Skip to main content

Maturity and Full-Assurance

             Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.  (Colossians 4:12)

          Oh, now here’s a prayer request sure to rankle the flesh of some. “Mature?  I’m mature! I’m over 70 (over 40, over 30, over 18)!” I’m the other way. I’m still trying to figure out what I’m supposed to be when I grow up, but I understand the irritation because among the big contestants for what I want to be is “perfect,” and my failure in that rankles, too.

          Put into proper context, however, the prayer request is just a little different. Epaphras prayed that the Colossians would stand firm in the will of God. This brings Ephesians 6 to mind, where, we’re told to stand firm as soldiers in armor. Here, the standing firm involves maturity and full assurance.

          Maturity is the state of being complete in natural (or spiritual in this case) development. Of course, we can be mature in one area and not another. Some would suggest that unless we are completely mature in every area, we aren’t mature. In some ways that’s true, but if we accept that definition, that means that unless we are complete in our development as a concert violinist, as a quantum physicist, and as a diplomat, we aren’t mature. That all or nothing thinking is silly, of course. But there are areas of immaturity that don’t matter much, and areas of maturity that matter a hundred or thousand times as much. On that basis, I’m going to suggest that maturity is the state of being complete in natural or spiritual development to the extent that we reasonably can be and that it is pertinent. Most of us have a long way to go in this regard even if we leave out all the silliness.

          Assurance involves positive demonstration. To be fully assured requires that we have experienced sufficient positive demonstration to satisfy us of the quality or accuracy of the thing in question. This is connected to maturity because a mature person can be assured of something without the silly and extreme demonstrations demanded by the immature. But again, the level of positive demonstration may be lower than the level of another. What was enough positive demonstration yesterday may be more than enough, or not enough, today. But if we’re mature, we won’t allow our vacillating, immature mental or emotional state to dictate to us. If we face doubts, the mature and assured person will face them honestly and gently, seeking the answer for however long it takes.

          We should also keep in mind that there is a sort of negative assurance. We can grant that we might be wrong, but have found nothing that proves a better possibility. Lacking absolute assurance, we work with the best assurance we can have, not merely the state of agnosticism, in which we claim we cannot know and therefore reject all possibility of knowledge.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pure...

            The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. (I Timothy 1:5)   I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. (Revelation 3:15-16) I’m probably cheating - or mishandling the Bible, but earlier I was thinking about love being pure and purifying. And hatred being pure and purifying. And anger…joy…patience… fear… jealousy… courage…lust… and other strongly felt feelings, attitudes, and beliefs. Today’s verse brings purity and love together, so it’s the verse of the day, but it’s not really the focus. That means my motive for sharing it with you probably isn’t pure. As you read through my list, you   probably thought, “Yeah” about some, and “What’s she on?” about others. But consider how much hatred, anger, fear, jealousy, and lust can crowd out everything else. This is like
Post a Comment
Read more

The Right Road

          Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. (Psalm 139:7-12)                  For years before GPSes existed, I told people I wanted something in my car that would tell me, “Turn left in half a mile…turn left in a quarter mile…turn left in 500 feet… turn left in 100 feet…turn left now …You missed the turn, Dummy!” The problem isn’t necessarily that I get lost so much as I’m afraid I’ll get lost. I don’t want to have to spend my whole trip stressing over the next turn. I have the same problem with my spiritual journey.   
Post a Comment
Read more

Not Sharing

            Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, and do not share in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure . (I Timothy 5:22) Today’s is a hard one. The part about not being hasty in the laying on of hands isn’t so much the problem unless your love language is Touch. We aren’t pastors. We don’t tend to be involved in commissioning anyone. What we don’t tend to think of when we hear “laying on of hands” is that it involves relationship and approval. Our sending them away as our representatives may not seem real to us, but just think about what being seen with the wrong folks can do to a reputation. I’ve heard that Billy Graham would not be in a room alone with a woman. Others follow the same policy, or at least make sure the door is open so that anyone who wants to can see that nothing’s going on. But the hard part is not sharing in the sins of others. What does it mean? It’s comparatively easy to say that being pure means not having sex with someone who is not our spouse.
Post a Comment
Read more