Strengthening Your Core, Part Two: Study, Connect, Serve, and Share
A stronger faith should help someone besides you. Receive God's word carefully, welcome faithful counsel, and use what you learn to serve and teach.
#349 — Strengthening Your Core (Pt. 2)
Nov 18, 2024
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Let growth reach other people
What good is stronger faith if it never reaches the way we treat people? Learning about God ought to help us listen, serve, and speak more faithfully. Study and prayer matter deeply, but their fruit includes a life that becomes more useful to others. Spiritual growth has a direction beyond becoming more impressed with our own knowledge.
An athletic training outline from the Fellowship of Christian Athletes offers a useful starting picture. We can consider its suggestions while testing every teaching by Scripture. Here the concern is how study, relationships, service, and sharing help us follow Christ. Use the outline only as far as it helps you receive and obey God's word. A useful suggestion must remain open to correction from the passage itself.
Let God's word direct you
Calling Scripture a playbook reminds us that we need direction beyond ourselves. But the Bible gives us far more: it reveals God, his saving work, and the life he wants for us. Yet the illustration highlights something important: we can't claim devotion to the Lord while remaining uninterested in the teaching He has given.
Second Timothy 3:14–17 describes Scripture making us wise for salvation through faith in Christ and equipping us through teaching and correction. Open it expecting to receive help, including help that changes your mind. Some passages will encourage what you already practice; others will expose an error or a neglected responsibility. The same word that comforts also corrects. A faithful student makes room for both, allowing confidence in God to grow alongside clearer obedience.
Read to understand and respond
Bible reading doesn't need to become a race. Slow down long enough to see who's speaking and what question the passage is addressing. Ask what it reveals about God and what response it calls for from the people involved. Then consider how its teaching applies to your own life without treating every historical instruction as a command given directly to you.
James 1:22–25 warns us about hearing without doing. Let something you have understood change a conversation, a choice, or a responsibility today. You might need to correct the way you speak, keep a promise, or seek reconciliation where it's appropriate. Record a question you can't yet answer and study it further. If you plan to teach the passage, be especially careful to distinguish its actual meaning from an illustration you find helpful. Sharing makes understanding important, but it doesn't require pretending that you know more than you do. After a study, try writing the passage's main point in a few sentences without looking at your notes. Then return to the text and check whether your explanation fits. This can reveal what you understood and what you merely recognized while reading. It also prepares you to answer a question without depending on a remembered phrase you can't explain.
Find faithful companionship
Belonging to Christ's body should also lead to personal relationships within it. We need more than a familiar room full of people whose burdens we never know. A believer may regularly assemble with Christians and still lack a trusted person with whom he discusses a struggle or an important decision. Specific friendship can provide encouragement that's difficult to receive from a passing greeting alone.
Ecclesiastes 4:9–12 shows the good of having someone beside us when we fall. Seek a friend whose encouragement helps you listen to God and do what's right. Look for someone who can listen honestly, encourage obedience, and speak clearly when your judgment needs attention. Be willing to offer the same care in return. Appropriate privacy and boundaries still matter; accountability doesn't mean surrendering every personal detail to another person's control. A good friendship helps each person remain responsible before God while making the burden of faithful living less isolated.
Receive help and pass it on
It's helpful to have a companion beside you, someone wiser to learn from, and someone you can encourage. Those aren't required titles; they're ordinary ways of giving and receiving care. Their value is that they remind us to receive and give. We need not choose between always being the learner and always being the person who knows the answer.
Proverbs 13:20 tells us that walking with the wise helps us grow wise. Look for counsel supported by Scripture and made credible by a faithful life. Age can bring useful experience, but advice still deserves examination by God's word. At the same time, consider a younger or less experienced believer whom you can encourage. You don't need to be flawless before sharing an accurate lesson or offering reliable help. Be honest about your limits, and let the relationship direct attention toward Christ rather than create dependence on you.
Serve a need you can meet
In 1 Corinthians 12:12–27, different members belong to the same body and need each other. No member gets to decide that another is unnecessary. Its setting includes the Corinthian discussion of spiritual gifts, but the concern for shared life and mutual care remains clear. Different contributions can serve the same body.
Start with a need you understand and help you can responsibly give. A ride, a patient conversation, or practical assistance may serve someone in a way they deeply appreciate. First Peter 4:10–11 calls believers to serve with the gifts they have received so that God is glorified through Jesus Christ. Such service should fit the role and authority Scripture provides. You don't need a public position before showing care, and you shouldn't invent a new requirement for the congregation because an individual act of help seems useful. If the need is beyond your skill, help locate someone better equipped rather than taking on a role you can't carry responsibly. Knowing a limit can itself serve the person well, especially when health, safety, or a serious personal difficulty requires qualified assistance. Before offering help, ask what would actually be useful. A person may already have several offers of the same thing while a less visible duty goes unmet. Be clear about the part you can do and when you can do it. Dependable help honors the person more than an impressive offer that leaves them unsure whether to rely on you.
Learn with someone else in mind
Second Timothy 2:1–2 connects strength in Christ's grace with passing faithful teaching to others. We learn so that the truth can keep reaching people. As a young listener, I began to pay better attention when I realized I was learning something I could someday teach. Preparing to help another person made careful listening matter more.
As you study, ask whether you could explain the point and show where the passage teaches it. Think about what someone else might need to understand. Don't add confidence where your understanding is uncertain; say that you need to investigate and then follow through. Colossians 3:16 connects the word of Christ with teaching and admonishing one another. A brief, accurate conversation can serve that work. Formal lessons are valuable where appropriate, but daily opportunities to speak truthfully about Christ also deserve preparation.
Connect today's study with today's care
Choose a step that joins learning with care for someone. Perhaps a question needs study, a burden needs help, or a decision needs wise counsel. Begin with the need before you instead of trying to do everything at once.
These practices won't make every effort turn out as we wish. They will help us give our effort a purpose shaped by the Lord's word. Continue praying for understanding and opportunity, examining what you believe, and serving within your responsibilities. The goal isn't merely to become stronger in a way you can measure privately. It's to know the Lord more faithfully and become better equipped to encourage, help, and teach the people whose lives touch yours.
Take the idea with you.
- 01Who helps me listen to God's word more honestly?
- 02How could something I've learned become help for another person?
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