The persons who know my private and public life most know that one of the major issues of my life is the matter of maturity. To believe that a person is mature is the high compliment – as I perceive Scripture. I believe it is the major Christian goal for the individual in a faith relationship with Jesus Christ, and with that the mature person means to become a model of integrity. Even without religious faith one can become mature in common grace so to be helpful in the perceptions of peaceful and loving context of natural life leading to problem solutions. God assists in this context. For the Christian there is added an even more important maturity relating to spiritual growth. This last is so much of an ideal that the King James Version translates the word as perfect. (Philippians 3:12, 15 – and other Epistles) If we are progressively meeting more and more the realization of the meaning of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), we are growing (progressing) toward full Christian and natural maturity. This observation would apply to other Scripture passages/application. Persons can, in their own devotion to examine themselves find nourishment and application from a status of spiritual infancy to status of spiritual maturity – the full grown Christian. (I Corinthians 11:28) To aid this process is a major reason for Church ministry, Scripture, prayer and the Holy Spirit. A church failing this purpose fails her meaning in the nurture of the congregation. If Scripture did not serve this purpose, we would have a much smaller Bible.
Words relating to this maturity include not only perfect, but excellent and complete – if we draw meaning from the original languages. All this leads not only to maturity as it is generally understood on earth, but also to that maturity relating to the application of God’s resources to the development of the soul in the cultivation of righteous life. Its roots are in the nature of God’s holiness. For much of society this growth is shrouded in mystery, perhaps does not seem to exist except in the minds of those who choose to create and advance it. I am seriously taken by some ideas of Einstein (believed to be one of the most complete thinkers of nature to the present era) who did not believe in a personal God. He wrote: The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. I find it difficult to account so magnificent a statement from an atheist who may have missed the claims of first mystery in God from Scripture. And, mystery is more than a feeling/concept. It is unraveled reality. It is admitted and covered with Christian faith. That there is some mystery to Christian faith there can be no doubt. Scripture affirms it. Faith assumes mystery. However, for the person who is engaged in nourishing spiritual growth, much of the mystery dissolves in the fellowship of God through Scripture, prayer, and the Holy Spirit. Then an awareness of inner freedom, love, righteousness, service and peace takes precedence to all else in life and thought. All is encapsulated in an awareness of God’s Presence, which is a presumptive claim if it is not joined with godly results that commend the claimant.
This growth is evaluated on the contrasts between the childishness of selfishness, anger, weakness, destructiveness, deviousness, rivalry, distortions, and the like to the mature active life of truth, love, service, righteousness, humility, responsibility, patience, and the like. The Apostle Paul summarized the evaluation in one of the most magnificent verses of all literature. (Philippians 4:8) The active Christian needs to take periodic inventory to determine if mature life, so different from immature, is growing and moving toward the ideal – so, as the Apostle cast it: Think on these things.
As the tug of a beautiful and natural world declines when the Christian grows old, there must be something better to replace it, or we may despair. We must know that, living decently in nature, with love, there is an urge for continuance. Life is precious to us even when it is difficult. We hold to it, even to acceptance of uncomfortable support systems. The Christian answer is primarily that immortal life is the goal, entered through Christ’s open door, and has a quality of righteous health. The Bible places high regard from God of the seeking person for God’s participation in life. It is accomplished by the work of God’s Holy Spirit in the fulfillment of the promise of Jesus Christ to his disciples – and to all believers. *Mark W. Lee, Sr. — 2016, 2020