2002-01-01
Good Morning Faithful Ones,
When Peter was writing to the early church, dispersed over Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) due to persecution by the Roman emperor Nero, he reminded them to endure in faith and not to turn away from the blessings of salvation through Jesus Christ. Yesterday’s passage spoke of Christ giving believers gifts that allow us to escape “destructive lust that is in the world” and thus, being able “to come to share the divine nature” (2 PET 1: 4). Today’s passage, 2 PET 1: 5-9, deals with how this is done. “For this very reason do you best to add goodness to your faith; to your goodness add knowledge; to your knowledge add self-control; to your self-control add endurance; to your endurance add Godliness; to your Godliness add brotherly affection; and to your brotherly affection add love. These are the qualities you need, and if you have them in abundance, they will make you active and effective in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But whoever does not have them is so shortsighted that he cannot see and has forgotten that he has been purified from his past sins.”
With this God-inspired construct, Peter points out that faith comes first. If you go back to your own beginnings in Christianity whether you were born into it or converted to it from another religion as I did, each of us has to undergo his own conversion to Christ. This can’t come until we are willing to acknowledge our sin, confess it, and repent from it. When something tragic has happened in one’s life, he must acknowledge what has happened and come to terms with it to heal spiritually and emotionally. If he digs in his heels by denying feelings or refusing to deal with the reality of the tragedy, he can’t move forward. John the Baptist understood this when in MT 3: 2 he pleaded with the people, “Turn away from your sins, because the Kingdom of heaven is near!” I assure you that the OT prophets also understood it when they pleaded with Israel to turn away from the idolatry they were practicing before the dyasporas (God’s punishment of scattering the people when Israel lost her nationhood and allowing their enemies to have sway over them for awhile). Some of us personally came to faith while under enormous stress, as some soldiers did while in fox holes under fire or a prisoner does while serving his term. For others faith comes gradually and they can’t tell you the exact moment when it dawned on them that they believed. Still others, like myself, were transformed by a combination of their experiences and having their lives transformed by the renewal of their minds by studying the Scriptures [see RO 12: 2]. All of us came to faith, because God extended the invitation, the Holy Spirit was there to make it possible, and we accepted it. RO 10: 9, “If you confess that Jesus is Lord and believe that God raised Him from death, you will be saved.”
We are not meant to stop at faith alone. The path takes us next to goodness. EPH 2: 8-9, expresses that “we are created by God to do good deeds which He has prepared for us to do.” But being willing to do good deeds is not everything that goodness is. It must extend to an attitude of the mind. I remember being told by my mother to do certain chores like cooking, as she was working outside our home. At the age of 13, I was very resentful. While I did what I was told, I was miserable and hated it. I can only thank God that He made it possible to for me to mature. It had to be the Holy Spirit who gave me the realization that I would have to do this for the rest of my life, and I had better find a way to enjoy it. That is what led me to begin taking cooking classes which greatly expanded the foods I could work with and my ways to prepare them. Today, I cook and love doing it. I am also grateful that my mother pushed me, even if it was to make her own life easier. The Holy Spirit is what allows us to take joy in the process of serving others and having the right attitude to be good to them.
Knowledge and then self-control are the next steps in Peter’s construct. 2 TIM 3: 16-17, “All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching the truth, rebuking error, correcting faults, and giving instruction for right living, so that the person who serves God may be fully qualified and equipped to do every kind of good deed.” Notice there was nothing in this bold and wonderful statement about judging others or becoming self-righteous. Without the teachings of God’s word, we would be lost in a sea of commands from Him that we had no means to carry out. God loves us too much to ask us to do something without telling us how to do it. In other words, He equips us to carry out His commands. One way we learn to do this is by having self-control. I am deeply concerned when medications like Ritalin are given to children who simply need to learn self-control from parents willing to take the time to teach it to them. I’m not saying that some children don’t need this medication, but sadly, it’s sometimes given by people not willing to take time to discipline their children with wisdom, compassion, and consistency. It is self-control that allows us to take the time to get a controversial statement clarified before losing our tempers. It also allows us to learn to stick to our studies, so we can successfully complete required courses for careers as well as take joy in the process of learning for its own sake. Imagine how a good dose of self-control would reduce the incidents of road-rage! Think about how self-control improves the quality of life in our own lives and that of the communities in which we live.
Endurance and Godliness are next. RO 5: 3-4 tells us how we should take joy in our tribulations, as that will build endurance which leads to personal character and to hope. See how many examples you can find in the Scriptures where God has repeated the message that enduring in faith brings extraordinary blessings. Godliness is assuming the qualities of God in our own lives. Peter is asking all of us to examine our lives to see how Christ-like they actually are. We should take him up on that challenge. From LV 19: 18 to LK 10: 27 and beyond to RO 14:13, the message from God is the same: Love one another. Don’t do something that would weaken or destroy the faith of another person. If there is one force that will bring people starving for spiritual nourishment to faith, it is the love that we as believers can demonstrate to them. We have been invited into “koininea,” that unique spiritual link that exists between oneself, God, and other believers. A potential believer who hasn’t come to faith can be shown by the example we set how precious, healing, and saving this relationship is. Then, he will want it for himself. That is what Peter means by “brotherly affection.” Do yourself a favor today, reread MT 5: 3-12, from the Sermon on the Mount, even if you have read it many times before. I promise you that every time to go back over a Scripture, God will reveal something new and wonderful for you. I can testify to that from personal experience.
Dear Ones, we have been forgiven for our past sins. We should never forget the greatest sacrifice of all that God made for us by the offering of His only Son on the cross for us. We should never forget this and dedicate ourselves to following the construct God has given to Peter for us
PRAYER: O Lord, You love us enough to command us to live righteous lives. Because You understand our sinful nature, You have the compassion to tell us through writers like Peter, how to live a Christ-like life. As if that isn’t enough, You shower us with the blessing of the Holy Spirit in our lives to give us a conscience and guide us to follow it. You gave us salvation through the Atonement and willingness to repent and confess our faith in Your Son. It must have been a walk on the wild side for You to give us free agency, but Your infinite wisdom told You that this was the only way You would know if we were choosing to be righteous or not. For Your profound love, compassion, guidance, and willingness to be present in our lives every day, You deserve nothing less than our trust, obedience, adoration, worship, praise, and thanks for eternity. We humbly dedicate ourselves to following the steps Peter gave us in today’s passage, so that we might serve You in a way that is honorable and pleases You. In Christ’s name, amen.
Tomorrow, we will see how Peter concludes his passage on God’s call and choice in 2 PET 1: 10-15. It reveals the loving and responsible attitude that Peter had toward the early church, one that mirrors Christ’s attitude toward each of us. By reading these messages from me each day, it is my hope that you are beginning to know the depth of the love God and His Son have for each of us. Bask in the warmth of that today and always. My husband, Peter, and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn