The first steps in building upon the foundations
Greetings in the name of Jesus:
Apart from just presenting different foundations in Christ than we can build upon we as the church need to have a spiritual formation. How we grow Christians within the church can be very different depending upon the people that you work with. I want to start this process in the same way that Christ began working to establish the church. That is through men. Christ had a direct ministry to men first before he began an outreach through healing and miracles that grew attention to the message that God had given him. Men are different kinds of animals, we have a unique set of needs and responsibilities that must be added to any growth plan spiritually that God wants men to have. One of these spiritual formation's can be seen in the book of Colossians 1:24-28. Men actually grow in Christ through suffering through their mistakes and bearing the responsibility of helping others. In other words we as men are called to be both examples of Christ and of service to others.
The problem is we cannot do this through our own intellect. We need two things; we need the mind of Christ, and the word of God. There are many men who strive to make a proclamation to the world around them about God but this proclamation can be of no good unless the world can see spiritual growth at work in a man's life. That means that each man who proclaims Christ must be perfected spiritually in front of everyone. That kind of growth cannot be achieved through our physical wisdom, but only through the workings of the power of God's Holy Spirit in a man's life.
In a man spiritual growth does not come from peer pressure but from spiritual disciplines. As we are perfected spiritually these disciplines need to be adopted into a daily routine that becomes so much a part of us that it is like a second nature. We do not need to have a large number of people in agreement with us in order to put these spiritual disciplines to work in our lives. PRAYER is one of the first spiritual disciplines we need to learn as a man. It is unfortunate that there are few men who really have learned what prayer is. Real prayer before God means that we have to completely take away all that we hide behind. It means for each man a need for solitude; being naked before God in a sense, and putting ourselves in a place where we can concentrate and listen to the voice of God. God does not speak in the middle of the noises that the world makes in our minds. The primary desire of the Holy Spirit is that we have growth as men in our relationship with God. Like in the one goes into training to hear God's voice we need to experience God in our quiet times as we read and meditate upon his word. This discipline means that we have to put ourselves in a position to be drawn closer to God.
SOLITUDE is not easy for a man to find today. It is not easy to find a quiet time, or a quiet place that is not invaded by the world around us. Our relationship with God depends very much on our ability to concentrate on God. We build RELATIONSHIPS with others by opening up our lives to them to experience life together. When we EXPERIENCE different things with God it is very difficult for us to walk away from that experience without having it changed life. No matter if we like it or not we need to realize that SUFFERING is a part of our Christian life. That suffering does not have to come from our desire to suffer, but just by being in Christ the world will make sure of persecution and injustice being served in our life. That's the reason then we must have an attitude of SERVICE as a man. We must be a servant of others first before we are served. That is one of the building materials that Christ gave his disciples to use in building upon the foundation that he had laid down for them.
This spiritual discipline of growth is developed through connecting as a real man to the needs of others around us. It is done not by evangelizing other people, but by letting a person to us about the pain they feel, the anger they feel, and the wounds that they have experienced. We are going to be talking more about this discipline of mind and heart over this week. I want you to take the time to pray, and follow the words I have capitalized in the above paragraph we will be talking about further ideas that can be used to experience Christ. May you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
Apart from just presenting different foundations in Christ than we can build upon we as the church need to have a spiritual formation. How we grow Christians within the church can be very different depending upon the people that you work with. I want to start this process in the same way that Christ began working to establish the church. That is through men. Christ had a direct ministry to men first before he began an outreach through healing and miracles that grew attention to the message that God had given him. Men are different kinds of animals, we have a unique set of needs and responsibilities that must be added to any growth plan spiritually that God wants men to have. One of these spiritual formation's can be seen in the book of Colossians 1:24-28. Men actually grow in Christ through suffering through their mistakes and bearing the responsibility of helping others. In other words we as men are called to be both examples of Christ and of service to others.
The problem is we cannot do this through our own intellect. We need two things; we need the mind of Christ, and the word of God. There are many men who strive to make a proclamation to the world around them about God but this proclamation can be of no good unless the world can see spiritual growth at work in a man's life. That means that each man who proclaims Christ must be perfected spiritually in front of everyone. That kind of growth cannot be achieved through our physical wisdom, but only through the workings of the power of God's Holy Spirit in a man's life.
In a man spiritual growth does not come from peer pressure but from spiritual disciplines. As we are perfected spiritually these disciplines need to be adopted into a daily routine that becomes so much a part of us that it is like a second nature. We do not need to have a large number of people in agreement with us in order to put these spiritual disciplines to work in our lives. PRAYER is one of the first spiritual disciplines we need to learn as a man. It is unfortunate that there are few men who really have learned what prayer is. Real prayer before God means that we have to completely take away all that we hide behind. It means for each man a need for solitude; being naked before God in a sense, and putting ourselves in a place where we can concentrate and listen to the voice of God. God does not speak in the middle of the noises that the world makes in our minds. The primary desire of the Holy Spirit is that we have growth as men in our relationship with God. Like in the one goes into training to hear God's voice we need to experience God in our quiet times as we read and meditate upon his word. This discipline means that we have to put ourselves in a position to be drawn closer to God.
SOLITUDE is not easy for a man to find today. It is not easy to find a quiet time, or a quiet place that is not invaded by the world around us. Our relationship with God depends very much on our ability to concentrate on God. We build RELATIONSHIPS with others by opening up our lives to them to experience life together. When we EXPERIENCE different things with God it is very difficult for us to walk away from that experience without having it changed life. No matter if we like it or not we need to realize that SUFFERING is a part of our Christian life. That suffering does not have to come from our desire to suffer, but just by being in Christ the world will make sure of persecution and injustice being served in our life. That's the reason then we must have an attitude of SERVICE as a man. We must be a servant of others first before we are served. That is one of the building materials that Christ gave his disciples to use in building upon the foundation that he had laid down for them.
This spiritual discipline of growth is developed through connecting as a real man to the needs of others around us. It is done not by evangelizing other people, but by letting a person to us about the pain they feel, the anger they feel, and the wounds that they have experienced. We are going to be talking more about this discipline of mind and heart over this week. I want you to take the time to pray, and follow the words I have capitalized in the above paragraph we will be talking about further ideas that can be used to experience Christ. May you richly bless God through your life in him.
THE UNWORTHY SERVANT
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