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 they have been cleansed from their past sins. (II Peter 1:5-9)
Yesterday, the points
were that living a godly life isn’t necessarily as complicated, difficult, or
dramatic as we may make it out to be, and that God is, has, and makes available
all we need to live a godly life. In today’s passage. So why does Peter start
listing off qualities we’re supposed to “make every effort” to add to our
lives? Isn’t that the opposite of what he said yesterday?
If someone gives you a
tool and teaches you how to use it, they have still supplied all that is
necessary. This is what we do with our children. First, we give them clothes
and dress them. Eventually, they learn to dress themselves. Still later, they
begin to provide their own clothing from their income. They may even reach the
point where they are making their own clothes. That is making good use of
what you have given and taught them.
We’re children. God may
need to provide direct protection initially, but His goal isn’t for us
to remain helpless. He wants us to turn to Him when we’re in need because He can and does supply what we need (yesterday’s point), but the objective is for us to join Him - to become more like Him and more mature, able to handle the things that may once have defeated us.
The list is not
exhaustive or comprehensive except in its focus on Jesus Christ. We must have
faith, goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, mutual
affection, and love. It’s a good starting point.
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