Four Steps, Gal.2:20.                          Continuation
Step4. 'Who loved me and gave.....'
Christianity is a religion of Love. Without Love it becomes empty, full of ritual and hypocrisy. God
loved the world and He gave His Son. No empty promises or just talk. It was unselfish, unconditional giving. Love is not impersonal, it asks for involvement.
Jesus said, 'If you love Me keep My Words' . He asked Peter 'Do you love Me? Peter answered, Yes. Jesus said 'Feed My sheep' -commitment, caring. We are called to love God but also His people-John 4:20-21. The Cross is the unreserved expression of God's love to man. Without Love
His Church becomes a religious club, an impersonal establishment; but we must take care not to drown everything in love.
Truth and Love go together. He is the God of both-John 14:21. We cannot love sin, we condemn it;
but love the sinner. God's love will keep us on the right path, it restrains us. We love at all times, till the very end.
How do we define love? The answer is in '1 Cor.13, 'Love never fails' , come what may Love is never without recourse (source of help).
'The greatest of these is Love' . We need Love even in Eternity because Love is the perfect bond of a relationship.
Why is it that so many people find it difficult to love unreservedly? It is the mark of a fallen life: sin, self and pride are always at the forefront.
Finally, Can we love God and not our brethren? No-1 John 4:20-21.
                                                                                        End

Four Steps, Gal.2:20.                   Continuation
Step 3. 'I live by the Faith.....' The Christian life can only be lived by Faith, the world lives by Sight-2 Cor.5:7.
What does our Faith mean to us and to others? Though Paul, the Apostle, had Faith he needed the Faith of Christ to live the life of God. A life of Trust in God. God has a never-failing Faith:Victorious. Rest your faith in God, not in circumstances, not in people-Jer.17:5.
What is the Faith of the Son of God? The one He had on earth, always resting in the Heavenly Father. He never doubted His Father's will. That Faith operated within the will of God, 'Not My will but yours be done'. Does our Faith move mountains or do the mountains move us? God expects us to live lives of Faith, not beggarly ones, resting on people.
How does God's Faith work in our daily lives? A daily dependence on God for our needs, for guidance and support physically and spiritually, not just in emergencies.
Put your faith into practice. He promised to provide for us-Matt.8:20. He enriched multitudes daily. If I am busy looking after myself why should God bother to look after me? We never please God more than when we trust Him wholeheartedly. That is why He made a list of such people of faith -Heb.11:30-40.
The Bible does not say that our lives will be trouble-free when we follow Christ. Any Gospel that states the opposite is a false Gospel. However, in all these trials and tribulations Paul declares that we are more that conquerors. How? Through Him that loved us. In His Faith-Rom.8:37.
                                                                            To be continued.

FOUR STEPS, Gal.2:20.            Continuation
Step.2. 'It is no longer....' . Life in Christ does not end at Crucifixion, Resurrection follows. Good Friday was not the end. There is New Life in Christ, Victory over Death- Hope of Eternal Life.
How does it happen? . God works it out in me. Christ becomes alive, not as a historical person-Real. A spiritual Rebirth takes place by the agency of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit enters our lives, in response to our repentance and renouncement of sin and commitment to Christ. The Holy Spirit revives our spirits which were dead in sin and we become alive to God-John 3:5-Spiritual Rebirth. This regenerated act is symbolized by water Baptism.
Immersed in water, We identify with Christ's death-the grave.
Raised from the water, Resurrection and newness of life.
What next? My obligation to walk the life of obedience to His Word and grow spiritually-Col.2:6-7.
Why do so many believers not progress after that? They do not forsake the world and its pull on their lives. Their minds are not renewed-Rom.12:2.
How will I progress in this New Life? God will watch over me and keep me along the way, like the farmer that tends his fields. A patient care to help me mature in the Faith and the knowledge of God. Spiritual progress is a must in my new life. It is the will of God-Eph.4:10-16.
                                                                            To be continued

FOUR STEPS, Galatians 2:20.
A verse that sums up the Christian Life. Four fundamental steps for the Believer. Paul, the Apostle, writes to the Galatian Church, troubled by  problems of legalism, to correct them and encourage them in the Faith.
Step 1. 'I have been crucified with Christ' . The Christian life begins with Crucifixion-Death. Not a logical way to start one's life. The world wants a successful way to start life. Crucifixion was a cruel, unpleasant way to die. We identify with Christ's death, we are not persuaded. It has already happened.
Why die? We die to the flesh and sin. We die to live a new life in Christ, 1 Cor.15:35-36. All of nature speaks of death and new Life.
Christ went to the Cross willingly, He did not have to do it. We follow in His footsteps. We should be of the same mind-Heb.12:2. We must die to the old life, it is vital to do so-John 12:24. New life and Old life cannot mix.
How does it work in our lives? We consider ourselves dead to sin and to the flesh-Rom.6:5-11. The flesh, however, is still there. The old nature, its passions and desires have been crucified. We have to live this out-Col.3:5-10. What is the result? The new man is free to grow in Christ, fed by the Word of God and led by the Holy Spirit.
Will I now have any more problems? Yes. The old nature, with its desires and opposition to the new one, will give me constant problems. I have to deny these desires and opposition daily.
Now I do not battle on my own because the Holy Spirit is in my life to help me and lead me in God's path. We must see to it that our spirits are strong and not ruled by the desires of the body and the soul.                                                      To be continued

Spiritual Growth, Eph.4:11-16.                continuation
Having talked about the need to grow spiritually we also need to look at the issue of recognizing the lack of growth in our lives. The Apostle Paul dealt with this problem in Heb. 5:12-14.
Should we be concerned about the lack of spiritual growth in the life of a believer or in a Church? Should we identify it and do something about it or simply ignore it? The answer to these questions is a firm- YES, we can not ignore it.
How do we identify the lack of Spiritual Growth? From the verses in Hebrews we see that the lack of growth is due to an inability to feed on the Word of God and instead depending on other things for Spiritual Food, really spiritual junk food.
If you have been a Christian for five years or more, you should be able to open your Bible and explore the basic truths of the Word. Whats more, you should be able to share these truths with other people. Concerning this problem, the writer to the Hebrews goes on to say that these believers cannot discern between right or wrong because of their immaturity. Instead of becoming teachers they still need to be taught.
What do we mean by lack of discernment? The inability to clearly see the difference between bad and good or the difference between what is genuine and false regarding Spiritual truth in the Bible. How will we be able to instruct others if we ourselves are not sure about what the Bible teaches?
Heb.6:1-2, enumerates another mark of Spiritual Immaturity. It is the preoccupation with First Principles in the Christian Faith and an unwillingness to move on to deeper things.
What are the First Principles? Repentance, Faith toward God, Baptism, Laying on of hands, Resurrection from the dead, the coming judgement. If we put these subjects in groups we see that they are: How to be saved-How the Church runs-God's future judgement.
The amazing thing is that these subjects are termed as 'Milk' and not solid food. If we are to grow in the Faith and mature as Christians we need Solid Food.                        End.

Spiritual Growth Eph.4:11-16.                    continuation
Do the Scriptures speak to encourage us to grow spiritually or is it left to our own devices to do so?
About a dozen references in the New Testament alone testify to the fact that it is God's will and desire for us to grow spiritually and not to do so would be against God's will. In 2 Pet.3:14-18, we are told to GROW in God's Grace and Knowledge. For Spiritual Growth to take place in our lives we need Grace and the true Knowledge of God. What sort of Grace and what kind of Knowledge?
Grace-Unmerited Favour. We are saved by Grace. We do not deserve it. God simply loved us and saved us from Eternal Hell.
We are, therefore, to grow spiritually in this undeserved Grace of God, not by our own efforts, goodness, good works, etc., but by allowing God's love to lift us out of sin and enrich us spiritually. Peter stresses the fact that we are to grow 'in Grace', not into Grace.
God lifts us from the soil of sin and transplants us into the soil of His Grace. We grow by remaining and functioning in His soil of grace. We do not grow by projecting ourselves into God's Grace. We are not the ones to do it or achieve it. We Grow by already being in the soil of Grace.
Peter also talks about growing in the Knowledge of God. Lots of believers are busy gathering a lot of Christian knowledge in their minds like, historical knowledge, Church knowledge, etc. All this will help in some respects to our overall Christian life but not necessarily to grow Spiritually. As believers, we need to learn who God is and what His desire is for us to live Godly lives.

In Pro.9:10, we are told that the knowledge of God's holy ways will give us understanding- that is  the correct the ability to know the truth of God's character, His ways, His will for our lives. We need knowledge of God in our hearts if we are to grow and become healthy beings in Christ. n We cannot go around getting hold of any doctrine that we meet and expect to live normal Christian lives

Sound knowledge of God's Word will produce sound believers planted and rooted in God's soil, watered by the Word of God to produce good fruit.                          To be continued

Spiritual Growth, Eph.4:11-16.                        continuation           
Another obstacle to Spiritual Growth is the Failure to minister to one another in the Church.
Ministering to one another is one of the greatest ministries in the Church and without it no Church can grow properly. It is God's will for us to minister to one another and for believers to build themselves up in the Faith-Heb.6:10.
However, many believers consider this to be the job of the Leadership only and through this attitude they impoverish the Church spiritually.
The other side of the coin, of course, is when instead of ministering to one another we engage in pulling everyone apart or criticizing everybody. In this we do not build up the Church but simply demolish it.
What do we actually need to do when we minister one to another and what does it involve? To minister means to 'serve' and this is what the Lord Jesus called us to do by setting an example for us-John 13:1-17 (here a service of refreshment). We are called to minister to one another in the Church. It is not the job of a few gifted people. We are to minister according to our abilities and capacity to do so and not according to what we fancy doing.
We minister to one another because we have first learned to minister to the Lord and having done this we give ourselves to ministering to His people. We must get it the right way round, i.e. to the Lord first and then to His people, and not the other way round. In the passage in John's Gospel Jesus laid aside His garments and stooped low to minister to His disciples. We cannot minister to people from a position of superiority. We have to rid ourselves of our pride and then stoop down. The Apostle Paul exhorts us to, 'In lowliness consider each other better than yourself'. Ministering to someone means to be involved with that person. All enmity must depart. What is the real motive involved in this kind of ministry? Love. No amount of pleasantries will produce ministry if Love is not the motive of our hearts. The Lord Jesus loved His followers and showed it in a practical way, setting an example for us to follow.               To be continued

Spiritual Growth, Eph.4:11-16.              continuation
Another Obstacle to Spiritual Growth is the lack of Counselling or an unwillingness in the person to receive
correction or guidance.
Counselling, Correction and Guidance are necessary in the life of the Believer and are part of God's Discipline. Where these are absent  Spiritual Growth will be stunted and progress in the Church will also be affected.
The Apostle Paul, in 2 Tim.4:1-3, instructs Timothy to administer Discipline in the Church. The words of Paul may appear strict and many people may get frightened by the sound of Discipline in the Church. However, Paul gives instruction about how to minister to believers. Where a problem arises is when believers are unwilling to accept correction and guidance. If we see that the Leadership of the Church is out to oppress us then we should do our best to avoid discipline which brings the obvious results of error and disobedience.
If on the other hand we see the Leadership of the Church as the people through whom God will work, then we will receive discipline as necessary for our well being-Job 5:17.
 Paul uses the word 'Rebuke'  for discipline, whether we like it not and without beating about the bush. He also uses the word 'Exhort' for encouragement, meant to point out what is right. Another word he uses is 'Convince', that is to point out to the person the truth of the matter so that the person will see the error of his ways. If a person cannot see what is true in Scripture how will he know what is good or not?
Whether we progress in the Faith or not depends entirely on our attitude to the Word of our God which we receive for our lives. If all we do is attend a Church for meetings and services but avoid getting involved we are hearers only and not doers of the Word.
Guidance, correction, and counselling are part and parcel of the Christian Faith and we cannot pick and choose what suits us. Christianity is not a 'Pick and Choose' Religion. God insists in His Word that Discipline as administyered by the Church Leadership is part of our Christian training, and if we refuse God's Discipline we refuse to be His children.                                         to be continued