Everything on earth has its own time and its own season.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 (CEV)I am sure that God who began the good work within you will keep right on helping you grow in his grace until his task within you is finally finished on that day when Jesus Christ returns.
Philippians 1:5 (Living Bible)
It’s taken a year to get to Day 28 on this Driving With Purpose set of reviews. The first post was on June 3, 2004. Hopefully we’ll get to Day 40 before the day when Jesus Christ returns!
Rick Warren uses a couple of metaphors to explore the slow process of maturity:
1. Vine-ripened tomatoes (as opposed to gas-ripened)
Rick reminds us that quality is best achieved with slow growth.
2. Occupation of Pacific Islands during World War II (Lane Adams, Spirit, 1985) Rick uses Lane Adams’ analogy of God’s pre-conversion ‘softening-up’ through ‘bombing’, the initial beachhead in our lives, followed by the longterm campaign to take over more and more territory until all of our life is completely God’s. It’s a violent image but it makes the point that God’s in for the long haul with us.
It takes so long to grow into maturity because:
1. We are slow learners
2. We have a lot to unlearn.
3. We are afraid to humbly face the truth about ourselves.
4. Growth is often painful and scary.
5. Habits take time to develop.
I appreciate Rick’s reminder that what takes years to learn can take years to unlearn. I remember the year before I started as a minister telling a friend I needed to develop stronger spiritual disciplines in the next two months. He wryly smiled and reminded me that spiritual disciplines took years to develop. So true.
We can co-operate with God in the process
1. Believe God is working in your life even when you don’t feel it.
2. Keep a notebook or journal of lessons learned.
3. Be patient with God and with yourself.
4. Don’t get discouraged.
I appreciate the image of seasons Rick uses to describe the times we seem to be shooting ahead and the times we seem to stagnate. I’ve found this especially applies to periods of fresh creativity that tend to be followed by times of dryness.
This chapter is a welcome alternative to the “Easy steps to maturity” approach to spiritual growth we can find ourselves pining for. Rick finishes with the sentence, “Even the snail reached the ark by perservering”. Nice.