“Growth has been too little, for too long.” Was this a quote by Franklin Graham, Hillary Clinton or Christine Lagarde? Was the quote in reference to spiritual growth, climate related legislation or economic growth?
The quote is attributed to Christine Lagarde, managing director of The International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF is an international organization headquartered in Washington, D.C. The organization represents “189 countries working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty around the world.”
Those of you who don’t care about or understand markets and economies, PLEASE stay with me. There IS a bigger picture here. To realize the bigger picture, just re-read the description of the IMF I quoted above from their website. WOW !! Sounds like a god-sized effort to grow jobs, foster global cooperation and decrease poverty doesn’t it? Well, it is.
According to every economist, fund manager, banker and prognosticator across the globe, lack of growth is the biggest problem facing the world. I only wish every preacher, priest and evangelist believed lack of spiritual growth was as big an issue for the world. Yes, we need to find and follow Jesus, but that’s just the start.
Economic growth AND spiritual growth have been too low for too long. All of our churches and spiritual leaders need to remember their God-sized agenda that is greater than the IMF. We all know growth is good and the lack of growth is bad. But growth is not initiated by monetary policy or a sermon. According to 1st Corinthians 3:7, “So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.”
So, where is God when we need him to push things along? Is God not doing His job? Can’t He just raise our maturity and growth like the Federal Reserve will raise rates in December? The answer is a resounding YES. But his WAYS are not our ways. We know that scripture from Isaiah don’t we?
I love definitions. Merriam-Webster, the OLD dictionary defines growth as “a stage in the process of growing : size (2) : full growth”. Wikipedia, the NEW dictionary defines growth as “a positive change in size, and/or maturation, often over a period of time.”
If you’re into nature or enjoy yard work, you know a little about growth. Growth comes in seasons, with time and by pruning. Growth involves changes in size that are positive and negative along the path to maturity. Nature prunes with the changing seasons and economies used to work the same way.
There used to be a natural business cycle of growth and retraction that never ended. Spiritual growth is not as much a cycle but more about maturity. Maturity is a process you don’t want to circumvent. It takes T-I-M-E. And there is the rub.
We live in a day and age where we want it all immediately. We want it now. We don’t want to wait and will do whatever it takes to make that happen. We assume we can make things grow how and when we want. We have a god-sized agenda of our own and a god-sized ego to believe we can make it happen. The only thing missing is God with a capital G.
To meet their own agenda, economists and politicians decided to circumvent natural cycles with monetary policies and legislation (zero interest rates, inflated deficit spending, ect). Most of you don’t care about such policies or see how these spiritual and natural occurrences are related. We have given responsibility of our personal and economic growth to someone other than ourselves or our God.
We expect a central banker or politician to solve the economic problems. We think attending church or writing a tithe check will take care of our spiritual growth as well. Too many have given up hope because their selected officials in both camps have become feckless. There is not much worse than lost hope. It tends to lag right behind or right before lost faith.
If our faith and our country are going to grow again, I submit they can and need to do it together. We must remember where growth comes from and how it occurs. We need to LEARN about suffering, pruning and maturing if we want to know growth. You can’t have growth for very long without the other. That doesn’t sound fun but it is Biblical.
Man made institutions that have god-sized agendas and expectations of themselves are getting a wake-up call. Growth has been too low for too long…and WHY is that? Because God causes growth and God is mainly concerned with our growth and maturity into the image of his Son, Jesus Christ. THAT growth is not measured in worldly charts and figures.
There is a day of reckoning coming for all nations and people. The IMF has done about everything possible to foster economic growth with zero results. Too many churches have tried to grow attendance with more services and programs at the expense of hard truth and repentance. The results are about the same.
Growth HAS been too low for too long. Low, slow or no growth the question remains….where’s YOUR growth !!