The Tension of Becoming

There are seasons in the Christian life when it is difficult to tell whether anything is changing.

You pray, but sometimes it feels as though you're talking to the ceiling. You open Scripture, hoping God might speak through its pages, but the words seem distant, disconnected from what you're walking through. You show up at church, hoping to find community, yet somehow leave feeling more isolated and alone than when you arrived. You try to remain attentive to God, looking and listening for some indication of his presence, but you don't see him, hear him, or even feel particularly close to him.

And somewhere along the way, you begin to wonder: Am I actually growing, or am I just going through the motions?

I think this is a more common experience than we care to admit.

Most of us have some idea of where we thought we would be by now.

We imagined we'd be more patient. Less anxious. More consistent in prayer. More trusting of God. Perhaps we thought certain struggles would be behind us, particular questions would have been answered, or our relationship with Jesus would feel more settled.

But then we look at our lives as they actually are.

Some of the same struggles remain. Old insecurities resurface. Relationships are complicated. Prayer sometimes feels difficult. And the person we've become doesn't always resemble the person we imagined we'd be.

There is a tension in that distance.

The distance between where we hoped to be and where we actually find ourselves.

And I wonder whether some of our deepest frustrations with spiritual growth come not simply from the difficulty of following Jesus, but from the expectations we've brought into the process.

We believe in growth, but struggle with the process

We know, at least intellectually, that following Jesus is a lifelong journey.

We talk about discipleship, spiritual formation, transformation, and becoming more like Christ. We understand that maturity isn't something we achieve overnight.

But knowing that growth takes time and being willing to live within that time are two different things.

We can believe in the process while quietly resenting how long it takes.

We begin to wonder whether we're doing something wrong.

Am I praying enough? Am I reading Scripture consistently? Why do I still struggle with anger? Why am I still anxious? Why do I keep returning to patterns I thought I'd overcome?

These aren't necessarily bad questions. There is an appropriate place for examining our lives honestly.

But something happens when we begin measuring our spiritual lives against an imagined version of where we believe we should be.

We start treating discipleship as though there ought to be a predictable relationship between our effort and the results.

If I pray faithfully, I should experience greater peace.

If I study Scripture, I should have fewer questions.

If I participate in Christian community, I should feel less alone.

If I practice the spiritual disciplines, I should become noticeably more like Jesus.

And when those results aren't readily apparent, we assume something must be wrong.

Sometimes something does need attention. There may be sin we've rationalized, relationships we've neglected, or responsibilities we've avoided. Spiritual maturity involves repentance, obedience, and difficult changes.

But not every season of struggle is evidence of spiritual failure.

And not every season that feels unproductive is actually unproductive.

Growth we cannot manufacture

One of the things I find fascinating about Jesus is how frequently he describes the kingdom of God through ordinary images.

Seeds. Soil. Trees. Branches. Fruit.

In Mark 4:26–29, Jesus tells a parable about someone who scatters seed on the ground.

The farmer goes about his days, sleeping and waking, while the seed begins to grow. Jesus says something remarkable about the process: the farmer doesn't know how it happens.

He has a role to play. He scatters the seed. Eventually, he gathers the harvest.

But he doesn't create the life taking place beneath the surface.

There's a distinction here worth considering.

We have responsibilities in our relationship with God. We are invited to pray, repent, forgive, love our neighbors, participate in Christian community, and respond to the work of the Holy Spirit.

But we cannot manufacture spiritual transformation simply by exerting enough effort.

God is the source of that transformation.

This doesn't eliminate our participation. It changes how we understand it.

We can participate faithfully without believing that we control the pace or outcome of our growth.

And perhaps that is one of the more difficult aspects of discipleship: learning to remain faithful when we cannot clearly see what God is doing.

When we confuse spiritual intensity with maturity

I wonder how often we mistake a meaningful spiritual experience for the normal measure of spiritual growth.

We remember the moments when God seemed especially near.

A retreat. A prayer gathering. A conversation. A sermon that confronted something we had been avoiding. A season when Scripture seemed to come alive.

Those experiences can be genuine gifts.

But problems arise when we begin measuring every other season against them.

We want to feel again what we felt then.

We return to the same practices, recreate the same environment, or search for another experience that will reassure us God is still working.

And when nothing comparable happens, ordinary faithfulness begins to feel inadequate.

Yet Scripture gives us a much more complicated picture.

The psalmists prayed through seasons of deep anguish and apparent silence.

The disciples followed Jesus through repeated misunderstanding, confusion, and unmet expectations.

Even after encountering the risen Christ, they still had to learn what faithfulness looked like in the ordinary demands of life.

The Christian life has room for extraordinary moments.

But it cannot depend upon them.

Some of the deepest work of God may take place in seasons that feel anything but extraordinary.

And sometimes what needs to change isn't simply our circumstances or emotions, but our understanding of what maturity looks like.

The person we imagined becoming

I think we all carry an image of the person we hope to become.

Someone who responds patiently rather than reacting defensively.

Someone who trusts God rather than immediately giving in to fear.

Someone who loves others without constantly needing something in return.

Someone whose relationship with Jesus shapes the way they live.

These are good desires.

But there is a danger in becoming so preoccupied with that future version of ourselves that we neglect the person standing before God today.

We can spend so much time disappointed with where we are that we become inattentive to what God might be inviting us into right now.

Paul offers an important perspective in Philippians 3:12–14.

He acknowledges that he hasn't already obtained what he is pursuing. He has not arrived at the fullness of maturity.

But his response is not resignation.

He continues pressing toward Christ.

There is both humility and hope in Paul's words.

He doesn't pretend to have become everything he's called to be.

Neither does he allow the distance between his present reality and his calling to become an excuse for abandoning the journey.

That seems important.

Spiritual maturity doesn't require us to deny our struggles or pretend we've arrived somewhere we haven't.

But neither does it require us to live under the constant weight of disappointment with ourselves.

We can acknowledge the distance and continue following Jesus.

Remaining instead of performing

In John 15, Jesus tells his disciples that he is the vine and they are the branches.

The invitation he gives them is to remain in him.

Not to manufacture fruit.

Not to become consumed with measuring their own progress.

To remain.

Remaining isn't passive. It involves trust, obedience, dependence, and the willingness to be shaped by Jesus' words and ways.

But the image is relational before it is productive.

The branch bears fruit because it remains connected to the vine.

I wonder whether some of us have become so concerned about demonstrating spiritual progress that we've neglected the relationship from which that progress grows.

We become preoccupied with whether prayer is working instead of learning to be honest with God in prayer.

We evaluate Scripture by whether it gives us something immediately useful rather than allowing it to challenge and reshape our understanding.

We assess Christian community by whether it meets our needs while overlooking the ways God might be teaching us to love people who require patience, forgiveness, and sacrifice.

Perhaps growth doesn't always arrive as a profound spiritual experience.

Sometimes it looks like recognizing an old pattern before it takes hold.

Sometimes it's apologizing without needing to defend ourselves.

Sometimes it's remaining present in a difficult conversation instead of withdrawing.

Sometimes it's acknowledging that we're exhausted, disappointed, or struggling to trust God.

These moments may not seem especially remarkable.

But they can reveal something important about who we are becoming.

We are being formed, whether we're paying attention or not

Spiritual formation isn't confined to what we typically call spiritual activities.

Our lives are shaping us all the time.

The conversations we replay in our minds. The voices we allow to influence us. The way we respond when we're interrupted. What we do with disappointment. How we handle success. Where we turn when we're anxious. How we speak about people who aren't in the room.

All of these things shape the kind of people we become.

Paul writes in Romans 12:2 about being transformed through the renewal of our minds.

In Ephesians 4, he describes Christian maturity in remarkably practical terms: speaking truthfully, putting away destructive patterns, practicing kindness, forgiving one another, and growing toward Christ.

This vision of transformation extends far beyond whether we've maintained a consistent devotional routine.

It reaches into our marriages, families, workplaces, friendships, churches, and private thoughts.

The question isn't simply whether we're having meaningful spiritual experiences.

It's what kind of people our everyday lives are forming us to become.

And whether we're allowing the way of Jesus to challenge the other influences competing to shape us.

Learning to live in the tension

I don't want to suggest that every difficult season is evidence that something wonderful is happening beneath the surface.

Sometimes we're exhausted and need rest.

Sometimes our circumstances need to change.

Sometimes we need to confess sin, seek counsel, address our health, or ask someone to help us carry what has become too heavy.

And sometimes we simply don't know what God is doing.

Christian hope doesn't require us to pretend otherwise.

But I do think we need to recover the possibility that spiritual growth may be taking place without our ability to measure it.

There will be stretches when faithfulness feels repetitive.

When prayer seems ordinary.

When change seems painfully slow.

When we look at our lives and wonder why we aren't further along.

And perhaps one of the great invitations of discipleship is learning to remain with Jesus in that tension.

Not denying where we are.

Not pretending we're further along than we are.

Not giving up because the journey looks different from what we imagined.

But learning to respond faithfully to God in the circumstances of our actual lives.

A different question

Maybe we've been asking the wrong question.

Instead of constantly asking, Why am I not further along?, what would happen if we began asking:

Where is God inviting me to respond faithfully today?

Not where I imagined I'd be five years ago.

Not where someone else appears to be.

Not where I think a mature Christian ought to have arrived by now.

Here.

In the actual circumstances of my life.

With the relationships, responsibilities, limitations, hopes, and questions I presently carry.

The tension between where we hoped to be and where we actually are doesn't necessarily mean we've failed.

It may simply mean we're still becoming.

And becoming more like Jesus is not something we accomplish through a series of impressive spiritual experiences or enough personal determination.

It is the ongoing work of God's grace, inviting our faithful response.

The goal of the Christian life isn't simply to become a better version of ourselves.

It is to become more like Christ.

So perhaps today we can tell the truth about where we are, release some of the expectations we've carried, and take the next faithful step.

Not because we've arrived.

But because Jesus is still inviting us to follow him.

For reflection: Where does the distance between who you hoped to become and who you are today feel most pronounced? What might it look like to meet God honestly in that space?

More reflections on Scripture, spiritual formation, and life with God at jessereed.org