Growing Up

(Jeffry W. Hamilton, by permission of website)

How long does it take for us to grow up? Used to be in the USA we would say legally by age 21, but laws changed and at 18 we count our young people as adults. Our legal system also takes action to charge children under 18 as adults, depending on the circumstances of a specific crime. So, growing up fluctuates, even legally.

Maturity isn't defined by our calendars. We've all seen celebrities act extremely immature even as calendar pages flow past. Their immature actions impact others. Age alone doesn't seem to change their actions. We all can come up with names in entertainment industries, movies, sports, etc., some in recent headlines. Too often they are surrounded by people who will not tell them the truth. Instead, their insupportable attitudes and actions are enabled by those living a fantasy life in their shadow.

Unfortunately, we also see it in our families, too. Don’t go there – it can open old wounds. It happens to Christians, too, in a slightly different way.

The New Testament addresses this in many different ways. I like Paul’s admission to the church at Corinth:

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. (1 Corinthians 13:11 KJV)

I’ve been taught that the “Be Attitudes” in Matthew 5 outline the progression of Christian growth. The first thing we acquire is the kingdom of heaven as we become God’s children, accepting His salvation through belief in Jesus as the Christ, His son. We move forward by learning how to be comforted for what cannot be changed, living meekly as we hunger and thirst after more and more of His teaching. We learn how to be merciful, how to ask Him to create a clean heart in us and become peacemakers. For this, we may be persecuted and we need maturity to handle that.

It does take Christian maturity to understand being set apart. We don’t move to mountain retreats and defend our faith against those who would storm ramparts. We are to live within the world, but apart from its effect on us. Paul, after telling us in verse 14 to not be unequally yoked to non-believers, tells us to separate ourselves:

Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, (2 Corinthians 6:17 KJV)

In Ephesians 4, Paul explains how to put into action the faith that brought us to Christ. We are to be renewed in our minds, moving toward God’s righteousness and true holiness. We are to speak the truth, hold our anger, labor for God, knowing that what we earn may have to go to someone needy.

We show our Christian maturity when we can follow Paul’s closing of that chapter:

And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:32 KJV)