Growth takes place in one of three ways. Things grow because one of three things happens.
First, some things grow just because it is in the very nature of those things to grow. You don’t have to do anything, you don’t have to feed them or nourish them or encourage them. Some things just grow. Weeds, for instance. Weeds grow without your help or mine. Debts ... debts grow. How did I possibly run up that much on my credit card? Taxes, of course, taxes. I do not for one moment believe any politician who campaigns on a tax reduction promise. Not on your life. Weeds, death, taxes. Some things just grow on their own.
But other things grow because they have been nourished and fed, they have been cultivated and encouraged. Just before Halloween, Ed Mitchell walked over here ...I should say staggered over here … with an enormous squash from his bountiful back yard. That monster was no accident. That took some cultivating. Now Ed will deny that, being a modest man; but if you compare his produce with the scrawny stuff that comes out of my back yard, I think the results speak for themselves. Some things grow when they are nourished and fed, cultivated and encouraged.
Oh, by the way, when I said monster, I did mean the squash, not Ed.
But did you know that there is a third way in which things grow? Some things grow best when they are pruned and cut back; some things grow best when they are trimmed and reduced for a while. At certain seasons of the year, if you cut back your roses or you trim back your vines, then next year they will flourish. When you cut them back, the growth energy gets channeled into new growth rather than just maintaining the old. Cutting and pruning, trimming and reducing, painful though it may look, actually promotes growth.
Today I want to think with you about personal growth and church growth. About the growth that is possible for you and me as persons, and the growth that is possible for our church. And to do so I want to nail down one very important premise:
If we grow as persons, then the church will grow too. And if the church grows, then we will grow as persons.
Did you get that? It’s a circular argument. One thing reinforces the other. If we grow as persons, then the church will grow too. And if the church grows, then we will grow as persons. If you and I become more and more mature, then we will be able to help our church grow, both in numbers and in ministries.
But the reverse of that is true, too. If the church will grow, if the church will offer more ministry, then you and I will grow as well.
Each reinforces the other. One hand washes the other. Growth.
But remember, some growth just happens... weeds, debts, taxes ... usually unwanted growth. And some growth takes tender care and feeding and cultivation. But some growth takes painful pruning.
Paul, writing to the church at Ephesus, wants us to understand growth. He wants us to see that the growth of the church and our own personal growth are intimately bound up together. Like a horse and carriage, you can’t have one without the other.
Ephesians 4:7, 11-16
I
One of the first lessons to be learned about growth is that good growth requires a goal. Growth needs a mark to aim for. If you are going to grow something, the idea is not just to get it as big as possible. The idea is to get it to hit the mark, to reach the goal.
When Margaret and I spent an afternoon at Longwood Gardens a few weeks ago, we were especially intrigued by the bonsai display. Do you know about bonsai? It’s Japanese gardening. It involves cutting and pruning trees so that they become exquisite, perfect miniatures. Some theorize that the Japanese developed this art because there is so little space in their land. Through creating miniatures they can have their gardens even in very small spaces.
Now the important thing to know is that a bonsai tree is not just a little tree; it’s not just a very young tree that hasn’t matured yet. It is a mature tree … in fact it can be quite old ... but through constant shaping and reshaping, pruning and clipping, it has hit the mark. It has attained its goal of being a complete specimen.
But did you notice? Its growth came about by pruning and cutting. It hit the mark and attained the goal of what it is supposed to be because someone was willing to subject it to the pain of pruning.
I submit to you that we need a goal in our spiritual lives, and that Paul has defined that goal for us when he says that we are to come "to the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." The goal is nothing less than that. The measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
So I raise up for you this morning the simple question, "Do you have a growth goal?" What kind of person do you want to be a year from now, five years from now, ten years? Do you have a growth goal, or have you settled into a pattern of complacency?
A friend of mine some years ago set himself a growth goal. He decided at about the age of 40 to learn to play the piano. It was a real trip to see this forty-year-old man hunched over a piano, picking out simple little five-note, one-hand tunes like they give six–year-olds. Some of us teased him about it, asked him when he would work up to,
"Three Blind Mice". But he wanted to grow, he had a growth goal, and was willing to subject himself to the teasing of his friends and the frustrations of older fingers to get there.
Growth is often painful; but if you have a goal, you tolerate the pain. You find the mark.
What this church is all about is providing you with the opportunity to set the right goal, to know what the mark is. The mark is knowledge of the Son of God, maturity, the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. We are going to offer as complete a program as we possible can to make that happen. It’s going to be tough and painful for us to get there. But remember that if we grow as persons, then the church will grow too. And if the church grows, then we will grow as persons. On your mark.
II
But there is something else about growth. Not only do we need to have a worthy goal, but also we need to have the right equipment. We need to have the proper tools at our disposal. Just knowing what we want to become is not enough. We have to get together the equipment that will make it possible.
The interesting thing about the equipment for spiritual growth, however, is that most of it is given by God to the church. God-given. It isn’t something we have to go out and find for ourselves. It’s given to the church.
Paul says, "each of us was given grace according to the measure of Christ’s gifts ... and his gifts were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for he work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ." Gifts. We are gifted through the church.
If you take that seriously, I think it means that hiding somewhere within this church are the gifts we need in order to grow. Don’t look longingly at other churches and what they have; look gratefully at what God has given us already.
Last Wednesday night, after the final sessions of our first training seminars were over, the two guest seminar leaders, friends of mine with no reason to sugarcoat anything ... both of them said of the groups they had worked with, "You have some interesting, gifted, people here."
Well, we do. And so we ought to give up worrying about what we don’t have and concentrate on using what we do have. We are gifted. God has given us what we need in order to grow.
How I wish I could persuade every one of us of our gifts! How I wish I could make each person see that his or her gift is needed. God would not have brought you here if He did not have something in mind for you to do. I believe that so much that I will even make this bold statement: if there seems to be nothing in this congregation worthy of your time and energy, then either insist that we use your gift, or else go find someplace else that will. God has brought us here to use our gifts. And if we do not use them, the body will fall short of its growth goals, and we will atrophy. We will shrivel up and die. And so will the church.
One of the most effective churches in this city is the Church of the Savior. At the Church of the Savior, as I understand it, if a member feels a need and thinks he or she hears a call to do some ministry, they just stand up in the worship service and say so. They say, "I feel the Lord’s call to do this thing ... does anybody else hear it? Is there anyone else who will come with me?" The Church of the Savior says that all you have to have is a few other folks who see the same need you see and feel the same gifts you feel, and you’re free to go and do it. Just do it.
We can learn from that. Get that equipment in place and use it. Feel the gifts God has given. Just declare them for the building up of the body. Don’t wait to be discovered or coaxed. Just step out.
A few weeks ago we distributed what I called the "Willing Spirit" forms. You had the opportunity to demonstrate your interest in one or more of some fourteen different possibilities for ministry. A good many of you told us what you might be willing to do. I want to assure you we are moving ahead as rapidly as possible to put you to work. I’ve talked with the chairs of each of the committees that would be involved. More meetings are set up for this week. We are very definitely going to call on you to use those gifts.
In addition, the Nominating Committee will be seeking people to teach Sunday School, to become deacons, to serve on committees, to do various tasks. When they approach you, I don’t want you to hear them as desperate people saying, "We’ve just got to have somebody, anybody, filling this slot." No, they will not be doing that. If the Nominating Committee asks you to do a task, it is because they believe they see gifts in you that should be used. It is because they believe that God has equipped you to build up the body of Christ. Please accept the gifts God has given for your own growth as well as for the growth of the church.
On your mark, get set. If we grow as persons, then the church will grow too. And if the church grows, then we will grow as persons.
III
Finally, on your mark, get set, and grow. If we grow as persons, the church will grow also. And if we grow the church, the church will grow us. Each reinforces the other.
Do you believe that God wants our church to grow? I think so. I know so. He wants our success. He commands our success. Listen:
“Speaking the truth in love, we MUST grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together ... promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love."
We MUST grow up in every way ... into Christ. There is no option here. We MUST.
What is it going to take for us to be a growing church?
Remember now what we saw earlier: that there are three ways in which growth takes place. Some growth comes about just in the course of nature. Some things, like debts and weeds and taxes, that we don’t want, will grow on their own. We’ve had some of that kind of malignant growth. We’ve had the tensions and the hostilities. When Christians do not seek to grow into new fields, they will let the weeds of hatred and prejudice and suspicion and tension take over. We’ve had that. But the Bible says "Speaking the truth in love." We’re not going to let the weeds grow.
Remember, too, some growth also takes place because we cultivate and nourish, we feed and we tend. Some growth takes place in a church just because people get their needs met and feel satisfaction. They get help and they grow.
I trust you see that happening. I hope you feel it happening for you. As you have seen us organize a new class for young adults; as you have witnessed the rapid expansion of our work with children; as you have discovered that you can now come here four days a week at noon for prayer and reflection; as you have found your way here for exercise classes and for training seminars ... have you seen that we are growing the church so that it will grow you?
There’s more to come. Next week we are gathering some younger couples to look at a marriage enrichment program. We’ve talked about this for months and months, but it’s going to happen. As rapidly as possible we are shaping a ministry for single parents … that’s a very high priority need. We’re going to grow people and grow the church all at the same time.
But I have said repeatedly that some things grow best when they are pruned and cut back, some things have to experience the pain of pruning before they can truly succeed. We are about to discover that in the church. No pain, no gain.
Everything that we need to do and feel called to do will cost money. The fellow who said that the best things in life are free obviously never tried to run a church. It’s going to cost us. And that’s where the pain of growth comes in.
I have been told on a number of occasions that many of us do not give responsibly to the church because the word is that the church does not really need the money. I am told that various ones have admitted that they do not tithe just because it has not seemed that the church really had to have their resources.
Well, apart from the fact that failing to tithe is failing to follow the Biblical standard, I also want to disabuse everyone of any thought that your church is wealthy. If you could look at our balance sheet today, you would see that over the past several years we have spent our money for a variety of things, and we have just about used up our reserves. You will discover this week when you get your mail that we are proposing an austerity budget for the coming year, a budget in which many of the things we have been doing will be cut back. There is going to be some pain and pruning in this church budget.
But to tell the truth, I am genuinely excited about lat. I am excited because, here we are, having organized a half-dozen new ministries in the past couple of months, on the very threshold of organizing more, on the verge of getting into the world out there and not just for ourselves, and we are really going to have to work to pay for it. I am excited about that, because I believe that’s when we’ll have some real growth.
Remember, real growth comes from pain and pruning. If the church hurts and prunes itself, that will grow us. And if we will hurt and prune back our wants and wishes, we will grow ourselves and grow the church.
On your mark, get set, grow.
