A growing christian - learning with lines and circles

From glory to glory - linear growth

Something that I am wrestling with is my previous model of expected christian growth looked like this:

or in other words I think I expected that the blue line would be the pattern of 'growth' in terms of knowledge, understanding and revelation of 'the truths' of my faith that would then impact my life and cause me to be more Christ like.  The pink line represents that for me I realised that God could intervene and increase the wisedom of my understanding of his revelation in such a way that my growth would be accelerate over time...

Unfortunatly the reality of my experience of 'growth' in terms of character and gifts was not at all exponetial or even linear like across the board - ok there were a few areas where for awhile - say the revelation and engagement with the Holy Spirit today where it felt exponential for awhile (but then I had a lot to catch up on) and as time went on I probably knew more christian things but it had little impact on growth for me as a christian.

I'm going in circles - from glory to gorey and back again

Whilst I acknowledge that there are times in life when I do hit a season of growth that takes me head knowledge up but also transforms my heart more, I tend for me to find that it looks less like a linear relationship/expectation and more like...

how a tree grows - depending on the season and the inflow of water, sunlight, nutrients etc  a tree grows outward at a faster /slower rate which can be measured.  Fo me this feels a lot more like how I grow - often I go round an issue again and again, each time i might grow faster or slower and there are often points where I think this is where I was a year ago or 5 yrs ago - because in one sense I haven't got very far in a linear direction - but as part of the growth of me as a person I have got a lot, hmmm, fatter, lol.

It also means that I am looking growth as having an outward impact rather than just focussing on the inputs and can think about what is the most appropriate form of input i need on this issue - is it better smarts, is it actually doing something, is it accountability to help keep me focussed etc?

I also feel that by changing this growth expectation helps me realise that growth is not just one dimensional or in one direction, it fits within the growth of me as a person.  It is the sort of growth style that I was thinking about when I was reflecting on when I drew a more holistic model of growth as disciple

Ok that's enough waffle from me (secretly pleased that I avoided the word organic :) - so I would love to hear from you, what is your growth style?  What image/metaphor do you use?  What have I missed do you think???

Comments

[Julie Marie]

I like the tree image, much more accurate than the linear (which I would have agreed with until around March of this year, when I fell off the line) but for me it would be not a round tree. This year, for instance, I've had a growth spurt in the humility area - particularly as it applies to spiritual understanding. (as a former conservative evangelical I used to have all the answers and now I have more questions than anything else - result = humility). But other aspects of growth remain stable - or maybe even regress (like I have no idea if I "know" God at all anymore). So rather than a nice round tree trunk, I'd describe myself as an unpruned bush that is halfway in the shadow and halfway in the sunshine. I'm terribly uneven.

[Makeesha]

That's really good, I like that imagery...something I would like to explore more. i think it would be of value to our group.

[Paul]

Julie - I love that image - it so reminds me of Jesus words about being a vine and needing to be pruned - and they really prune vines. Hmmm maybe growth is made up of many circles?

[Paul]

Thanks Mak - if you;re interested in using this with you people I suggest life shapes as a good starting point - in fact i just blogged about it here http://paulmayers.blogs.com/my_weblog/2006/11/fitting_life_in.html