two dollars, we would encourage you to get one for each adult in your family and each junior high age person on up. So these booklets are suitable for all of those age groups. One per individual will undoubtedly be necessary. By the way, for those children in grades 3, 4, 5, and 6, there are children's journals being printed. Now, they're not off the press yet because, of course, we're early in this whole process with Chapel of the Air as a pilot church, but we hope to have them here by the time of our first adventure Sunday, September 21. So children in grades 3 through 6 will also be able to have a journal and work with us in this process. I hope that you will prayerfully consider being involved. I'll have more to say about this next Sunday. But I want to ask you, are you ready for a time of spiritual growth, of intensive effort on your part, of discipline so that you can see accelerated spiritual growth in your own walk with God? Now, there may be some of you that have just come through a time of intensive growth. I want to encourage you to take 24 hours to get your breath and then decide to be a part of this one too. It may be that you haven't grown for years. I hope that you will ask God to make these next months a time, a meaningful, special, significant time in your life when you will be able to see measurable, observable, definite, spiritual growth in your life, living things grow and change unless there's something that interrupts the growth process, last summer I interrupted those larva, they're not going to grow up because I killed their nest. I sent them to their great reward with great delight too, I might say. And you know in our own spiritual development, there are things that can hinder us, namely sin. Sin preclothes spiritual growth. We cannot grow if there is sin that is unconfessed or undelted with in our lives. And so before we really can get to the point of growing spiritually through this effort, we need to examine our hearts to make sure that sin has been adequately dealt with. Before we can tell the king that we're ready to take the steps of discipline, whatever ones we may wish to take, we have to be able to go to the king and make sure our lives are clean and right with him. Is that your case this morning? You see, really Lord of your life today? Growth will only come if Jesus is Lord. And if today there is something that would choke off, that would preclude your being a part of this adventure, I beg with you, child of God, to deal with that. And it may be that you're not a Christian at all, you've never been saved, you have to have life before you can grow. A baby has to be conceived and born before you can grow up to be a child, an adult. You are born into God's family through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. We want to give you an opportunity this morning to make that life transforming decision be born into His family. Let's bow together in prayer. As we sit here this morning, and many of us have heard about the spiritual adventures some want already, others of us may be have heard about it the first time in this message. But I want to ask you a question. Are you at the point right now that you're willing to say yes, I want to join that adventure? That's for me. Now I recognize some of you cannot do it. That's fine. But if you say yes, I can do it and I will do it by the grace of God. I want this to be a time of accelerated spiritual growth in my life. Would you lift your hand and put it down? I'm asking this for practical reasons as well as for other. Thank you. God bless you. Now if you couldn't lift your hand then, could I at least ask you to pray about it, consider it? You don't have to be a member of our church. All you have to do is be coming here and sharing with us what God is doing in your life. But would you at least pray about it, ask God to give you direction? Maybe there are some decisions in your life that have to be made before you can say yes, I want to join. You need to be saved or perhaps you need to get sin dealt with in your life. Father, I pray that you will work with us. I pray that you will bring us to that point of knowing what your will is for each of us in the adventure this fall. And if today right now you are dealing with us regarding areas of our life that are not under your kingship, for your majesty is not being observed, then give us the courage to make the decisions and the changes that need to be made right now so that we can grow. In Jesus' name, amen. [BLANK_AUDIO]