My wife recently sent me this picture of my oldest son. The string represents his height at the beginning of the school year. Needless to say, he has grown three and half inches in nine months!

I sat there, studying the picture, blown away at what had happened. Wow, he is growing up so fast, and I’ve even begun to notice some of his emotional characteristics changing.  Still, I look at that picture and what really struck me was how much I didn’t notice.

I knew that he had gotten taller, but I lost the magnitude of the growth!

It was a stark reminder for me: Am I paying attention to the change that is happening around me?

Every day things change. We change, the people around us change, and, if we aren’t paying attention, the change will happen and we won’t be able to deal with the new reality. In my experience, most of us are opposed to (or at the very least scared of) the possibility of change.

I think Connor represents the truth about change: Healthy things grow.

If we try to stop his growth, it will hurt both him and us in the process. “Healthy things grow” is a reminder that whether it be a relationship, the church, or your kids – all of us were made to grow.

And here is the flip-side to that: If you aren’t growing, are you really healthy?

Are you growing personally? Professionally? Organizationally?

Karen did something that all of us are called to do on a regular basis: We are called to stop and measure growth. We are called to stop and assess where we are and where we’ve been. Having the courage to hold the string up to the reality is the key to knowing if you’re growing, or just maintaining a broken system.