Holy Spirit grant us your grace that like a grapevine we may continually be pruned and grow through the experience of life and God's continuing presence in all things, the joys and the struggles, that leave us changed and renewed.
As we move through life most people encounter times which may be termed as faith crises. These often surround significant life changing events but also can come on slowly; grown over many years. In these moments our faith may experience one of three things fixation, transition or termination. Of the three, transition is the necessary element for maturation of faith.
Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” Paul is speaking of the process of faith maturation. Harry Wendt observes that one of the problems in the church today is that we teach kids like adults and adults like kids. His implication is that we overload kids with material they are not developmentally ready for and we dumb down classes for adults preventing their development to mature faith.
The journey of faith from childhood to maturity is a complicated one. It moves through a variety of stages that parallel and are related to human development. James Fowler is the most notable name of the last twenty years in the area of faith development. He related faith development to the cognitive and moral developmental models of Piaget, Kohlberg and Erikson. He believed these stages extended long into life and that not all were completed by all people. These stages did impact, however, on how people dealt with life crises of faith and the transition from one stage of faith development to another was important in resolving these crises.
One’s faith is a deeply personal experience by definition. It is “one’s” faith. It grows and matures in a world, however, where it is surrounded by an uncountable number of faiths. These different faiths are not necessarily different religions, but other the personal faith expressions of family members, teachers, friends, pastors, and more. Each person’s particular faith shaped by their life’s experience and their ability to process the experience of spirituality and the mystery of the divine.
Early in life this faith develops through the stories of the faith filled with fanciful possibilities. A child is no more able to separate the stories of fairy tales from the stories of the Bible than they are from real life. Reality is no more concrete and fixed than are such stories of Santa Claus and the tooth fairy. The child’s ability to incorporate the experience of faith is connected to their experiences of love and nurture. In time this emotional development of faith gives way to appropriating faith through the thoughts and faith expressions of siblings, parents and grandparents and the language of faith used by these important figures in their life.
In pre-adolescence the first of the major transitions in faith occurs with the onset of Fowler’s Stage Three where personal faith really begins to emerge with the development of cognitive abilities. A child begins evaluating and testing ideas and begins to appropriate faith for him or herself rather than as an aspect of family practice. At this stage judgment is often made about the faith of others, weighing and evaluating them, but since personal faith is not yet fully formed little energy can be directed to reflecting on one’s own faith. Faith tends to be very ideological at this time. “It’s” what I believe. Such faith struggles to accept that others might, faithfully, believe otherwise. 25% of adults become fixated here.
What pushes us out of this cocoon of early personal faith and into the next stage of faith development is encounter with dramatic life experiences which directly conflict with the one’s presuppositions about God and how faith works. Leaving home or loss of significant persons in one’s life often promote this turn inwards towards evaluating the effectiveness of one’s faith. Fowler calls this stage Individuative-Reflective faith. It shifts emphasis to an attitude of, “Its what “I” believe”because it treats all beliefs as equal for individuals. It demythologizes religion and its stories: treating everything as symbol. Ritual becomes important for how it organizes life not because any real power lies in it. Fowler found 60% of adults functioning through this faith experience and expression.
Development beyond this stage usually depends on the experience of tragedy or personal defeat. Fowler calls this fifth stage Conjunctive faith because it "implies a rejoining or a union of that which previously has been separated." "Unusual before mid-life, Stage 5 knows the sacrament of defeat and the reality of irrevocable commitments and acts. … Alive to paradox and the truth in apparent contradictions, this stage strives to unify opposites in mind and experience. It generates and maintains vulnerability to the strange truths of those who are 'other.’” It accepts seemingly incompatible concepts like “God who is just and merciful” as part of the mystery of God without internal compulsion to rationalize or explain as them as disrupting to faith. It is an experience expressed by Paul in Romans chapter 5, “Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” This stage often does not begin until a person is middle-aged.
Maturing in faith is a strange and unsettling process that moves forward in starts and fits. It sometimes is aided by a crisis that is resolved well and sometimes stunted or fixed when issues of conflict are not resolved or are handled immaturely.
How does a congregation help to support this path to mature and healthy faith? We do it being constant and faithful servants of God lifting before ourselves and our brothers and sisters a variety of the images of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We do it by creating opportunities for Bible Study where young members and old can hear other people’s faith stories and how they meet life’s challenges through their faith. We do it by speaking about God in our homes and having conversations about why we as a family do some things and not others. We do it by learning to, and teaching our children to value the insights and wisdom of others but being willing to remain faithful to our personal experience of God. We do it by being open to discovering new wisdom from God and his Word as our lives are changed by experiences good and bad, joyful and sorrowful; and above all things with hope in Jesus Christ.
God may be the same yesterday, today and tomorrow but our experience of him and his world is not. When we are children we have a faith that is sufficient for how we know the world, but as we move into and through adulthood we must have a faith that matures with us. If we resist moving forward to new ways of seeing and knowing God we resist the very way God has created us and we will not be prepared for the challenges of life which require a new faith. We are to be like grape vines bringing forth new fruit knowing that when we stop growing we become brittle and break. “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I put childish ways behind me.”
As we move through life most people encounter times which may be termed as faith crises. These often surround significant life changing events but also can come on slowly; grown over many years. In these moments our faith may experience one of three things fixation, transition or termination. Of the three, transition is the necessary element for maturation of faith.
Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” Paul is speaking of the process of faith maturation. Harry Wendt observes that one of the problems in the church today is that we teach kids like adults and adults like kids. His implication is that we overload kids with material they are not developmentally ready for and we dumb down classes for adults preventing their development to mature faith.
The journey of faith from childhood to maturity is a complicated one. It moves through a variety of stages that parallel and are related to human development. James Fowler is the most notable name of the last twenty years in the area of faith development. He related faith development to the cognitive and moral developmental models of Piaget, Kohlberg and Erikson. He believed these stages extended long into life and that not all were completed by all people. These stages did impact, however, on how people dealt with life crises of faith and the transition from one stage of faith development to another was important in resolving these crises.
One’s faith is a deeply personal experience by definition. It is “one’s” faith. It grows and matures in a world, however, where it is surrounded by an uncountable number of faiths. These different faiths are not necessarily different religions, but other the personal faith expressions of family members, teachers, friends, pastors, and more. Each person’s particular faith shaped by their life’s experience and their ability to process the experience of spirituality and the mystery of the divine.
Early in life this faith develops through the stories of the faith filled with fanciful possibilities. A child is no more able to separate the stories of fairy tales from the stories of the Bible than they are from real life. Reality is no more concrete and fixed than are such stories of Santa Claus and the tooth fairy. The child’s ability to incorporate the experience of faith is connected to their experiences of love and nurture. In time this emotional development of faith gives way to appropriating faith through the thoughts and faith expressions of siblings, parents and grandparents and the language of faith used by these important figures in their life.
In pre-adolescence the first of the major transitions in faith occurs with the onset of Fowler’s Stage Three where personal faith really begins to emerge with the development of cognitive abilities. A child begins evaluating and testing ideas and begins to appropriate faith for him or herself rather than as an aspect of family practice. At this stage judgment is often made about the faith of others, weighing and evaluating them, but since personal faith is not yet fully formed little energy can be directed to reflecting on one’s own faith. Faith tends to be very ideological at this time. “It’s” what I believe. Such faith struggles to accept that others might, faithfully, believe otherwise. 25% of adults become fixated here.
What pushes us out of this cocoon of early personal faith and into the next stage of faith development is encounter with dramatic life experiences which directly conflict with the one’s presuppositions about God and how faith works. Leaving home or loss of significant persons in one’s life often promote this turn inwards towards evaluating the effectiveness of one’s faith. Fowler calls this stage Individuative-Reflective faith. It shifts emphasis to an attitude of, “Its what “I” believe”because it treats all beliefs as equal for individuals. It demythologizes religion and its stories: treating everything as symbol. Ritual becomes important for how it organizes life not because any real power lies in it. Fowler found 60% of adults functioning through this faith experience and expression.
Development beyond this stage usually depends on the experience of tragedy or personal defeat. Fowler calls this fifth stage Conjunctive faith because it "implies a rejoining or a union of that which previously has been separated." "Unusual before mid-life, Stage 5 knows the sacrament of defeat and the reality of irrevocable commitments and acts. … Alive to paradox and the truth in apparent contradictions, this stage strives to unify opposites in mind and experience. It generates and maintains vulnerability to the strange truths of those who are 'other.’” It accepts seemingly incompatible concepts like “God who is just and merciful” as part of the mystery of God without internal compulsion to rationalize or explain as them as disrupting to faith. It is an experience expressed by Paul in Romans chapter 5, “Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.” This stage often does not begin until a person is middle-aged.
Maturing in faith is a strange and unsettling process that moves forward in starts and fits. It sometimes is aided by a crisis that is resolved well and sometimes stunted or fixed when issues of conflict are not resolved or are handled immaturely.
How does a congregation help to support this path to mature and healthy faith? We do it being constant and faithful servants of God lifting before ourselves and our brothers and sisters a variety of the images of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We do it by creating opportunities for Bible Study where young members and old can hear other people’s faith stories and how they meet life’s challenges through their faith. We do it by speaking about God in our homes and having conversations about why we as a family do some things and not others. We do it by learning to, and teaching our children to value the insights and wisdom of others but being willing to remain faithful to our personal experience of God. We do it by being open to discovering new wisdom from God and his Word as our lives are changed by experiences good and bad, joyful and sorrowful; and above all things with hope in Jesus Christ.
God may be the same yesterday, today and tomorrow but our experience of him and his world is not. When we are children we have a faith that is sufficient for how we know the world, but as we move into and through adulthood we must have a faith that matures with us. If we resist moving forward to new ways of seeing and knowing God we resist the very way God has created us and we will not be prepared for the challenges of life which require a new faith. We are to be like grape vines bringing forth new fruit knowing that when we stop growing we become brittle and break. “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became an adult, I put childish ways behind me.”
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