"In your faith supply moral excellence..."

A person's response to God's election and the convicting work of the Holy Spirit is faith.  Faith, the capacity to believe, is the expression of the human side of salvation.  God must grant the capacity to believe however, because man is dead to spiritual things, because of his sin - Eph. 2:1.  (When thinking on this one time while my mom was visiting, I asked her if a dead person can do anything, just to see how she would respond.  She came right back with this quick wit, which is so my mom, "A dead person can stink!")  Once God grants faith, that faith is permanent.  (God has to grant it because the only thing a dead person can do is stink!)  Genuine, God energized faith will never die because God continues to preserve it and protect it by His power.  God keeps us secure through the faith He gives us - 1 Peter 1:5.

After God grants faith, what are we to do next?  The Holy Spirit says through Peter that we are to strive to become godly...

"...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" - 2 Peter 1:5-7.

Peter says in verse three that God has given power for godliness....

"...seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness..."

We are to labor and work for virtue because God has already labored for us.  Once we make a profession of faith in Christ, we are not to drift along in the current of corruption we just escaped - 2 Peter 1:4.  We are to strive, we are to labor, we are to pursue, we are to make the maximum effort to live for the honor of God.

I love what John Piper says is Peter's point here in these verses, "God is for us with divine power. Of that we may be sure. Now, in the confidence of that power, take pains not to live unworthily of His love." 

Verses eight through eleven basically tell us that if the qualities listed in verses five through seven are ours and are increasing, we can have confidence that we are God's elect.  Piper says it this way, "The evidence that God's power has been given to you by faith is that you are now making every effort (as verse five says) to advance in the qualities of Christ."  In other words, if we have made a profession of faith but have never put forth the effort to then live Christ-like lives, or we have stopped making the effort, we can have no confidence that God began a good work in us. 

In my next post...we'll take a closer look at those qualities listed in verses five through seven.  May we take great pains for Him not to live unworthily of His love for us!  Consider what the love of Jesus did for us - He bore the wrath of God on our behalf.  Let that be the catalyst of our love for Him and may we pursue hard after being like Him!