Evidence of Maturing Faith
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Good Morning! What a blessing to be in the house of God worshipping Him this morning! I want to take a moment to just tell all you mothers thank you, thank you for the countless hours you pour into your children, thank you for the example you set daily of what selfless love looks like.
I don’t know where any of us would be without the love of a mother. The prayers of a mother and the values you instill within the children that God has entrusted to you to raise in the fear and admonition of Him.
I pray you all have a great day, and that your husbands let you get a nap, I hope they do whatever you ask of them and I mean whatever you ask of them. Men you want to show your spiritual maturity then make serving your wife your goal everyday of the year and not just today. Amen.
Turn with me in your Bibles this morning to the gospel of . We are going to be talking this morning about the
evidence of spiritual maturity.
The evidence of spiritual maturity, now if you remember last week our Lord was speaking to us about the soils, your remember? We learned that this soil that Jesus was referring to was the soil of a persons heart and how they receive the Word of God.
We saw that there was really only two types of soil that Jesus taught us about. The type of soil that produces nothing, that was the first three.... The hard soil, rocky soil, thorny or weedy soil produces nothing. We learned that these types of heart are hearts in the wrong place, hearts that are shallow, and hearts that are unkept.
These types of hearts can bear no fruit, they don’t hear the truth of the gospel and respond. Then he talked about a different soil that produced a hundred fold, 60 fold, and 30 fold in terms of fruitfulness.
Then He went on to say the difference between the soils that produce nothing, and the soils that are productive is hearing the truth. Hearing it in the sense that you embrace it and you have a heart that can receive it and then it produces something eternal in your life.
I don’t know about you but when I die I want to be found fruitful don’t you?
So Jesus was teaching about bearing fruit and that in order to bear spiritual fruit a persons heart makes all the difference. God doesn’t desire you or I to stay where we are He desire for our lives to count and impact eternity, not just here on Earth.
It was funny how Amy has been wanting me to make her a raised bed and wanting to get some stuff planted and we took to the yard this weekend to get it done and I built her a raised bed and we got some seed in the ground and we had already been growing some seed in a tray and were transplanting some seed that was already in the process of growing.
As we planted them I recalled last weeks sermon, and how God desired to plant something within us, that would produce something lasting and eternal. But I watched as the kids were excited because we got them in the ground yesterday morning, and by yesterday afternoon after being in the sun we already had some sprouts sticking up from the ones which we transplanted.
I watched how excited the kids were and how excited she was that they were already producing and I thought to myself this is how God feels when His children begin sprouting spiritual things in their lives.
When there is life within something it is evident. When something is going to die you already know before you put it in the ground, I say all of this to say, when there is spiritual life within you, it is evident you know it and the things of God begin to grow out of your life.
When there is no life within you it is evident as well. So after Jesus teaches about growing and maturing in the Lord, He gives three short parables and he gives us the evidences of spiritual growth.
ARE YOU GROWING?
Let’s listen to Jesus and find out if we show the evidence of spiritual growth.
(Read)
(pray)
What are the evidence that you are growing in your faith?
Do you illuminate the darkness with the truth of the gospel?
Do you illuminate the darkness with the truth of the gospel?
And he said to them, “Is a lamp brought in to be put under a basket, or under a bed, and not on a stand?
Mark 4:21
Jesus asks a silly question here how many of you would take a lamp light it up and say hmm I really think we should put this under the bed where no one can see it?
of course you don’t the purpose of a candle or a lamp is to bring light into a dark place. When I was little I remember during bad storms we would get the candles out and sit them on the dinner table, and they would be there in case what?
In case the lights went out, that’s right?
Sounds pretty simple doesn’t it? We all think this is elementary because we know exactly what the purpose of a lamp or candle is, don’t we? I think the issue is that we understand exactly what a candles purpose is, but I think we forget what our purpose is.
Jesus is the light of the world and you are His candlestick, you are to shine the light and love of Jesus into the midst of darkness wherever you go. Let me ask you a question, does a candle once its lit, does it begin to decide who it will shine for or who it will go out for?
Absolutely not it just shines it is the nature of the thing, once a fire is put to the wick it just burns and everyone can see it. Jesus says one evidence that you have spiritual life growing in you is that you shine the light of His love and glory wherever you are.
We see pictures of this throughout the Bible don’t we?
Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.
For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret.
If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.
So if we are children of God then the light of Jesus has been planted within us and as a result then we are to have no fellowship with darkness, we are to shine brightly for the glory of Jesus.
DO YOU KNOW WHY YOU ARE ALIVE TODAY? DO YOU KNOW WHY YOUR HEART IS EVEN BEATING? BECAUSE JESUS WANTS YOU TO BE A CANDLE STICK.
Ladies it’s mothers day so quick sidenote, how brightly do you shine at home? This is not meant to demean or diminish, but listen to me there is nothing greater than a woman who reads the truth and then shines forth that truth in her own life, nothing more powerful than that.
It doesn’t mean you walk around perfect all the time with a halo on your head getting everything right and never getting frustrated, I mean come on I know who your married to I would be stressed out too.
But really it doesn’t mean that you have to have it altogether and are living truth out perfectly remember we learned last week, ministry is messy your just scattering seed.
(teachable moments)
I am a firm believer that more truth seeds were planted in me while my mom and I were driving from tallahassee to carrabelle than any sermons I ever heard, and she got frustrated and she was angry and she messed up alot, but you know what she did?
She planted truth in me, she shined it when she would tell me what God spoke to her during sermons, what she felt like God was telling her and then she tried to walk that out in front of me.
That’s shining truth of what you believe and it is also what planting looks like, but ARE YOU SHINING IN YOUR HOME?
EVERYONE ARE YOU SHINING WITH THE GLIMMER OF JESUS?
It is is an evidence of whether or not you are growing in maturity....
For nothing is hidden except to be made manifest; nor is anything secret except to come to light.
Jesus says this stuff I am showing you I aint showing it to you so you can hide it away and never share it, NOTHING I SAY SHOULD BE HIDDEN BUT IT SHOULD BE PROCLAIMED!
Are you Applying the Truth You Hear?
Are you Applying the Truth You Hear?
Mark
If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.” And he said to them, “Pay attention to what you hear: with the measure you use, it will be measured to you, and still more will be added to you.
“PAy attention” or “Take Heed”
This phrase means seek to understand
It speaks of being so intently listening to the truth of God that you are determined to live it out.
He is not just telling you to listen, He is telling you to listen and apply to your heart what you understand about what yuo have heard.
You must learn this anytime Jesus is asking you to pay attention, He is not really just telling you to hear the words.
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
He says how you listen is important as a maturing believer you must seek to both hear the truth and obey the truth. to walk in the light you have been given. Let me ask you a question what good is a religion to believe in if you care nothing for living it out?
It is worthless, it is a waste of time.
This is what Jesus is saying here.
(pharisee/disciple)
“FOR THE MEASURE YOU USE IT WILL BE MEASURED TO YOU AND STILL MORE WILL BE GIVEN”
What does Jesus mean here?
“Measure” this is a unit of measurement it is math terminology. It means you have heard the truth you have examined the truth and you have calculated how to go about walking it out.
(Holy Spirit)
You might only have a little bit of truth to walk in right now.
(SHINE THE LIGHT OF JESUS IN YOUR HOME/LIFE)
Sit back and calculate what would that look like in my life?
Then you begin to apply it and Jesus says when you take the little bit you know and begin to work it out your gonna get the same amount again and if your faithful with that again and again, EVEN MORE WILL BE GIVEN”
For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”
:
Jesus says when we hear the truth of His word and we refuse to acknowledge and listen to it, then what we have will be taken away. Jesus is saying if I cant trust you to be faithful with a little bit of truth then how am I going to be able to give you the deeper things the bigger things.
You see some of us want deeper sermons, we want to know the hidden mysteries of God and yet we aren’t even applying the truth we know and so the deeper things of God are escaping us, we don’t get it. This is not to say that you have to constantly be walking around beating yourself up because maybe you have failed to obey something, but instead call out to God ask Him to help you live out the truth you hear, it maybe that you hear one thing in a message that you need to apply to your hearts, so for that whole next week work on that one thing ask God to guide you strengthen you and then keep it in the forefront of your mind.
As you begin to obey the little truths God will open your eyes to a whole new world with Him more truth will be entrusted to you and more truth will begin to transform you!
ANOTHER MARK OF SPIRITUAL MATURITY IS THAT:
YOU TRUST THE LORD TO GROW YOU
YOU TRUST THE LORD TO GROW YOU
And he said, “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground.
Mark 4:26
He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how.
What is the point here?
The point is not the scattering of the seed, it is the process of how something grows. It is true that we have to apply truth to our lives and try to live it out, but we must trust Christ to mature us spiritually He is the One who enables and empowers us to do it. This once again ties in to the previous thought.
When ti comes down to how the seeds of truth grow us, I really don’t understand how, there are some things that GOd began to sow seeds into my life years ago, that I am just now realizing what it was developing in me. For years I didn’t know why this one area was such a struggle for me but now looking back I see what God was doing.
This is why we cannot become discouraged when we become stagnant and seem to be constantly struggling applying god’s word to our hearts, because it is the Lord who changes us. yes we strive after it seeking to understand God’s word and apply it, but in the end the Lord is the One who causes growth.
God is working right now producing in you what you will not fully understand until you see it begin to sprout, when you respond to situations in a Godly way, when you have strength during hardships, when you have a passion for the lost you begin to say where did this come from? It is because truth was being planted in your heart and it is beginning to bear fruit.
And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.
You have to be sure of this fact
GOD IS NOT FINISHED WITH YOU YET!
GROWTH IS GRADUAL
The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear.
Mark 4:
You are not going to be 100 percent holy overnight, everybody say it takes time. It takes time, but not just time sitting you must put time in to your relationship with the Lord to get fruit out of your relationship with the Lord!
Rejoice in the growth you see!
Right now for some of you there might only be a little sliver or blade of grass of maturity, be happy!
I AM NOT WHO I WANT TO BE BUT THANK GOD I AM NOT WHO I USED TO BE!
GROWTH IS NOT OVER UNTIL THE HARVESTER COMES TO REAP HIS HARVEST!
But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”
We are not done growing until the Lord returns to take us home! We put truth in it begins to sprout we change as fruit comes up over and over again this process happens and overtime we begin to change into a mature spiritual plant, we are useful we are living life on purpose and it is growing upward for the glory of God!
When the Lord comes to call us home during the harvest then once He gathers us to Himself we will be fully mature!
The Kingdom of Heaven Grows Large in Your Mind
The Kingdom of Heaven Grows Large in Your Mind
And he said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable shall we use for it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.”
Mark 4:30-32
When you are not growing in your faith all you can see is the world around you, there is no concern for anything except worldly things, your career, family, bills, your concerns but as you begin to mature you begin to focus more on the spiritual realm, amd not just this physical world. Im telling you when people are focused on the physical and not the things of God it shows me thier lack of spiritual maturity, things become about thier wealth, their blessing their kingdom but the kingdom of God takes a backseat.
But as you begin to grow spiritually Gods kingdom and the gospel begins to loom large in your mind it starts out as small, but as you grow so does it in your minds and hearts. all of a sudden your life bgins to focused on eternity and not just on the material things where moth and rust destroy, you begin to share your faith, and seek God’s word, and then you begin living with the end in sight.
PEople who live for this world show two things either 1 they are not saved or 2 they are spiritual babies that have never learned how to apply biblical principles.
(preach)
SHADE
YOU ARE ABLE TO HEAR TRUTH
YOU ARE ABLE TO HEAR TRUTH
With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it. He did not speak to them without a parable, but privately to his own disciples he explained everything.
Mark 4:33
Mark 4:
Mark 4:
(preach)