2nd PETER: SESSION 2 "Add to Your Faith" 2 Peter 1:5-11

2^nd PETER: SESSION 2

"Add to Your Faith"

2 Peter 1:5-11

Do you have a pet peeve?  Mine is people who say they have been believers for 40 years and are no different now than then.  Why do some Christians never seem to grow up?  How do believers grow?  Peter gives us some answers in the next section of 2nd Peter.

 2 Peter 1:5–11 (NKJV) But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, ⁶to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, ⁷to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. ⁸For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. ⁹For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. ¹⁰Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; ¹¹for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

PRAYER

Last week’s message was theological and very technical. Many of you said you were blessed, but I think some were bored!  The next messages I hope will be more practical in nature and easier to apply.  Thanks for hanging with me.

Let's go to the text…

⁵but also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith...

For this very reason: What reason? Remember the previous verses:

1.  We have been given all things.

2.  We have been given great and precious promises.

3.  We are a partaker of the Divine nature! 

God's seed and is in you and is producing His fruit in your life.  You are becoming like Him!

Giving all diligence: supply with intensity on our part, daily and consistently...

Add to your faith: this is a command; not optional... cooperate with the spirit of grace...

Faith is the beginning point…

Romans 1:17 NKJV For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “The just shall live by faith.”

Galatians 3:26 NKJV For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus.

What is faith? Taking God at His Word!

Hebrews 11:1 NASB Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Hebrews 11:6 NKJV But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

Romans 4:17-18 NKJV (as it is written, “I have made you a father of many nations”) in the presence of Him whom he believed—God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did; who, contrary to hope, in hope believed, so that he became the father of many nations, according to what was spoken, “So shall your descendants be.”

Faith is the foundation...

1 Corinthians 3:11–13 (NKJV) For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. ¹²Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, ¹³each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.

So now the question: Have you ever put your faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ?  This is the starting point.  If you are not saved, you cannot grow.  This is where we begin with all our counseling and discipleship: Are you a Christian?  When were you saved?  Tell me about your experience with Christ.  Give me your testimony?

Let's just stop right now... Are you saved?

How do you get saved?  Not by doing good, not by going to church, not by baptism or confirmation.  You only get saved one way!

John 14:6 (NKJV) Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me."

Invitation... Roman Road...