Pursue Growth and Maturity in the Life of Christ until we Arrive at a Full-Grown Man

As believers in Christ who have the life of God in their spirit, we need to pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ until we arrive at a full-grown man, the church as the Body of Christ growing into a mature man.

None of us can say that we have already arrived at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of Christ; we all need to grow in life daily so that together we may arrive at a full-grown man.

On our side, we need to remain open to the Lord for His divine dispensing.

On the Lord’s side, He is working both within us and around us to arrange the best circumstances so that we may gain Christ and grow in life.

We may think that what we need is more joy or peace, or we may think that our real need is more patience; however, God simply wants that Christ would grow in us.

So He arranges a certain set of circumstances and a particular environment to help us be emptied and unloaded so that we can have an increased capacity to enjoy Christ and be filled with God.

God wants to grow in us and spread into every part of our inner being, but we are so busy – we’re occupied with many things.

So the Lord in His mercy and sovereignty works behind the scenes to help us have an open vessel to Him, and if we cooperate with Him by simply saying Amen to Him, we will be emptied of anything besides God that fills us, and He will grow in us.

If we check with our experience, we all have to admit that many times we fail, for we struggle with God, we wrestle with Him even as Jacob did, and we many times seem to win.

Jacob wrestled with God for one whole night and he prevailed, so God had to touch him and cause him to limp, and Jacob asked for His blessing.

We may be like Jacob, wrestling with God and fighting back whenever He arranges things and persons to come our way that we don’t like and situations that we want to change.

But may we just remain open to the Lord, whether we wrestle with Him or not, so that He may transform us to change our life by His life, and to fill us with His life so that we may become mature in the divine life.

May the Lord gain in us all an increased capacity for us to be filled with God.

And may we grow unto maturity so that we may mature in the divine sonship and be sons of full age.

As the Lord grows in us, He is inwardly transforming us into His image and He is outwardly conforming us to Himself, so that Christ is formed in us.

As this takes place, we ourselves struggle and travail for many others so that Christ may be formed in them (Gal. 4:19).

Amen, may Christ be formed in us! May He grow in us!

May He spread more in all the parts of our inner being so that we may grow in life unto maturity and arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ!

We need to Pursue Growth and Maturity in the Life of Christ until we Arrive at a Full-Grown Man

The word “mature” in the New Testament refers to the believers being full-grown, mature, and perfected in the life of God.

We have received the life of God at the time of our regeneration, and we all now have the life of God in our spirit, for we are children of God, sons of God, becoming heirs of God. Hallelujah!

However, the life of God needs to grow in us.

We need to grow in the divine life and pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ until we all arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

We shouldn’t be content with ourselves and with where we are; rather, we should pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ.

May we all go on with the Lord little by little, day by day, by forgetting the things which are behind and stretching forward to the things which are before (Phil. 3:12-15).

Yes, we did enjoy the Lord yesterday, and yes, the word of God was so sweet and nourishing to us last week, but today we have a new portion of Christ, and today we must grow in life unto maturity a little more.

We need to forget the things which are behind and stretch forward today to the things which are before, pursuing toward the fullest enjoyment and gaining of Christ for the uttermost enjoyment of Christ in the millennial kingdom.

Paul was such a person; though he knew Christ, he experienced Christ, and he was so advanced in the Lord, even toward the end of his life he was still striving to pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ so that he may gain Christ to the uttermost.

He was never contented with himself but always pursued Christ; he used to persecute Christ by pursuing Him in a negative way before his conversion, and after his conversion, he pursued Christ by persecuting Him in a positive way so that he may gain Christ.

We need to be such ones.

We need to forget, even right now, the things which are behind, and stretch forward to the things that are before, pressing toward Christ that we may gain Him and obtain Him.

Our goal is to gain Christ so that we may grow and mature in His life.

This should be our aim and goal in life – to gain more of Christ.

We need to pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ until we all arrive at the measure of the stature of Christ, at a full-grown man.

And as many of us as are relatively full-grown in Christ, we should have this mind and set this as our goal.

How can we become mature in the divine life? We need to continually grow in this life.

Just as a child needs to grow in the human life day by day so that he may become a mature man, so we need to grow in the divine life day by day, little by little, until we are mature in the divine life.

In Matt. 5:48 the Lord said, Therefore you shall be perfect even as your heavenly Father is perfect.

This is not merely a requirement but even more, a reality that is taking place in us today.

This word is the conclusion of the law of the new life in the constitution of the kingdom of the heavens, decreed by the Lord in Matt. 5:14-47.

He concludes by commanding us to be perfect in life even as our heavenly Father is perfect.

As children of God born of God with His life and nature, we need to grow in the divine life, pursuing growth and maturity in the life of Christ, until we are perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect.

Based on the divine life that grows in us and by living out this divine life, we can be perfect.

The divine life in us can cause us to be perfect even as our Father is perfect.

The Lord’s commandment to us, the citizens of the heavenly kingdom, is that we are perfect even as our Father is perfect; this is His commandment and His expectation.

May we care for the desire of the Lord’s heart, keep His commandment, and grow and mature by the life of our heavenly Father within us so that we may be perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect.

This we do not in and by ourselves but by the life of God in us. May we come to the Lord, again and again, open to Him, and contact Him.

Throughout the day, may we call on His name and pray to touch Him, open to Him, and let Him work in us.

Even when we may not like something or may not agree with a situation, may we just open to Him and pray, allowing the Lord access to our inner being.

Lord Jesus, we are not content with where we are and what we are; we want to pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ! Amen, Lord, grow in us today. Bring us on to maturity. We forget the things which are behind and stretch forward to the things with are before so that we may gain more of Christ. We pursue, dear Lord, toward the fullest enjoyment and gaining of Christ for the uttermost enjoyment of Christ in the millennial kingdom! Make us the group of people who pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ. We want to live by the divine life and allow the divine life to grow in us. Grow in us, Lord, and bring us on to maturity. May Your life within us grow a little more today. Grow in us and perfect us, making us perfect even as our heavenly Father is perfect. Amen, Lord, we want to grow in life unto maturity until we all arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ!

The Ultimate Issue of our Growth and Maturity in Life is the Full-grown Man, the Church as the Body of Christ growing into a Mature Man

The prerequisite for maturity in the spiritual life is our continual growth in the divine life.

As soon as someone is born again by receiving the life of God, he needs to grow in life by longing for God’s word in the Bible as the guileless milk (1 Pet. 2:2).

Every new believer needs to read the Bible and drink the spiritual milk in the word of God.

As we drink the Lord in His word, the element of God is added to our being and our old element is discharged; we are renewed in our mind and we grow in life.

May we continually come to the Lord concerning our growth in life so that He may give us the portion of grace that we need to grow in life every day.

On one hand, we believers in Christ are persons with the spiritual life; on the other hand, we are like a plant cultivated on God’s farm (1 Cor. 3:5-9).

We need to grow. We need to grow in life unto maturity as persons with the divine life and as plants on God’s farm.

We grow in the spiritual life by holding in love to Christ as the truth and growing up into Christ in all things, who is the Head (Eph. 4:15).

As members of the Body of Christ, we hold to Christ, the Head, and we receive the divine dispensing coming from Him so that we may grow in the life of Christ day by day, little by little.

As we take Christ as the truth and grow in the life of Christ, we will arrive to maturity to become full-grown and mature.

The ultimate issue of our growth and maturity in life is the full-grown man, the church as the Body of Christ growing into a mature man.

This full-grown man mentioned in Eph. 4:13 refers to the church as the Body of Christ growing into a mature man.

As we all pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ, we all arrive at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, at a full-grown man.

This means that the Body of Christ is growing until it becomes mature, reaching the stature of Christ to be the fullness of Christ. Wow!

This is the ultimate and full issue of the believers’ growth and maturity by the life of Christ in His Body.

As we go through the process of being transformed in the life of Christ, we become like Him in the image of His essence (2 Cor. 3:18).

As we grow in life unto maturity in the life of Christ, we become like Him in the measure of His stature.

On one hand, we have His image, and on the other hand, we have His stature.

As we are growing, we are not growing into different persons; we all are growing into the same person, the corporate Christ, the church as the Body of Christ.

Our collective growth in Christ issues in the building up of the church as the Body of Christ and the maturity of the Body of Christ.

All our growth in life contributes to the building and brings in oneness.

We are all growing to be the same as Christ, the firstborn Son of God, in His image and in His stature.

This is God’s eternal economy, to make us the same as Christ in life, nature, expression, and function, but not in the Godhead.

May we all arrive at maturity in the divine life as we pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ so that we may become the full-grown man, the corporate Christ for the expression of God on the earth.

Lord, we hold You as the Head and we want to grow up into You in all things. Flow in us and supply us with what You are so that we may grow in life unto maturity. Bring us on with You, Lord. May we all grow unto maturity until we all arrive unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ! Amen, Lord, may there be continual growth in the divine life in us today! Cause us to grow until we look like Christ, speak like Christ, and live like Christ by having Christ be formed in us, speak in us, and live in us. Gain the full-grown man, Lord, the corporate Christ that matches the stature of Christ for Christ to have a fullness! We want to pursue growth and maturity in the life of Christ today and every day until we all arrive at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers in the message for this week, and portions from, Life Lessons, vol. 4, pp. 70-73, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Making Ourselves Ready for the Lord’s Coming (2023 ICSC), week 2, entitled, Making ourselves Ready for the Lord’s Coming by Growing in Life unto Maturity.
• Further reading on this topic:
  – Reconciliation, Enjoying God, and Becoming His New Creation, via Holding to Truth.
  – Testimony of Hans-Michael Ruthe via Living to Him.
  – New Jerusalem has the Fullness of Christ, article via, New Jerusalem blog.
  – What Is Spiritual Growth? Article via, Bibles for America blog.
  – Arriving at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, article via, One Body, One Spirit, and One New Man, Chapter 6, by Witness Lee.
  – The Growth and Building Up of the Body of Christ, article here.
  – Growing by taking Christ as our person, article via, One Body, One Spirit, and One New Man, Chapter 6, by Witness Lee.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – By divine regeneration / We the sons of God became, / But we must mature to fullness, / Thus the birthright to obtain. / Born and fully grown to manhood, / God’s full sonship we may share; / By the measure of full stature, / We God’s sonship will declare. (Hymns #741 stanza 2)
  – Forget the things behind! / Stretch for the things before! / Press onward with this mind: / Always want more! / Seeking in Him to grow, / Increasingly to know / Him that I daily might / Be found in Christ. (Song on, What things were gains to me).
  – In the Body we’ll be fitly framed / As the many members Christ supply; / Working in the measure of each part, / All by growth in love the Body edify. / Now we’re one His purpose to fulfill, / As the one new man of His plan. / Unto Him be glory in the church, / And in Jesus Christ forevermore—Amen! (Hymns #1232 stanzas 5-6)