Reformed Covenanter
Cancelled Commissioner
We grow in grace: in graciousness, pleasantness and beauty. The Christian gets lovelier and lovelier. At least, that is the way it should be. Growth does not mean that the Christian becomes more and more austere in relation to others, more and more remote, more and more terrifying, more and more witch-doctor-like. He becomes lovelier and lovelier: gracious, pleasant, beautiful. He grows in knowledge. He grows in his abilitiy to resist temptation. He grows in ability to fit into the body, to be part of the Christian social organism (Ephesians 4:16). How dreadfully difficult that is! So many of us are tempted to conclude that we can only have freedom and only find spiritual space if we become individualists. But growth means being compacted, co-ordinated into the body, becoming more adapted, more adaptable, more useful to the body itself. We are not meant to function except as members of the body of Christ. We have no right to be growing away from the body of believers. We should be growing into it.
Donald Macleod, A faith to live by: understanding Christian doctrine (2nd edn, Fearn, 2002), p. 216.
Donald Macleod, A faith to live by: understanding Christian doctrine (2nd edn, Fearn, 2002), p. 216.
