Make Every Effort

For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.  For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.  But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.  -  2 Peter 1:5-9

The beginning of this chapter and book provide the background for the rest of the book.  Peter reminded us that God has given us everything we need for a godly life through his divine power.  Without an understanding of God’s power and its’ availability to us, this text would appear to be heresy.  However, Peter begins verse 5 with “For this very reason,” letting us know that it is because of what God has already done that we can and should follow his instruction in this passage.

Make Every Effort

Cultural Christianity today would suggest that mere faith is all that God wants for us.  However, Biblical Christianity includes teachings such as those found in James 2:18-19:

But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.”  Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.  You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.

This suggests that faith is just the beginning and that there will be natural outflows of true faith.  Peter tells us that because of the power that God has made available to us, we should make every effort!

Add to your Faith

While it is true that Peter suggest that we should make every effort, there are certainly efforts that are not as productive for our faith and our effectiveness.  I’ve seen many people work very hard as if the effort itself was an addition their faith, but they have not added the things that God has called us to add.  It is not just effort that God calls us to, but a sincere effort to grow in our faith.  Peter gives us a progressive list of qualities to add to our faith:  Goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, mutual affection, and love.

Increasing Measure

In case anybody has nailed this list and is confident of their goodness, knowledge, self-control, etc. Peter reminds us that God’s call is not to come to a finishing point in our Christian walk.  Rather, God calls us to possess these qualities “in increasing measure.”  No matter how much you have added to your faith, God is still calling you to grow.  You have not arrived.

So that…

The result of our growth in the faith is that we will not be ineffective or unproductive.  I’m probably not alone in the experience of getting to the end of a long day of hard work and realizing that I haven’t really accomplished anything…or I haven’t accomplished the right things so my list of things to do is just as long as it was when I started.  Peter calls us to focus our efforts on the right things so that we won’t have this kind of experience in our faith.

Nearsighted and Blind, Forgetting they have been cleansed…

The consequences of a life without spiritual growth and adding to our faith is ineffectiveness and unproductivity.  However, the reasons for this lack of Spiritual growth are blindness and forgetfulness.  Peter says that people that do not make every effort to grow and add to their faith are nearsighted.  We do not see what is coming and therefore are not preparing ourselves for the future.  My experience walking with the Lord tells me that I’m glad my faith has grown since I first came to know Him.  There is no way that the faith I had at first would have been enough to get me through the challenges of today.  Worse yet, Christians who do not add to their faith forget that they have been cleansed from past sins.  This means a faith that does not grow is an ungrateful faith that takes Christ’s work on the cross for granted.  Jesus told a parable of such ungratefulness in Matthew 18:21-35.  This ungratefulness and unwillingness to bring the same grace to others cost the servant his own forgiveness and he was turned over to the jailers until he could pay back all that he owed.

Looking Forward

Peter reminded us that God has given us everything we need for a godly life through his divine power and we should, therefore, make every effort to add to the faith with which we began this journey.  In the next few weeks, we will see how Peter uses this background to address some of those who were declaring a different gospel or theology that made more sense to the human mind.  Peter reminds his readers that he was an eyewitness of God’s affirmation of Christ on the mountain and that the prophets foretold His coming.  When we have personally experience the power of God, we cannot deny the true Gospel!

Pastor Pete

Everything We Need

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.  -  2 Peter 1:3

Our new series, Reminders, is based on the belief that the role of the church and the pastor is to remind believers what the scripture teaches us about our faith and what we believe.  You may be new to the faith, but most of us have at least a basic knowledge of the Christian faith.  However, that knowledge is so heavily influenced by the common “proverbs” of this world that what the scripture actually teaches often gets lost in the shuffle.

His Divine Power

Peter was speaking to a church that was being influenced by teachers and leaders both in the world and within the church that depended on reason to decide what they believed.  Therefore, anything that didn’t make sense to their mind with regard to the faith had to be disregarded.  Peter, however, started this reminder with God.  Instead of starting with what made sense to his readers, he started with the power of God.  When we start with our own strength and understanding, what is possible is very small and limited.  However, when we start with the power of God, anything is possible!

Everything We Need

This is the phrase that echoes in my ears ever since I first read it.  I often feel so weak and hopeless in the situations and circumstances of my life.  However, Peter says that the divine power of God has become a resource for us.  Therefore, we have everything we need.  Think of what this means for the call of God!

When we start with our own reason, we often respond to God’s call by reminding him that we’re “only human” or that we can’t be what He has called us to be.  We can’t put our addiction behind us and we can’t change our attitude.  We have come to believe that we can’t really become what God has called us to be, because we are weak.  This is the point at which we must remember that Peter started this text with a reference to “His divine power.”  It is hard to say “I can’t” to the God who has already given us “everything we need.”

His Glory and Goodness

Many question the goodness of God.  We look at his commands and our weakness and our reason tells us that He must be crazy or twisted to call us to such impossible things.  However, when we truly know God, we find out that He is good.  When we know that he is good.  Glory and Goodness are a good combination.  It is scary to think of someone with the power of God who would not use it for good.  But God has incredible power and majesty combined with incredible goodness.  Therefore, he gave us the resources that we need to accomplish his call.  All that He called us to do is possible through His divine power!

Looking Forward

The story starts with what God has done.  It always does.  That is the incredible excitement of the creation story, the amazing truth of Christmas, and the exciting power of Easter.  God is the initiator.  And this story is the same.  Join us as the series continues next week.  Next week, we spend more time dealing with our response to what He has done!

Pastor Pete

Grace and Peace

Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.  -  2 Peter 1:2

We did not have Bible Studies this past Sunday, due to inclement weather.  However, in preparation for our new series, entitled reminders, I hope that you don’t miss this chance to review the first couple of verses in the book of 2 Peter.  Peter greets the believers to whom he writes with a greeting found throughout the New Testament, “Grace and Peace to you….”  It is easy to read over this greeting and ignore its significance.  However, when you stop to think about what the apostle Peter is really trying to impart with this greeting, it is amazing!

Grace: Unmerited favor

What does it mean for me to impart grace to you with my words?  I am telling you that I want you to receive favor that you don’t deserve.  No matter what you have done, to me or to others, my desire for you is to receive the grace of God.  How difficult is this for us to truly speak this greeting to others.  Even when we choose not to take revenge on others who have hurt us or those that we love, our temptation is to hope that they get what they deserve in the end.  The apostle Peter, however, provided an example of how Christians ought to impart grace to others through our words.

This is impartation is particularly important given that Jesus gave Peter (Matthew 16:19) and then the Church (Matthew 18:18) the authority to bind and to loose.  What if the grace that God wants to bring to others comes through us?  What if others did not receive grace because we failed (or refused) to give it to them?

Peace: To set at one again

While we often define peace as absence of war or as quiet and rest, the Greek word that is translated here means essentially to be made whole.  Warring parties are divided.  However, parties that find peace have been brought together again.  Often, the war that causes us the most trouble is the war that is fought within us. Romans 7:22-23 describes this war in vivid detail.  Then, in verse 24, Paul asks the question “Who will rescue me…”  The answer comes in verse 25:  “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”  The answer to the war that is waged inside of us, the war between the will of God and our own will, is the power of Jesus Christ to deliver!

Peter’s greeting imparts the peace that comes from wholeness in Christ to his readers.  He wants them to no longer be divided and warring within, but rather to be “set at one again” by the power of Jesus.  Not only should we receive Peter’s greeting with the thanksgiving that Paul expressed in Romans 7:25, but we should do our best to impart this same Peace to others.

The Knowledge

Peter wrote his second epistle, at least in part, to speak against the heresy of Gnosticism, which exalted human knowledge.  The word knowledge here is translated from the Greek word epignosis (not simply gnosis), which means full knowledge or true knowledge.  Thus, Peter reminds his readers that the Grace and Peace, which he seeks to impart through his words is one that can only be found through a personal knowledge of Jesus Christ, even an acknowledgement of Jesus as Lord, rather than a promotion of our own superficial knowledge.  Jesus is the source of Grace and Peace in our lives.  Therefore, even as Peter imparts these in his greeting, he also points his readers to the source, that we may truly receive what he seeks to impart.

Looking Forward

Throughout our study of the book of 2 Peter, we will find “Reminders” about what God’s Word really says about the nature of the Christian faith and the power that God imparted to us through Jesus Christ.  However, all of this is just superficial knowledge without the “full knowledge” that God brings through our personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Grace and Peace to you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, 

Pastor Pete