HP+YE=G&C
Today I would like to share with you the divine formula for genuine growth and change in your life.
HP {His Power} + YE {Your Effort} = G&C {Growth & Change}
I want to build on last week’s article, Real Power. The focus of that article was on God’s mighty power that lives inside every single believer in Jesus Christ. It is the very supernatural power of God that enables us to do and be what we could never do or be on our own.
However, in order for any growth and change to take place in our lives, in order to become the fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, and people God wants us to be and for us to be effective and productive, His power alone is not enough! That’s right, His power alone is not enough. It takes one more vital, essential ingredient for the formula to work!
Here it is. 2 Peter 1:5-8 NIV
For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; to your goodness, knowledge; and to your knowledge, self-control; and to your self-control, perseverance, and to your perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ!
Each of us must make Every Effort to add to our faith the qualities listed above. You see if we do, if we possess them, if we grow in them in an ever-increasing measure, we will be effective and productive as a Christian! You will grow and change as a result of implementing this divine formula in your life, in your marriage, and in your parenting! None of us can succeed without the implementation of this formula. It is the primary reason most Christians are failing to grow and change.
As I wrote in Real Power, many do not grasp the immense power of God living in them to change! They fail to understand it, believe it or use it. But beyond that, in spite of all the spiritual food Christians are eating in an abundance of Christian programs, apps, messages, and podcasts, they are failing on a massive scale to make every effort to add to their faith! Christians are not making every effort to grow and change, to develop these qualities in their lives! Without deliberate intentionality in these vital matters, you will stay an immature, infantile Christian the rest of your life! You will never be effective or productive in the things that matter most in life!! That’s exactly what God’s word is telling us.
Let me give you a very simple, yet profound illustration. God has given the farmer rich, abundant soil. God has given the farmer the power of sunlight. God has given the farmer rain and water. God has given the farmer, through God’s creation, seeds to plant. God has given the farmer his eyes, his hands, and his entire body with which to do his farming. All those things are God’s part! But the farmer must get out of bed. The farmer must put on his clothes. The farmer must prepare his equipment, and keep it in good running order. The farmer must get out into the fields and plow up the soil, cultivate, and prepare the ground for planting. The farmer must plant the seeds. The farmer must pull the weeds. The farmer must put forth real, genuine effort, work and exertion to make all this happen, or his fields will sit idle, barren, and unproductive, and his farming will be utterly ineffective. No matter how much rain God brings, no matter how much sun shines, all that will grow in his fields are weeds!! The farmer will gain nothing. Fields don’t plow themselves! Crops don’t plant themselves! Weeds don’t pull themselves! But for the farmer who does his part, who prepares his fields, who does the work, who sows abundantly, that farmer will also reap a wonderful harvest, if he does not grow weary and give up! That’s God’s promise! God will always do his part!
This is why Paul wrote: Follow the Lord’s rules! Hardworking farmers are the first to enjoy the fruit of their labor/efforts!
Each of you has tremendous potential because of God’s great gift to us through the Gospel. Each of us can become someone far greater than we ever thought we could be. No matter what our upbringing, no matter what our past is like. But we must use the divine formula.
HP {His Power} + YE {Your Effort} = G&C {Growth & Change}
If you do this you will be truly amazed at what God accomplishes in and through your life.
Helping you become a Strong Disciple,
Because of Jesus,
Pastor Mark Darling
