How Deep Are Your Spiritual Roots? Luke 8:11-15 -- By: Robert N. Wilkin

Journal: Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society
Volume: JOTGES 12:1 (Spring 1999)
Article: How Deep Are Your Spiritual Roots? Luke 8:11-15
Author: Robert N. Wilkin


How Deep Are Your Spiritual Roots?
Luke 8:11-15

Robert N. Wilkin

Editor
Journal of the Grace Evangelical Society
Irving, TX

I. Introduction

Have you ever tried to grow a potted plant? I have and frankly I haven’t done very well. It can be very tricky to keep them growing. Don’t give them too much water. Don’t give them too little water. Watch the light. Too much will kill them. Too little will too. Make sure you have the right kind of soil. Make sure the pot is big enough for the roots. When the roots get too big for the pot, transplant it so that it doesn’t become root bound.

You don’t just leave a plant alone and expect it to do well. Without care, plants will suffer and ultimately die.

I grew up in Southern California. Along with Florida, California is the leading producer of fruits in the United States. Down the street from us a family had an avocado tree which produced literally thousands of huge, beautiful avocados. We ourselves had lemon and pomegranate trees which produced excellent fruit.

We also had some other fruit trees which bore some fruit, but never mature fruit. For example, we had a banana tree, and it only grew small, green immature bananas about the size of your pinkie. We had a peach tree, and it bore fruit, but it was small and hard and never came to maturity.

Even in California, there was variation in the productivity of fruit trees. Some didn’t produce any fruit. They simply withered and died. Some produced fruit each year, but not mature fruit. And some produced good, mature fruit.

In a sense, this is also true with people. People need care if they are to grow to the point where they are mature and act like it. If you

are a parent, you know this quite well. Children don’t raise themselves. If left to their own devices, they will be very immature.

This is especially true in the spiritual realm. Baby Christians don’t automatically grow into mature, spiritual believers. If you are a church leader, you know that it takes considerable care to help new believers grow to maturity. The church exists, in part, to oversee the spiritual growth and development of the believers in the church. “Obey those who rule over you, and be submissive, for they watch out for your souls, as those who must give account” (Heb 13:17). “I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able” (1 Cor 3:2).

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