Young children love playing with whatever you give them.  Some parents buy awesome toys with many fancy gadgets and mechanisms built in, only to find that the spaghetti pot and lid seem to be just as entertaining.  Give a child an old spoon and a sandbox, and you will see a kid entertained for hours as they dig and build.  I’ve even seen children playing with ‘grown up toys’, toys that are made for kids but represent adult activities.  Items like, easy bake ovens, a toy chainsaw, toy cars, and even toy lawn mowers.  One time I witnessed a young boy pushing his ‘plastic mower’ on the already mowed grass while his parent used the real gas powered John Deer.  The little boy gleefully yelled out, “look at me, I’m all grow’d up”.

I think many adults who authentically love Jesus have done the same thing as that little boy.  They have mimicked what they have seen other believers do, and by doing so they think they are now ‘mature’.  I have sad news, it is not the ‘things you do’ that make you mature.  It is what you believe and how you allow the power of Christ, who ‘is’ your belief, to live his life out through you.  That is maturity.

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