Faith Training || 2 Peter 1:5-9 || Manna for the Mind #29

Welcome to Day 29 of my “Manna for the Mind” devotional series! This series takes a passage of scripture (typically 1-3 verses) and builds its understanding through its context and connecting scripture. Doing this helps us understand what the Bible truly teaches us. 

2 Peter 1:5-9

5             In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence and knowledge,

6             and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness,

7             and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.

8             The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

9             But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.

Faith is more than just believing in specific facts. Having faith is shown in your loving actions towards others, through your growth in Christian character, and through practicing different moral disciplines. How you follow God is shown in how you treat each other because scripture continuously tells us that we need to love each other how Christ has loved us. How you follow God is shown in how you grow as a Christian. How you speak and act through the different spiritual disciplines you’ve learned in your studies and prayers is vital in your Christian growth. How you lean on your faith is based on the moral foundations you have learned. There will be core facets that you build your Christian walk on, so how you build on your Christian values will be critical to becoming a Christian.

Several results come from strengthening your faith: learning to know God better, persevering under different trials, doing God’s will, and providing genuine love for each other. These actions don’t happen automatically. They require dedication, discipline, and patience. They’re not optional, either. As a Christian, these are things we must do daily. These aren’t things we can do, check off, and move on from. All those things happen simultaneously and through the help of those around us.

God empowers and enables us to do his will, but he also gives us the responsibility to learn and grow. Part of this empowerment is shown in Colossians 2:3.

Colossians 2:3

3             In him lie hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

Wisdom is the Greek noun Sophia (sof-ee’-ah), which means skill or wisdom. It’s used to describe wisdom, insight, human or divine skill. Simply put, it’s clarity. Within God likes all the treasures that help give us clarity for life. God provides clarity to help us live the life that he created us to live.

Knowledge is the Greek noun gnosis (gno’-sis), which means knowing or knowledge. It’s used to describe knowledge, doctrine, or wisdom. It refers to working knowledge that comes from first-hand personal experience. It connects theory to application in a direct relationship. This applied knowledge is only as accurate as the relationship it derives from.

God gives us the clarity to see where he will use us and the knowledge to understand and comprehend how he will use us.

1 Corinthians 9:25 describes the training to fully utilize our new knowledge and wisdom.

1 Corinthians 9:25

25          All athletes are disciplined in their training. They do it to win a prize that will fade away, be we do it for an eternal prize.

Self-discipline requires reflecting on your strengths and weaknesses, emphasizing the latter. God will use our weaknesses to his strengths. It means building the ability to say no when the temptation or the people-pleasing screams at you to say yes. Self-discipline says you can say no when others try to guide you away from the church and Jesus altogether. Self-discipline says no to sexual temptation. Self-discipline says no to laziness and yes to “can do” and will do.” It’s a long, steady course in learning attitudes that don’t come naturally and training yourself to hunger for the purposes that God hungers for.

John 13:34-35

34          So now I am giving you a new commandment: “Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other.

35          Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

Loving each other was not something new for the audience to learn. What was revolutionary about this command was to love each other as much as Jesus did. We need to love others based on Jesus’ sacrificial love for us. This kind of love will bring unbelievers to faith in Jesus and keep believers strong in a world hostile to God. Note that the love of Jesus is open to all people of the world, both those who believe and do not believe. Believers will receive this love to keep them strong in an evil world. Nonbelievers will receive this love to believe in who Jesus did and what he did for us.

Jesus was a living example of God’s love, as we are also to be. Live like Jesus lived is the main mantra for all believers. Think about situations where you are faced with the different teachings of Jesus. Do you automatically think about the people in your life who are hard to love or whom you believe you can’t love? I end up thinking about the people that are hard to love. People who have done me wrong, mistreated me, and those who I don’t have a positive outlook. The love of Jesus calls you and me to show a type of love that seems humanly impossible.

To have this kind of love, we must humble ourselves through realizing that Jesus died for us and loves us despite all the sins we commit. Then, we need the Holy Spirit to pour out God’s love on us so that we can pour out that love onto others.

Romans 12:10

10          Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other.

One type of honor involves ulterior motives. We can honor our bosses, and they will reward us. Our employees are honored so they can work harder. The wealthy can be honored, so they will contribute to our causes. The powerful can be honored so they can use their power for us and not against us. Notice the pattern: we honor them so we can use their resources in some capacity.

Another type of honor involves God’s path of love. We honor people because they’ve been created in God’s image. We honor each other because they are our brothers and sisters in Christ. We honor people because they uniquely contribute to make to Christ’s church. We honor them to give glory to God and celebrate His creation to the world.

1 Peter 1:22

22          You were cleansed from your sins when you obeyed the truth, so now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. Love each other deeply with all your heart.

This sincere love involves selfless giving. It’s giving in a sense that puts others above the extras you give to yourself. God’s love and forgiveness are given to us freely so we can take the focus off ourselves and keep our focus on others. Jesus sacrificed his life for us to show how he truly loved us. Through this sacrifice, we can now wholeheartedly love others by following his example and giving of ourselves sacrificially.

The last part of our faith training involves grace and peace as taught in 2 Peter 1:2-3.

2 Peter 1:2-3

2             May God give you more and more grace and peace as you grow in your knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord.

3             By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence.

Many believers want much of God’s grace and peace. Still, they are unwilling to put forth the effort to get to know him better through studying the scripture and through prayer. To enjoy the privileges God gives us freely, we need to continuously grow in our knowledge of God and Jesus. It’s part of why I’ve enjoyed writing these Bible studies and devotionals for the last five years (which is crazy to think about). I learn just as much as you do. I get so interested and intrigued about what I learn that I want to share it with someone.

This blog has allowed me to ramble on about the different teachings of God that I’ve learned about uniquely. This is all the flow of thought from the Holy Spirit. I prep my notes, sure, but the actual teaching comes from the flow of being in the moment. The Spirit guides my words and thoughts flow to create a (relatively) coherent lesson for you to learn something. The goal is for you to learn something and share it with those around you. I often reflect after a writing session on how well it all flowed together, and I give all glory, thanks, and praise to God for using me in this fashion.

How will you train your faith for God to use you?

Father God, thank you for your various gifts and blessings. We know that they came with a heavy price through the death of your sin, but you love us so much that you were still willing to give them to us. Help us continue in the training. Let us not give up when things get complicated. Let us lean on you in those times to become the strongest of ourselves you created. It’s in your name, we pray. Amen.