After the Apostle Paul holds Epaphras up as an effective teacher of the Colossians – evidenced by the fact that the gospel was bearing fruit in their lives and increasing – Paul goes on to connect spiritual education directly to life growth two more times in the first chapter of his letter.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
First in verses 9 and 10:<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n
9 And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge <\/b>of his will in all spiritual wisdom <\/b>and understanding<\/b>, 10 so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him: bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God <\/b>…<\/p>\n\n\n
And then later in verses 28 and 29:<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n
28 [Christ] we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching <\/b>everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. 29 For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.<\/p>\n\n\n
The first instance highlights the believers’ obligation to learn on their own, presumably with the aid of the Holy Spirit. Paul says he prays they will be filled with knowledge of God’s will “in all spiritual wisdom and understanding”.<\/p>\n\n\n
The result will be believers walking in a manner worthy of the Lord, defined as “bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God”.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
It’s notable that Paul maintains that as the Colossians walk in the knowledge they have already received, they will receive more <\/b><\/i>knowledge.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
The second instance highlights Paul’s prerogative as a teacher to warn and teach “everyone”, again with the goal of maturity in Christ.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
Whether learning occurs independently or under a teacher, the predictable result is spiritual growth, fruit, and maturity.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n
If this can be reverse engineered, then we can say stagnation, lack of fruit, and immaturity – either on the individual or congregational level – is evidence of a lack of learning, both independently and under another’s teaching.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
After the Apostle Paul holds Epaphras up as an effective teacher of the Colossians – evidenced by the fact that the gospel was bearing fruit in their lives and increasing – Paul goes on to connect spiritual education directly to life growth two more times in the first chapter of his letter.\u00a0 First in verses […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,11,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-knowledge-of-god","category-learning","category-teaching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2525"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2525\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2526,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2525\/revisions\/2526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}