Sunday, February 11, 2018

Growth - The Art of Becoming ...



Growth is an interesting concept.  The late Rich Mullins put it so well:
"It's not that we have become, it's that we are continually becoming ..."
This ties in beautifully with a concept introduced in The Shack.  God refers to self as a verb:
"I am a verb.  I am that I am.  I will be who I will be.  I am a verb ... alive, ever active, dynamic and moving ... "
If we are made in God's image and he is the great, "I am" ... then we are called to be the same.  Not, "I was ..." ... not "I will be ..."  but rather alive in the moment, growing, dynamic, changing.

Growth is hard.  So often we want to sit.  We get absorbed into complacency.  Sitting doesn't engender growth. Growth hurts.  Growing pains hurt.  We are stretched.  It's uncomfortable.  But we must grow.  For life is about more than ourselves.  When we grow ... when we breakthrough, others follow.

Isaiah 54:2-3
"Enlarge the place of your tent.  Stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back' lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes.  For you will spread out to the right and to the left" ...
This year I am in a new job, in a new school.  One of the biggest reasons I made the move, was because I realised for me personally, I had reached all the growth that I was going to have at my old place of work.  It was an amazing job and I was grateful for the years and the growth that I had there. However like a root bound pot plant, I knew that if I was to stay any longer I would not thrive any more.  It was time to go.  The move has been good.  I am on a massive learning curve in my new job and it's good.  Not always comfortable and sometimes, really hard.  But it's good, it's right and I am stretched.  I am becoming.  Becoming what?  More of who God made me to be.  Although I am challenged, I feel more aligned in my current job than I have in any of my previous ones.  It's good.

The story of the Velveteen Rabbit speaks beautifully about this art of becoming ...


It's a process.  I am challenged.  How about you?