From Baby to Father in the Faith

I have been thinking about stages lately.

The Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard believed that a human life moves through three distinct stages from a life driven by immediate experience, to a life shaped by duty and moral commitment, and finally to the highest stage: a life surrendered entirely to God, lived by faith. What struck him was that these were not just phases you passed through. They required a decision. You had to choose to grow.

The Apostle John had his own version of this, written nearly eighteen centuries earlier. In his first letter, he addresses three groups by name: little children, young men, and fathers. Three stages. Three ways of being in the faith.

The little children know their sins are forgiven and they know the Father. It is the beautiful, uncomplicated faith of a new beginning you have tasted grace and everything has shifted. You are being fed, learning to walk, finding your footing. There is nothing wrong with this stage. Every great story starts here.

The young men are strong. The word of God lives in them and they have overcome the enemy. These are the defenders believers who have moved from simply receiving the faith to contending for it. They know what is at stake. They have wrestled and come out standing.

And then the fathers. John describes them simply: they know Him who is from the beginning. Not a list of battles. Not a résumé of achievements. Just depth. Just intimacy. The fathers carry something transferable they have walked long enough with God to now walk alongside others, passing on what they know, what held them, what changed them.

Last week at the Ministers’ Conference for Covenant Nation Church, Pastor Emmanuel Iren ministered on something I have not been able to shake. He pointed to the timeline of Jesus’ earthly ministry three and a half years and asked us to see it not just as history but as a pattern. That was how long it took to bring twelve ordinary people from their first encounter with Jesus to the point where they could carry His mission into the world.

Three and a half years of intentional, close, relentless discipleship. Pastor David Ogubeli touched on the same thread that this is the model. Not a rigid contract, but a posture: that anyone being poured into, anyone taking their growth seriously, should expect real transformation within that kind of window.

It is in perfect alignment with what Christ demonstrated. He was not just preaching. He was making fathers.

This is what I keep coming back to: the will of God for every believer is maturity. Not survival. Not maintenance. Maturity. The whole structure of the church, as Paul lays it out in Ephesians, is oriented toward one end that we grow up into the fullness of Christ. That we become people who can carry the Great Commission with actual weight behind it.

And this does not stay in the church walls. The believer who understands this is a growing person in every direction in their work, their relationships, their thinking, their character. Growth is not a departmental thing. It is a posture toward life.

Kierkegaard was right that the move between stages is not automatic. It requires something of you. You have to be willing to leave behind the version of yourself that the previous stage produced. That is not always comfortable. But it is always the point.

From baby, to young man, to father. From being fed, to fighting, to giving away what you have gathered. This is the arc God designed for every one of us and the invitation is always open.

You do not have to stay where you are.