Growing things change

"Healthy things grow, and growing things change." - Jim Kelly

I shared in our small group a few weeks ago about where I have been in my spiritual journey lately. I thought I might write it out for some people to read.


John Miller (a founder of Reba Place) wrote about the beatitudes of Jesus that the people Christ had described were salt and light. They were not being instructed to be salt and light or commanded to act like salt or light. The people who are meek and broken, poor and mourning, hungry and thirsty are salt and light, and they will make a difference in this world.

My first serious Christian training has taught me to believe that I am responsible for being like light and salt. I am used to having quiet times; reading and praying and keeping track of where I have been and where I am going. I have made maturity goals of sorts and sought to achieve them through chosen books and disciplines. I like the thrill of new insights and often sense that the Holy Spirit is giving them to me as I study and think.

Life in community is different from that independent growth program I've just described. Also, because I don’t have a ton of time to read and think, I am in less control of my maturing process. Before, I spent one summer in community and I know that it was an intense time of inner changing and shifting for me. I have trusted that the process of living in community will continue to help me mature. Something in me feels I should be more in control of the changes that are happening. But that feeling isn’t right. I am disciplining my life and practicing my faith in some very real ways. Mentorship, accountability, fellowship, small groups, the witness of the saints here, the examples living all around me – those are all contributing to my formation. I know that they are. But I can’t tell you exactly what is changing, how things are shifting, the ways I am different. I believe that I am.

The things I set out to change are not the things that are changing. But things are changing. I liken this to losing my life and finding it.