Meeting: Sunday School
Date: 22nd March, 2026
Topic: What does it mean to grow spiritually? (Pt. 2)
Minister: Pastor David Kilanko
(Ephesians 4:14-15) — That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; 15 – But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:
(2 Peter 3:18) — But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.
The purpose of this teaching is not to have a sensual knowledge of how to grow but to actually grow. Growing in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ is not growing in knowing things about Him or what He can do, but growing in His person and in being like Him.
In the natural world, there is so much varying knowledge about daily living, but in the spiritual realm, knowledge is bound by the word. We should note that we must pray but being prayerful alone isn’t sufficient for spiritual growth, because if after your prayer you can’t bear with your brother, then you aren’t growing.
When we got born again Christian, we were still babes in Christ. Being born again is supposed to gender towards our spiritual growth, and not really the core pillar of growth. Being born again, prayerful, pious and even giving our body to serve in God’s house are all good practices but do not commend us unto God for spiritual growth in our soul. A person who is 80 years old can still be a babe in Christ if he or she is not growing up spiritually.
Rather, the core pillars of spiritual growth are the gospels of the kingdom — milk, meat and strong meat. Without the gospels of the kingdom, it is not possible to raise the souls out of babyhood to childhood. If you don’t introduce a soul to the gospel of the kingdom, the soul can remain a baby forever. Our inability to feed adequately according to the varying proportions of meals allocated for our age in the spirit makes us spiritually malnourished.
Let us consider how the gospel and commandments of God help us to grow. (Romans 8:14) — “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.” — It doesn’t matter where a person is coming from or how bad their situation is, as long as they can be led by the spirit of God, they will arrive at Sonship. Even if the person is the most carnal or cantankerous person, if he or she is submitted to learning the leading of the spirit, they will arrive at sonship.
(Hebrews 12: 9-10) — “Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.”— Every leading of the spirit is for our profit. Everything the Lord arranges is for our own profit. Many times, our earthly parents discipline us so that we don’t disgrace them but still, God uses it for our profiting. Everything the Lord subjects us to is so that we can be partakers of His holiness.
As much as prayer isn’t a determinant of our spiritual growth, we must not undermine it still. The vehicle of growth is obedience but some of the things we supply that make us move towards the trajectory of growth are giving attention to prayer, giving attention to the word, and being led to do good works. Truly, there is no Sonship without the leading of the Spirit. There must be a relationship between you and the Lord for there to be any form of leading. Two things are key determinants of leading; Relationship with God and Submission to spiritual authority. We see this play out between Samuel and Eli. As a result of age, and spiritual authority, he was able to respond to the voice of the Lord (1Sam. 3:4-20). If he had not been subject to Eli and known his voice, he wouldn’t have picked anything.
Leading of the Spirit should be a normal experience for growing every believer, but we mustn’t take pride in it. We must not run with our leading but submit to our spiritual authority to be tried. One of the major components of a soul that will arrive well at salvation is that concerning leading, we are meek and willing to allow it to be tried. Without leading, both subjective leading and objective leading, one can’t grow spiritually. Subjective leading is a leading where the Lord divinely orchestrates situations to subject us to a particular dealings in life to remove carnal natures from our souls. We must be a people who are always checking with the Lord concerning our lives to know whether His hand is in what we are going through, because not every dealing works out salvation, so we must be willing to submit our leadings so as to ensure it leads us to salvation.
Many times, nature is not removed in the place of comfort. Abraham may not have come to a place where he had an everlasting covenant with God if he was not subjected by God the way he was. Many times, in an attempt to protect our life or things, we find ourselves protecting natures that won’t allow God, that are meant to be removed. It is obedience to the gospel of the kingdom that will make the soul arrive at growth. is what takes away nature rooted in us not being able to explain scriptures or account for the many leadings.
A lot of us came to church through different hopes that were painted to us: admission into the university, entrance into heaven as against hell and so on. These hopes can make us stay in church active. But as the Lord is bringing teachings and leadings our way for our change, we must change and grow up from being babes. The hope of the Lord must purify our own hope, in everything we do in church. If hope doesn’t change, we will do everything and salvation will not be wrought in us. Our hope is meant to be purified as we grow up spiritually. If our hope is still intact, then there is a growth problem. The reason for the gospel of the kingdom is to purify hope.
“24 And after some days, when Felix came with his wife Drusilla, who was a Jew, he sent for Paul and heard him concerning the faith in Christ. 25 And as Paul reasoned about righteousness, temperance, and the Judgment to come, Felix trembled and answered, “Go thy way for this time. When I have a convenient occasion I will call for thee.” 26 He hoped also that money would be given him by Paul, that he might release him. Therefore he sent for him the oftener and communed with him.” – (Acts 24:24-26) Just like Felix, a lot of us still have wrong hopes in us even though we’re hearing the gospel of the kingdom. This is why God needs to judge wrong hope in us if not we can’t say we are truly growing. The hopes of everlasting life has to be progressively seen and believed-in through the gospel, if not, we cannot grow towards and unto God in Our souls.
The fivefold ministry is also an arrangement of God for our growth. According to Reverend Kayode Oyegoke, God speaks to ministers for saints, He doesn’t go directly to saints when there’s the fivefold ministry. Everything concerning our growth has been given as gift of men – ministers. God speaks to the five fold ministry for the growth of men. The messages our ministers preach to us, the admonition they give to us about reading the scriptures is for our growth and not for self gratification. In fact, reading the bible is meant to aid the understanding of the doctrine being taught to us. The fivefold ministers have been ordained for our growth, and the lord has blessed them for this purpose.
It takes time for souls to grow up spiritually the same way it takes time for us to grow up physically. Growth takes time, you can’t fasttrack it. In essence, suffering is also one of the arrangements that aid the growth of a believer. Suffering is the allowance of God. Suffering that the Lord permits is critical to our spiritual growth. Suffering also has to be by leading and not what we orchestrate by ourselves.
We need to grow up spiritually. Sin widened the gap between man and God through the fall of Adam, so we need to now grow up spiritually. If there was no gap, Adam ought not to have died. The goal of God was that Adam will feed on every tree of the garden to have strength. Then when he has fully eaten of these trees, he (Adam) can now partake of the tree of life – but this was disrupted.
Since the fall of Adam, man has begun to go downwards in sin. Sin has eaten deeply into the heart of men and this is because of the inverted growth towards hell. When Adam was created and was initially in the garden, he just needed to grow into the image and likeness of God. But after the fall and even overtime, regression has made it that even before man can grow into the image and likeness of God, man need to go through an initial sanctification from works of the flesh. After this, sanctification from sins of the flesh will follow suit. Flesh will be the next to be dealt with in order to judge that corruption of the world in our souls and make us spiritual and christ men. After escaping from the corruption of the world, we need to overcome the world through the teachings of the gospel of the everlasting life. Spiritual growth is also meant to help us have victory over the oppression of evil spirits.
Finally, the reason for growth is to become like Christ and God.
Round Up
“For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.” – (Romans 8:29) The reason why we need to grow up spiritually is to grow up into God, and there are stages to get to this growth eventually. Recently, Pastor Laide said “you can’t talk about destiny without destination.” We all have our destiny, and our destination is what defines it – and we need to grow up spiritually to get to this destination. Our destination is God, hence He should be the basis for our destiny.
If our destination is God, then our destiny should revolve around all things pertaining to God. Our destiny is not defined by the four temperaments, because those are part of the things that gratify flesh and make us chase after things that fade away.
This world should not determine our destiny, rather, it should work out righteousness in us through the leading of the spirit, as we journey to God. Tribulation in the world for us believers works patience in us. In essence, all this work together for us to grow up into the destiny the Lord has purposed for us.
We should glory in tribulation because Jesus went through it and gloried in it, and he was said to be the express image of God. This is how God also wants us to come into His image and likeness.
Flesh is powerful, it is a power – power of satan, this is why we need to grow up spiritually so we can be turned away from this power unto the power of God. How do we get this power of God? Through the gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation. The gospel might be shameful, but it is a deliverance from the power of flesh and satan.
THE END