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Hey, it's Mike Henry with Follower of One. This is the second of a multi-part discussion on first Peter four. Today I'd like to read verses one and two, "Therefore, since Jesus Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. So as to live the rest of the time in the flesh, no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God." Again, that's from the new American standard. Yesterday, or in the previous episode, I spoke about how the first verse talks about we prepare ourselves by arming ourselves with the purpose that Jesus had, which was coming to die. He came to die, and we are all destined to die. That's our destiny. But when we are prepared to suffer in the flesh, we cease from sin. And he goes on to talk about this here. How do we stop sinning? We don't stop sinning in this life. It's when we enter the next life that we cease from sin, we live the rest of our time in this life, in the flesh, no longer for the lusts of men. My expectations were always wrong, and I would always get surprised by my circumstances. I always dreamed about the most positive outcomes to everything. I expected everything to work well and to go well, to be easy, to be beneficial, I always had high positive expectations. I'm a good example of why people like to be pessimists because as an optimist, I feel like I'm regularly disappointed. I joked last time about how the secret to happiness in golf is to maintain low expectations. Many people who are pessimistic will tell you that if they can maintain low expectations, they're always positively surprised. That's not what this verse is talking about though. It's not coaching us on being pessimistic as a lifestyle. This passage, I believe is challenging us to put aside the idea that our life works for us. We will not leave this life with anything. The treasure that we lay up in heaven, which is something that I love to think about. I believe that's in the form of the relationships that we have and the investment that we made in people and the investment that we made in helping others learn about Jesus. To me, that's laying up treasure in heaven is basically making a difference. Taking part in Jesus's work. Jesus came to restore man to a right relationship with God. The degree to which we participate in that action. I believe we're laying up treasure in heaven. In other words, we're being challenged in this passage to focus, not on ourselves, but on what Jesus would have us do no longer for the lusts of men, but for the will of God, Jesus said over and over again that he came to do the will of his father. He's showing us. That our job is to do the will of God the father. Our job is to make Jesus known and visible in the world. And the way that we do that, isn't by just going to church all the time. It's by living as a follower of Jesus Christ. That's why we talk about our five daily activities. Pray, appreciate others, know you believe, serve others, and speak for yourself. I hope to challenge you today, as you prepare, remind yourself today, my life extends beyond my flesh. My life extends beyond that to the point where it's just me and God, there's no more sin and I'm there with him. What do I need to do today to work towards that end to lay up treasure in heaven? Not to be focusing on my stuff and my comfort today, but rather to focus on where I will one day be in eternity. I believe that's the great part about this challenge. And my favorite part of this passage is coming up in the next episode, which we'll talk about tomorrow or whenever you hear this, it's the next episode verses three and four are exciting to me. Thank you for being a marketplace minister. Thank you for making a difference in your workplace. Today, ask God to show you how to look past your flesh and past your present circumstances to look 150 years into the future and the type of difference that you hope your life makes both in this world and in the next it all matters.
Hey, it's Mike Henry with Follower of One, and for the next couple of episodes I'd like to talk about 1 Peter 4. The first four verses of 1 Peter 4. The first verse says, "Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin." That's from the New American standard. That's kind of my default translation. Our attitude matters and our expectations matter. Accurate expectations are like armor. I always joke when I play golf that the secret to happiness in golf is to maintain low expectations. And in a way, some people may interpret this passage as Peter telling everyone expect things to be bad. I'm not exactly sure that's the message here. So yes, clearly the phrase opens. Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh arm yourselves also with the same purpose, Jesus suffered and died. And this word suffering is clearly about that. He's talking about how Jesus suffered and his suffering brought about death. But if we can arm ourselves with the same purpose, We can prepare ourselves. We have armor. We have this armor that comes from God. Is the armor what you might call pessimism or planning for the worst? I don't believe so. I believe the best is what we're looking for. The best happens to be something other than what we see and feel and think in our own minds. I believe our world is much more broken. Then we like to admit, especially when I use the term, we as those of us in the western world who have enough money, much of the people of our brothers and sisters around the globe are not as well off and they're not as wealthy as the people of America are. Poor people in America are wealthy by most nations standards, but this suffering that he's talking about here results in death. We will die. Prepared to die. That's a different story. How can we prepare to die? We can't prepare pessimistically to die and not, in my mind, I think my preparation for death must extend beyond it. It must extend to the resurrection, and I believe that's what Peter's saying here. If we can see past the worst that can happen to us on this planet, in this life. Then we are free to cease from sin. He will go on and explain that phrase a little more in the next verse, and we'll talk about that tomorrow. Today I want to keep this short and simple. Let's arm ourselves with the purpose of Jesus Christ. That purpose is to follow him, be like him, and do what he said. We will die. Death is inevitable for each and every one of us. But we can arm ourselves with the preparation that there's a life beyond that death and that life calls us to serve Jesus now and through everything that happens to us. I hope that you get this message and that I get this message that by preparing myself for all of the worst things that can happen, I'm focusing on what Jesus would have me do in spite of my situation. In spite of the suffering, Jesus is calling me to a life that extends beyond our circumstances and to beyond this life. And I want to go there. I want to be armed for that, to serve alongside Jesus and to make a difference in his world. Today, I hope you prepare yourself not for misery and agony and difficulty, but for whatever happens, knowing that you, your life extends beyond your circumstances. I want to focus beyond my circumstances today. I arm myself with the purpose that Jesus had. I get to serve other people regardless of what happens today so that he might become glorified. Thanks so much for being a marketplace minister, and thank you for intentionally trying to live your faith to make a difference in the lives of the people that you meet every day.
Logan Bloom is an author, speaker, and founder of the Servant Leader Network. Their mission is to help empower leaders to be a light to the world in whatever context they find themselves in.
As a pastor's kid, Logan felt called to serve God, which he thought meant attending bible school and choosing vocational ministry. So he followed that path and has been in ministry most of his life.
But he realized that you don't have to be in ministry to be a light to the world. Ministry isn't just left to pastors, church staff, and missionaries. God is activating the saints in every sphere of society to be a light to the world.
Ministry is service. You don't have to quit your job to do that. Detaching Jesus from the day-to-day is a mistake. It's not the vision Jesus has for us. God loves to get into the ordinary details in our lives and turn them into extraordinary things.
In this episode of Follower of One, Logan shares how his ministry is helping equip business leaders to be a light to the world exactly where they are.
You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...Subscribe to Follower of One: A Faith at Work Podcast
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Welcome back to the follower of one podcast. I'm Mike Henry Sr. Thank you so much for being a part of this podcast. I'm grateful that God has called us to do these episodes, and I believe he will continue. We've been talking through 2 Peter 1. Beginning pretty much at verse two and going through verse eight. So far, and today I'd like to add a little bit more to this series. I keep thinking it's about to end and I believe it will soon. Let's see how we could do today. For today, let's talk about verses nine and 10. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or shortsighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. Therefore, brethren be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling and choosing you. For as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble. Let me go ahead and read verse 11 two for in this way, the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. We've been talking about this whole list of traits, these list of attributes as being a process. It begins with God giving us faith, and then we supply moral excellence and knowledge, self-control and perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love. We add those things to the faith. We add each thing in its order almost. It's almost like the series that we go through and I spoke in the last episode. About how we make a lap around the track today. I think he's challenging us that if we lack these qualities, we're blind or shortsighted. We've forgotten the race that we run. We've forgotten the which lap we're on. We've forgotten the purification that we were given from our former sins. We just stopped focusing on our relationship with Jesus when I first became a Christian. I remember thinking, you know, it's Wednesday and I haven't thought about Jesus at all since Sunday. I would go days without thinking about my relationship with Jesus. I would forget my position in Christ and I would have to be reminded Jesus or the Holy Spirit would remind me, or something else would remind me. I think sometimes we can also get stuck on one of these, one of these issues I. I admitted at the beginning of this that I come to this because I struggle with self-control. I constantly give myself a pass, and it's almost like every time I get to the self-control chapter, I take a break, I give myself a bye, I take a day off. I want to keep making laps around this track because every lap is an opportunity to grow, to not be blind or shortsighted. But to remember and be diligent about making my calling certain, as long as I practice these things, I won't stumble. If I keep making trips around this track, I have the opportunity to continue my growth, to continue growing in the Lord, to walk with him more. And I see that because now after being a Christian for a really long time, I do spend more time. Consciously thinking about my relationship with Jesus. It didn't happen overnight. It takes time. And that time is something that I was always in a hurry for. I always wanted God to make something happen today. But what we're being told here is we make laps around this track and we grow in our relationship to Jesus, and the more times you've been around the track, the less you will stumble. The more you know who you're chasing, the more we know what we're doing, and the more we know the one who calls us, the greater the likelihood that we will not stumble Jesus will be present in our mind on a daily basis or on a moment by moment basis. Our faith will be real to us on a moment by moment basis, and as a result, the entrance into the kingdom of our Lord and Savior. Everything about knowing him and knowing God will be abundantly supplied to us. We get that because we made these laps around this track today. I would like to encourage you to make sure that you grow. Keep moving around the track. Don't let something like self-control stop you, as I'm telling you is my challenge. I'm admitting that here so that you can help me by praying for me and make sure that I keep going past self-control to perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love that I keep making my laps around the track. And I prayed that for you. I prayed it before I recorded this, and I will continue to pray it. Thank you so much for being a marketplace minister. Thank you for growing in your faith. Thank you for letting your life make a difference in the lives of the people around you.
Welcome back to the Follower of One podcast. I'm Mike Henry Sr., the founder of Follower of One. And I like to talk a little bit about the Bible every day and challenge us to go to work as people who make a difference in the lives of the people that we interact with. Today, we're wrapping up the series on second Peter, one, one through eight. I want to finish by reading second, Peter eight today. "For these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord. Jesus Christ. "I read from the New American Standard translation of the Bible. Those words "useless" and "unfruitful" are translated slightly differently in different texts. But the general idea is these eight qualities that we've just been talking about beginning with faith, moral excellence, knowledge self-control perseverance, godliness, brotherly, kindness, and love. These qualities are this process. I believe that Peter is talking about. In this process, God gives us the faith. Then we add moral excellence and knowledge and self-control and perseverance. We add these things. I always feel like the before picture, I've been a Christ-follower for a long time, but I still often feel underdeveloped. I feel like I should have more faith or I should be able to trust God more. I should walk more in my ability to trust him and to obey him and to do what he says. And I don't often measure up. And that is a problem for me. I work on that regularly. Maybe you feel that way. I think what we need to do is give ourselves a little bit of a pass because what we learn here is we iterate through this process. Faith, moral excellence, knowledge. All of these qualities are a process and we grow in them. We make another lap around the track. I would consider this a lap around the track. So we exercise our moral excellence and our knowledge and our self-control and our perseverance through a series of activities that occur over a period of time in our lives. And at the end by adding brotherly, kindness and love. We grow in our faith. Our faith grows. God gave us the faith, but he didn't give us a fully developed faith. It's still our responsibility to grow it. That's the challenge that Peter gives us here with the phrase "increasing". We need to be increasing. We need to be growing our faith. And that requires that we grow our moral excellence and our knowledge all the way through to love. We want to continue to grow and those things are ours to do. In fact, I think what I'll do is I'll add one more episode to this and talk about verse nine tomorrow. To continue growing, eventually we grow to reduce the uselessness or the unfruitfulness of our knowledge of our Lord, Jesus Christ. If you remember back in verse two, it talks about the knowledge of God and in verse three, the knowledge of God results in us, getting everything pertaining to life and godliness, Peter's helping us grow in our knowledge. I want to help you grow in your knowledge, but it's not through any teaching of mine. Let's read the scripture and let's trust the Lord. Let's spend some time obeying him today. Ask him, go ahead and pray. That's our first daily activity. Punch in, get on the clock and ask God to show you where you need to grow today. What can you bring today? Is it godliness or is it brotherly kindness or is it love? Let's bring some more of these qualities to our workplace. Eventually, God guides us through this process. Our faith grows and we become more useful and more fruitful. In the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's my prayer for us today. My prayer is that we become more useful and more fruitful, right where we are in our workplaces, however, we spend our time each day. We become more useful and fruitful. Thank you for being a marketplace minister. Thank you for growing in your faith. Thank you for actually investing a little energy every day, to try and continue to increase these qualities and become more useful and fruitful. The difference that you make matters. Over time, this changes and God uses us in the lives of people. Thank you for being a marketplace minister. And also thank you for checking out https://followerofone.org. That's our website. Go there, check out our online community and also sign up for the next Marketplace Mission Trip, where you get to practice these things a little more every day. Thanks very much.
Welcome back to the Follower of One podcast. We continue our discussion of second Peter chapter one verses five through eight. Today, our verse is verse seven. "And in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness love." If you remember from the previous episodes, we are supplying these things to our faith. The faith was given to us by God. And then we supply moral excellence and knowledge and self-control and perseverance and godliness. We have supplied those things. We've talked about those in previous episodes. Today, we want to talk about brotherly kindness and love. These are two Greek words that the Greeks use to distinguish between different kinds of love. And we tend to use the word "love" to mean both of them. Brotherly kindness. You maybe have heard people talk about "phileo" love. I believe it's where we get the word Philadelphia. It's this desire to do what's best for our brother to look out for our family and our friends. Brotherly kindness is an appreciation similar to what would be expected of us in a workplace. Brotherly kindness, being kind to the people that we work with, the people that we interact with. when we talk about appreciating others is one of our five daily activities at Follower of One. We're talking about brotherly kindness and love a little bit. We're vague because I believe both of these go together in our progression of our faith. Brotherly kindness, the first one is this affection that we have for people that we know. We look out for the people we know. And then we go on, we graduate into this next level of love. Again, remember that we bring it. It's not given to us, but we bring this love. The last love that we add to our brotherly kindness is "agape" love. This is a different Greek word, but this is a love that is intentional. Love is action. This love. Acts in the best interests of the people that we interact with every day. This love does what's best for others, even to our own detriment, in some degree. These are the kinds of love that are, it's our challenge to bring. We add them. It's our job to bring these qualities to our faith. God challenges us through the apostle Peter and through his word. To bring this kind of kindness and love to the interactions that we have every day at work today, I would like to challenge us what can we do to love the people around us more? Well, our first daily activity is to pray and maybe what we need to do today is ask God how we can show more kindness, more, love, more appreciation for the people that we interact with. Who do we look past? Who do we miss? Are there servers at food restaurants or male persons or other people that serve us in different ways? And we just look past them. Let's add brotherly kindness and love to the interactions that we have with people today. I believe that's our challenge as followers of Jesus Christ. When we see in this progression that Peter. As run us through faith results in love. And I believe that we even iterate through this. It's almost like it's a cycle. So our faith, we add moral excellence. We add knowledge. We add self-control perseverance, godliness, brotherly, kindness, and love. And it brings us right back to God. This whole process is an iterative process to grow us up in our face. The end result being that we end up like, God, God is love. Thank you for being a marketplace minister. And thank you so much for making a difference in the lives of others as you work your faith and your actions matter. And I'm excited that you're listening to this podcast, take a minute and share it with your friends, or if you'd like to join us at https://followerofone.org.
Welcome back to the Follower of One podcast. We're continuing our series through 2 Peter. Today, we're in chapter 1, verse 6. Let me read 5, 6, 7, and 8. "Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence in your faith, supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." We have this process that's going on in our life that begins with faith, and then we bring moral excellence and knowledge and self control. And today, in addition to our self control, we want to bring perseverance. And then to perseverance, we will bring godliness. Perseverance is necessary because if you're like me, persevering is one of those things that requires energy. Just because I can make myself be operating under self-control today, doesn't mean I'll do it again tomorrow. Perseverance takes time. It's difficult for us to tame ourselves and train ourselves in self control, and therefore we must persevere. Perseverance is the natural next step. Just because we begin self-control today, doesn't mean we will persist in it. Persisting in it requires this perseverance, and so we must bring perseverance. It's important because we will not achieve godliness. Godliness is being like God, doing the things that God would have us do. We want to be God-like. Our goal is to be like Jesus Christ, to model Jesus Christ in our lives and to our friends. That requires that we are godly people, that we become like God, that we do the things that God would have us do. It's interesting because this word's clearly translated godliness. I believe that's the natural result of this process. We stepped through from moral excellence to knowledge to self control. When we persevere in our self control, the result that we produce is godliness. We become like God. We do the things that He would do. Today. I want to challenge us. Let's persevere. Let's chase after God hard. Let's keep going. Whatever one more day, one more hour, I'm speaking again to myself. I chose this entire passage because it's talking to me. We need to prepare ourselves and grow up in our faith, and this process, we step through these different qualities. We iterate through this process, and we grow as followers of Jesus Christ. And He puts us to work in more and more opportunities with our friends and the people that we work with. Today let's grow. Let's keep growing. Let's persevere. Hang on, go one more time. Do another lap. Exercise for another few minutes. Let's persevere so that we move on into godliness to being like God, so that we can make Him visible in our world every day. I want to challenge you today. Pray. Ask God to help you persevere. Ask Him to help you remain present with the people that you interact with. Ask Him to help you make a difference in the lives of every person that you interact with today. You will become more like God as you do that, as you listen to Him. You ask Him for guidance and listen to Him, and then do what He says.And so that's what we want to do today. Thank you for being a marketplace minister and thank you for spending your energy and trying to grow up in your faith so that you will glorify God. That's what we try and do in Follower of One. I'd like to invite you to become a part of our online community. Join us at https://community.followerofone.org. You can join our online community for free, take part in a Marketplace Mission Trip, and begin to practice these traits in your life and grow up in your faith. Thanks very much.
Welcome to the Follower of One podcast. I'm Mike Henry Sr., and today, we're continuing our conversation through 2 Peter chapter 1 in this progression of character traits or things that we should pursue as followers of Jesus Christ. And today we're in 2 Peter 1:6. "And in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness." Self-control is the core reason why I chose to study this passage, and to make a series of podcast episodes, or devotionals, on this topic. Self-control is what I need to focus on as a human being and as a Christ-follower. We spoke earlier about how we were to supply moral excellence in our faith. Moral excellence, I believe, is this pursuit of trying to get where we are living according to the best that Jesus has for us. We take the knowledge that we have of Him in our first set of faith, in the first faith that He gives us, and we apply our lives to that knowledge. We act according to what we believe. Self-control comes after knowledge. So knowledge follows moral excellence, and then self-control follows knowledge. Now this is a different command. This is about managing ourselves. Managing ourselves toward what's best from God, and toward what's best for others. Self-control is this ability to keep my body tamed; to keep my mind and my spirit and my energy within the control of myself, and also submitted to the Lord. I can overeat or I can lose my temper, and where I lose self-control, I'm not a God-honoring person. I'm not all aligned. There's another reference to self-control in 1 Corinthians chapter 9, verse 24 and 25. It says, "Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may win. Everyone who competes in the games exercises self-control in all things." This self-control is subordinating my own desires to my long-term goals. This is where I have the biggest problem. I give myself a pass. I claim that I don't want to eat sweets, but then in the evenings, I decide I want to have some sweets. I give myself a pass. I give myself a "bye." Do we give ourselves a "bye" in and around our friends and in, and around those people that we are with? Self-control is one of these characteristics that we have to bring to the Lord. He gives us the faith, and then we bring these other attributes, and self-control is a key piece in this puzzle. Today, I want to challenge us. Where do we need to exercise some self-control? The Holy Spirit will tell you where you need to do this. Just ask Him. Pray and ask the Holy Spirit to show you where you need to exercise self-control. And while you're praying, you can pray for me, because I need to exercise self-control too. Ask the Holy Spirit to help me exercise self-control; to do the things necessary to achieve the goals that I want to achieve. Just like in this passage in 1 Corinthians 9, I exercise self-control so that I can achieve the goals that I have. My rational mind has these goals. The Holy Spirit gives us a passion and a desire to accomplish certain things. Do we want to allow our own lack of self-control to take us out and to disqualify us? Today, I'd like to challenge you, pray and ask the Holy Spirit to show you where you need to use more self-control, and ask Him to give you the strength and the energy to add that to the knowledge and the moral excellence that you brought to your faith already. Ask Him to allow you to add self-control to the knowledge and the moral excellence that you've already added to your faith. Let's keep this process going so that we can glorify God daily in our workplace. Thank you for being a marketplace minister and thank you for making a difference in the lives of the people that you interact with every day. Your self-control matters. All of our effort in this area matters. And so, let's continue to add these features to ourselves and to our faith so that we can glorify God in our workplace. Thanks again for being a minister in your marketplace. And also we're getting ready to have another Marketplace Mission Trip. Go check that out at https://FollowerOfOne.org. Thanks very much.
Welcome back to the Follower of One podcast. I'm Mike Henry Sr., and our goal is to help you to be a full-time minister in your regular job. We've been going through a series on 2 Peter chapter 1, and today, we want to talk a little bit about adding knowledge to moral excellence. We're in verses 5 and 6. "Now for this very reason, also applying all diligence in your faith, supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance..." I stated before that I see this as a circular progression. It begins with faith as we spoke about in the last episode, and the first thing we add to our faith is this moral excellence. This commitment to doing what's best to choosing- to live a life that's morally excellent; that lines up with God. Our choice to obey is the key first step. What we add to our faith is our choices to obey, and then God gives us more. He gives us more intelligence. He gives us more opportunities. He gives us this knowledge, and that's why I believe knowledge is second. We obey our way into knowing Jesus, we don't simply study our way into knowing Jesus. Our truth of knowledge, our growing up in Christ, comes first from obedience, and that opens the door to knowledge. But we have to work on our knowledge. And then when we learn new things, we can't unsee them. We can't unlearn them. So then we must begin to control ourselves to live according to the knowledge that we've gained. Knowledge and self control go together. This whole series that we began on 2 Peter verses 2 through 8, it was motivated by my own goal to focus on self-control. So please know that I'm speaking to myself as I often say. This is my time to remind me what needs to happen in my life today too. Self-control is the ability to dictate to ourselves what we're going to do. And in my case, I tend to give myself a pass. We'll talk about this more tomorrow, because what follows self-control is perseverance, and we'll still be in verse 6 tomorrow. Today, I want us to concentrate on adding knowledge, studying about Jesus. Do you read the Bible every day? And then do you let that Bible reading transform you? Take a few minutes every day, and read a little bit of the Bible. You can read a proverb, you can read just a few passages of scripture. Many daily reading plans are only a verse or two or three long. I would encourage you to get more of the Bible in, if you can, to grow your knowledge, to take in more. There are places in the Bible that require some work, and there are other places in the Bible that may call for memorization. Let's focus on knowing Jesus. Let's obey Him and study Him, and the way we know Him is we obey Him and we study Him some more. The knowledge and the obedience go together. Add to your moral excellence knowledge, and then to your knowledge, self-control. Today, let's read the Bible. Let's ask God to show us Himself through our scriptures, and then let's look for opportunities to obey what we read today at work. Watch how often Jesus will use what you read this morning in your workplace today. It will surprise you. Thank you for being a marketplace minister. And thank you for making a difference in the lives of the people that you work with every day. We are excited to live our faith, and I hope that we help you live your faith on a daily basis. That way we can enjoy our relationship with Jesus and glorify Him as we do our daily job and as we do the things that we enjoy. Also, if you'd like to learn more about our community, check us out at community.followerofone.org, where you can sign up to become a member, take part in our community, and even go on the next Marketplace Mission Trip. Thanks very much.
Welcome back to the Follower of One podcast. I'm Mike Henry Sr., and we've been talking through the first chapter of 2 Peter. We're in verse 5 today. "Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge". The title of today's post is about "Why is faith first?" What we're talking about here is growing into the God-life. I mentioned the God-life in the previous episode, where it says that we become partakers of the divine nature in the New American Standard. We actually get to start living the God-life. That's our salvation. And it's God's divine power in verse 3 that grants us everything pertaining to life and godliness. We get everything pertaining to life and godliness through the knowledge of God. That's in verse 2. And all of this begins with faith. In verse 1, Simon Peter says, "to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours." We get the faith first. Faith is the down payment. It's what God gives us when He gives us the Holy Spirit, and He gives us faith, and as we exercise that faith, we grow into this God-life. And that's what I think this whole exercise - these next four verses - are about. They're about how we grow into the God-life. I want to put it on like a jacket, or I want to grow into it. I want to learn how to use the professional tools instead of just the amateur tools or the kids' tools. I want to grow up in my faith. I want my faith to be something that is applicable and makes a difference in the lives of my family and myself and the people around me. And so I have to grow up in my faith. We come to our faith in the Lord from death. Remember in Ephesians, it says we were dead in our trespasses and sins. And what we've done is we've come to the life. We've come to this new God-life through faith. Faith is first. And he says that he begins this verse, "Now for this very reason, also". He's tying together those first four verses. And then he challenges us to apply all diligence. Diligence is "persevere with careful or painstaking attention and effort." This is hard. We broke the world, and restoring these- this God-life, rejoining the God-life requires effort and work. God summoned us. He's given us this responsibility. He brought us to this challenge. Our work is to grow into it. And that's where we supply moral excellence. That's the first thing that we apply to our faith. We get our life right. We get morally excellent. We live as if we believe God. Moral excellence is this idea that I abstain from certain things. I do other things that I might not do if I were not a follower of Jesus. In doing these things, we start to grow up. It's like doing practice. When you start, when you first begin to golf or when you first begin to take part in any sport, you take the baby steps first. You do the small things first. The small things first are moral excellence. Moral excellence is where we are called to line our lives up with God and with His life. We want to live according to what we know about God. I want to talk about this more in the next episode. So we'll continue in 2 Peter, 1:5. We'll continue in that verse tomorrow, as we go through these different characteristics that we bring to this God-life and grow up in the God-life. Today I want to challenge us as followers of Jesus. Let's ask God to show us where our own life doesn't line up with the things that God wants in us. Let's supply moral excellence by lining our lives up with what we believe about God. Ask Him to show you where your life doesn't line up with what you know is consistent with your beliefs, and then do something about it. Take some action, and do something about it. Let's not let another day go without pursuing moral excellence, because it's the first step in growing into the God-life. Thank you for being a marketplace minister, and thank you for making a difference in the lives of the people that you interact with every day. Our job as ministers is to help other people move one notch closer to Jesus. I'm excited that you listened to this podcast, and that you consider how you might be able to help other people move one notch closer to Jesus. Your actions make a difference in our world. And I'm grateful for that. Thank you very much.
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