God grows his church, and grows his church up.

I love experiencing God grow his Church. Experiencing God grow his church up is better!

Last week I shared one exciting aspect of my job, watching God grow LifePoint by building our leadership team. This week I want to add an even greater demonstration of God’s work. I love to see God grow us. I am uber-blessed when we get to enjoy the fruit of God growing us up! There is a big difference between growth and maturity. You can grow without maturing, but a church will never produce real fruit without maturity. Growth can be measured. Maturity must be cultivated until good fruit is produced. Faithfulness to God’s mission demands maturity.

Several years ago LifePoint took a leap of faith to relocate. Our purpose was to strengthen our ministry and expand our mission for the gospel. Our defining prayer was to become a greater launchpad for mission. A church demonstrates real maturity when it sends people out to live mission. The mission of LifePoint has expanded in a number of ways. We are experiencing some real gospel fruit, too. I want to share two specific stories of missional fruit from our labors today.

First, I recently spent over an hour talking with a LifePoint high school student about her plans for mission over the next year. Yes, that’s right. She’s building a plan to be intentionally engaged in mission over the next 1-2 years as a process to discern God’s call on her life. She’s thinking through issues like the kind of trips she needs to take, the places and work that would be most beneficial for her to experience, and how she can best prepare. I am amazed at the wisdom that is demonstrated in her plan, and the heart for Jesus motivating it. She is planning to maximize the remainder of her time in high school to learn, expand her worldview and experiences, and discern God’s will for her life regarding a call to being a missionary. I will tell you more about this amazing young lady at a later time.

Second, I want to introduce you to another young LifePoint lady that recently graduated from high school. She too has been discerning God’s call on her life and recently received some amazing news. She leaves for Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary this August to “dive in” to the work of following Christ on mission. What she is about to do is an amazing adventure with God that reality TV can’t touch. Go read more about it here.

LifePoint, it is powerful to watch God save people among us and send them out from us. This is growth and, more importantly, maturity that we are cultivating among our church body. This gospel fruit will only continue as we as a church grow and mature to produce more and more. Let us celebrate and thank the Lord for the great privilege of laboring for his mission. Ask God to do this more and more. There is no greater joy or privilege in this life. There is no greater work for the Church. May God grow his church, and grow us up! May God use LifePoint to multiply his Kingdom mission in this way exponentially.