One thing I forgot to mention earlier is we've got on the information desk there are some reports,
financial reports for the church that the year just completed and also a proposed budget for next year.
If you'd like to have that a week ahead of time to look through, it is available there tonight for you.
Next Sunday evening is our annual meeting and I hope that all of you will plan to be here
and especially those of you who are members.
Now let's open our Bibles together to 2 Peter chapter 1 where our text will be verses 8 through 11.
We'll read God's Word first.
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.
For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted,
having forgotten his purification from his former sins.
Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about his calling in choosing you.
For as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble.
For in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
will be abundantly supplied to you.
Our growth in Jesus Christ is not measured by our theological knowledge,
but rather by the character qualities that may be seen in us.
One can have a THD and still be a spiritual dud.
One can argue the fine points of theology and yet live like the devil.
Growth in Jesus Christ is not measured by the degrees we may have on the walls,
the length of the Sunday school pins we may wear on our lapels,
or the number of Sundays we have attended without any absence.
But our growth in Jesus Christ is measured accurately by the character that is displayed in our lives.
In the earlier part of this text, in 2 Peter 1,
we are told to diligently seek to supply out of our faith seven traits or character qualities.
The absence of these traits indicates serious spiritual health problems.
In fact, Peter tells us in verse 9 that if we lack these qualities
that are mentioned in verses 5, 6, and 7,
it means that we are in the first place blind, spiritually blind,
or short-sighted is another way of saying it.
The word that he uses for short-sighted is the word that gives us our word, myopia.
That's what I suffer from, among other things, short-sightedness.
I can tend to see things up close. The older I get, the less that's true.
But for a long time now, I've had a difficult time seeing distance.
That's myopia.
Peter says if we do not add to our faith qualities like moral excellence, courageous goodness,
if we don't add knowledge, the true knowledge of God, if we don't add self-control
and the ability to endure in the time of trial,
and godliness, and brotherly kindness, and love that sacrifices for the welfare of others,
if we don't add these things, then we are suffering from a spiritual eye disease.
We're blind and short-sighted, but not only that.
He says we are suffering from spiritual Alzheimer's disease.
He says we've forgotten purification from our former sins.
Have you ever known someone with Alzheimer's? It's a terrible mental disease,
a disease of the brain.
A dear lady who is a friend of our family suffers from this.
And several years ago, she got to the point of not even recognizing her husband of nearly 50 years.
And today she is in a home in Ohio, not knowing anybody that she's known through all the years.
Her personality has changed, totally oblivious to the reality of what's happened in her life
and really what's happening at the present moment.
A very sad state.
Peter says that you and I can fall into the same disease spiritually and forget what we've been saved from.
It is refreshing to all of us to hear a man like David stand up this evening,
who is close to his conversion date and can recount how God has changed his life.
The fact is that many of us would have a hard time remembering.
It's easy for us to forget what we've been saved out of and what a miracle God has performed in our lives too,
even if we were saved as children.
He says if we are not adding to our faith these traits and qualities,
which really are a reflection of Christ himself,
if we are not growing in this way, we are diseased Christians.
We are blind and short-sighted. We suffer from forgetfulness,
not remembering that we have been saved out of awful sins and cleansed by God.
He says, in essence, that such individuals are apparently saved, but they're not living like it,
because of the spiritual dry rot that is set into their souls.
I was speaking with a father this last week who shared with me a terrible decision that his daughter has made,
a decision to leave her husband and her four children, the oldest of whom is just turning 13.
She's tired of it. She doesn't want the responsibility anymore.
And of course the story is complex.
He recounted when she walked into the home and shared with her father that she was going to do that.
And after he got over the initial shock and the stun of that announcement,
he said, well, honey, are you saved?
And she said, well, daddy, I'm saved, but I'm terribly mixed up.
Well, that's an understatement.
She's not only mixed up, but she has fallen into the very trap that Peter's warning about here,
a failure to grow, which has ended in disease that is not only destroying her,
but is affecting tragically the family that she's brought into the world.
How does a person get into such a state as that,
where decisions are made that destroy oneself and destroy a family and destroy other people?
How does one get into that kind of a state?
The answer really is very simple. It is not hard.
The answer is a Christian gets into that state when he or she fails to grow in Jesus Christ.
That is the importance of growth.
It's not a matter, well, I'll grow if I feel like it, and if I don't, I won't worry about it,
and it'll all come out in the end the same anyway.
Bad thinking.
Failure to grow leads to tragic consequences in one's life.
The importance of growth cannot be overstated.
We must grow in Jesus Christ or face the ugly consequences that will inevitably come.
The consequences of deterioration in our character,
resulting in personal tragedy and ultimately God's disapproval on our lives.
The increase and the presence of these qualities listed in verses 5 through 7
provide three extremely important results in our lives.
The first result is an effective life. We see that in verse 8.
There is a danger, you see, and the danger is that we may waste our lives by a failure to grow in Christ.
A failure to add to our basic faith these other qualities that round us out and mature us.
A failure to grow results in an abnormal immaturity,
which if it persists results in a failure to achieve one's potential in life.
Well did the poet write,
of all the words of tongue or pen,
the saddest are these what might have been.
I cannot tell you the tragedy accurately. I cannot depict it good enough.
But you go to some place where there are older people
and you search out a Christian who has failed to grow in his or her life
and who looks back upon a wasted life and you will see heartache and you will see tears and bitter remorse.
And it cannot be reclaimed. What has been wasted is gone.
I remember when I was in high school our pastor would take a group of us young people
and some older people to a nursing home once a month.
And there we would sing and then put on a service for them.
In one particular home I well remember a lady who must have been close to 80 years of age.
Whenever we would have the service she would sit in the chair and just weep and weep and weep.
One day she invited the pastor and some of us to come up to her room and so we did.
And up there she showed us some of the precious things, the few precious things she was able to bring out of her life
into these cramped quarters where she was spending her last days.
And she explained to us why she was weeping in our services.
She told us that when she was a teenager God had called her to serve him on the mission field.
And her parents didn't want her to go. They wanted her to stay with them.
And so she turned her back on the calling of God and stayed with her parents.
And she went on to explain to us how all of her life she had lived in regret of that decision.
That is an awful danger. To live a life that is wasted, an ineffective life.
One of the wonderful results of growing in Christ is an effective life.
There is a dynamic that is involved here.
The supplying of these qualities that he mentions in verses 5 through 7 will produce two very desirable ends.
He says God will render you, God will bring you to a place of usefulness.
Now Peter says it negatively. I'm changing it to make it positive.
But if we in fact do increase in these qualities, he says that we will be useful to God.
There will be something active and industrious and effective about our lives.
We will reach our maximum potential for God if we give ourselves diligently to growing in Christ.
It's worth it.
And he also says the second result will be that there will be fruitfulness, productiveness.
There will be a positive and expected outcome from what has been planted within us.
Why be diligent about spiritual growth?
Because in the first place it will lead to an effective life.
Spiritual effectiveness comes to as one develops in the genuine knowledge of God.
And these character qualities are added to the life.
And we are either gaining ground or we are losing ground spiritually.
We are something like a canoe that is in a stream of water.
As long as you're paddling the canoe, you are making progress.
But the moment you stop, the current begins to carry the canoe the other direction downstream.
The same is true spiritually.
As long as you and I are paddling away diligent in growing in Jesus Christ,
we are making progress and our lives will be lived effectively.
But when you and I stop being diligent about growing, we begin to float downstream.
It's worth it to be diligent, to focus on, to concentrate on growing in our Christian walk with God.
There's a second result of doing that that is very important.
Not only will we have an effective life, but he tells us in verse 10 we'll have a certified call.
What is he saying here?
Well, notice he says that we are to be diligent,
to make certain about God's calling and choosing of us.
God's choosing of us refers to His election.
The fact that God in His sovereignty chooses some sinners
to be rescued from their deserved and self-chosen judgment.
God chooses some to be saved.
He has done this in Jesus Christ before the foundations of the world.
You and I can give a testimony like we heard tonight at the time that we found Jesus Christ
and accepted Him into our lives or begged Him to come into our lives.
The fact is that we were chosen long before God even spoke the world into existence.
God looked into time and irrespective of anything meritorious or worthy about us
because there are none of those things, God says, I will graciously save these.
What about the rest?
God simply allows them to go where they want to go.
He allows them to live out their lives in the direction they desire to live them out,
for justice to be fulfilled.
You and I must bow the knees and thank God that in His grace He has chosen us in Christ,
for if He had not, we would never have responded to the call of God.
Now the calling is the second thing he mentions.
That's the work of God in salvation, in summoning us to believe on Christ.
A few years ago I got a summons from the county.
I was to appear at the court in order to be available for jury duty.
And only if I died and maybe one or two other potential things happened could I miss that date.
It would have been easier to die than to fill those other two things that they mentioned.
I was to be there on that Monday morning and I was not to have any excuse for not being there.
Well, in an heavenly spiritual summons, God called us to faith in Jesus Christ.
Chosen before the foundation of the world, but in the history of our lives,
at that moment that God had prepared, He called us.
And He used seed that was sown ten years before or three weeks before or whenever it was.
But He called us and awakened our heart to hear His voice and we responded in faith.
Now notice what Peter says about this.
He says, be diligent to make certain that you're one of the chosen and one of the called.
Make sure about it. Make sure.
This verb comes out of classical Greek language.
It was used originally by the Greeks to refer to a warranty deed,
which of course proves that one possesses something.
It was also a word that was used in those days in the validating of a will to authenticate it that it was genuine.
Here's what Peter is saying.
He's saying when you add these qualities to your life,
when you develop your character to be like Jesus Christ,
what that does is to provide evidence that your salvation is genuine.
And notice that this is our responsibility.
He says, you be diligent to be certain that you are called and chosen of God.
Well, for whose sake are we doing this? For God's sake?
Are we trying to prove to God that we're one of His chosen, one of those He's called?
No, of course not. God knows His own.
We're giving evidence to ourselves and to others of the genuineness of our conversion when we grow in Christ.
One of the reasons some people struggle with the assurance of their salvation is that they are not growing and they're floating.
And that doesn't provide assurance for the heart.
As long as you and I are growing in Christ,
there is assurance in our heart that we are genuinely God's children among those that He has chosen and called to be His own.
I have never known a growing Christian who doubted his salvation.
Inevitably, doubts come in a time when we are floating downstream.
Then notice the last part of this verse, verse 10.
As long as you practice these things, what things?
Those character qualities that he's talking about.
As long as you practice these things, as long as they are present in your life, you will never stumble.
He could not write this more strongly.
He puts two negatives together, which in the English is very poor grammar, but in the Greek it's very good.
Two negatives make a positive to us. To the Greek, two negatives underscore the negative.
What he says here is that you will not never by any means stumble.
This is just as certain a statement as the one in John chapter 10 where Jesus says,
and they shall not never perish by any means.
You and I are guaranteed that as long as we are practicing these character qualities,
we will not stumble in the Christian life.
Stumble here means to fail.
We're not going to trip up to experience reversal and misfortune.
Who does trip up?
Well, the answer is those who are blind or short-sighted.
Those suffering from spiritual myopia stumble.
If I take my glasses off now and try to navigate around this church,
I would probably come back a little bruised.
I can make out the big things. It's those little things that get you.
It's possible to be that way spiritually and to stumble.
Who is it that stumbles? It's those who are immature,
those who are babies.
It's possible to be an abnormality in God's family,
to be a handicapped child of God by our own choice, our own failure to grow.
He says if we are growing, we will never stumble.
We will have an effective life in the first place if we are growing.
And secondly, we will have a certified calling.
And the track record of our lives will testify to us and to other people,
this person is truly a child of God.
It's worth being diligent about this matter of growing.
And finally, he tells us that if we are growing,
there will be an abundant reward. Verse 11.
When you and I are practicing these things,
we are adding, supplying richly these things in our lives,
these character qualities.
We will have an abundant reward.
You see, our destiny is the Kingdom of Heaven.
That is our hope.
The eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, that is mentioned here.
Today's trials are easier to take in light of tomorrow's prospect,
Christ's Kingdom, that place where He will exercise His rightful authority.
He tells us that one day you and I are going to have some kind of an entrance into that Kingdom.
And He says that if we are growing Christians,
we will have an abundantly supplied entrance.
A welcome home celebration.
We might put it this way.
We'll have the mother of all homecomings.
When we get to Heaven,
we will be glad that we gave diligence in this world to growing in Jesus Christ.
Because you see, the implication seems to be here.
It's possible to squeak into Heaven without this kind of an entrance.
But who wants to do that?
He says give diligence to growing in Christ,
becoming mature in Christ,
so that when you enter into Heaven there will be an abundant entrance.
The Apostle Paul may have in mind here what was a tradition in that day.
Olympic winners were often welcomed back to their hometowns
throughout the Roman Empire
with special entrances that were built into the city wall in their honor.
A brand new gate was put into the city wall,
and these Olympians were brought through the gates.
It was their gate dedicated in their honor,
and that was their entrance into the city.
And great celebration, ticker-tape parade sort of thing.
Peter says, look, give diligence to growing,
so when that day comes and we enter into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
there may be a rich, abundant, Mother of all homecomings entrance for you.
It's important to grow in Christ by diligently supplying out of our package of faith these character qualities.
Come back and think about those tonight before you go to bed
and ask God to add those to your life
and determine by His grace that from this time forward,
perhaps like you have up to this point,
but certainly from this time forward,
you are going to be diligent to see that these things are increasing in your life
so that you can enjoy these great results,
an effective life, a certified calling that you're a child of God,
and an abundant entrance into the Lord's eternal kingdom.
Let's pray together.
Lord Jesus, I pray that we will not be satisfied just to float along with the current of things.
As we are in the stream of life,
may we be busy and diligent and serious about our Christian walk.
I pray that will be true of every teenager who's here,
every junior high or every high schooler,
every college student, every single adult,
every young married person, middle-aged person, older person.
Wherever we are in our lives,
may there be a seriousness about the things of God,
a seriousness about growing into Christ-likeness
so that we can enjoy the blessed results of that kind of a life.
May we press on with diligence.
In Jesus' name, Amen.