COLOSSIANS 2:19

“and not holding firmly to the head, from whom the entire body, being supplied and held together by the joints and ligaments, grows with a growth which is from God.”

I have an almost seven month old grandson whom I love immensely (any grandparents out there?). Every time he is taken to the doctor for a checkup and those nasty, painful shots, they weigh him and measure him. Then the doctor tells my daughter and son-in-law how he measures up against other children his age by telling them he is in a certain percentile. All they have to do is ask me or my wife and we can tell them he is perfect. Right?

Paul finishes this long sentence by making a profound statement at the end. He says, “grows with a growth which is from God.” Everything that happens in our life, every growth moment comes from God. Now, those growth moments may come easily or through some struggles. But God is always trying to make us more like Him. Paul uses the Greek word auxesis, which only occurs here and in Ephesians 4:16, “from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.” It simply means growth or increase, toward maturity.

APPLICATION

The verb form of auxesis is auxanó and is used a lot more through the New Testament. The same basic meaning is there, though. You get the picture. Our growth, our increase, our maturity in our Christ life only comes through God. It is His “Miracle Grow” inside of us that gives us that growth spurt we are looking for.

Do you want to grow? Do you want to mature as a believer? I hope so. Who wants to stay on the bottle? Back to my grandson – he has been introduced to some semi-solid foods this month. He is partial to green vegetables right now (good man) but will try other things. His mama even gave him some fresh avocado. I threatened to turn her into Child Protective Services for that, lol. Yuk!

My grandson cannot survive on the bottle. He has to have solid food. He will need protein and some carbs (they are not all bad). And we cannot stay on the bottle spiritually. We must allow God to grow us up and put us on solid food. Paul even speaks to this in 1 Corinthians 3:1-2, “1 And I, brothers and sisters, could not speak to you as spiritual people, but only as fleshly, as to infants in Christ. 2 I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to consume it. But even now you are not yet able,” Don’t be like the Corinthians. Tell God you are ready for steak!

Father, I want to grow and mature so give me the kind of food I need to grow!