Patience is an area most of us need to grow in. And this is especially true when it comes to evaluating our growth and journey toward maturity. It’s easy to beat ourselves up when we’re not as far along or moving as quickly as we would like. But remembering the slow steady growth of trees, and even babies, helps us to extend this same grace to ourselves.
To be sure, an acorn doesn’t become a mighty oak tree overnight, though at times it seems this way. We blink and we’re surprised by how much it has grown. But this surprise speaks to our awareness and not the speed of growth itself. Growth takes place over years, and often outside of our immediate awareness. It’s for these same reasons others can notice how much our kids have grown when we can miss it; we’re too close to notice their subtle changes.
But, even when we’re looking for it, we allow a lot of grace and understanding in our kids’ journey of development. We don’t scorn them for not mastering walking on their first attempt. Instead, we readily expect them to continue crawling a bit even after they’ve taken their first few steps. We understand this is something they are growing into and we can extend grace to them accordingly.
It’s with this same perspective we should evaluate our own journey of growth. Certainly, it’s good to recognize where we miss the mark and clearly express our desire to do better. But we do this while also recognizing growth takes place over time and is not accomplished overnight. While remaining faithful in making better choices everyday, it’s usually best to measure our growth over a decade rather than a day.
If we’re a better man than we were 10 years ago, then let’s carry on.
Growth takes time, and a long view allows us to more accurately discern whether we’re making steady progress toward the man God has called us to become—even if we still stumble or occasionally find ourselves crawling. With perspective, we can see whether we’re truly walking forward or if we’ve grown stuck and too comfortable in patterns we were meant to outgrow.
In the end, growth takes time—and most days, it unfolds quietly, beneath the surface. Trust the process, even when progress feels slow or uneven.
