Imagine you have to drive somewhere, somewhere you’ve never been. But, instead of looking at a map, you decide to just wing it. Or, imagine you’re going to build a house, but instead of using a blueprint, you decide to just start hammering boards together. For myself, just the thought of drive somewhere I’ve never been without even looking at a map is just unnerving to me. Nonetheless, if a person did that, they might get lost or disoriented along the way, but they would probably reach their destination, eventually. Someone can build a house without a blueprint, but chances are things won’t go as smoothly as it would if they had used one. And, I would say something similar is true for the Christian faith.
If someone were to say to me, “Look, all I need is faith. I don’t need anything else. I don’t need a plan or a map. I don’t need a blueprint. As long as I have faith, it will all work out.” Okay, I’m not inclined to disagree with that, necessarily. Again, two people can set out for the same destination. One can use a map, and the other can just wing it. Give them both enough time, and chances are they both will arrive at their destination. Even so, it stands to reason the one who uses the map will have less trouble along the way. Obviously, faith is essential. But faith is only the beginning. We always have faith, but spiritual growth includes more than mere faith. One of the things I really like about this passage from 2 Peter, is the Apostle gives us a kind of blueprint for what to do with Christian faith.
This passage is an ancient sermon with a beginning, a middle, and an end. It begins with what God has done for us in the past. The middle part tells us what to do with our faith in the present. And then, it ends with a promise about what God will do for us in the future. So, it begins and ends with what God does for us, and what God does for us enables us to do what we need to do with our faith in the present So, let’s start with the beginning and what God has already done for us.
The Apostle begins by telling us that God, in Christ, has given us everything we need, so that we might live and live with single-minded devotion to God. He says, “His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness.” Through Christ, God has given us everything we need, which is another way of describing God’s grace. But what, exactly, has God done for us in Christ?
“His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us…so that…you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust (in other words “because of desire”), and may become participants in the divine nature.” That’s a mouthful, I know, but the basic idea is that grace brings us to a knowledge of Christ, and the more we know him, the more we become more like him. In other words, we grow in grace. This goes back to the idea that grace transforms us. Or, as the Apostle puts it, we “become participants of the divine nature.”
There is something about knowing Christ that changes us. That may seem obvious enough, but it helps to know how the word “knowledge” is used in the scriptures. In the scriptures, knowledge is never just about facts that we know in our head. Certainly, part of faith is learning things about Christ, but knowing Christ is also about knowing him by participation, or by experience.
One of the great things about YouTube is that if something breaks, you can pull up a video and learn how to fix it. I wanted to change out the brake pads on my truck, so I pulled up a few videos and watched how to change out the brake pads. Now, after watching those videos, would I say I know how to change out my brake pads? Well, kind of, maybe. I have a general idea. But, after I get in there and did the work and actually change out the pads, would I say I know how to change out the brake pads on my truck? Yes, absolutely. There’s no doubt in my mind I know through experience and not just by watching some videos.
So, take one of the commandments our Lord gave us, as an example. In the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 7:12, Jesus says, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law and the prophets.” Now if I read what he says, and someone asks me, “Do you know what he is saying?” There is a sense I can say, “Yes, I understand what that means.” In other words, I comprehend it with my mind. But it’s a whole different ball game when I try to go out into the world and in everything treat others the way I want to be treated. Because what that means is, even if others don’t treat me the way I would like to be treated, I’m still going to treat them the way I would want to be treated. And in doing that, not only will have a better understanding of his commandment, but I will have a better understanding of him, because that is the way he lived. So, it’s certainly true that we study the scriptures as a way to know Christ and who he is and what he’s done. But it’s when we put his teachings and his way of life into practice that we begin to know him in an intimate way.
But, again as the Apostle says, Christ has already given us everything we need for life and godliness. The one who calls us is the same one who empowers us. So, when we set out to imitate his life, his power is already at work helping us along the way. In Philippians 3:12, Paul says, “I press on to reach the goal, because Christ Jesus has made me his own.” Notice, he doesn’t say, I press on to reach the goal in order that Christ will make me his own. That’s getting it backwards. On the contrary. Paul says, I press on the reach the goal because Christ has already made me his own. He already belongs to Christ and that is what enables him to press on towards the goal. So, that’s the first part of the Apostle’s sermon. The first part tells us God has given us everything we need to live and to live with a single-minded devotion to him.
The second part tells us what we are to do now, in the present. He says, “For this very reason (in other words, because of what God has done for us), you must make every effort to support your faith with goodness, and goodness with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with endurance, and endurance with godliness, and godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love.” This is the blueprint part of the sermon.
Notice he begins with faith. The apostle is speaking to Christians, so he begins with what all Christians have in common: faith. But then he says make every effort to support your faith with goodness. The word translated as “goodness” is the word virtue. The idea of virtue is that there is a way of living that is fitting or appropriate to the good creation that God has created. So, not just any way of living is appropriate to life. To live with goodness, or virtue, is to live in a way that is appropriate to life. So, not only do we have faith, but we make an effort to live in a way that is fitting, that is appropriate to each given situation. Then, to our faith and goodness, we add knowledge. This is spiritual knowledge, which we’ve discussed is knowledge about the faith, about Christ, and knowledge gained through the experience of living like Christ. To our faith, goodness, and knowledge we add self-control, which is pretty self-explanatory.
To that we add endurance, which is self-control sustained over a long period of time. To that we add godliness, which is essentially single-minded devotion to God. To that we add mutual affection. The word he uses here is philadelphia, which means “brotherly love” or “love between brothers.” In other words, we nurture love between the members of the body of Christ. So, we have faith, goodness, knowledge, self-control, endurance, godliness, mutual affection, and then finally to all of that we add love. The word used here is agape, which is the highest form of love. So, this isn’t just love between the members of the body, this is love for all people, and it is a self-giving kind of love. This is the kind of love that imitates the love of Christ who gave himself for others.
So, notice there is a directionality to these. It begins with faith, faith in our foundation Jesus Christ, but then it builds on that, layer upon layer, until we reach Christ-like love. The Apostle says, “For if these things are yours and are increasing among you, they keep you from being ineffective and unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” In other words, we don’t have to be perfect in our efforts to add to our faith, but so long as we are growing in these things, growing in grace, then we will be fruitful and productive.
Finally, we come to the third part of the sermon, the part about what God will do for us in the future. The apostle says, “if you do this, (that is-if you continue to grow in grace) you will never stumble…(and) entry into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be richly provided for you.” My friends, if you ever wondered, “Okay, I have faith, now what?” This is your answer. This passage provides a blueprint, a plan, a guide to growing in grace.
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