Speeding up Maturity
For the longest time I was convinced that the growth process we call maturity had it's own speed for each person that could not be changed. Maturity happens physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. The combination of all these aspects is the maturity I'm speaking of, and they used to be on similar timetables.
Examples from people joining the armed services and "growing up", to couples having their first child and dramatically changing were all around me during my formative years. It is said that the hormones and chemicals in our food today is causing more rapid physical maturity, which is quite possible. Or it could be the widespread knowledge of nutritional advances, especially in the early years of growth. It is said that the amount of information made available in the last decade is more than many centuries combined in the past. The mental capacity to process information is not necessarily maturity but it is a higher requirement at an earlier age than ever before. Emotional and spiritual maturity has not been able to keep up with the speed of physical and mental, resulting in many of society's woes. The emotional maturity "catch-up" is what's noticed in the aforementioned armed service and parenting examples. Spiritual maturity has been relegated by society as an option, or perhaps no longer necessary.
There are those that work to slow down the ever increasing speed of physical and mental growth in our youth. There are those that work to pick up the pieces of broken lives in youth that couldn't emotionally and spiritually handle what they physically and mentally could do. There are those that preach against the activities that cause the broken lives, hoping that the increased mental capacity will bring self-control to damaging activities. All of these pursuits are noble, many are needed, but in my opinion they will ultimately fail.
The reason I believe they will fail is that they don't recognize the holistic aspect of humans. Unlike animals, we have souls so the spiritual dimension sets us apart. Spiritual maturity is the key to balancing the other areas of maturity. It is also a key component of emotional maturity. I now believe it can allow overall maturity to speed up. So, the question becomes, how is spiritual maturity obtained? Unlike physical maturity it, it isn't automatic. Unlike mental maturity, it isn't the capacity to process ever increasing amounts of information. Unlike emotional maturity, it isn't gaining control of the feelings that rage in us. Spiritual maturity is the process of changing our focus from ourselves to God, and in that process to others.
A person of any age that can be described as spiritually mature, will therefore be more emotionally mature, will be more mentally mature and in many ways more physically mature. To speed up maturity, take the focus of the moment off yourself. To speed up maturity move the focus of each moment to your creator and his purposes. To speed up maturity move the focus of the moment to those around you (part of God's purposes). The key to this is so simple many people miss it entirely. The Bible says the key is to ask (which puts the focus on God). It does not say the key is to try (which puts the focus on self) harder.
It is crucial that the youth of today capture this vision earlier in life, as the physical and mental changes in their life happen earlier in their chronological progression. This truth must be added to the work that care for the youth of our society. In a day of self-help books, Rick Warren had this message in his best seller The Purpose Driven Life. However, for many centuries it was available in the best seller of all time, THE BIBLE. Availability is not all that ot takes, however. Asking seems so simple. Check this blog's entry for May.
