Spiritual formation

Welcome!

Today: Spiritual formation

Passage: Eph 4

¹ As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. ² Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another inlove. (Eph 4, NIV 84)-emphasis added

God was so pleased to call us unto Himself

The Character of the Christian is shaped by Christ, from within

When there is true repentance, there is true transformation

Spiritual formation is a very important process every Christian should go through

If our relationship with Christ does not change our Character, something is wrong with that relationship

¹⁹ My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you, (Gal 4, NIV)

When we say “yes” to Christ, we must allow Christ to be “formed” in us

As we allow the Spiritual formation of our life, the formation of our ministry will follow. If we do not let Christ do the character change (formation) in us, and we do the ministry, we will hear lot of noise

⁷ In building the temple, only blocks dressed at the quarry were used, and no hammer, chisel or any other iron tool was heard at the temple site while it was being built. (1 Kings 6, NIV)

When we allow all the sharp corners in our life be a”dressed” by God and His word, there will be much less noise in the church, home and elsewhere we go

In the verses from Ephesians 4 mentioned above, we see two pairs: “humble and gentle”, “patient and bearing with one another”

“Humbleness” is a matter of the heart, which helps us to be gentle with others. If you are not humble, you cannot be truly gentle

Without patience, you cannot truly bear with others

There is fake gentleness that people act, even when not humble; there is also fake “bearing with one another” where they keep the grudge in the heart and put a “smile” on the face. That is not what the Apostle is talking about

True gentleness comes from a heart of true patience and forgiveness

You don’t become a “gentleman” just because someone calls you so

Our family and friends must say so

We are called to live the life of Christ, before we start witnessing Him to others

How good are we, in living the life worthy of our great calling?

How much patience, humbleness and gentleness we have?

When we loose our temper, how worse we (can) become?

Let us allow Christ to do the complete (trans)formation in us

We will go deeper on this, in the days to come

God bless

BG

Prayer: Lord Jesus, I admit that I made you stop that process of character change in me. Please continue the spiritual formation in me, because I still need to change a lot, before I could influence others for good. Thank you; Amen