Tag Archives: Spiritual Growth

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Developing A Life Plan (ESD)

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A personal Life Plan is perhaps one of the best ways to help keep your life on track, and is a tool that can help you become the person that God created you to be. Developing a plan for your life is a critical aspect of spiritual growth, because it lays our a tangible blueprint that can help you achieve the goals that God has for your life.

Unfortunately, most people never stop to accomplish this simple task.

Blueprints

I’ve maintained a personal Life Plan for several years now, initially starting to develop my own after reading about it on Michael Hyatt’s website. Once I got my plan in place, I wrote a blog post detailing it slightly. You can read that post here.

However, over the years, I’ve tweaked my plan to fit my life like a glove. And the more I utilize this tool, the better it becomes. This one simple activity can be traced to a significant portion of my personal and spiritual growth over the last few years.

Creating a personal Life Plan is simple, but it’s not easy. It’s simple because it’s your life. You already know your plans and goals. You know yourself better than anyone else and what you want to accomplish in life, how you impact the people and things most important to you, and where you’d like to see yourself in the next few years, and longer.

But it’s not easy. It takes some work. It requires some effort. However, it is well worth the time invested.

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Memorize Scripture: 2 Timothy 4:3

Much of Paul’s letters to Timothy read like a commentary on today’s society, even though he wrote these two thousand years ago. This week’s passage seems especially so.

You can find it in 2 Timothy 4:3:

2 Timothy 4:3

In the first couple of verses of this passage, Paul charged Timothy to stand firm, preaching the Word of God with boldness. In this next verse, he explains why this is necessary and urgent.

The need for Timothy to be patient is critical. He will soon be entering some difficult times for Christianity, and Paul is about to describe what those times will be like. The situation that begins during Timothy’s ministry has sunk lower and lower throughout the centuries, and we see the continual progression of this today.

What is the problem that Timothy faced, and we face now? It is a lack of commitment to “sound doctrine,” the Word of God. Paul warned that very quickly, people would not want to be faced with the truth of Scripture, or the conviction that comes with it.

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12 Ways To Live As Citizens Of The Kingdom Of God

As a minister, I’ve been asked a wide variety of questions, some valid, others not so much. Probably one of the questions I hear most often is how to grow as a Christian, or how to grow in righteousness.

Kingdom

Psalm 15 is a brief, and yet detailed account of this very thing. In the previous psalm, David wrote about the folly and the wickedness of mankind. In this psalm, though, he looks at the other side of the coin. He describes what a citizen of the kingdom of heaven looks like.

Over the years, a wide variety of books have been written about this topic. Some of them are worth reading, others are not. Some give some excellent pointers, others seem to offer very little help at all.

But David’s brief description in this psalm offers several key characteristics to develop, and a few to avoid as well.

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Memorize Scripture: 2 Timothy 4:1-2

As we begin the fourth and final chapter of Paul’s second letter to Timothy, we see Paul turning to a more personal charge for Timothy and his ministry. Paul senses his death is imminent, and he is ready to pass on the torch to a young man in whom he has invested much.

Look at this week’s passage, found in 2 Timothy 4:1-2:

2 Timothy 4:1-2

Paul is certain that his death is at hand. And he is ready to go. However, before that can happen, he must pass on a personal charge to young Timothy. Much of that is found in this fourth chapter if 2 Timothy. And, even though it is directed towards Timothy personally, there is much that we can learn from his words.

Paul begins this chapter with a very solemn charge. His language here is very similar to his statements in 1 Timothy 5:21 and 6:13. And the idea of giving a charge such as this isn’t limited to Paul’s writings. Moses charged Israel in Deuteronomy 19:1-10, and Joshua in Deuteronomy 31:7-8. Joshua, Samuel, and Solomon gave charges to the nation of Israel, and David charged his son, Solomon. Jesus gave such a charge to the disciples in John 13:34. Each of these charges, and Paul’s charge is no different, carries with it an air of seriousness and gravity.

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The Benefit Of Heading Outdoors

I’ve been reminded frequently over the past few weeks just how important it is to take a break once in a while. I’m not talking about taking a vacation, although that’s necessary as well. What I’m seeing the need for is for brief breaks throughout the day to help you stay effective.

Rocky Mountains near Como, CO

I don’t know if you are like me, but once I get into a zone of productivity, everything else takes a back seat. Once I get into the swing of a project, I will continue working on it until I finish, or until I must shift gears to something else. I’ve been known to skip lunch or stay late at my desk, or even stay awake half the night, simply because I’m on a roll.

That’s great for productivity.

But it’s not so great for my health, physical or spiritual.

The need to take a break is an essential part of our being. We were created to rest; we need to stop and slow down occasionally.

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Memorize Scripture: 2 Timothy 3:16-17

In last week’s passage, Paul reminds Timothy of his upbringing, and how he had been taught the Scriptures since childhood. In that passage, he states again the relationship between the Scriptures and salvation. From there, he state just how critical the words of God are for ministry, giving Timothy a brief explanation of their origin.

You can see this week’s passage in 2 Timothy 3:16-17:

2 Timothy 3:16-17

In this passage, Paul gives what has become one of the most often quoted sections of Scripture concerning Scripture itself. The point Paul is making here is that Timothy should continue in the Word, just as he was raised in the Word. The main reason for this is that Scripture is of divine origin; it is from God himself!

Some understand Paul to be referring only to Old Testament Scripture here, since that is what he knew, and the New Testament wasn’t fully written yet (and much of it was written by Paul himself, anyway). However, in 1 Timothy 5:18, Paul refers to Luke’s gospel as Scripture, and in 2 Peter 3:15-16, Peter includes Paul’s writing in the category of Scripture. So a strong argument can be made that this passage to Timothy includes both Old and New Testament writings.

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Book Review – Titus For You by Tim Chester

Titus For YouThe Pastoral Epistles, which include 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy and Titus, are by far some of the most practical letters in the New Testament when it come to ministry. In these short epistles, Paul writes to two young men who are leading churches: Timothy, in Ephesus, and Titus, in Crete.

These letters are full of incredible advice and spiritual insights for growth, both as a Christian and as a leader and minister. One of my personal goals over the past year and a half has been to study and memorize both of the letters to Timothy, and Titus is next on the list for this fall.

I think these are pretty important letters for us to examine in detail.

I’ve read several other books from The Good Book Company in this series, covering Galatians, Romans 1-7, and Judges. I’ve enjoyed each one of them immensely. So, when I saw an opportunity to read this one on Titus, I was pretty excited. At first, I wasn’t sure how it would compare with the others, since all of the ones I have read were written by Timothy Keller, and this one is by Tim Chester.

My fears were ungrounded. Chester hit a home run with this look at Titus. I feel like he did a great job dividing the letter up into sections to examine in detail. The chapters he writes here follow the natural breaks in the text itself, lending itself well to easy reading, or even to fit a preaching schedule.