Last week, we were examining the rudiments of spiritual growth under the topic: Investing in Your Spirit being. We began by examining what the rudiments were and we stopped at the Word of Righteousness. We read Hebrews 5:9-14 which says:

 

“And having been perfected (talking about Christ Jesus), He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him, ¹⁰ called by God as High Priest “according to the order of Melchizedek,” ¹¹ of whom we have much to say, and hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing (another way to see this is that they have grown dull in understanding). ¹² For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food. ¹³ For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe…” ¹⁴ But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.”

 

So, the conclusion we drew from here was that if you are ever going to grow spiritually, you cannot all the days of your life rely on feeding on milk. The reason is because a time would come where milk alone wouldn’t be sufficient. In verse 14, we saw that solid food is what would do the work if you are going to grow. We said that The Word of Righteousness talks about the entire body of knowledge that is needed for a believer’s healthy spiritual growth. THE BELIEVER MUST BE TAUGHT THAT THE SAME GOD WHO LOVES EVERYONE ALSO CHASTISES HIS CHILDREN WHEN THEY GO WRONG. So, you cannot base all your entire knowledge of God on that and neglect the other side of Him.

 

- Faith

There is no faithless believer anywhere. Although the Bible says “not all men have faith”, it didn’t say this in the context of believers. Romans 12:3 says: “God has dealt to each one a measure of faith.” Now, it is wrong to think that our faith in God is only exercised when we need to things from Him. Even though it includes that, however, it is not limited to that alone. To be able to grow spiritually in the kingdom of God, you need faith as well. Don’t limit the use of your faith to receiving bread and butter alone from God, use your faith for spiritual growth as well. Colossians 2:6-7 tells us: “as you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him…” The question is: how did you receive Christ? It is by faith! Ephesians 2:8 tells us: for by grace, you have been saved through faith…”, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving.”

 

So, you need faith to grow spiritually. The reason why you aren’t growing is because the word of God is not being mixed with faith in your heart. Jesus said in Matthew 4:4: man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” That word, for it to produce in your life, must be mixed with faith. Hebrews 4:1-3 says: “Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. ² For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. ³ For we who have believed do enter that rest…”

 

It takes faith to navigate the terrain of spiritual growth. If any preacher has told you in the past that you don’t need faith when it comes to growing yourself spiritually, you only need efforts; you need to have a rethink. Such a preacher has told you nothing but a lie. You can replace the word ‘rest’ there to mean growth for the context of what we are talking about. It could be read this way: for we who have believed have believed unto growth and edification. So, that tells you that faith is an essential rudiment when it comes to growing spiritually. Mere reading of the word of God without you allowing it to mix with faith in your heart would only amount to head knowledge. And guess what, it is not head knowledge that grows a believer, it is faith knowledge.

 

What actually brings about growth is when your faith is being tested and the word of God that you have received is being tried. Because whether we like it or not, the word of God will be tested. When certain things in life comes your way to shake your belief in God, to test your resolve about the fact that you have given your life to God wholeheartedly, you simply need faith to be able to withstand (Mark 4).

 

“For this reason, we also thank God without ceasing, because when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe.”

2 Thessalonians 2:13

 

Did we see that? The word of God works effectively in you because you believed, talking about the place of faith again, isn’t it? So, you need faith in spiritual growth processes so that the word of God can work effectively in you who believe.

 

- Prayer

There are different kinds of prayers: prayer of faith, prayer of consecration, prayer of thanksgiving, prayer of intercession, et cetera. But the apostle Paul gave us a number of prayers that is geared towards spiritual growth and which we must regularly pray even as we pray other types of prayers.

 

“For this reason, we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding…” This understanding talks about two things and I want to point it out to us. Number one, the understanding about ourselves, and number two, the understanding of God that we have come to realize from the pages of the Scriptures. ¹⁰ that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God; ¹¹ strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy; ¹² giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.

Colossians 1:9-12

 

The same type of prayer he prayed for the people of Ephesus in Ephesians 1:15-18; the Bible says:

 

“Therefore, I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, ¹⁶ do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: ¹⁷ that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, ¹⁸ the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints…”

 

But there is another one that is known as PRAYING IN TONGUES which directly imparts our spirit even as we do it. In 1 Corinthians 14:14, apostle Paul said “For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful.” Jude 1:20 also says: “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.” So, there is such a thing as praying in tongue. No wonder, most of the prayers the apostle Paul prayed for the church at Ephesus are towards the development of their spirit than anything else

 

A variant of that prayer is what we read earlier in in Ephesians 3:16 which says: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, ¹⁵ from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, ¹⁶ that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man…”

 

The Mindedness of a Spiritual Man

Now this series would end with this subtopic: The Mindedness of a Spiritual Man. Because if you are ever going to make anything spiritually meaningful out of your spiritual life: be it spiritual growth, investing in your spirit being, you must be mindful of the things that you mind. What exactly is the mindedness of a spiritual man?

 

If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. ² Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.

Colossians 3:1-2

 

The mindedness of a spiritual man talks about being mindful of the things of God. It talks about what God is doing, what the word of God says and how we can align ourselves with the will of God.

 

Mark 8:33 says: “but when He had turned around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.” Now, the simple extrapolation form here is that it is possible for a man to be mindful of the things that pertains to men and not God. Another way to scripturally put it is “to be carnally minded.” If you have set your mind on the things of the flesh, what it simply means is that you are carnally minded. Romans 8:5-8 tells us: “For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. ⁶ For to be carnally minded is death… (spiritual death - which means not being alive to God), but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. ⁷ Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. ⁸ So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”

 

The word ‘set’ there talks about a positioning, a posture of the mind, tilting towards the flesh or the natural. What are the things of the flesh that most of the times occupies the mind of people and the Bible is talking about? Galatians 5:19-21 shows us: ^“Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, ²⁰ idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, ²¹ envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” These are the things that preoccupies the minds of people who are not spiritually alive to God. Any man or woman whose mind is not active and alive to God cannot be found wanting of these things that are being mentioned in this place.

 

Ways to Be Spiritually Minded Always

 

­- Giving Attention to God’s word

 

My son, give attention to my words;
Incline your ear to my sayings.
²¹ Do not let them depart from your eyes;
Keep them in the midst of your heart;
²² For they are life to those who find them,
And health to all their flesh.

Proverbs 4:20-22

 

The challenge with many today is that they don’t give attention to the word of God. And those who do don’t allow the word to settle in their heart. Now, the ‘heart’ as used here is not the one that pumps blood into your different parts of the body. The heart here talks about your spirit. If you read the same portion in the Passion Translation, it says:

 

Listen carefully, my dear child, to everything that I teach you,
and pay attention to all that I have to say.
²¹ Fill your thoughts with my words
until they penetrate deep into your spirit.
²² Then, as you unwrap my words,
they will impart true life and radiant health
into the very core of your being.

 

That is, it!!! The word of God that you receive must settle in your spirit, and this is the only time it would become potent and be effective. If you don’t mind the word, you are like what apostle James talked about in James 1:21-23, it says: “Therefore, lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. ²² But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. ²³ For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; ²⁴ for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.”

 

- Live a Spirit Conscious Life

I have realized that the best way to live a Spirit conscious life is to be filled with the Holy Spirit every day. This is the challenge with many believers today. They claim they have the Holy Spirit but they are not filled by the essence of the Holy Spirit. Always take yourself to the Holy Spirit for a consistent refuel and refilling. This is one way to be minded of Him always. Ephesians 3:19 says: “to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” The only way to be filled with the fullness of God is by being spiritually minded.

Thanks for the gift of your time, I am Obayomi Abiola Benjamin!

Feel free to share your thoughts or testimony in the comment box below. I promise to respond to them as soon as possible!