4 Ways Healthy Church Members Cultivate True Growth
Growing to Be Like Jesus
How do healthy church members cultivate growth? The following are some suggestions for continuing to develop godliness or holiness in life.
1. Abide in Christ
Jesus said:
“I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.” (John 15:5–8)
The key to growth in godliness is remaining in the true vine, who is Christ Jesus. Here, remaining in Christ and bearing fruit is “nothing less than the outcome of persevering dependence on the vine, driven by faith, embracing all of the believer’s life and the product of his witness.”1 And this fruitfulness comes as the word of the Lord remains in the disciple. “Such words must so lodge in the disciple’s mind and heart that conformity to Christ, obedience to Christ, is the most natural (supernatural?) thing in the world.”2 Abiding in Christ, remaining in his word, is essential to proper Christian discipleship and growth.
What Is a Healthy Church Member?
Thabiti Anyabwile
This guide from Thabiti M. Anyabwile biblically and practically instructs church members in ways they can labor for the health of their church.
2. Use the Ordinary Means of Grace
Many Christians seem to believe advancement in spiritual maturity must come through some extraordinary or “breakthrough” experience. For them, it’s the fantastic that produces growth. But as we’ve just seen in John 15, it is the ordinary means of grace that ordinarily produces growth and maturity. In fact, while the sensational and extraordinary can and often does lead people astray, the word properly taught and understood never will. The “ordinary means of grace” include the study of the Word of God, participation in the ordinances of baptism and communion along with the gathered church, and prayer. These are the customary ways in which the grace of God is proclaimed, displayed, and appropriated in the Christian life. By the word of God, we hear Christ revealed and glorified, and there we “learn Christ” most clearly. But in the ordinances of baptism and communion, we see Christ and the gospel as we picture his death, burial, and resurrection for us and for our salvation.
A healthy Christian does not neglect these ordinances and means of grace but rejoices in them, prepares for them, and is reminded through the senses of the glories of Christ our Savior. She or he remembers that grace “teaches [or trains] us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live selfcontrolled, upright, and godly lives in the present age” (Titus 2:11–12). A healthy Christian relies more and more on the grace of God as it is communicated through the word and the ordinances.
3. Participate in the Local Church
Hebrews 10:25 instructs us not to neglect the assembly of the saints. Instead, we are to gather and encourage one another more and more as we await Jesus’s return. The public assembly is meant for the edification, the building up, the growth of the Christian. Neglecting to participate in the corporate life of the church or failing to actively serve and be served is a sure-fire way to limit our growth. Ephesians 4:11–16 offers a pretty strong argument that participation in the body of Christ is the main way in which Christ strengthens and matures us. When we serve others in the church, bear with one another, love one another, correct one another, and encourage one another, we participate in a kind of “spiritual maturity co-op” where our stores and supplies are multiplied. The end result is growth and discipleship.
4. Look to Jesus’s Coming
Finally, we grow in holiness by meditating on and looking forward to the coming of Jesus. Most of the New Testament references to Jesus’s return are connected with some exhortation to holiness and purity. For example, in Matthew 24 when Jesus finishes teaching the disciples about his second coming, he concludes with the simple exhortation to “be ready,” to look for his return, and to live a fitting life in the meantime. Matthew 25 follows with three parables, all exhorting his hearers to watch and to be faithful until he returns. The Lord taught that his second coming is something for us to meditate upon consistently, and that that meditation should lead us to guard our lives and to grow.
A healthy Christian relies more and more on the grace of God as it is communicated through the word and the ordinances.
Titus 2:13–14 refers to the “blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” with this explanation of Jesus’s mission: “[He] gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.” In other words, we look to the cross and the second coming of Christ and remember that Christ has done everything for our redemption, purity, and zeal—our holiness. The apostle John includes a very similar statement in one of his letters. He writes:
Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. And everyone who thus hopes in him purifies himself as he is pure. (1 John 3:2–3)
Our yearning to be with Jesus and to see Jesus is intended to make us more like Jesus in holiness. Looking forward to Christ will produce growth in healthy church members.
Conclusion
The healthy church member is a growing church member. Specifically, she or he is a church member that grows in Christlikeness, holiness, and maturity. That maturity and holiness are developed in dependence upon Christ, his word, and others in the local church. And most wonderful of all, we will not stop growing until we reach the fullness of Christ!
Notes:
- D. A. Carson, The Gospel of John: An Introduction and Commentary, Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1991), 517. 4Carson, The Gospel of John, 517.
- Carson, The Gospel of John, 517.
This article is adapted from What Is a Healthy Church Member? by Thabiti Anyabwile.
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