Grow in Grace (2 Peter 3:18)

At the conclusion of the Amongst Ourselves meeting, Jonny Rice spoke briefly about the need to grow as believers in Jesus Christ. Just as a child must learn to talk, to eat and to walk, becoming more and more independent and increasingly able, so a child of God must learn to develop in these things.  A child of God must learn to talk, communicating with God on a regular basis, learning to listen to His voice and speaking often of Christ. In the same way a child learns by watching, listening and repeating, so must we find ourselves in the places where prayer takes place, listening to the teaching of the Word and chatting about the things of God with our friends. A child of God must have a desire to feed on the meat of the Word, exploring the Scriptures for themselves rather than just sitting in church, Sunday by Sunday, with your mouth open, waiting to be fed. Explore the Bible for yourself, question the things that you learn and take them all back to the Word and make sure it checks out. Finally, a child of God must begin to put the things he/she learns into practice, learning to stand strong and walk on for God in a sinful world, all the while growing in the knowledge of their Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, and learning to love the things of God. Sadly many believers, young and old, fail to grow. They miss out on the leading of God, the instinctive discernment of the Holy Spirit, in their lives, unskillful in the Word of God (Hebrews 5:12-14) and a weak force for the Gospel. Let's be strong for God, growing in grace and the knowledge of Christ as we both learn and teach, in Listooder and beyond.