Spiritual Growth #8

Growth within God is possible within every believer. Continuing on with our breakdown of spiritual growth, we are going to add to conversion, identity, sin and grace. As we covered before, spiritual growth is the process of allowing Christ to live within us and express himself through us. 

5. Faith: 

The action needed for spiritual growth is faith. Faith is trusting even when you can’t see. Faith is living out the word of God even when times are tough. What most believers don’t realize is, faith is above our five senses, it deals solely with the spiritual realm. God wants to know you trust Him enough to act on His word. Faith is so important to the spiritual growth process that without it is displeasing to God. 

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.- Hebrews 11:6 

Growing up playing competitive basketball at an early age, I found myself always looking at player rankings and which players sports reporters thought were good. I was ranked in the state of Indiana but I was never ranked nationally. I played against other nationally ranked players and I felt I could compete just as good, if not better than them, so I would always question these reporters. However, I received good guidance from my father and AAU coach and they reminded me to trust the process and have faith in the future. During a time of doubt or times when you are unsure, that is when faith should kick in the most. Stay faithful to your work ethic, faithful to your beliefs/ethics and most importantly faithful to the Lord and His will.  

6. Holy Spirit:

The spirit is the heart and soul of your spiritual growth. Only the strength within us from the Holy Spirit will our lives produce what we are supposed to. What some believers don’t realize is, it is possible to be a Christian and to not have the spirit of God live through us or have the spirit alive within us. 

When I got to college, I experienced a new level of hard work. Class, weights, practice and study tables day in and day out was exhausting. I remember my roommate and I specifically finding time to take a nap between classes. With all of this going on, one could feel this was straining and tiring causing them to relax or “sleepwalk.” However, if I wanted to succeed and not just be a player on the team but a leader, I had to use and enable the power within my teammates, coaches and academic advisor to help me succeed. 

7. Scripture: 

God’s word should be more than just positive words and more of living out your spiritual understanding. The bible is not just to give us information but a guide to look to. It is your playbook in knowing how to live your life and defeat the enemies against the Kingdom of God. It’s important to spend time in the word and search what God says, but more important to allow this the word to live through you. 

In college, I played for two really good coaches that specialized in their offensive play calling. Both had many different offensive plays with hundreds of different options to those plays. As a point guard, I took pride in knowing all the plays and where every position was supposed to be. For me to truly understand and be able to execute the playbook in practice and games, I had to spend time studying on my own and with assistant coaches. 

8. Prayer: 

God has given us a way to connect and communicate with Him in the spiritual realm, and that is with the use of prayer. Prayer is the access of spiritual growth and causes all parts of Christian life to relate to one another.  I am a big believer that confidence is built through what you work at. If you want to build confidence in your athletic performance, in your studies or in your relationship with the Lord, you must work at it. We previously spoke about faith, well praying goes hand in hand with faith because it is a part of action. Faith + works= God intervention. What praying does is shift your focus and worries of a situation to God. We will speak on the other part of action God calls us to do, but praying gives God’s strength to a believer. 

Now that we have spent time talking about eight parts of the spiritual growth breakdown, I encourage you to start implementing these into your routine. We will continue to talk more about spiritual growth, but its important to understand that it’s possible to grow spiritually because Christ lives within every believer.