30 Days to Growing In Your Faith

27 Jul 30 Days to Growing In Your Faith

I’m diverting from our normal schedule to let you know about an important new resource that will soon be available.

I have just written a new book, 30 Days to Growing In Your Faith, that my publisher, Thomas Nelson, will be releasing on August 3, available through Amazon and other book retailers. Because you’re a reader of my blog, I wanted you to know about this important resource for encouraging spiritual growth.

Why I wrote 30 Days to Growing in Your Faith

I remember many years ago, late at night, sitting on a park bench under a soft street light at the Christian college I was attending, wondering why in the world the Christian life wasn’t working for me.

While I had grown up in a “moral” home, it wasn’t a “Christian” home, so I knew very little about living a truly Christian lifestyle. After I graduated from high school, I attended a state university where I supported myself by playing drums in a rock band. During this time, I had ample opportunity to develop attitudes, values and behavior that didn’t translate well into the Christian life. Then, I became a Christian the summer after my first year in university, transferred to a Christian college and jumped into the deep end of the Christian life.

Only problem was, I didn’t know how to swim. I didn’t know how to live the Christian life. Oh, I stopped doing all the bad stuff. I quit running around with bad people doing bad things. I instinctively knew that much. But inside, I was still selfish, needy, arrogant, angry, biblically ignorant and very confused.

I sat there on the park bench journaling in a notebook, chronicling my failures and wondering what was wrong with me.

Many decades later, I realize nothing was wrong with me. I was just going through perfectly predictable spiritual growth pains. The people who led me to Christ gave me a Bible and told me to read it every day, pray and go to church. Their advice was good, but it was like bringing a squirt gun to a forest fire. It wasn’t enough. I needed more. Much more.

Now, many years later, I am finally beginning to understand some of the things I didn’t understand back on that park bench.

As a result, I have written 30 Days to Growing in Your Faith. It is a companion volume to my previous book, 30 Days to Understanding the Bible. The book gets out to all four corners of the Christian life on a very basic level (what a Christian needs to know, be and do), but does so in a super-condensed format that enlightens but does not overwhelm.

If I could time-travel back some fifty years and talk to young Max on that park bench, I would tell him what is in this book. Then, I would tell him, “This book doesn’t contain the most you need to know. It contains the least. Reading this book will not be the end of your learning in the Christian life. It will be the beginning.

“After you read this, there will still be things you don’t know, things you won’t be, things you can’t do. But it will give you the foundation you need to guide and accelerate your spiritual development.”

I can’t help but wonder where my life would be today if I had known and understood all this back then. My desire in writing this book is to help as many other disciples of Christ avoid wandering in a spiritual wilderness for years on end, as I did.

This book will lay a foundation for a lifetime of future growth

One of my most influential seminary professors used to say, “Most true learning is self-generated. So, teach the basics and teach them well, and the students will be able to go on to a more complete understanding themselves.”

That was true with me. I believe it is true for others. So, I have lived the last number of decades with a passion to teach the basics with the hope and prayer that that foundation will enable a believer to build a more complete and robust Christian life.

Knowledge isn’t everything, but everything rests on knowledge. As I say in the book:

• You can’t believe something until you know it,
• you won’t live it until you believe it,
• and you won’t impact others (including your family and loved ones) until you live it!

So, as I said, knowledge isn’t everything.  There is more to the Christian life – much more – than just knowledge, but knowledge is the beginning, the starting point, the foundation. Jesus said, “You shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).

As you build a biblical knowledge base sufficient for life in the 21^st century, you will be able to nurture a robust spiritual life and surmount the danger of being swept out to sea by the riptide of modern culture.

This book will be helpful for newer believers, laying out a game plan that will guide and accelerate spiritual growth. But it will also be very valuable for a more established believers, answering lingering questions, filling in gaps, strengthening convictions and providing a ready game plan for helping others (family, friends, church members, students, etc).

Conclusion

I don’t know of another resource that will allow you to learn more, easier and faster than this volume. But don’t let the brevity and simplicity deceive you. There is depth in the book, also, which if embraced, will leapfrog a believer years down the road compared to not knowing this information. So, I hope you will get my book, read it, and lay a foundation for a lifetime of future learning.

Preorder your copy before August 3 and receive some special preorder bonuses at: https://www.thomasnelson.com/p/30days/

I’ll have a bit more to share about this with you next week before we return to our the final section in our “Renew Your Mind ~ Transform Your Life” series. See you then!

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