How to See Growth While Avoiding Legalism

When I look at the wonderful ladies in my church, I am struck by how amazing they are. 

Always offering a kind word to someone who needs it. Working hard to provide for college lunches. Ministering faithfully to the youth. Submitting cheerfully to their husbands, and loving them with a selfless love that's hard for me to imagine. 

And when I look at the men, I see the same thing. They live moral, upright lives, and they work to minister to those around them. They love their wives and children. They speak patiently, and their speech is always graceful, seasoned with salt. 

In short, these brothers and sisters don't seem to mess up as often as me. 

I know that's not true. I don't expect them to be perfect, because I know that the Bible says "none is righteous, no, not one." (Romans 3:10) I'm not putting them on a pedestal of idolatry, and I know that only Jesus lived a sinless life. 

Still. They're doing the commandments of the Lord way better than I am. 

Am I spiritually healthy? Is there something I need to be doing differently?

Following this train of thought, I often slip into legalism. I start getting up half an hour earlier to read my Bible and pray. I berate myself for speaking thoughtlessly at school, and I redouble my note-taking in sermons. 

And yet, for some reason, I don't become perfect in a week. No, to the contrary—I just get arrogant, and assume, "Oh, I'm spiritually healthy! You should listen to what I have to say about everything, because I'm so wise and mature."

Then, I start messing up. And I start noticing how much I'm messing up, and I lose hope—because no matter how hard I try, I only seem to fall further and further into the wickedness of my heart. Is there a chance for me at all?

Needless to say, this approach doesn't work. But how, then, do we grow? How can we avoid the pitfalls of arrogance and legalism while still maturing in our faith? 

Growth is possible, and we shouldn't feel like we're backsliding in our faith just because we feel more sinful than ever. The Holy Spirit is always working in our life, and one way that he nurtures us is by making us more aware of our own sin.

Here are three things that have helped me to remember when I'm feeling discouraged about the growth (or lack thereof) that I see in my life as a Christian. 

 

Growth is not about being perfect. 

As you grow and mature in your Christian walk, you're going to become more aware of your sin. 

This is to be expected. We're all too blind to reality, half the time—we're like an infant staring at a book, trying to understand what the words mean while we don't even know how to talk yet. Part of our growing up is learning what words are, then learning how to speak them, and then finally how to read them. We don't start off by asking a baby to form an opinion on what Shakespeare's word choice in Richard III says about the historical significance of the Wars of the Roses. 

We're growing in our ability to read our souls. Before, we couldn't really see the depths of our wickedness. And as we mature, we learn to read. 

And what we read frightens us. 

Because we're also learning what we should be like, and comparing it to who we are. And we see the disparity. The disparity that only continues to grow, the longer we look at it.

We need to remember that growth is not about being perfect—we cannot do that. No, growth is learning to read. Learning to see our sin for what it is, and reveling in God's goodness. 

And the sanctification comes along with this. If we learn to hate sin, we will cling to Christ even closer. 

 

Growth comes with time. 

At the start of this article, I talked about the older men and women of the church. How I never measured up, compared to them. 

There's a problem with that. You see, I'm 16. I haven't been a Christian for 50 years yet—so why should I feel horrible because I don't act like I have? 

I tend to think that if I work super hard at something for a short period of time, I'm going to learn it, and I'm going to learn it well. And that I won't need to wait for years and years to gain the knowledge. 

But that's not true at all. Some things take time. You cannot become a perfect person by putting yourself rigorous self-examination and Bible study! Those things are good, and they can help—but they will not replace years of faithful living. 

Years of faithful living are what we're after. That'll give you something that you can't learn overnight: experience. 

And experience will always strengthen faith. 

Because God is faithful, and he is the God of eternity. 

 

Growth isn't predictable. 

I like graphs. Charts that predict the future, that show you how much you'll make if you invest x amount of dollars in a y percent interest bank account, or how many bacteria will be in the petri dish after waiting z number of years. 

Maturing in the Christian life isn't like that. 

You simply cannot graph your soul. Some days, you'll be doing well—the next day, you're struggling to pray. Seasons of life shift, and our abilities shift with them. 

This is an encouragement to me. Because if I have a bad day, I'm worried that the trajectory has changed, and that I'm only going to continue to spiral. 

But that's not true. God is still my God, and I am still his daughter. 

And he's going to complete his work in me someday.

 

When you feel that you've lost hope, and that you can't keep up with the pace anymore—remember the cross. 

No matter how much sin you commit, the atonement Jesus made is enough to cover it. Every single sin. 

Every. Single. Sin. 

As we grow in our knowledge of how much sin is inside of us, doesn't that show us how powerful the cross was? 

And therefore, how good God is? 

This is what growth in the Christian walk looks like. It's seeing Christ for who he is, and seeing ourselves for who we are. It's the Holy Spirit. 

The Spirit will bear fruit; never fear. God is working to cleanse you of your sin. 

But in the meantime, just focus on God himself. 

Because the power of the cross will never fade.