By Devern Fromke

I stood looking at a shallow dish of water in which some kernels of corn were breaking and sending forth green shoots. In that moment something I had been trying to express came into mind so vividly. It was just as though the Lord were saying: “It is not nature’s design for kernels to remain in this dish. Even so, I have too many little babes like these sprouting kernels who are under the delusion that, having accepted Me as their personal Saviour, all they need to do is grow. They do not seem to realize there can only be spiritual growth as there is proper climate and proper soil.”

I pondered what it would mean to be placed in a proper climate. He seemed to say: “Your climate is like a framework–so very important. There are some frameworks in which it is impossible to grow … if gaining a place in heaven by and by is your only goal, then you cannot expect spiritual growth, for there is no proper climate; you can only expect to reach heaven because Another has paid your admission price.

But if life holds the possibility of an infinite growth after the Infinite Pattern, then that should focus your eyes, stir your heart and quicken your spirit, for you can live with real expectancy for the big, the significant, the ultimate. Until you have been awakened to this kind of goal, do not assume that you have begun to breathe of that Eternal Climate.”

I understood the importance of a proper climate, now–what was the proper soil? Then I remembered a verse that is often quoted at this point as the answer: “But go on growing in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.” … As I looked again at the little kernels in which death and decay was working, yet in which life was sprouting forth, I realized the importance of being transferred into “another dish”–into the environment or soil of His grace. As long as the little kernel remained in the dish, it was still living from its own stored up nutrients. Similarly, as long as there is no changing of the center of my life from self to God, there can be no real growth, or living by Him as my new source of Life. Living on the soil of myself, I simply cannot (really) grow.

We are not made to grow as a self-centered being–living in a display dish … We are designed to grow as our roots are in HIM. Hence the very first step in growing spiritually is a transplanting–a shifting from a self-centered to a God-centered source of life: this is growing in grace. And further, we must become alive and completely harmonized in the climate of His desire and purpose: this is growing in knowledge.

The rest of the article is at GraceNotebook.com