Growth = Change

"So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you." Romans 12:1-2 The Message (www.biblegateway.com)

"Be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Romans 12:2 NIV

We would all agree that growing is a good thing and that we all need it. The one problem that most people face with growing is that it equates change. Change is a difficult thing for us to do, because whether we like it or not there has been a way we've been doing stuff and it became routine for us, it is comfortable. We really like to be comfortable. But the truth is without change, growth can't happen.

As a culture or maybe just human nature, we think change is a good thing as long as it doesn't effect us, then we revolt against it. "Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself" Leo Tolstoy. Gypsy Smith said, "Go home. Take a piece of chalk. Draw a circle around yourself. Then pray "O Lord, revive (change) everything inside this circle." While that last quote deals with revival, someone was looking for answer to how to do something and when we look for answers we want the other party to change, not ourselves. The ironic thing with change is it is inevitable. We will have to go through changes. But on the other hand growth is optional. You can choose to embrace or reject growth. John C. Maxwell says, "people who refuse to grow will never reach their full potential."

Making the change from being an occasional learner to someone dedicated to personal growth is tough. It goes against the grain the way most people live. Most students upon graduation think, "Thank goodness that's over. I'm done with studying.: But that kind of thinking doesn't take us any higher than average. And my father's voice still echoes in my head, "Lad, anyone can be average." He would say that to me all the time when I was in school. In essence, as long as you are you are going to class and handing stuff in you can get a "C" or maybe a "B", but if you apply yourself you can achieve greatness or in school an "A+". God doesn't call us to be average but extraordinary. And that requires us to change and grow.

One last quote to wrap this up. A quote that a mentor of mine from college would always remind me, "Leaders are learners. Once you stop learning, you stop leading." We need to keep learning and changing, and growing.

**some parts extracted from Your Road Map to Success by John C. Maxwell