Muffing Up Maturity

Yesterday I read an article that Woody sent to me. It was written by Gordon MacDonald. Some of you may recall that MacDonald is familiar with “muffing up.” Unlike other fallen Christian leaders, MacDonald humbly repented of his sin, and God has seen fit to continue to use him, just as he used a king named David who muffed up centuries ago. MacDonald is now editor at large of Leadership magazine and chair of World Relief.

Martin Thornton said, “A walloping great congregation is fine and fun, but what most communities really need is a couple of saints. The tragedy is that they may well be there in embryo, waiting to be discovered, waiting for sound training, waiting to be emancipated from the cult of the mediocre.”

Joel Osteen has made it big. Let me promise you, he has a walloping great congregation. In Houston – what used to be the Rockets’ stadium – Lakewood Church hosts three services with an average attendance of 16,000 per service. On Larry King Live he was introduced as a “megapastor.” Woody kiddingly told me, “Hey! I want to be a mega-super-hyper-maxi-pastor!” Osteen’s main goal is to make people feel really good about themselves and believe that God has better things for them - both in this life and the life to come.

MacDonald writes about how we as a church are not too bad at bringing people to Christ and doing basic discipleship. It is possible to have programs - and the modern church loves programs! - that bring people to Christ and take them through booklets that teach them the basics of the faith. But programs rarely produce true mature Christians.

We are good at producing “churchy Christians,” but listen to how MacDonald describes the holy, Christ-like, and godly man or woman of God : “I have in mind those who walk through all the corridors of the larger life – the market-place, the home and community, the playing fields – and do it in such a way that, sooner or later, it is concluded that Jesus’ fingerprints are all over them.”

Like I was hearing on Tom Dooleys’ Through the Bible podcast, these are people who - just by the way they live - leave behind them a trail that makes people ready to hear about Jesus. It’s hard to define a mature Christian, but you are likely to know one when you see one. The marks of maturity include a spiritual devotional life that is self-sustaining, wisdom in human relationships, humble service, and comfort in the everyday life in the real world where faith is lived out among unbelievers.

How many people do you know that are like that? Have we forgotten how to raise saints? What are we doing wrong? Reading the wrong books? Doing the wrong studies? Preaching wrong? Too much emphasis on self-help? Too much application in church of the world’s principles of success?

Mature Christians are formed in many ways, but one important key is through mentoring.
When I was a young wife and mother and missionary in Bolivia, I realized that I sorely needed a godly woman to mentor me. During one furlough I decided to approach several mature women that had experience in ministry as well as being a godly wife and mother. I was shocked and sorely disillusioned when one after the other, they refused to share their lives and wisdom with me. One of them told me bluntly, “I have nothing to teach you.” I almost got down on my knees to beg her, “Can’t you teach me some of what you know about following Christ and serving others? You host many people in your home. Can you give me tips on having a healthy balance between hosting guests and caring for family? Can you at least give me some recipes that are easy to fix for big groups?”

“No.”

The answer was final. And my heart was broken. I could only go to God and say, “You have to help me! I want to do this right and well. Help me, please!”

Mentoring might involve sharing a helpful book with someone, but it goes way beyond sharing recipes and reading books. As we read that book, we talk of life and we pray about ways that God needs to change us and how to go about that. Mentoring takes place on the streets of life – learning how to live as a Christian in the nitty-gritty of life. “Mature Christians are made one by one through the influence of other Christians already mature,” says MacDonald.

I’ve been writing a devotional. A couple of weeks of Su’s Daily Devos focus on the reality of suffering in our lives. Mature Christians grow through suffering. A sense of inadequacy is the stepping stone to dependency on God. Wrestling with questions and doubt are the springboard to growth. Mature Christians fail forward, as has MacDonald. They say a strategic “no” when others are indulging themselves with “yeses.” And they fall and learn to get up again. As MacDonald says from his own personal experience, “Mature Christians are experts at repenting and humility.” Mature Christians learn under one who has gone before so that “his/her life becomes a textbook on Christ’s work in us.”

Just like my failed search for a mentor over 20 years ago, young people today are failing to find mentors. People of my generation are more interested in cruises than modeling Christ. As MacDonald puts it, they are “too busy, too distracted, too secretive, and too afraid.” He doesn’t add that they are also too immature! Maturity in Christ has not been among their long-range goals!

I hope and pray along with Gordon MacDonald that we won’t lose a new generation of young Christians who couldn’t get past infancy because we were unwilling or unable to “emancipate an embryo,” or at least share a recipe!