Alignment for Accelerated Spiritual Growth

Imagine the Christian life was lived on a scale from zero to ten. The closer you were to ten, the more selfish and ‘full on flesh’ you are while, the more you moved towards the zero marker, the more ‘self-forgetful’ and ‘full on God’s Spirit’ you became. As re-born Christians, I believe that aligning our lives more and more to zero is what will bring us to that place where the Holy Spirit gradually removes all the weights around our ankles that, till date, make running our race towards Christlikeness so tedious and slow.

Many seek wealth growth; many seek career growth while many more seek to increase their businesses/market share and/or client base. Nothing wrong in any of that, it is just that personally, all I am seeking in this season is a more accelerated spiritual growth. I am tired of being a toddler or at best a pre-teen in the Lord. I sense deep in me that God is calling me to a higher place in Him. I need to grow up some more and quickly too. If you feel the same need too, then together we must carefully and honestly determine where we are on our Life scale and take steps to align ourselves closer to the zero marker. For only when we do this will we begin to experience acceleration in our spiritual growth. We will begin to decrease so that God can increase in us to the point where we cease to exist, and the life we live is really the life of Christ living in us!

This kind of spiritual alignment requires a total ‘abandonment’ to the control of God’s Spirit but like we see in the lives of Jesus Christ and his disciples, therein lay the power and effectiveness of their ministries. Jesus Christ was fully aligned to the will of his Father, God. He did nothing more or less than what he heard God tell him to do. We know how fast his impact grew. We saw how much he did in three years by just remaining at the zero marker. Pre-Pentecost, the disciples, were confused and scared bunch of men barely able to speak to anyone about Jesus Christ. But fast forward to the Day of Pentecost and what do we see? A group of bold and suddenly articulate group of men ready to die for Jesus Christ. What moved them so quickly from one point to the other? The in-filling of God’s Spirit and their commitment to living at zero. It had ceased to be ‘about them’. It was all about Jesus Christ now. From that day on, what you see is a rapid growth in the number of Christ-followers. That is what happens when we align our minds, wills and bodies to God’s will. We will experience acceleration and growth.

You know; Jesus Christ did not come to sort ‘self’ out. Like I said earlier, he came to earth fully aligned to God’s agenda. Jesus Christ was a Servant-Leader. Why do I bring this up? Many of us Christians have lost sight of this in our pursuit of power, blessings and miracles. I believe that until we begin to re-align ourselves to this ‘servant-heart’ nature of Jesus Christ we will not produce much. You see, the faster we want to grow spiritually, the higher we want to stand in grace, the more engulfed our hearts must become with a desire to serve others.

That brings us back to our zero marker. Only when we line our minds, wills and bodies up to the point where satisfying self ceases to be our priority, will we be able to make bringing about God’s will here on earth our number one goal. This calls for daily deaths to self, and while it is not easy, it is possible. If it were not, God would not have asked us. We can choose to be aligned to God’s word every day, and if we want to pick up speed as we run our race, then we must make this choice daily. You know how we say ‘No pain, no gain?’ In this instance, it is ‘No alignment, no acceleration’.

Aren’t you tired of running on a spiritual treadmill; plenty of motion but no progress? I know I am. I want my Christian life to pick up momentum like never before, and I know exactly what needs to be done.

Now that you have read this, it is my prayer that you do too. Shalom and remember; God is especially fond of you.

Bola Essien-Nelson (aka Salt) is a blogger/author based in Lagos, Nigeria. You can connect with her via her blog – The Salt Chronicles on Blogger where she is ‘seasoning’ the world around her one salt blog at a time.