Are You Still Growing?

            Never stop growing.  People often admire how quickly children grow, but do not recognize as often or as long when someone becomes a babe in Christ.  Hopefully the growth of the Christian does not stop.  So why do people stop taking notice?  Maybe we need to encourage one another more often in spiritual growth.  When was the last time you encouraged someone in a spiritual nature?  Encouragement can go a long ways.  It may just make a terrible day turn bright, and it is free to give.  The only thing it costs you is what God has given you, breath.  This is encouraged in 2 Peter 3:14-18,

Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

            Peter wrote this right after he described the end times.  It is urgent that we walk in righteousness since Christ’s second coming can take place at any given second.  With this in mind, Christians have all the more reason to encourage one another and continue in growth.  It can be seen if one measures body weight on a consistent basis that it constantly fluctuates.  If you weigh yourself in the morning it will be different then when you weigh yourself that night.  On a regular day, a person will weigh more in the evening than they did that morning.  Our spiritual weight (i.e. growth) should measure the same way.  Have you grown more spiritually by the end of the day?  If not, then you have not consumed a healthy spiritual diet.  Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6).  Growth comes with a good spiritual diet and encouragement.