Over the last few weeks, our theme has been “power”. We looked at what the Bible says concerning God the Holy Spirit, who gives us the ability to love one another and who leads us into the truth. And we studied what the Bible tells us about Prayer and the reading of the Word, two important means by which we access the Spirit’s power. This morning, we are looking at another power which the Holy Spirit gives us, and that is the power to change, and mature, and bear fruit. Because the Christian life isn’t just a matter of getting saved, and then serving, and sacrificing, and suffering until Jesus comes back. We aren’t just marking time, doing our best to be good Christians until Christ returns. No, the Christian life is, or at least it should be, a life of joy and fulfillment. And much of that joy and fulfillment flows from the transformation that God is bringing about in us through his Spirit. Because the more that God changes us to be like Christ, the more we are able to know him and to experience his love for us. And that brings us joy. Sound good? All right. I’ll begin by sharing with you a passage from Paul’s letter to the Philippian church.
“3 I thank my God every time I remember you. 4 In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5 because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6 being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus || 9 And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, 10 so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 11 filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.” (Philippians 1:3-6, 9-10)
What is Paul confident of? Verse 6: he is confident that the good work which has begun in them will continue, until it is fully and finally brought to completion on the day Christ returns. And so spiritual growth is an ongoing process, one that begins when we first place our trust in Christ, and which continues throughout our lives. It is also a progressive process; note that Paul prays in verse 9 that their love would continually increase, that it would abound “more and more”. And so God does not intend that we be spiritually static; that we remain the same over time. God intends that we grow and change, and that is Paul’s prayer here. So what does Paul say will be the result of the work that God is doing in them?
• (v. 9) Their love would “abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight”
• (v. 10) They would “be able to discern what is best”
• (v. 10) They would be “pure and blameless”
• (v. 11) They would be “filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ”
And these are the kinds of changes that God desires to make in us as well. By the way, did you see a mention in any of these verses of an age limit? In other words, this process of becoming like Christ, does it level off, or plateau when we turn, say, fifty, or sixty, or seventy, or eighty? Do we ever retire from growing in faith? No. This is a lifelong process. And so as long as we are alive, we are to be changing. Paul writes this in 2 Corinthians:
“16 Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.” (2 Corinthians 4:16)
Now, I’m doing what I can to slow down the “wasting away” of my outward body; you probably are too. But the point Paul is making is that the (sadly inevitable) deterioration of our flesh does not imply a corresponding spiritual decline. Someone might assume that, along with losing some physical strength and perhaps even some mental sharpness, we would also suffer a loss of spiritual strength and power. But Paul tells us that precisely the opposite is true. Even as the strength of our external body diminishes, our spirit continues to be renewed, every day. And that is why this process of spiritual transformation, this process of becoming like Christ, doesn’t stop or even slow down as we grow older. Because God is continually renewing us spiritually. Yes, even those of us who are on Medicare.
OK. We read in Philippians 1:6 that God is the one who began this process of transfor¬mation, and that he will bring it to completion. Does that mean it is automatic? Is it something that just happens, no matter what I do? Should I “let go and let God”? No. Spiritual growth requires intentional effort on our part. Yes, the power is all from God. But we have to cooperate with God. Listen to what Paul tells us a little later in Philippians:
“12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” (Philippians 2:12-13)
This is a key verse in understanding how the process of spiritual growth and maturity works in our lives, because it highlights both our part and God’s part. I’m going to look at it in some detail because it is so important. First, when Paul tells them to “work out” their salvation in verse 12, he isn’t saying that they are to earn or to merit salvation. But to understand what he is saying, we need to realize that “salvation” has several components, a beginning, a middle, and an end, and he is referring to one specific component.
• The beginning of salvation is “justification”. This is a one-time event which takes place when we first trust in Christ. It is a legal declaration by God that we are no longer guilty of sin, but that the guilt of our sin has been transferred to Christ, while the credit of his righteousness has been transferred to us. We have no part in our justification, other than to receive it by faith. It is a unilateral act by God.
• Following justification is “sanctification”, which is the lifelong process of being changed into the likeness of Christ. This requires us to cooperate with the Holy Spirit’s work in us.
• Finally, there is “glorification”, when Christ returns and we are fully and completely changed, as Paul describes in 1 Corinthians 15:52. He writes that it will happen “in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet”. And this is also something that God does, without any action on our part.
In other words, salvation is an initial event, followed by a process, followed by a final event. And so when Paul tells the Philippians that they must “work out” their salvation, he is referring to sanctification, that middle part of salvation. Let’s read it again:
“12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” (Philippians 2:12-13)
As I said, this is a key verse because it highlights both our part and God’s part in sanctifi¬cation. Our part is to “work out” our sanctification, “with fear and trembling”, verse 12. We have to do something. But we are able to do our part only because it is God who is working in us through his Holy Spirit, “to will and to act”, verse 13. He is the one who is strengthening our will to live holy lives. He is the one who is enabling us to carry out our holy intentions, in ways that fulfill his purposes. Do you see the partnership here? We work together with the Holy Spirit, we cooperate with the Holy Spirit, in this process of spiritual transformation. God provides the power, but we have to use that power. We have to act.
OK. Now, I want to pause here and make an important point. This process of spiritual growth, this process of becoming more like Christ—in our desires, and values, and thinking, and speech and actions, does not affect our standing with God one bit. We are loved by God, completely and unconditionally; we are accepted by God, completely and unconditionally, from the very beginning of our walk with Christ, and every day after that, because we are in Christ. The basis of God’s love and acceptance of us is not our work, it is the work of Christ on the cross. But our growth in faith and obedience does change our experience of that relationship. Because the more that God changes us to be like Christ, the more we are able to comprehend his love for us, as we saw last week. In addition, the changes that God makes in our lives through the process of sanctification provide confirmation that the initial event, justification by faith, has actually taken place. So our spiritual growth still matters, very much.
All right. We have to do something in order grow spiritually. What is it that we have to do? I’ll start with an illustration. Over the past few weeks, our television screens were filled with images of the Winter Olympics in Italy. For example, you may have watched:
• Luge, where they speed down an icy track at 80-90 miles an hour on what looks like a Radio Flyer sled. Or skeleton, which is just as fast, except that they go head first, lying on their stomachs with their faces literally an inch or two off the ice. Anybody want to sign up for that? By the way, the sport of skeleton is called that because the sled they use is so minimal and bare-bones that it looks like a skeleton.
• Now curling, one of my favorite events, is the exact opposite of that. It’s very slow, basically shuffleboard on ice. But with Canadians shouting, “Curl, eh!”
• Of course, there’s figure skating, in which the skaters perform intricate routines to music, alone or in pairs, with jumps, and spins. Axels, Salchows, Lutzes, Toe loops. I’ll confess they all look the same to me. I can’t tell a double Axel from a triple Lutz—admit it, neither can you—but it’s very impressive nonetheless.
• There’s speed skating, where the athletes have thighs like tree trunks. Or short-track speed skating, which looks like barely controlled mayhem. It seems like half of those races end with the skaters all flying off the track and crashing into the barriers. And then the judges have to figure out who gets a medal. Fun times.
These events are all very different. Some of them can be very dangerous, as we saw when Lindsay Vonn crashed out ski racing. Others are pretty safe. Like curling. Maybe they risk a sprained ankle. Some of the athletic disciplines require precision, while others require strength, or endurance, or a complete lack of concern for personal safety. But what they all have in common is that they require many years, and thousands of hours, of practice. Thousands of reps on the squat rack at the gym. Thousands of miles of cross-country skiing. Thousands of hours repeating skating drills, or sweeping in front of the curling stone.
But here’s the key point: during those years, and those thousands of hours of training, there wasn’t any one day, or week, or month that made the difference, that made them into an Olympic athlete. It was the slow, steady, accumulation of skill and strength over time, little by little, day by day, that made them into what they are. Mikaela Shiffrin, who won a gold medal in this Olympics, isn’t the best slalom skier in history because she had a really intense workout one day back in December of 2017. No, Mikaela Shiffrin has won the most Alpine Ski World Cup victories ever, because she got up every day for years and went to the mountain, rode the ski lift up to the top, took a run down the slope, practiced her technique, maybe fell and got up, and then did it over, and over, and over, and over again.
The same is true for someone who develops skill or mastery in any discipline, whether it’s learning to play the piano, or speak a foreign language, or restore classic cars, or build custom cabinets. Change and growth doesn’t happen overnight, all at once by some Herculean effort. It happens gradually, little by little, as we try, and fail, and try again, and succeed, and then build on that success to try something else, and something else, and something else. It’s that discipline of doing a little bit, over and over, every day, that results in amazing progress over time.
And the same is true of spiritual growth. The same is true of the changes that God is making in us, with our cooperation. It’s the commitment to daily spiritual disciplines that make a huge difference over time. This is why the application for our sermon on prayer was simply to pray, once a day, “Father, please bless our church”. That is something that each one of us can do. I believe it will have a tremendous impact, as each of our individual, brief prayers, repeated every day, combine to produce a chorus of prayer to God. And if you will do that, then over time, you will probably find yourself praying more for the church. Perhaps you’ll pray for the ministries that you are involved in. Perhaps you’ll pray for the requests that are shared on Sunday morning during worship. Perhaps you will pray for the pastor (please do!). As I mentioned last week, we also have monthly prayer guides in the back for those who would like to use them. But the important thing is to pray every day, even if it is just one five-word prayer. And then build on that, over time, as you are able.
It's the same way with reading the Bible. What was our application? “Read the Bible today”. Not, “read a chapter of the Bible every day”. Not, “read through the Bible in a year”. Not even, “Learn Hebrew and Greek so that you can study the Bible in the original languages”. No, just read the Bible today, and every day, even if it’s only a paragraph or a single verse. What matters is the repetition; getting in the “reps”, as weightlifters would say. And that daily repetition of disciplining yourself to read the Bible, even for only a few minutes, will pay huge dividends over time. I promise. If you will do that consistently, read the Bible every day, you will see results. Some of you can testify to the benefits of daily prayer and daily Bible reading, because you have been doing it for years.
But it’s not just so-called “religious” activities that matter to our spiritual growth. Any kind of spiritual change that we need to make can use the same approach. For example, let’s take the way we communicate. Getting control of our tongue, our speech. The Bible says that this is a critical area of Christian character:
“26 Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless.” (James 1:26)
“Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” (Proverbs 18:21)
If don’t keep a tight rein on our tongues, James says that our religion is “worthless”. And our speech literally has the power to bring death or life. So this is important. If, then, God should convict you that you need to get better control of your speech, what would you do? If your words are too negative and judgmental, for example, what do you do? Well, what you shouldn’t do is take an oath that from this day forward, you will never utter another critical word. That will almost certainly fail. Because bad habits get stronger over time, just like good ones. And so they have to be unlearned in the same way, little by little over time. A better approach would be to say, “God, please help me to say one encouraging thing to someone every day”. That’s all. One positive, encouraging thing each day. It doesn’t seem like much. But over time, it will bring about massive changes in how you use your speech. Because it will cause you to be mindful of what you are saying. It will make you sensitive to how your words affect others.
And if you think that a few words of encouragement won’t make a difference, listen again to the wisdom of Proverbs:
Gracious words are a honeycomb,
sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. (Proverbs 16:24)
We greatly underestimate the constructive power of genuine, authentic words of praise and affirmation. Their healing and nourishing effects penetrate into the deepest part of us, right down to the bone. Mark Twain once wrote in a letter, “I can live on a good compliment two weeks with nothing else to eat.” And he was probably underestimating the lasting effects of positive words. But Mr. Clemens was only restating what Proverbs told us thirty centuries ago.
So that’s what you might do if God convicts you of the need to better control your tongue. Here’s another example. Suppose that God has convicted you of the need to share your faith. Is this something we should all be able and ready to do? Yes. Every day, we cross paths with people whose deepest need is to know Jesus Christ as Savior. And so love should compel us to share the good news with them. Here is what Paul writes to the Colossian church:
“2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” (Colossians 4:3-6)
Paul is asking them to pray that God would open doors for him to share the gospel. And he asks for prayer that he would do so clearly. He also urges them to “make the most of every opportunity”, and in the context, this means they also should always be on the lookout for opportunities to talk to people about Christ. By the way, if your reason for not sharing the gospel is that you don’t have opportunities, are you in prison? No? Then you probably have more opportunities than Paul had.
OK. If God is convicting you of the need to grow in this area, what should you do? Well, following this principle of “little by little, day by day”, you could pray daily, or weekly that someone else would take the initiative to ask if you are a Christian, or to ask why you are different. Make it so easy that you have absolutely no excuse. Of course, over time, there are other things you could do. Learn the Romans Road to Salvation. Write out your testimony. But to start, you could ask God that openings to talk about Christ would just fall in your lap. And if you will do that, and then respond as you are able to the risk-free opportunities that God brings your way, I predict that in a short time, you will find yourself sharing the gospel with confidence. Because you will see God working, and that will give you joy.
Now, these are just two examples to show how this principle of “little by little, day by day” can work to build us up, and strengthen our faith. It definitely works. But it can also work in the other direction. If spiritual habits decline, or if sinful habits increase, then this same principle leads gradually, over time, to becoming distant from God. It leads to a lack of interest in the things of God, a lack of taste for spiritual things. And ultimately, if the decline continues, it can lead to someone walking away from the practice of their faith altogether. So it’s important to maintain what you might call “spiritual hygiene”, to continue the regular practice of spiritual habits like daily prayer, and daily Bible reading, and regular Christian fellowship. Because just like you need to brush your teeth every day for good personal hygiene, so that your teeth don’t decay, you need to practice good spiritual habits for spiritual hygiene, so that your faith doesn’t decay. Proverbs warns us of this:
10 A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest—
11 and poverty will come on you like a thief
and scarcity like an armed man. (Proverbs 6:10-11)
It isn’t usually one big issue that causes decay or decline. It’s a host of little issues, left unaddressed, that accumulate over time. So we need to be watchful and alert, and take care of the little things. We need to do our spiritual maintenance and take care of our spiritual hygiene.
OK, let’s reset. I’ll tell you a story: In the ancient world, there was a famous athlete, named Milo of Croton. A real person. He lived in Greece, in the 6th century B.C., and he was celebrated for his amazing strength. He won multiple victories wrestling, in the Olympic games and in other competitions. Supposedly, he would display his strength by carrying a full-grown bull on his shoulders around the Olympic stadium. And the story of how he developed his great strength was this: he took a newborn baby calf, and lifted it onto his shoulders. Then every day, he lifted the calf again. As the cow gradually grew larger and heavier, Milo’s muscles adapted, little by little, to its increased size and weight, until eventually, he could lift a full-grown bull. Now, that story may be a bit embellished. I always wondered how he got the full-grown bull to cooperate. But if anyone wants to try it out, be my guest. Find a baby calf and start lifting, and let us know how it turns out. But regardless, the principle is sound. Daily repetition will eventually result in a huge gain.
Let me give you another way of thinking about this topic of spiritual growth. In the church at Corinth, there were some divisions in the fellowship. Some of the congregation favored Apollos as their teacher, and others favored Paul. So they had an “Apollos” faction and a “Pauline” faction. It seems like a great problem to have, actually: would you like to be taught by Apollos or Paul? How about both? Here is his response:
“5 What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. 6 I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. 7 So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. 8 The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. 9 For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.” (1 Corinthians 3:5-9)
For our purposes this morning, what I would like you to draw from this passage is the analogy that Paul uses, which is that the church is God’s field, and that God is the one who causes the growth. Apollos and Paul are just two workers, one who plants the seed and one who waters the seed. Let me ask you, have you ever planted a garden? Do you do all the work in one really long, intense day? And then do the plants shoot up immediately? No, of course not. First, you prepare the soil, you use a hoe or a tiller to break up the ground. Then you plant the seeds and cover them up so the birds won’t eat them. Later, you may add fertilizer or weed killer. Every few days or so, you water. If weeds start to appear, you pull them up. After a few weeks, the green shoots appear, and finally the crop – maybe beans, or tomatoes, or corn. The point is that growth happens slowly, over time. But it doesn’t happen automatically. You have to tend the garden. You have to hoe, and plant, and fertilize, and water, and pull weeds. You have to do a little bit of work, every day. And eventually, you get the reward, the fruit of your labors. A garden full of beautiful, delicious vegetables. God is the one who made the plants grow. But you had to act also, so that they would get the food and water they needed, and so that the bugs and the weeds didn’t take over.
And you can think of your spiritual life like that, as a garden. God is causing the growth. And you will see a harvest of righteousness, and faith, and hope; a harvest of love, and joy, and peace in your life, if you will maintain good spiritual habits, little by little, day by day. This church, First Baptist, is God’s garden as well. And if we each do our own individual part, whatever it may be; to plant, or to water, or to weed, little by little, day by day, then over time we will see a wonderful harvest of health and vigor, and God will bring the growth.
I’ll close with this: In the seventies, there was a song, written by David Mallet and made popular by John Denver. It’s called the Garden Song, and it’s better known by its first line, “Inch by Inch”. Here is the first stanza, which I’ve adapted a bit:
Inch by inch, row by row
Gonna make this garden grow
All it takes is a rake and a hoe
And a piece of fertile ground
And inch by inch, row by row
Father bless these seeds I sow
Spirit warm them from below
'Til the rains come tumblin' down
Inch by inch and row by row, and we will see a great harvest. That’s my prayer, for each one of you and for this church. Amen.
