2 Peter 1:5-8 (NLT) “Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone. The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
At the beginning of this chapter Peter calls himself “a slave and apostle of Jesus Christ” (verse 1) and everything Peter teaches us and tells us is an eyewitness account. Peter was the first to identify Jesus as the Messiah (Matthew 16:16) and in Matthew 16:18 Jesus calls Peter the rock upon which He will build His church. Peter’s faith was deep, he was the only one to walk on water towards Jesus (Matthew 27-29), their bond was strong. At the beginning of Peter’s second letter, he reminds us of what faithfulness and integrity looks like. He tells us to supplement our faith or enhance it with several different things: moral endurance, knowledge, self-control, patient endurance, godliness, affection and love. All of these are traits of a Christian who is spiritually mature, and it is important to feed our faith in order to grow. Peter knew there would be obstacles that would challenge our faith, he had personally struggled through some of them. He also knew that “God has given us everything we need for living a godly life” (2 Peter 1:3). Our spiritual growth is a life long process and heeding Peters advice will help us develop a stronger relationship with Christ. We should strive to become more like Him and working on these Christian characteristics will help us move closer to that goal. Our final goal is to be part of God’s Kingdom, and while we wait for Christ return, we should keep in mind what verse 8 says: when we grow in these traits we are more productive and useful. We should be looking forward to His return and using our time wisely. I hope you will join me on Wednesday when we take a closer look at these 8 characteristics. Until then, may God bless you and bring peace to your heart.