How to Grow in Grace
“But grow in grace, and tn the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”, — 2 Pet. 3:18.
NEXT to being born again, the most
important thing in our earthly life is growing in the life into which we have been born. A dwarf is an unfortunate being, and usually a hideous being. An intellectual dwarf is, however, a more unfortunate being than a physical dwarf. There have been physical dwarfs who were intellectual giants, and there have been physical giants who were intellectual dwarfs. Every one forgot the physical limitations of the intellectual giant.
In the days immediately preceding the Civil War there was a great division of sentiment in Georgia as to whether Georgia should secede or not. Col. Robt. Toombs, or ashewas familiarly known, Bob Toombs, was a manofcommanding physical presence and by no means an intellectual dwarf, but Alexander Stephens, who afterwards became Vice President of the Southern Confederacy, was a man of great physical limitations. He never weighed more than seventy-eight pounds, but he had one of the finest minds of any man in the United States. Bob Toombs was in favor of seceding. Alexander Stephens, though he afterwards became Vice President of the Southern Confederacy, was opposed to secession. These two men stumped the State of Georgia in joint debate. One night Bob Toombs was speaking, and Alexander Stephens sat almost sunken out of sight in his big overcoat. Bob Toombs looked at him and pointed at him in contempt, saying, “There sits Alexander Stephens. I could eat him up.” Alexander Stephens in his piping voice called back, “Well, if you did you would have more brains in your belly than you ever had in your head.” He was a physical dwarf but an intellectual giant.
One of the saddest sights in the world is a man or woman who isintellectually dwarfed. One of the most painful recollections of my childhood is a young woman whom I knew, whose father was one of the brainiest men I ever knew, but his daughter for some reason or other never grew intellectually after she was seven years of age. She lived to be over fifty but was an intellectual dwarf all her days, the sorrow and burden of her family.
But sadder still than the intellectual dwarf is the moral and spiritual dwarf. There have been men who were both physical giants and intellectual giants who were moral and spiritual dwarfs. We see a striking example of this in Germany today. It has been quite generally admitted that many of the greatest thinkers in all branches of science and philosophy were to be found among the Germans, but many of these German intellectual giants are the defenders of the most appalling atrocities of which the Germans have been guilty. I would rather be both a physical and intellectual dwarf and a moral giant than to be a physical and intellectual giant and a moral dwarf. Many of those of very small stature intellectually have been moral and spiritual giants. Paul says in 1 Cor. 1:26- 29, “For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: That no flesh should glory in his presence.”
The church today is full of dwarfs, men and women who were converted five, ten, twenty years ago, and who have never advanced beyond their starting point. A great multitude are being born again in these days in the Sunday meetings, and the grave question confronts us, will they stay just where they are, spiritual babes, or will they grow? It is. for them to say, and it is for us to say by helping them or hindering them, so we come to the subject, How to Grow. The Bible makes this very plain. It makes it so simple that any one can understand it. If we will take the steps to promote the growth which the Bible clearly sets forth, then we shall grow. If we do not take those steps we shall not grow, we shall remain spiritual dwarfs and monstrosities, and there will be no one to blame but ourselves.
I. To Grow in Grace We Must First of All Be in Grace.
First of all, to grow in grace we must be in grace. One of the greatest mistakes men and women are making is in trying to grow in grace before they are in grace. One of the greatest mistakes we preachers are making is trying to build people up in the Christian life before they are in it. If a baby is to grow satisfactorily it must be well born, and if we are to grow in grace we must be born again. There was a baby in New York that was fed on elephant’s milk and it grew one hundred pounds in a few weeks, but then it was a baby elephant to begin with. A human baby would not have grown the same even if it were fed on elephant’s milk, and just so you can feed a man, woman, or child on the best food for a child of God, but he will not grow like a child of God unless he is a child of God to begin with. So to grow in grace we must first be in grace, we must be born again to start with.
That brings us to the question, how is one born again, or how do we come into grace. John 1:12 answers the question, “As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.” To become a child of God we must simply receive Jesus. It is not enough to turn over a new leaf; it is not enough to merely quit our meanness, it is not enough to “hit the trail;” it is not enough to join the church: we must RECEIVE JESUS. What does it mean to receive Jesus? It means to take the Lord Jesus to be to ourselves what God offers Him to be to everybody. What does God offer Jesus to be? First of all He offers Him to be our sin bearer, the one who bore our sins in His own body on the cross, Isa. 53:6: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.” 1 Peter 2:24: “Who his own self bare our sins in his body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye are healed.” To receive Jesus then means to take Him to be our sin bearer, the One who died in our place, and to trust God to forgive our sins because the Lord Jesus died in our place.
In the second place, God offers Jesus to be our risen Saviour who has power to save us to the uttermost, to deliver us from the power of sin day by day. As we read in Hebrews 7:25, “He is able to save to the uttermost them that draw near unto God through him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.” To: receive Jesus then means to take Him to be our risen Saviour, who has‘all power in heaven and on earth, and therefore has power to give us victory over sin day by day, and just to trust Him to do it. In the third place God offers Jesus to be to us our Lord and King, as Peter puts it in Acts 2:36, “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” To receive Jesus then means to take Him as our Lord and our Christ, that is, as our Divine Master, to whom we surrender the entire control of our thoughts, and our King, to whom we surrender the entire control of our lives. When one does thus receive Jesus he is born again and he has entered into grace, and therefore has taken his first step, the all-essential step, toward growing in grace.
Il. To Grow in Grace We Must Openly Confess Christ Before the World.
In the second place, in order to grow in grace we must make an open confession before the world of Jesus, whom we have received as our Lord. He Himself says in Matt. 10:32, 33, “Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.” There is no possibility of growth in grace without the open confession of Christ before the world. If we really accept Him we will confess Him. As God says in Rom. 10:9, 10, “If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt believe in thy heart that God raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved; for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh, and if we believe in Him with the heart we shall confess Him with the mouth. If we are to grow in grace it is necessary not merely that we confess the Lord Jesus when we join the church, we must constantly confess Him, every opportunity we have. There are few things that Promote growth in grace more than the frequent confession of Christ. I once heard a very wise old minister say to some young converts, “If you make a good deal of Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ will make a good deal of you, but if you do not make much of Jesus Christ, He will not make much of you.” Here is where many are stunted, just little spiritual “sawed-offs”: they do not make a practice of confessing Christ. And here is where many young converts go forward by leaps and bounds, because they are making a constant practice of the confession of Christ.
III. Must Eat the Right Kind of Food.
In the third place, if we are to grow in grace there must be the right kind of food. We grow by what we eat. You might have a baby physically the best born in the world, but if you did not feed it the right kind of food, and plenty of it, it would not grow. The baby of John Sullivan would not grow as fast as the baby of Tom Thumb, if we gave the baby of Tom Thumb plenty of good, nourishing milk, and did not give the baby of John Sullivan any food at all; so a man or woman or boy or girl may be born again, but if you do not give them the right food regularly they won’t grow. What the right kind of food fs the Bible tells us in 1 Peter 2:2: “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.”
The Word of God is the food of the mighty. Nothing will take the place of Bible study to promote growth. No amount of listening to Sunday or any other preacher will take the place of personal Bible study. No amount of reading good books, even the very best books, the books of Andrew Murray or any other devotional writer, will take the place of direct, personal Bible study. Fenerbach, the German materialist, said, “Mann isst was er ist,” or to put it into English, omitting the pun, which is not translatable, “a man is what he eats.’ This is certainly emphatically true in the spiritual life. Jeremiah said, “Thy words were found, and J did eat them; and thy words were unto me a joy and the rejoicing of mine heart: for I am called by thy name, O LORD God of hosts,” (Jer. 15:16), and the Psalmist says, “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the wicked, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the streams of water, that bringeth forth its fruit in its season, whose leaf also doth not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.” (Ps. 1:1-3), But it is not enough that we feed
on the Word of God, although that is the right kind of food, we should feed regularly. Many study the Bible and do not grow much because they study so irregularly and so unsystematically. We should study the Bible every day, never letting a single day pass by under any circumstances, that we do not give some time to Bible study. We read of the believers of Berea that “These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, examining the scriptures daily, whether these things were so.” (Acts 17:11). We should have a regular time each day set apart and kept sacredly for Bible study. I was once calling upon a member of our church in Minneapolis, one of the most intelligent women in the church. I put to her the question, “How are you getting on in your Christian life?” She replied, “I am not getting on at all. My life is a disgrace to me, a disgrace to the church, and a disgrace to Jesus Christ.” I asked her why that was. She replied she did not know. Then I put to her another question, “Are you studying your Bible every day?” She answered, “No, not every day, some days I put a great deal of time into Bible study, and then I go days without studying it at all.’ Her little babe lay in the baby carriage near her. I turned to the baby and said: “Mrs. N,, suppose you should feed that baby every two hours today, every four hours the next day, then two or three times in the whole day the next day, then let it go two or three days without feeding it at all, then feed it every two hours the next day, and then let it go two or three days without feeding it at all, how do you think the baby would grow?” She replied, “Why the baby would not grow at all, the baby would die.” I said, “That is just the way you are treating your soul: some days you spend a good deal of time in Bible study, then you go days without studying it at at all.” She was like many. They wonder at their not growing in the Christian life, but there is no mystery about it. The Bible must not only be studied, but it must be studied regularly, it must be studied daily, and there must be a regular time and system of Bible study.
IV. Must Be Plenty of Good Air.
In the next place if we are to grow we must have plenty of good air. Good birth and good food are not enough, we must have good air to breathe. During the last ten years there has been a great awakening among physicians and all intelligent people, to the importance of plenty of good air for health and growth. A woman who was at the head of a home for defective children in Scotland, once told me that almost all the children in that institution owed their physical weakness to breathing the air in their homes that had been contaminated by the tobacco smoke of their fathers. How pale and puny are the children who are cooped up in stuffy houses. One reason why Californians are so healthy is because they live in the open. People come to California sickly and puny and grow strong because they sleep out doors and live out doors, and then many of them are foolish enough to attribute it to the Christian Science they learned in Los Angeles. No, it was the good air you got in Los Angeles. So in the spiritual life, to grow we must have plenty of good spiritual air.
WHERE DO WE GET GOOD SPIRIT-UAL AIR?
1. Above all else in prayer. If we really pray we go up into the mountain where the air is fresh and pure and plenty of it. The air of the world is stuffy and foul, it stunts our growth, unless we often go alone into the mountain. “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.” (Isa. 40:31). Even the Lord Jesus, when He lived in this world, found it necessary to go off into the mountains to pray. We read in Mark 1:35, “And in the morning, a great while before day, he rose up and went out, and departed into a desert place, and there prayed.” And in Luke 6:12, “And it came to pass in those days, that He went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.” If the Lord Jesus needed thus to go alone with God to pray and breathe the air of heaven, how much more do we need to do so.
2. Another place where we get good air is in Christian fellowship. In Heb. 10:25 God warns us against “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is.” No one can grow well without Christian fellowship.. What a change in the atmosphere there is when we leave the society of the worldly, even worldly Christians, and get among really godly people. Join the church. It is necessary for your growth. Some people get converted and then go into a hole and pull the hole in after them. They keep aloof from Christian fellowship; they join no church. Such people never become strong, full grown Christians. But not only join the church, but join a church where the fellowship really is helpful, a church where they preach the Bible and lots of it. Avoid the churches where they pull the Bible to pieces. They will hurt you, not help you. And avoid the churches where they neglect the Bible. Join the church that makes much of prayer. Join the church where the conversation and tone is high spiritually.
But it is not enough just to join the church, cultivate the society of Christians. Many people join the church and then keep aloof from fellowship with their fellow members. Little good comes from that. Go to the prayer meeting regularly. The prayer meeting Christian is the growing Christian. One of the noblest Christian men we ever had in the American army was Major General O. O. Howard. He was emphatically a prayer meeting Christian. Some years ago when he came to the coast to take charge of the forces out here the people of San Francisco proposed to make a reception for him. They chose for the night of the reception the prayer meeting night. On informing General Howard of the reception he thanked them for their kindness but told them that he could not go to a reception on that night, that that was prayer meeting night and he always made a practice of attending the prayer meeting and would not put the prayer meeting aside for any other consideration. If you wish to be a growing Christian be a prayer meeting Christian.
V. Exercise.
One more thing is necessary for growth and that is exercise. Our muscles will not grow strong unless we use them, and our moral and spiritual muscles will be flabby unless we give them good, stiff exercise. I took a pair of Sandow’s dumb bells around the world with me to keep in physical trim. I knew that unless my body was kept in physical health and strength I could not do the work. When we began our five months campaign in the City of London, with the enormous buildings in three different parts of the city, the committee who had the matter in charge, feeling that there was so much money involved in my being able to go through with the campaign, and that there would be so much lost if I should break down, went to Lloyd’s to get them to insure me against a physical break down. Lloyd’s thought the risk was too great and refused to take it, but I never missed a single meeting. Of course, I know it was due to God’s grace primarily that I kept in physical trim through the five long, heavy months of work; but it was due also to my taking care of my body, by taking plenty of regular, systematic exercise, and if we are to keep in trim spiritually it is absolutely necessary to exercise. We cannot be spiritual loafers and expect God’s grace to make up for our own neglect of sense and of duty.
WHAT IS THE BEST EXERCISE?
1. Bringing others to Christ.
The Lord Jesus said to His first disciples, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” (Matt. 4:19). The best way to keep from going back into the world is to keep bringing others out of it. The soul-winning Christian is the best growing Christian. Go to work to win souls. Speak to.at least one person daily. Mr. Moody made it a rule in his Christian life to never let a day go by without speaking to at least one person about his soul, and oh how he grew. He came on by leaps and bounds in the Christian life, and from a most unpromising beginning became the most prominent man in Christian life and work in the whole country.
2. But there is another form of spiritual exercise which is necessary for growth, that is, generous giving. One cannot grow spiritually if he is stingy. God’s word is plain. We read in 2 Cor. 9:6-8, “He which soweth sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which soweth bountifully shall reap also bountifully (Paul is talking about giving). Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver. And God is able to make all grace abound toward you (i.e., toward cheerful givers); that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work.” It is the “liberal soul” that is “made fat.” In Luke 6:38 we read, “Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.’ The man who gives generously will grow greatly. The man who does not give, or who gives in a niggardly way, will shrink. Become at once a systematic giver.
CONCLUSION. God commands us to grew; every consideration of reason and self-interest and noble purpose, and of the interests of God’s kingdom urges us to grow. Will you grow? It remains with you to say whether you will or not. All that is necessary for you to grow is that you follow the teaching of the Word of God as we have studied it today. First, that you be sure that you are in grace, that you are born again; second, that you constantly confess Jesus Christ before the world; third, that you study the Word of God regularly; fourth, that you take plenty of time for prayer, and cultivate Christian fellowship; fifth, that you take plenty of spiritual exercise by bringing others to Christ and by giving regularly, systematically, and generously as God has prospered you. Will you resolve today with all your heart that you will do these things? If you do, then each year of your Christian life will find you farther on in the attainment of the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Every year of your Christian life will be better than the year that went before.