SPIRITUAL GROWTH

On the surface, it is unfair to underrate such enthusiasm. But since we are seeking to tackle or sort out a problem which had constituted heavy roadblocks or bottlenecks to peoples’ spiritual lives, we must look deeper enough! 

And what does that imply? It entails that we must be more critical of the matter to allow God Himself investigate our hearts in our pursuits of all that emanate from Him! 

As long as we are able to humble, soften and moderate our hearts with ardent sincerity before Him, we will certainly get the answers to our deepest hearts’ spiritual searches; especially as we delve into the important issue of spiritual growth in the church; the Body of Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior! 

To get back to God on this crucial research; where shall we refer to but the Holy Bible? One may be tempted to argue, after all, the same Bible had always been our point of reference all this while or even over decades; what then are talking about? It is certain the same Bible; God’s spoken Word had declared conclusively that He can never be fully and perfectly represented without His Spirit’s backing!

Zech 4:6 – “So he answered and said to me: "This is the word of the LORD… 'Not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,' Says the LORD of hosts.”

John 15:26 – “But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.”

1Cor 12:3 – “Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God calls Jesus accursed, and no one can say that Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit.” Also read; Mt 16:17; Mk 9:39; Jn 15:26; 1Jn 4:2-3.

2Cor 3:5,6 – “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.”

We must already have been very familiar with scriptural references like the ones above and can without a shred of doubt from our hearts deny their authenticity. So we must not even waste so much time talking about the relevance of the use of God’s Word except by the Holy Spirit. In fact, one’s conscious should be occupied by incessant irk if God’s Spirit had been ignored or not given His proper place in the Word ministry. 

What that had amounted to is the fraudulence and encroachment of intellectualism into the church; and the predicted move of the anti-Christ; which had left our pews filled with innocent souls wondering or in question to whether we are serving the true living God!