Recently I listened to the Stages of Faith presentation again but this time with my wife and daughters and it was a wonderful experience. I wanted my wife and kids to hear these ideas to see how we can help add to their faith and help prepare them better. A comment from Zen at JRGanymede said:
“Don’t teach so clearly they can understand.
Teach so clearly they can’t misunderstand.”
I cannot recommend this presentation enough so if you haven’t listened to it yet, set aside some time and enjoy it by clicking here.
I think that the material covered there can have an incredible impact on people who are struggling or even younger people who may not understand trials or the dark night of the soul when it inevitably envelops them.
I was pleased to see the volume of notes that everyone was talking and I took some myself that I wanted to share here.
- “Spiritual growth is linked to the coming of Christ.”
- When we lose our openness to doing God’s will, we can get stuck in any stage of faith.
- We can have a positive view of God and yet not want to change our lives.
- Churches that have a lot of stuck stage 2 people are not growing.
- [Salvation] is not going to happen because of anything we do, but if we do nothing, it’s not going to happen either.
- God uses the dark night of the soul to drain the selfishness from us.
- There’s a good doubt and a bad doubt. There’s a doubt that leads to more doubt, and ad doubt that leads to faith.
- “We should never cling to a stage and refuse to go on.”
- Don’t give a lot of advice at Stage 4, just be with them and listen.
- Stage 4 wants to go deep, they want to be alone.
- Men are more comfortable in Stage 3 and women in Stage 4.
- Stage 5 people are not stressed.
- As you mature, the mentors get fewer, but the opportunities to mentor increase.
- We will appreciate different parts of the scriptures depending on the stage we are in.
