Falling dominoes theory of spiritual growth

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1still_waters

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I often hear Christians talk about spiritual growth and spiritual fruit development as if it's a synchronized mathematical equation.

It goes something like this.

If you do A, then B will follow, as will C and D and E and F, and so on.

For example they may say something like...

If you learn to only think on the good, then you won't have a negative thought about such and such. Then as a result of that, love will just overflow in to every area of your life. (Thinking on the good isn't the main idea I'm trying to get at. I'm using it as an example to explain my overall point. So don't get hung up on the thinking positive aspect of this post. It's not about that.)

So it ends up making spiritual growth and development look like a line of dominoes, where if you push down the first domino, then all the others will follow.

I don't know about you, but things don't work that way for me.

I don't experience this seamless overflow in one area of my development, just because I've addressed another area.

Have any of you studied any of the Eastern religions that make use of charts/wheels, where everything falls in to place if one aspect of life is addressed properly? I feel like Christians may have become influenced by such concepts of spiritual growth and fruit development.

For me, spiritual growth and development isn't like a row of dominoes placed closely together, where they all fall due to one push. Rather spiritual growth and development seems like dominoes placed far apart. We have to address each one individually. One topple doesn't mean they all topple.
 
Funny, it's almost like I'm simultaneously agreeing and disagreeing. There have been parts of my life that were like dominoes, and some that certainly were not.

I guess every person and situation and hang-up is different. <----- But how obvious is that, lol. :rolleyes:
 
Spiritual growth has never come from some magic formula or game for me. It has come from spending time with Him in prayer, music, thought, and the study of His Word. It has also come from life experience (the valleys, the mountaintops, the rivers, facing the giants of life) that has shown me that He had me in the palm of His hand even when it didn't FEEL like it or LOOK like it, and it has shown me, without question, that He is using every single bit of it for either my good or someone else's.
 
Just to troll you. :)

3 Not only so, but we[a] also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God&#8217;s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
 
Stuey said:
Just to troll you. :)

3 Not only so, but we[a] also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; 4 perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 And hope does not put us to shame, because God&#8217;s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. One thing does PRODUCE another. There is a tiny start, ending in something fully produced.

That is more complicated than one domino falling on another and everything just sorta falling in to line seamlessly and effortlessly.

:P
 
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