How To Know If You’re Spiritually Mature

Spiritual maturity is often misunderstood. How do you know if you’re becoming more like Jesus? 

Some think maturity means knowing more. Others think it means having increasingly longer quiet times, using the right vocabulary, or being able to debate the finer points of doctrine. Still others assume growth is measured by church attendance, ministry involvement, or how “blessed” their life appears. These are not bad things, but they are not the primary measures of spiritual maturity and growth in Scripture.  

Here’s a hard truth: you can know a lot, do a lot, look very spiritual, and still be immature. 

The church in Corinth is a good example. They had gifts, knowledge, and spiritual experiences, yet Paul rebuked them for spiritual infancy, jealousy, pride, and self-centeredness. They were immature. 

In contrast, true maturity looks like Jesus in Philippians chapter 2. 

Philippians 2:3–8 says, “Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”

Christian growth is becoming less focused on yourself and more focused on God and others in all things. It’s moving from “How am I doing?” to “How can I glorify God and serve others?” It’s moving from “Are my needs met?” to “How can I meet the needs of others, and especially, how can I help others follow Jesus?”

Paul roots his commands in the gospel itself. He unfolds the humility of Christ—how Jesus, though equal with God, “emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant” and “humbled himself …to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Philippians 2:6–8).

C. S. Lewis once wrote, “Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.” That is what Jesus did for our salvation. And that is maturity in Christ. 

In everyday life, this changes everything. Maturity looks like listening before speaking in a tense conversation. It looks like serving in unseen ways without recognition. It looks like forgiving when your pride wants to hold a grudge. It looks like asking, “Will this glorify God and build up others?” before making decisions about your actions, time, money, and words, even if they are things you are technically free to do in Christ. 

Real maturity is being increasingly God-centered and others-focused. It is forgetting self because you have everything you could want or need in Christ. Growing mature is only possible when you look to the Son of Man who “came not to be served but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). 

The more we behold Him in the Bible, the more the Spirit shows us all that we have in Him. The more we behold Him, the more the Spirit makes us like Him. This is how God justifies sinners and how He forms us back into His image.