How are You Doing as a follower of Jesus? Are you growing in your faith? Are you closer to Jesus today than you were last year at this time? More obedient? Serving more? More surrendered?
It’s good for us to evaluate our lives from time to time. We evaluate other areas of life to see if they’re healthy: our finances, our health, our grades (if you’re a student), our job. But we rarely evaluate our spiritual lives.
The reason may be that we don’t know how to evaluate our spiritual maturity. How can we evaluate where we are spiritually?
I read an article that tried to do exactly that using a familiar passage of scripture – Philippians 2:3-8. I suggest that you read it now before going any further.
How can we evaluate
where we are spiritually?
Now that you’ve read or re-read the passage from Philippians, let’s look at how Jesus responded in this situation. Obviously on a spiritual scale of 1 – 100, Jesus ranks at 100. So using Him as our guideline we can get some idea of where we fit on the scale.
Here are four things the Apostle points out about Jesus.
Jesus was:
1) Others Focused. Verses 3-4.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
Spiritual maturity can be gauged by how little you elevate yourself and how much you elevate other people. Jesus was not thinking about His own comfort when He came. He was thinking about you.
2) Self Denying. Verse 6-7A.
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing.
Even though Jesus was God, He didn’t use that as a reason to remain in heaven. Instead, in a remarkable expression of self-denial He went from the highest level of exaltation to the lowest. That is spiritual maturity.
3) A Servant. Verse 7B
Taking the very nature of a servant.
Spiritual maturity is all about being a servant. Serving God and serving others.
4) Willing to Submit. Verse 8.
And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled himself by becoming obedient to death.
Few, if any of us will be asked to die for our faith. That’s not the point. The point is, are you willing to submit to lesser things? Are you willing to do whatever God asks you to do? A Christian who is growing in their faith will submit to God and the Word of God.
So, using Jesus as your guide, How are you doing? How are You Doing as a follower of Jesus?
How would you rate your spiritual maturity on a scale of 1-100?
But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 3:18.
Stay in the Word
Pastor Steve
A Word for the Week 