THURSDAY 17th
2 Peter 1:5–7
‘For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.’
In verse 1 of this chapter you will recall that the recipients of this letter had received a faith of equal standing to the apostles, the same faith that we too have received as we have been saved by grace. As we get to the verses before us today, Peter encourages the believers that because of all that God has done and has promised them, to add to their faith seven supplementing qualities. In other words, don’t stop at receiving faith, there is so much more on offer to help complement or to supplement us in our Christian walk.
The seven qualities he lists are, (where the word is different in the NIV it will be in brackets), virtue (goodness), knowledge, self-control, steadfastness (perseverance), godliness, brotherly affection (mutual affection) and love.
In one of the places where I have pastored I remember an elderly lady I used to visit, and she had amassed the biggest cupboard full of vitamin supplements that I have ever seen outside of a shop that sells them. Supplements that were supposed to do so many things to help the skin, the bones, the blood, the nerves, whatever you can think of needing a supplement for, she had them, they would do so much to maintain a healthy body, that if they really were as good as they claimed and you took them as recommended you would expect to be able to escape death! She took them, but she didn’t escape death, I know because I took her funeral service! I guess that they did help in some way, but only temporarily.
Peter says, add these supplements to your faith, and in doing so they will enhance your Christian living, they will make you effective and fruitful, they will not stop you from dying physically, but they will ensure you ‘an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’ (2 Peter 1:11)
Put together what I am sharing today reminds me of the Scripture found in 2 Corinthians 4:16–18 that says, ‘So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.’
Naturally, physically, we can keep taking the tablets, but the day will come when the outer self is going to expire, what is more important and necessary is that we keep ourselves in a state of spiritual fitness and we can ensure this by adding the qualities mentioned in these verses.