LIVING WATERS
For the proclamation of the Gospel and the edification of the Body of Christ
The Maturing Believer
"Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that through these ye might be partakers of the divine nature…" (2 Peter 1:4).
We cannot too highly value and appreciate heart-hunger for the Word. It is the Spirit of Truth. We may have been born again without knowing much of the Bible, but we certainly are not going to grow to any extent apart from a careful and persistent study of the Word of God.
Yes, the maturing believer is a Spirit-dependent student of the Scriptures, "whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises; that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature".
Christian progress is not a question of attaining to some abstract standard, or of pressing through to some far-off goal. It is wholly a question of seeing God’s standard in God's Word. You advance spiritually by finding out what you really are (in Christ), not by trying to become what you hope to be. That goal you will never reach, however earnestly you may strive.
It is when you see you are dead unto sin that you die to it (daily); it is when you see you are risen that you arise; it is when you see you are a ‘new creature’ in Him that you (progressively) grow.
Seeing the accomplished fact in the Word determines the pathway to the realizing of that fact. The end is reached by seeing, not by desiring or working. The only possibility of spiritual progress lies in our discovering the truth as God sees it; the truth concerning Christ, the truth concerning ourselves in Christ. (Watchman Nee).