Models for spiritual identity and growth from st Paul:

What is the apex of christian spirituality? What’s christianity’s Nirvana? A friend asked yesterday.

After some thought, I said, becoming a matured child caught up in the intimacy union between The Son and His Father. The metaphor Paul offered was a family metaphor. We are daddy’s kids. We incarnationally, but slowly, come to realize we are also God’s kids! Adored by a loving Father.

St Paul’s model was entering into the intimate Sonship of Jesus with His Loving daddy. Some people know this I am space as their home. Jesus was always praying and being in that beloved space of intimacy with his dad. That’s what we are invited to enter in true Christianity. That loving relational bond between them is our home.

We are growing up into The Son, who is the perfect child of the Father. So, it’s an adult child model we are looking at in Christian spirituality.

St Paul calls it being adopted into His Sonship. We enter into the intimacy between Son and Father. That’s our new home as we mature as children. Adult childhood is christianity’s nirvana. We enter His Sonship then grow up in it. That’s the metaphor given by St Paul for spiritual growth. We enter the Sonship relationship Jesus has with His dad. And we do so more and more deeply as we grow.

From slavery to the adoption as sons and daughters into heirship were St Paul’s metaphors for spiritual growth. Still feels true to me.