Maturity No.1 Introduction

You might be helped this evening if you have your Bibles open at Ephesians 4, though in looking at our introductory study, we shall be moving around the Bible quite a little bit, but focusing attention specifically and later on, on the verses that have already been brought to your attention. As a number of you know, and some of you one day may have the delightful experience of discovering, the countryside around the steel city of Sheffield is quite unique in the United Kingdom. And I well remember as a lad going to one of the little villages north of Sheffield, and with my father, we were introduced to a Pentecostal pastor, a lay pastor in the Assemblies of God, and he showed us around his nursery.

He wasn't able to earn sufficient money through his church, it was only a small work, and so he had this nursery, which created profits and funds for his ministry. And I can remember him showing me around this place of 4 or 5 acres, and him telling me, you know it takes a lot of time before a nursery, before shrubs and trees and plants make any profit at all. He went on to say, some of these saplings have taken at least 7 years before they've acquired even a youthful maturity.

And he was advising me in effect as a teenager, that being a nursery man, being a market gardener, was not perhaps the most profitable of enterprises to get involved in. It takes time for saplings to grow, and to become tall enough to attract people to purchase them for re-transplanting, and placing in their gardens, in their allotments, or what have you. And that introduces me to my subject this evening, of Christian maturity, and the fact that all of us are called, if we belong to the Lord Jesus Christ, to work in cooperation with the Holy Spirit, to becoming mature.

Now that doesn't happen, unless you happen to be a very special person, I've yet to meet the breed, it doesn't happen overnight. It takes a lengthy period. Many would concede with the Apostle Paul, it requires a lifetime to become mature, and even then, there's still a lot to be done, before your personality is changed, and made perfect, and ready for you to be presented, before the great Heavenly Father.

It's good to want to be mature, but what does mature mean? Well, I turned to one of my several dictionaries, and discovered there, this intimation of its significance. Mature means fully developed, not childish. And then I turned to Roger Cesaris, and there I discovered certain synonyms, which describe maturity, weathered, hardened, seasoned, and even well cooked, with the exception of the proprietor of the Bianto magazine, I'm not too sure that we want people well cooked in the tabernacle, but weathered, inasmuch as they have experience of the Christian way of life, and have stood the test of time, fully developed, yes, not childish, moving on to being like the Lord Jesus Christ, that surely is our aim, and throughout the pages of Scripture, it seems to me in Old Testament and New Testament, the believer in God, the servant of the Lord, is encouraged to be mature.

Now, look at some of the subjects we're going to be looking through, later on in our series, because as I bring the subject matter to you right now, you can start to feel, as to whether this series is going to apply to you or not, because it's very, very practical. How mature are you in your prayer life? If you've got no problems in handling your prayer life, in remaining consistent in your quiet time, then there's nothing that I can teach you. But the majority of us, and I would include myself, have tremendous battles in handling our prayer life.

But the man who is fully mature, as was our Lord Jesus, has conquered that particular difficulty. Many of us confess to needing instruction and help and correction. What about guidance? You have no problem in getting guidance? You always know, with several options, just which way to take? Well, if that's the case, then again, my studies will have no help for you.

But if you're like some, the majority of us, who, when confronted with alternatives, let alone options, have difficulty, then maybe we shall benefit by considering this area of maturity in respect to guidance. What about worry and evangelism, handling money, controlling thoughts, overcoming temptation, getting on with other people? How do you rate yourself with the latter? If you never have any difficulties at all, if you're so loving and such a beautiful personality that you've never had a squabble, you've never had a wrong thought or an attitude towards anyone in the tabernacle, then skip next week, watch the television, and come back the week later on. Because we're going to be looking at how we handle this whole area of getting on with others, which is part of Christian maturity.

You see, maturity is a multi-sided thing. There are so many, many areas to it. And the amazing thing about the Bible is it deals with every facet.

And all we're going to have time to do in these ten weeks of study is just to look at a sample of them. So I continue this evening by introducing the subject. The Greek language is a very rich one, and sometimes you only get one word in the English for five in the original Greek.

And that applies to the whole concept of maturity. I mean, here in Ephesians 4, the apostle makes it very plain that he wants us to become mature. He says that in the 13th verse.

But there are other occasions when he's got exactly the same thought in mind, and yet he will use differing words to get the concept across. For instance, when he's writing to the Corinthians to go to an epistle with which you should have some degree of familiarity, having been on it for about 30 Sunday mornings, he tells us at the beginning of the first chapter of the first letter to the Corinthians that his express wish, this is verse 10, I appeal to you brothers in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought. Perfectly united.

Another Greek word which would sustain the translation mature. And it's got the concept of being thoroughly adjusted. If your engine is working properly, if you happen to own a car, everything is in right alignment, you've got oil that's causing the thing to tick over smoothly, there you've got an illustration of something thoroughly adjusted, mature.

And Paul is asking that the Corinthians might be like that in their fellowship. Later on in the same chapter, he addresses them in terms of potentially mature people. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 6. He does them a great compliment, a great honor in this verse when he says, we do however speak a message of wisdom among the mature.

And by that word he's really thinking in terms of perfect, people who have or potentially have or aim to have perfect understanding. That's another aspect of maturity. And then do you remember how in the second epistle of Paul to the Corinthians he makes reference to his thorn in the flesh.

And now how he's besought the Lord on two or three occasions that he may be delivered of this physical ailment. But he gets a response from the Lord. 2 Corinthians 12 and verse 9. God said to me, my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in weakness.

My power matures you even though you physically are in a weakened condition. Well I give you these three examples just by way of illustration to show you that the whole concept of maturity in the New Testament has many facets to it. But if you've lost therefore the overriding objective let me focus your gaze for a moment and turn you to Jesus.

Because every facet, every characteristic that describes, that deserves the description maturity is found in Jesus Christ. And that's why the apostle hoists the Lord Jesus in front of us in Ephesians 4 and says let's go unto maturity let's be like him. The Old Testament tells us in Psalm 37 and verse 37 mark the perfect man.

And Job chapter 1 and verse 1 tells us that Job was a perfect and an upright man. Even in Old Testament Scripture as well as in New Testament Scripture there's that straining forward to being mature in the service of the Lord. Now is it true that we should have that as our aim? Is it viable? Is it possible to suggest to Christian people that the characteristics of our Lord Jesus Christ should be reproduced in us? Certainly it seems a pretty bold sort of assertion but it does have the confirmation of our Lord Jesus behind it.

Will you turn to a very important verse. Luke chapter 6 and verse 40. Luke 6 verse 40.

While you're finding it I'll give you the context. Jesus is putting down certain instructions for his disciples telling them how they ought to live. It's a shortened version of the Sermon on the Mount that meets you in that sixth chapter of Luke's Gospel.

Ah, but Lord Jesus, how do we know that our life pleases you? The answer to that question is in the verse that I've just asked you to find. Luke 6 verse 40. A student is not above his teacher but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher.

You get the point? Who is the teacher in this chapter? The Lord Jesus. How do we know if we attend his classes that we have graduated? Well we do so by assessing our lives and comparing them with that of the Lord Jesus. Everyone who is fully trained, again the Greek word sustaining the translation mature, everyone who is fully mature will be like his teacher.

The church where I was brought up we used to sing a delightful little refrain. To be like Jesus. To be like Jesus.

All I want to be like him. All through life's journey from earth to glory. All I want to be like him.

There's good biblical theology behind that specific desire. When our Lord Jesus was on earth, how did he go about evangelizing? It's a very interesting study to work out the method of Jesus in communicating the Gospel. How would we go about it today? How do you reach the most men for the Lord? Well you have your Mass Rally, your Book Wembley if you have a name like Billy Graham or some other great evangelist and notable figure.

Or maybe you get behind a microphone and get the secular or the religious broadcasting authorities to beam your message across the nations of the world. But the interesting thing is, barring obviously the exception to the last illustration as radio wasn't around in our Lord's day, he didn't go for the Mass in areas of communication, at least not very often. He spent his life for the three years of his public ministry with twelve men in particular.

And day after day he fed them with information, he illustrated what he had to say and he tried to instruct them in the things of the Lord. They were his disciples, that word meaning a one who follows in the discipline of another. Now there were lots of things that these disciples had to have taken out of their personalities.

They weren't immediately mature on coming to the Lord Jesus. In fact they were a quarreling bunch. If they had any one common characteristic, then it was the tendency to become infantile at times.

You remember how on one occasion Jesus has to settle them because they're quarreling as to who's going to be the chief in the kingdom of heaven, that is amongst the disciples themselves. On another occasion he has to say, well you're a pretty dull lot, you're not concentrating, you're not understanding me. Dullness was one of their characteristics.

Fearfulness he tells them about the cross and going to Jerusalem and one acts as spokesman and said no don't go there, it would be much better that you stay in Galilee where it's much safer. All these were aspects within the disciples of immaturity and they had to be cut out. And bit by bit Jesus started to do this.

Not that even at the end of three years they were fully perfect, they were always moving on, but at least they were making progress. The years were going by and they were growing and some of the characteristics which were unpleasant and unlovely were diminished if not eradicated. And you know my dear young Christian friend, and it's nice to see some of the youngsters as well as older people here this evening, that should set the pattern for us.

The older we are, the more years we've got under our belt, the more common denominator is apparent or should be between us and the living Christ. That is moving on to maturity. Jesus takes these men and he's like a potter at the wheel as he mulls their lives.

And occasionally there's a crack, there's a flaw, but he doesn't take the lump of clay and throw it on one side. Only one person was ever rejected who made an ascent to be the disciple of the Lord Jesus and his name was Judas. The Saviour starts all over again.

He sees the flaw and he puts his fingers on the clay and with the moist, deft, skilful hands that belong to him, he mulls Peter and he makes him into what he believes Peter can be. You remember how when he first accosts Peter he says, Thou art Simon, but thou shalt be. Jesus always sees the potential that is in a man, that is in a woman.

But to make that potential actual takes a long time often and the process can be quite painful. As my nurseryman friend in Sheffield would have told me if he'd spelt out the science of cutting and trimming plants and shrubs to make them stronger. So our Lord Jesus has a concern for eleven men to make them mature and as they gain a maturity and move out into Palestine, to Asia Minor and some possibly, certainly according to legend, as far away as India, they can teach others the things of God and encourage other disciples and followers to become mature.

Well, that's our aim. To be like the Lord Jesus Christ. Fully trained.

Let's go back then to Ephesians 4 which has the classic passage on Christian maturity as far as I can evaluate in the New Testament. Here is the apostle who has before to the Philippians told them that he's pressing on to the mark for the prize of the high calling in God. He's moving on to maturity.

He takes up the same theme and he writes to that group of churches in the Ephesus area and he exhorts them to go on and to serve the Lord and to become more like Jesus. From the 11th verse, you remember, of chapter 4 of Ephesians he indicates that the reasons why apostles and all the ministry gifts were bequeathed to the church was, verse 12, to prepare God's people for works of service and continuing in the same verse, so that the body of Christ might be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Still on the same theme, verse 14, then we will no longer be infants tossed back and forth by the waves.

And going on to verse 15, instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the head that is Christ. You see the point. Paul has the Lord Jesus in front of him and he says, move on and become more and more like him.

Well, as we've already conceded, that's a pretty tall order, isn't it? How big are we to be? As big as Jesus. That's our aim. Somebody sent me a record some years ago from the States from Earl Roberts' son and a beautiful voice.

He sang a little piece entitled, I never heard anyone else sing it from that day to this, How Big is God? And it was a majestic song as he went out to speak of the height and the depth and the width of the person of our Lord. And here is the Apostle Paul saying that we're aiming to be like our Lord Jesus Christ. How big is he? Well, you can't really measure him.

It's like trying to measure the Atlantic with a foot rule, isn't it? However far you get, there's so much more to go. How great is the Lord? Very difficult to find words to express the greatness of Christ. Did any of you evangelicals dare to go and see the film Mary Poppins? And you discover that Mary was fascinated by something that now eludes my mind so I'm disclosing that I saw the film and she describes it as being supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

She can't find a word to describe how wonderful this thing is that I've forgotten. And isn't that how we feel sometimes when we think of our Lord? How big is he? So very high. How wonderful is he? So very great.

But nonetheless, we have him as one to model our lives around. Remember the story of the man who went through to Lilliput, Gulliver? The myth and how all these tiny little folks from Lilliput looked up and they saw this big, big man. They wondered who on earth he was and how it was that he could be as big as that.

Well sometimes we feel like those citizens of Lilliput as we face this particular injunction of the Apostle Paul, become as big as Jesus. It seems impossible. But we still have to keep the idea in mind that Paul isn't joking when he suggests that our target, even if it's not attainable in this world, is nonetheless to be kept in front of us.

He's not joking like in the story of Jack and the Beanstalk and the Beanstalk just grows and grows and grows and grows and it's just unbelievable because Beanstalks don't grow like that. And Paul's talking about Christian growth. He's talking about something that he believes to be absolutely necessary, a process in which he is engaged.

And it's not wild growth. Oh, I can give you a lovely illustration of wild growth. I'll be free about 9.30 this evening.

Call in at Shakespeare Road and let me show you the back of our rose bushes. The wild growth. We've only a small garden.

But all the weeds have conspired together to get a footing in our particular plot of soil. And the growth is often wild. But Christian growth, it's directed.

It's directed to being like the Lord Jesus. Well, what was Jesus like? Says the Apostle Paul, as you read by implication in Ephesians 4, he was a man who had eloquence of language. You see, one of the ways in which you can work out a person's maturity is listen to them talk.

And so Paul in verse 14 makes reference to infants. It's lovely to hear infants talk, isn't it? Well, it is sometimes. But if you're a nursery school teacher, and it's hour after hour, Monday through to Friday, by the time Saturday comes, real melody is silence.

In fact, I heard a mother say today, you know, there are times when just for a day, though I love my children, I'd like to be without them, just to have a little bit of silence, or at least intelligent conversation with one of my contemporaries. You work out a lot about a person's maturity through the way that they talk. Infants prattle.

Infants have their own way of communicating. And they have a very narrow dictionary and means of expression. But the Lord Jesus Christ, and the maturity that we're aiming for because it was one encapsuled by him, had an eloquence of language.

Have you ever studied the language of the Lord Jesus? Have you ever seen the reaction that people have to Jesus when he talks? Even his enemies have to confess that they've never heard anyone speak like this man speaks. And when they bring him in front of the theologians, the men who've got all the degrees, his own understanding of God and the doctrines of grace are so phenomenal that they are lost to find a human explanation as to the origin of his knowledge. Such an eloquent man is our Saviour.

You know, the early church sometimes was full of prattle. Oh yes, they had scraps. When Jesus found the disciples quarrelling, that was in embryo to be the state of the church.

The early church. Time after time, there was difficulty. Or so it would appear in some of those local communities of Christians that are gathered together around a shemina.

That's why Paul generally writes his letters. If they hadn't squabbled, he wouldn't have written his letters. So in one sense, we're glad that he did squabble.

They did squabble because we've got the usefulness of the contents of Paul's letters. But Christians today can be full of prattle, can't they? You and me, claiming to be mature, and yet sometimes quarrelling in areas that are not terribly important. No, says the apostle Paul, full maturity is like Jesus.

And the Lord Jesus was not an infant. He was a man, a proper man, having intelligence, having a way of communication which was so very wonderful. He had the eloquence of the ages within him.

But not only the eloquence of his tongue, does the apostle Paul make reference to in the 14th verse, and then later on in the 20th and 21st verses, he also refers to the temperance of his life. Verse 20 is beautifully translated in the Authorized Version when it speaks about how you learn Christ. How did you learn him? What did the Authorized Version writers understand by that expression as they put it into the A.V.? Well, what impressions came through to you when you heard about the Lord Jesus? How did you learn him? What was his lifestyle like? What were his reactions like? And throughout the whole of these verses, the apostle is engaged in a sort of negative teaching.

By negative, I mean he is putting down certain things that the Lord Jesus Christ never did. And by using just a little bit of logic, you can work out, therefore, what he did do. This is a very interesting way of teaching that the apostle very often employs.

He teaches in a negative fashion. How did you learn Christ? He doesn't tell us all of the marvelous characteristics of the Lord. Rather, he goes on to speak negatively of things in which the Lord Jesus did not engage.

For instance, verse 25. Each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor. Why? Because you never learned of Christ engaging in libel.

You know the expression, your tongue running away with you? Not the Lord Jesus. He's too temperate, you see. He was never libelous.

He never found that evil desires were so enthroned that he submitted to temptation. Verse 22. You were taught with regard to your former way of life to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires.

Jesus had no Adamic sinful nature, but nonetheless there were real temptations which the devil placarded in front of him at the beginning of his public ministry and intermittently throughout the whole of the three years. But never once did Jesus succumb. That's how you learn Jesus.

He's a man who's a master in the tempting circumstance. And don't say those temptations weren't real. They were real, and they hit him at a force, the intensity of which they've never hit you, because you, like me, you've broken at some time.

So you've never known how fully intense temptation can be. Only the one who always rides temptation and comes through to the victory understands the force of it in all its power. But the Lord Jesus, he never compromises with evil desires.

He's never libelous. There's never uncontrolled anger. Verse 26, in your anger do not sin.

Why? Because Jesus didn't. Do not let the sun go down while you're still angry, because again, the Lord did not. You see what I mean by this negative teaching? All these characteristics that Jesus never illustrated.

And because they were absent from him, says the apostle Paul, they are to be absent from you. Why? Because that's the only way you can approach practically the subject of being mature, being like the Saviour. You remember how when our blessed Lord was brought before that, those series of mock trials, how he retained his maturity and his control, his dignity? One of the things that strikes me as being a great proof of the divinity of Jesus is how he copes with a pressurized circumstance.

What do I mean? Well, I've intimated these trials. Here he is. You remember the story.

He's been arrested in the garden. The disciples have scattered. They've run away.

And as he anticipated, in the hour of his need, he's just on his own. And they bring him before the high priest. The high priest, in a flush of enthusiasm, having Jesus the pawn from Galilee, or so he thinks in his hands, he rips his garments.

He loses his own self-respect. He breaks the law of Moses, which prohibits such an action as this. And when you contrast the prisoner with the high judge, if you please, you come down on this side in answer to the question, who retains dignity? The Lord Jesus.

In front of Herod? Well, Herod is so distressed because Jesus will not do some magic for him. Jesus will not speak to him. The disappointed Herod, who loses respect all the way down his life.

And Pilate is in an utter quandary. He doesn't know what to do with Jesus. He's got this telegram from his wife.

He's got the pressure of the Jews. He's afraid of Caesar. And yet, at the back of his mind, there's this thought that Jesus Christ is different from any other prisoner who's ever been propelled in front of him.

Pilate's in a flap. And in these three trials, it's Jesus who retains dignity. It's the Lord Jesus, the man of maturity, who is composed and shows temperance, even there as he does on the cross.

You think of him as his body is racked with pain, as there he is, aloft on Mount Calvary. And there they snipe like snarling dogs at him, shouting up their abuse, hurling up their hostile shafts of criticism and libel. And yet, Jesus retains his poise and his dignity.

Now, these are things which are most important characteristics for us always to have in mind. Why? Because, you see, they define for us what is meant by Christian maturity. There's the eloquence of his language.

There's the temperance of his life. And you and me, we're to aim to be like that. It doesn't come overnight.

That's why the Apostle Paul, after years of trying, can still in a very, very honest passage write to the Philippians, not that I've already obtained all this or have already been made mature, but I press on to take hold on that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to be mature to have taken hold of it, but this one thing I do, forgetting what is behind and straining towards what is ahead, I press on towards the goal to win the prize which God has called me heavenwards in Christ Jesus. And Paul says everyone should adopt that philosophy in life.

You'll read Philippians 3 in the NIV when you get back home, and you'll see how the context slots into Ephesians 4. No, my nurseryman friend would have told me in my years as a teenager back in Sheffield that to have good growth takes a long time. Maturity doesn't come overnight. But he aimed at it in the realm of nature, as you and I must aim at it in the realm of the Spirit.

But what are the obstacles? Well, Paul works them out. From verse 17 onwards. You must no longer live like the Gentiles do, he says.

And let me read the introduction in the NIV, verse 17, Ephesians 4. So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord. Why is he speaking so strongly? Because he wants them to attain, or at least to begin to attain, to the measure of the fullness of Christ. And if you do that, then prohibit compromise.

Don't live like the Gentiles do in the futility of their thinking. What's the reason why Gentiles can never be children of light? What is the reason why unbelievers can never be mature? Well, says the apostle. And here, if you please, is some of the most staggering language in the whole of the New Testament.

Verse 18. They're darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God. They are separated.

But what is Paul saying by way of negative argument? You are united. You see, it's not an imitation of Christ, despite what he says in verse 1 of the 5th chapter, that really is captivating Paul's thinking now. He is saying that we participate in the very life of Christ, not just mimicking Him.

This is no sort of Mike Yarwood approach to presenting in his own personality, in the brilliant way in which he can some of the politicians of the present day. We are not just imitating the Lord, although it will seem that to the outsider, we are participating in the very life of the Lord Jesus Christ. And if you're participating in that life, then you have no right at all to compromise in any area.

If you compromise, you're bound to lose out in maturity. What the apostle Paul goes on to say in the 20th verse is apposite, is relevant. You, however, did not come to know Christ that way.

Why? Well, He never compromised. Surely you heard of Him and were taught in Him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. Verse 24, we are to put on the new self, created to be like God.

Again, it's a mind-blowing statement. Think of this. If you forget everything I've said this evening, in the name of the Lord, take this home with you.

You are created to be like God. And whatever your success, and however much you may have acquired in the material and in the professional areas of this world, unless you have some God-likeness, you're an utter failure. You're absolutely immature.

You are made, if you belong to Jesus Christ, to be like God, partaking of His very life. And in the areas that you compromise, you thereby forfeit maturity. The major obstacle, compromise.

Second major obstacle, embarrassment. See, we belong to God, but we can embarrass God. Look at verse 30, the Apostle Paul slots easily into the teaching of the doctrine of the Spirit.

Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. How do I partake of the life of God? By the Holy Spirit within me. Now, if He's within me, and I engage in practices that are not in accord with the example of Jesus, then I embarrass the Holy Spirit, and I lose out in maturity as a result.

So, as Paul puts it, again, very interestingly and understandably, in the 27th verse, do not give the devil a foothold. Has he got a toe in your life still? You say, he's got more than a toe, he's got half a leg. Right, well, amputate it for him.

And endeavour, by refusing to compromise, to eliminate embarrassment, as far as the Holy Spirit's presence in our lives is concerned. I'm nearly through, and I'm aware that there are other meetings, so let me try and bring the whole thing together. Why am I getting so hot under the collar, literally, this evening, about the area of the doctrine of Christian maturity? Because it's so vital.

The 16th verse of this chapter speaks about the Church as it should be. There's a great deal of difference between the Church ideal and the Church actual. Now, it's not the language of growth, it's the language, really, of machinery, or of body function, but growth is obviously implied.

Paul says that from him, the Lord Jesus, the whole body, that's you and me, and every member of the Church of Jesus Christ, should be joined and held together by every supporting ligament, growing and building itself up in love as each part does its work. There is the classic description in the New Testament of the Church ideally. But it doesn't always happen.

Why doesn't it happen? Because of immaturity. Immaturity bedevils the Church. I don't know of a local church that doesn't have some problem in that area.

I don't know of any mission society that doesn't. I was telling friends on Monday that when I was off for a couple of days over the last weekend, I immersed myself in the life of that great man, William Carey, who spent years in India and did a magnificent work for the Lord. He, Carey, and his friend, whose name, I believe was, I think it's Nelson, I wouldn't be too sure of that, but Carey and his friend were out in India for some years before anybody else joined them.

And when new recruits came to that area of Calcutta within a matter of months there was discord. There was disharmony. Carey's working 40 miles away from Calcutta.

They're working in Calcutta. There's a breakdown in relationships. And Carey is so concerned that the testimony of the Lord Jesus in that area shall be reduced because of the quarrelling amongst Christian people.

Now, I don't say that to criticize Carey. I'm not holy enough, not mature enough myself to strap that man's bootlaces together. He was such a great man.

But I'm using it as an illustration that even 200 years ago in missionary enterprise immaturity, bedeviled, at least reduced the effectiveness of God's work in India. And it's the same here in this country. It's the same on the south coast.

We are impelled by God's Word to look for a maturity within ourselves as individuals, within this local fellowship and in our relationships with other fellowships. I wanted to spend five minutes making this extremely practical. But I reckon I'll have time to do that as the weeks roll by in the subject matter that's going to be in front of us that all devolves from my introductory subject.

But this I put to you right now in the closing moment. In what area of your life are you immature? In what area do relationships break down? In what area do you allow your tongue to run ahead accelerating at a rapid speed when it shouldn't even be moving at all? Can you cope with difficulties within the Christian fellowship? Can you cope with someone saying something against you without backbiting? Can you have a specific view in one area, not necessarily of Christian theology, but in worship order, in running prayer meetings, in holding Bible studies? Can you have one view that maybe is not shared with everyone else and sink your view for the advantage of everyone? That's maturity. We're not all the same.

We never will be. And it's as the edges are rubbed off our personalities and we work together and we love one another that we become the people that Jesus Christ can use. It took the Saviour years to rub off the edges of the disciples and the job wasn't complete even when the Lord returned to heaven.

It had to continue down the years of their lives. We're all to some degree immature. Look in the mirror.

Examine yourself. And in the area of your weakness, come before the Lord and come before His Word and ask Him, Father, will you enable me by Your power to reduce that tendency, whatever it might be, so that I might become more mature and more helpful to my brother and to my sister in the local fellowship so that our church can be used more for you than it has been. Well, there I conclude my introductory study.

And next week we move into the area of how to handle relationships, how to get on with others. My wife should be speaking with me for the last time. Thank you again for your great love to us.

Praise you for the maturity of our Savior and how He maintained it, maintained such a dignified life throughout all the years and throughout all the incredible pressures. Lord, we do want to be like Him. I so much want that in my own life and confess my utter failure sometimes even to reproduce any of His characteristics.

Help us, Father, in utter dependence on the Spirit to put down what is wrong in our natures and take up what the Spirit makes real and right. And as we grow in grace, may we grow in the knowledge of the Savior and know what it is to be being filled with the Spirit of God so that we might glorify and bring pleasure to our blessed Redeemer for His sake. Amen.