Beware of the dangers of growth in your relationship with God. If you don’t watch it, you may weaken your faith instead of growing deeper in it. Now this may sound like a strange statement and perhaps difficult to wrap your head around, but I believe that it is worth discussing. You may or may not agree with my thoughts, but I ask that you not disregard them too quickly before you reflect on them.

It has been my experience, both for myself and in coming alongside others that our faith develops at three different levels, let me call them the steady level, the giant step level and the great leap level (perhaps over time I’ll come up with some snappier labels).

Over these next three blogs, I want to take the time to outline what I have discovered about each one.

First, the “steady level.”

The steady level is difficult to notice on a day to day basis much like perhaps the act of choosing to lose weight. You engage in regular spiritual disciplines that increases your knowledge of God and your understanding of his ways and purposes, although in incremental steps. You pray regularly for things in your life, for your loved ones and issues around the country and the world. You participate in personal and corporate times of worship and express your thoughts and praise to God. And all of these activities (among others) are done often simply because you have committed to them, not necessarily that you “feel” like engaging with them each and every time.

If you think about it, you may not be sure that you are growing each time you engage in one of these tangible activities and it may never even cross your mind that you are growing. And yet, if you stop and reflect after a period of time (perhaps every six months or so) and look back on your life, you can honestly say that you have grown, you have changed how you act and think. Others around you may even make comments to this effect. And this is all good. I like to use the phrase, “an inch a day.”

When you commit to these regular and consistent growth actions, it is because in your heart you truly do wish to grow, and so you engage in activities that are designed to help with this and that have been used by Christians over the centuries. And hopefully overtime you become convinced that there is growth, steady growth, which gives you even more confidence to maintaining these disciplines.

This is always exciting for me as I come alongside others. Many begin the journey with me and as much as they are committed to the process, I know that they aren’t always convinced that it will make a huge impact on their lives. And yet, when I have them reflect on their lives after a period of time, more often than not they can point to growth in their lives that they weren’t expecting and they are encouraged. Often times, those that are close to them have made comments about good changes that they are seeing – this always adds increased energy to our conversations.

However, as encouraging as this can sound, there are dangers that lurk beneath the surface. If you don’t stop and reflect from time to time, you may not recognize any growth and wonder why you continue on this path. If life gets “busy” in ways you weren’t expecting and you suddenly miss your regular times of intentional activities that lead to growth, you may look back and think to yourself that you haven’t regressed to any great degree during this time, so how important can these activities really be.

In a culture that demands instant gratification, being committed to the “steady level” of growth may have its challenges and distractions. Give me a big event that embraces all my senses and that gives me a shot of spiritual adrenaline – perhaps this will carry me for a period. Why bother with the consistency of the regular? And while such events can create momentum, they will never capture or sustain that momentum, this requires the consistency of the spiritual disciplines.

As someone who leads others on the journey of discipleship, you are leading by example. You need to become convinced that the “steady level” is a good level. That growth is taking place. A big part of your role will be to encourage those you come alongside to enjoy to consistency of growth, an inch a day, and to always make this a priority in their lives.

Next time, the “giant step” level.

For the kingdom.

We had our annual volunteer training and appreciation day at our church last Saturday. It’s fun to engage with so many individuals who give so much to the life of the church.

During the morning session we were privileged to have Carey Nieuwhof come and speak to us – you can find his own blog at careynieuwhof.com.

At the end of his talk he gave us 7 things to do as leaders to keep us in the game so that we wouldn’t give up and burn out. And although I nodded and agreed with what he had to say, the one thing he said that stood out more than the rest was this: “Grieve your losses.” If people have let you down, if things haven’t gone as planned – don’t simply push forward with a stiff upper lip, admit to yourself that you’ve lost something or someone, and take some time to grieve what you have lost. Only then can you truly move forward without a host of “loses” building up inside.

I’ve been thinking about that all week, especially in light of what I perceive as losses in this work of life-on-life discipleship that have weighed on me, and I don’t know if I have grieved them. I’ve done many things with them, but I haven’t grieved them. I’ve gotten mad at people, I’ve become cynical, I’ve blamed myself, I’ve judged, but I don’t think I have grieved.

You see, I have set standards/ideals that I have in mind for those that I commit at least two years of my life to – I’ve written about them in previous blog posts. Now I’ve come to understand that not everyone will fully and exactly imitate me, that it isn’t my objective to turn out “Matthew robots”. We are all made uniquely and will walk alongside others in different ways – I get that and I’m okay with that. In fact it has been fun to watch how those I’ve built into choose to use their unique personality and build into others in ways that I am wowed by. At times I’ve incorporated some of what I’ve seen them do into what I do.

But there are others that I’ve built into that completely walk away. And not only do they walk away from building into others but at times they walk away from any intentional relationship with God. What happened? How could that be? It was only a year or more before that we were engaging the scriptures, praying together, wrestling with life issues, laughing and crying. I was baring my soul and they were baring their soul. And now nothing. Done. Over. “Life” has taken over and pushed God out of the picture. At times I feel like I don’t even know the person anymore, don’t know how to engage with them on the odd occasion that we run into each other.

It hurts! It hurts deep in my soul, my heart aches, I’m frustrated, I’m at a loss for words. What happened? How could something that appeared so amazing have taken such a step back? Why do they no longer desire to seek God with all the heart, mind and strength? What can I do? What should I have done? Answer: I don’t know, simple as that.

And as such, I’m going to commit from this point forward to grieve. To allow myself to be sad, to cry, to let misery engulf me. These are losses that I don’t understand, that I can’t explain. But they are losses, no question about it, and it hurts!

For the kingdom.