Sermon Tone Analysis

*Peter’s Plea:*

*Be Diligent to Grow in Your Faith*

/2nd Peter 1:8-11/

 

 

August 12, 2007

Sun Oak Baptist Church

 

* *

*Introduction*

 

          A.

Please turn with me in your Bibles to 2nd Peter 1:5 and I encourage you to take out your sermon notes as well.

B.

As we are getting started this morning I want to give us fair warning that we will not be dealing with one of the “feel good” passages in God’s Word.

We will be dealing with Peter’s plea in verses 8-11 for Christians to be diligent in adding to their faith the seven (7) essential ingredients for Christian growth that we dealt with two (2) weeks ago.

*Read 1:5-7.*

Remember that the word “add” here in the Greek is an imperative, it’s a command – pursuing these in optional for a Christian.

1.       Pastors often try to encourage people to grow in their faith by suggesting regular church attendance; that they attend Sunday evening services; read their Bibles; pray throughout the day; a pastor might encourage us to develop friendships with unsaved people in order to open opportunities to share the Gospel and so on – and these practices are meant to encourage people to grow in their Christian life.

2.

But understand that Peter doesn’t make adding or increasing in these Christ-like character traits optional – we are commanded to pursue them.

And Peter strengthens this command by using the word “diligent,” which means that we are to be “earnest” or “steadfast” about this.

But he doesn’t even stop there.

Verses 8-11 are part of a plea to pursue Christian growth by giving three (3) reasons why it is so very important to work at growing and maturing in the Christian life – three (3) reasons why we must be seeking to move from crawling as a baby Christian; to learning to walk as a toddler Christian; and then finally to begin running the Christian race – as Paul says in 1st Cor.

9:  “run as if to win.”

 

                   3.       Look at 1:1.  Verses 1-4 are a unit; so are verses 5-7; so are verses 8-11 and so are verses 12-15 – and while each of these sections are units they all fit together to communicate a message that is critical to Peter’s reason for writing this letter.

Follow along as I read and see how verses 1-15 all fit together.

*Read and pray.*

C.

As we begin to unpack the truths of verses 8-11 some of us might find them very confrontive – and in fact they are.

They are an “in your face” confrontation by Peter that is his plea for Christians to take seriously the command in verse 5 to “add.”

He makes every effort to persuade us about the importance of growing in the Christian faith; about of making the pursuit of Christ-like character a central priority in our life and his approach is to confront – to sit us in a chair, look us in the eye and ask us the hard questions and he does it by presenting three (3) incredibly important reasons why we should be diligent to obey the command in verse 5 to be about the business of adding these seven (7) qualities to our lives.

*I.

First of all, reason #1, is so that we will have a /productive/ Christian life.*

See 1:8.

*Read 1:8.*

Why should we be diligent to add the seven (7) virtues of verses 5-7 to our faith?

Because if we do we will have a productive, or a fruitful, Christian life.

Here’s the question Peter confronts us with in verse 8:  is our Christian life productive?

Is our Christian life productive or isn’t it?

What do we have to show for our decision to receive Christ as Lord and Savior?

Would our Christian testimony resemble a barren desert or would it look like a fruit orchard that is producing a harvest for God’s glory?

That’s the question Peter confronts with in verse 8.

And he does it by identifying what it means to have a productive Christian life.

A.

For one, being productive means that a Christian is constantly in the process of growing.

Look at verse 8 again.

*Read 1:8a.*

The word “abound” here can also be translated “increasing.”

In other words, adding these seven (7) Christ-like character traits is not a stagnant proposition.

Just like we would regularly pursue adding money to a savings account, the idea here is that Christians are to be constantly in the process of adding these qualities to our faith – constantly moving towards more and more Christ-likeness.

Like a young fruit tree continues to mature and grow if properly cared for, so being a productive Christian means we must constantly be in the process of growing and maturing.

B.

Being productive also means that a Christian does not have a “barren” life.

1.       Look at verse 8 again.

*Read.*

The word “barren” could be better translated “idle” or “lazy.”

The word pictures a desert – a desert is “idle;” the heat beats down; hardly anything grows – it’s barren.

A barren vegetable garden is idle and doesn’t produce a crop and it’s the same thing for a Christian not growing in Christ-likeness – Peter says they’re barren.

2.       Unfortunately the tragic truth is that many people attending church have lives that are just like a desert – when it comes to spiritual things they are very idle and barren.

They say they believe the Bible and they see that Peter says to be diligent about these things – but they do nothing about it.

As James says they are “hearers” of the Word but not “doers.”

People like this can be very active in connection with other things that they believe in:  for example their hobbies; cleaning house; fishing; a bridge club and so on; they can give themselves wholeheartedly to a career, but when it comes to the fact that God has taken a personal interest in them and that Christ has died for them – there’s idleness and their Christian life looks like a desert – that’s tragic.

3.       There’s something I want to underscore here so we don’t miss it:  the kind of Christian activity that Peter is talking about in verses 5-7 is the result of changed character and this is fundamental to understanding Peter’s plea.

We must be something and become something before we can do anything – that’s verses 1-4.

The reason people struggle with verses 5-7 is because they don’t have the changed character that comes in verses 1-4 – in other words they haven’t truly been born-again.

We must be something and become something in verses 1-4 before we can do what Peter says we must do in verses 5-7.

And if we don’t seek to do verses 5-7 Peter confronts us with the truth that are Christian life will be barren.

C.

A productive Christian is a Christian that is the ongoing process of growing so they are not barren, and next, if we are diligent to keep adding these things not only will our Christian life not resemble a desert, we also will not be unfruitful.

*Re-read 1:8.*

The word “unfruitful” goes hand-in-hand with the word barren – they go together.

Unfruitfulness, or uselessness, is a by-product of being barren.

I’m pretty sure most of us would agree that it would be quite difficult, if not impossible to grow an apple tree in the middle of the Sahara desert and it’s the same thing in the Christian life.

1.       Peter’s plea here is incredibly serious on a personal level.

Don’t lose sight of where he’s heading:  *read 1:10.*

Here’s the issue – so be honest:  are you producing fruit in your Christian life?

When is the last time that you shared the Gospel with someone?

Are you more patient today than you were last year?

Do you love others today more than you did five (5) years ago?

Can we say with conviction that we love God more today than last year, the year before, and so on?

In other words:  is our Christian life producing fruit?

2.

But not only is Peter’s plea serious on a personal level it’s also incredibly serious on the corporate level – meaning in the church.

For example, do you think on the whole that there are more people who claim to be Christians attending church today or less than there were ten (10) years ago?

A 1991 Gallup poll showed that 78 percent of Americans surveyed expect to go to heaven when they die – 78%.

However, the survey also went on to show that the majority of these people hardly ever pray, hardly ever read the Bible, and attend church irregularly.

They also admit that they live to please themselves instead of seeking to please God.

Another survey estimates that a little over a hundred churches a month are closing their doors.

Question:  do these kind of statistics sound like the church at the corporate level is producing fruit?

D.

Why is it so critical that we diligently seek to add the Christ-like character qualities of verses 5-7 to our faith?

Because first of all, then and only then will we not be barren and unfruitful – then and only then will we be productive Christians – only then will be useful to God.

 

* *

*II.

Secondly, reason #2, because he who lacks these things is /blind/.*

See 1:9.

*Read 1:9.*

Why should we be diligent to be about the business of growing in the Christian faith?

Do you see what Peter is saying here?

A person attending church who lacks these things (the things in verses 5-7), or who is not diligent in regard to adding these Christ-like qualities to their faith is demonstrating a fundamental ignorance and Peter tags a person like this with two (2) labels.

A.

First, he calls them short-sighted – or blind and this label is incredibly sober warning regarding the danger of false conversion.

1.       The reality is that Jesus solemnly warned us, and so does Paul, and so does Peter (and by the way – so does virtually every book in the NT) of the incredible danger of people that attend church somehow thinking they are a Christian, and somehow thinking, or hoping, or believing that they will go to heaven – when the fact is there is no evidence in their lives of the qualities in verses 5-7.

Turn with me to 2nd Cor.

3:12.

Someone who is short-sighted is someone that can’t see distant things – they only see things that are immediately in front of them and obviously, people who are blind can’t see at all and notice what the apostle Paul says about blindness.

*Read 3:12-16 & 4:3-4.*

Now flip back to 2nd Peter.