Hence, the Holy Spirit allows us to fail after our eager beginning. He applies the principle of need in every phase of our advance. The calculated failure is used to cause us to move beyond the early infant-enthusiasm to the place where we have to dig in and settle down upon the explicit truth of the Word.
THUS, the opening to today’s consideration and final reading in The Realization of Spiritual Growth, Chapter 40 – “Principles of Reckoning.” I went long in my last post, so I’m going to keep it short today, leaving you with this one thought before we begin:
Prosperity has never enriched the world, as adversity has done. The best thoughts, the richest lessons, the sweetest songs which have come down to us from the past — have not come from the minds and hearts of those who have known no privation, no suffering, no adversity. They are the fruit of pain, of weakness, of trial. –JR Miller, Glimpses Through Life’s Windows.
SO, with that, let us take up where we left off and complete our reading in Chapter 40—Principles of Reckoning, Part 2.
In the inexorable riches of Christ,
Joe
Neh. 8:10, Isa 30:15, Jas 1:2; Prov. 21:30
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Chapter 40—Principles of Reckoning – Part 3
Reckon, continued
Hence, the Holy Spirit allows us to fail after our eager beginning. He applies the principle of need in every phase of our advance. The calculated failure is used to cause us to move beyond the early infant-enthusiasm to the place where we have to dig in and settle down upon the explicit truth of the Word. Before we can grow in any aspect of truth, we must be established in the knowledge of it. In every area of our spiritual development, it is one thing to begin on a new plateau, but it is quite another thing “through faith and patience to inherit the promises” (Heb. 6:12).
Our immaturity was understandable during the “milk-of-the-gospel” stage of our Christian life, but now it is time to face up to adulthood. We have partaken of the meat of identification. “Strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil” (Heb. 5:14). In our need and desperation we grasp a truth, but our initial knowledge is insufficient to enable us to persevere in it. To cause the truth to take hold of us and become a living part of our life, the Holy Spirit removes the token experience from us—but the knowledge of the truth is retained. By this means we are to be established in the truth, that we might “grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 3:18). The first taste of identification awakens our heart-hunger for its practical fulfillment. “I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:12).
It will help us to bear in mind that the principle of time underlies all of God’s dealings with us. Growth takes time!
“The God of all grace, who hath called us unto His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect [mature], establish, strengthen, settle you.” (1 Pet. 5:10)
