Sermon Tone Analysis

*7 Essential Ingredients for Christian Growth*

/2nd Peter 1:5-7/

 

 

July 22, 2007

Sun Oak Baptist Church

 

 

*Introduction*

 

          A.

Please take your Bibles and turn with me to 2nd Peter 1:10.

*Announce guest speakers in August.*

B.

This morning will be examining seven (7) ingredients that Peter identifies as being essential to Christian growth.

We might compare these ingredients to the roots of a tree:  the more that these seven (7) qualities are a part of our life and the deeper they run the stronger and more fruitful our testimony will be.

Lettuce, radishes, and many other crops are soon out of the ground and ready for the table – sometimes in as little as a month’s time.

But an oak tree is different.

It can require well over a 100 years to come to the fullness of its growth; it keeps adding to its root system and growing.

Carbon dioxide, sunlight, water, Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer – nature uses all seven (7) of these ingredients working together to cause that tree to grow.

And in much the same way we will see that Peter is going to confront us with seven (7) ingredients that are absolutely essential to Christian growth.

As we work our way through chapter one (1) try not to lose sight of the proverbial forest for the trees – remember where Peter is headed in this chapter.

*Read 1:10.*

Chapter one (1) is about holiness – it’s about being certain we are a child of God.

C.

*Pray.*

Notice 1:1 and follow along as I read:  *read 1:1-4.*

Basically these first four (4) verses are about what God does for us.

*Note 1:1; 1:3; and 1:4 and comment.*

These are the things God does.

As we know, the Christian life doesn’t start with what we do – it starts with what God does for us.

Nothing we do can save us – salvation begins and ends with God.

But with this foundation set in place, from here, from this starting point of what God does for us in salvation, we have to move into what we must do in response to what God does – as James puts it:  faith without works is dead.

God saves, it’s all His work, but then we make our calling and election sure by living a changed life.

And this “living out” of the Christian life is precisely what Peter turns to when we come to verse5:  God has saved us – now what.

*Read 1:5-12*.

D.

A wealthy man once met with the president of a college because he was seeking a shorter degree program for his son rather than the traditional 4-year degrees the college offered.

“The boy can never take all that in,” said the father.

“He wants to get through quicker.

Can you arrange it?”

The president of the college thought for a moment and then said:  “Maybe so – He could do a short program.

It really depends on what you want to make of him.

I mean – when God wants to make an oak, He takes a hundred years, but it only takes Him two (2) months to make a squash.”

And it’s kind of like that in the Christian life:  many people that make professions of faith seem to want a “microwave kind” of spirituality – like instant coffee or potatoes.

But that’s not God’s design – it’s not His plan.

There are no short courses; no gimmicks; no short-cuts to Christian growth.

E.

And this truth is exactly what we run smack into in verses 5-7.

Peter confronts us with seven (7) ingredients that are essential to Christian growth and we can’t expect to attain each of them overnight.

To help us unpack and then unwrap the glorious truths in these verses I want to pose and then try to answer some questions.

You may not have see it at first, but this list deals with the whole of the Christian life – it’s remarkably complete.

Peter begins his letter with the charge to be certain of our foundations, he makes sure that we are properly grounded and rooted, and now he begins to dig into how we grow.

Here are a couple of the questions we’ll answer this morning:  what’s involved in living a balanced Christian life?

How can we be certain that our faith is not a dead faith?

What specific steps can we take to grow and add to our faith in order to respond to Peter’s plea to make our calling and election sure?

 

 

*I.

First of all, a Christian grows by being /diligent/ to add virtue and knowledge to their faith.*

*Read 1:5.*

An oak tree begins its life as a seed planted in the earth and then begins to grow as nature supplies carbon dioxide, sunlight and water – and a Christian grows by diligently adding to their faith virtue and knowledge.

A.

Before we dig into the meanings and application of “virtue” and “knowledge” let’s first get a handle on a couple of things Peter says right at the beginning of verse 5.  *Re-read 1:5.*

 

                    1.

The phrase “for this very reason” take us back to the previous verses.

Peter’s saying:  “I’ve laid the foundation – God saved you – now here’s where you go from there.

God did His part – now it’s time for you to do yours.”

2.

The words “giving, diligence, and add” all go together.

“Giving” refers to “bringing in” or “supplying besides” and it’s a word that suggests putting forth a strong effort.

The word “diligence” refers to doing something with “zeal or eagerness and with a sense of urgency.”

Finally, the word “add” might be better translated “supply” or “furnish” and it is a command.

Get this:  adding these seven (7) ingredients to our faith is not, repeat, not optional.

3.

Let me try to put the meaning of these words all together.

Peter is describing what might happen if we were to go to a bank and they tell us that we need specific paperwork to complete a particular transaction.

We are already a customer, and we have already given them three (3) pieces of documentation that we’re missing a few others – for example our birth certificate.

We happen to need that money so we go about finding our birth certificate with zeal and eagerness because if we don’t the transaction won’t go through.

We want to “give” them that piece of paper; we want to “supply” it to the others they have; we approach this with “diligence” because we need the money; and then we “add” it to what they already have – the bank has done its part just like God does His part, and now we have to do our part.

4.       Turn over to Phil.

2:9.

This is what Peter is driving at and we need to fix it in our minds:  he’s reminding us that, like the bank, God won’t do our part.

We can’t do what God does, and God will not do what we can do – that’s why “diligence” here is so important.

God will not give us good habits; He will not give us character; and He will not make us obey Him.

We have to work at these things ourselves.

*Read 2:9-13.*

B.

Turn back to 2nd Peter 1:5.

So in this way, with this kind of diligence, we have to add or supply certain things to our faith in order to grow just like we have to supply the bank’s required documentation in order to make our withdrawal – which brings us right to the first of Peter’s seven (7) ingredients:  virtue.

1.

The word “virtue” as we use it today generally refers to the positive aspects of someone’s character, their “goodness,” but that’s not what Peter has in mind here.

He’s not talking about being “good” – there are a lot of good people in this world, in the church and not in the church.

Instead of “goodness,” Peter is referring to “virtue” in the sense of “moral power,” or “moral energy.”

Don’t miss this:  Peter is not referring to goodness – instead he’s referring to the activity or vigor of our soul – to self-motivated “moral energy.”

In other words, be diligent to be certain that our faith is a living faith and an active faith – be certain that our faith is vigorous and energetic.

2.       It’s interesting that Peter puts “virtue” first in his and I believe one (1) reason is because this “virtue,” in the sense of having a disposition of moral energy, is why so many people struggle to grow in the Christian life.

Why do some people seem so excited about church, and others don’t?

Why are some professing Christians eager to read and study their Bibles, excited about serving the Lord – and others aren’t?

In the context of what Peter says here there are only two (2) possible answers to these questions:  either they aren’t truly saved or they haven’t been diligent to add virtue to the starting point of their faith.

I trust we have an appreciation for the serious and tragic lack of virtuous moral energy in lives of most Christians in America today – survey after survey proves the truth of this statement.

Instead of virtue – there’s deep passivity; instead of energy – there’s lethargy and laziness.

Many professing Christians in America today have become the “couch potatoes” of the Christian world.

3.

So how do we do this – how do we add virtue?

It begins and ends with choices – choices we make in terms of how we spend our time; what we watch on TV; the movies we watch; the people we associate with; the books we read; and so on.

Be certain of this:  Danielle Steele and soap operas do not add virtue – in fact most of what is in the world does just the opposite: it literally drains virtue from us rather than adding it.

So Peter’s calling us to make choices that will make our faith grow in vigor – rather being drained of vigor.

C.

And secondly, to our virtue we are to add “knowledge.”

 

                   1.

The word “knowledge” here takes us back to familiar territory because Peter the word for “knowledge” that he uses here is the word “gnosis” and not “epignosis/”/ that he used in verses 2 and 3.  “gnosis/”/ here refers to “insight, understanding, or enlightenment.”

2.       Let’s apply these ideas of adding insight, understanding, or enlightenment to our faith in context to see what Peter is after.

One reason this knowledge is so important is because the “energetic” virtue Peter refers to here needs to be governed and controlled.