"Complacency is easy,
and it is a deadly foe of spiritual growth." - A. W. Tozer
Many try to apply efficiency
principles to spiritual growth, and it has not worked the way people expected.
In general, shortcuts taken to bring spiritual growth have not yielded desired
results, which has resulted in many people not pursuing personal spiritual
growth as an essential matter. Lack of character transformation is no more seen
as a serious issue. When moral and ethical standards mentioned in the Bible are
violated or ignored, nowadays, we see a growing tendency to move on with no
regret, thought, or action.
At times people hide under
what they do for God to cover the failure to become what God desires from them.
According to Dallas Willard, "The most important thing in your life is not
what you do; it's who you become. That's what you will take into
eternity." We can be so busy for God that we do not have time to spend
with Jesus and allow the Holy Spirit to transform us. Have we reached a point
in our spiritual life where we have quietly said to ourselves that, "I am
like this, and I will remain like this? I do not think God can transform me
internally."
Paul talks about a Christian
becoming mature in the Lord and measuring up to the full and complete standard
of Christ (Eph. 4:13). Are we willing to pursue spiritual disciplines in our
life which will help us become more like Christ?
We should not neglect our
daily devotion time of prayer and Bible reading. We should not form a habit of
neglecting our devotions by thinking that we will do once we are done with all the
other pressing needs of daily life. We must give it a top priority and have a
set time and place for it. We should look at adding spiritual disciplines that
will help us grow in our devotional life and challenge us to be intentional
with our activities.
When it comes to our
spiritual life, we must be intentional that we do not become a Consumer
Christian.
"Consumer Christianity
is now normative. The consumer Christian is one who utilizes the grace of God
for forgiveness and the services of the church for special occasions, but does
not give his or her life and innermost thoughts, feelings, and intentions over
to the kingdom of the heavens. Such Christians are not inwardly transformed and
not committed to it." - Dallas Willard.
A statement from John Ortberg
has challenged me a lot. He says that "Spiritual growth doesn't mean a
life of doing what I should do instead of what I want to do. It means coming to
want to do what I should do." Are we committed to genuine spiritual
growth, which will transform our character in this efficiency-focused world? If
we invest time, we will reap rewards that will last for eternity.
