growth

Every time I see my grand-daughter I'm aware of how she's grown.

I was down in York on Saturday afternoon for a family celebration. And the wee girl (with her parents, of course!) was there as well.

It's a good six weeks, I'd guess, since I saw her last, and she's fairly come on since then. Almost, but not quite, walking - more 'taking steps on her own' (as her mother discerningly puts it).

She's growing. And to watch that growth brings a joy to a grand-father's heart which is hard to out into words.

How much harder for any of us to grasp what our growth in grace must mean to the Lord. He delights in such growth on our part with a joy that's as huge as himself. I doubt we fully understand what joy our growth affords him.

And I doubt we even start to comprehend what pain there is within his holy heart when no such growth is evident.

There's a story Jesus told along those lines which I've been working at today. It's simple, short, and more than a little sobering.

A man has a fig-tree, planted in a vineyard. He comes to look for fruit on it, but finds none. He's been doing that now for a good few years. He's patient. But he's getting frustrated. There's no real growth.

"Cut it down!" he orders. It's becoming a waste of space. Or a waste of good soil, at any rate.

The man who's charged to secure that growth pleads for another year. He'll dig round it, give it the benefit of some healthy manure - he'll pull out all the stops, that is, do everything he possibly can to promote that genuine growth.

And then, a year on down the line, if there's still no fruit, well, then the tree can be given the chop.

God looks for growth, longs for growth, provides for growth, delights in growth. And he's grieved and dismayed and dishonoured by a lack of growth.

When there isn't that growth in our lives, when we're not growing "in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ" (2 Pet.3.18), we've become a waste of space.

That's not my verdict, but his. Growth matters a whole lot more than we sometimes think to the Lord.