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I was suggesting to you in the first session of our seminars that one of the major lessons of this little epistle of second Peter is that our world is temporary. There is an eternal kingdom. The purpose of our temporary world is to make possible progress. That all true progress is of eternal consequence. And therefore, Peter, in reminding us of the fact that our world is temporary, leading to an eternal kingdom, Peter is hoping to persuade us to use every resource we have been given in order to make progress for that eternal realm.
Not only progress in the things that we do and achieve external to ourselves, but progress in ourselves, in our personalities, in what we are. As men and women that have been born of God, we live eternally. It is open to us, along with God, to shape what we will be as persons in that great eternity. It is open to us in this temporary world of change to develop our potential for enjoying eternity.
This world being temporary, it is a world where willy-nilly we are on the move. We cannot in any sense stay still. It is possible, therefore, to make progress of the wrong sort. That will lead in life to sorrow and slavery, and in eternity to disaster. It is possible to be moving, but moving nowhere in particular, just meandering, going round in circles, not making any real progress.
And if bele- as believers we do that, we injure ourselves eternally by failing to develop the potential we could have developed. And therefore, the desirable thing is, and that is why Peter ins- tends to keep on reminding us until we can recall his message at any time, that ours is now the opportunity, along with God, to use the resources he has given, to make progress, to develop potential, that our enjoyment of the eternal kingdom might be the maximum.
Now, as we saw, Peter is determined that we should not only be reminded and be stirred up by being reminded, but so deeply reminded that we can recall what he has told us. And therefore, now I'm going to put, uh, here on the screen a suggested skeleton of a thought flow for the first eleven verses of the epistle. The point of this is that we shall try and get the outline, the way the thought is going.
Sometimes, you know, it is possible, uh, not to see the wood, as they say, for the trees, to get bogged down in the detail of what a writer is saying, and then fail to see what is the general flow of his argument, what is the point and punch of the big message that he has to get across. So don't let's get bogged down in too much detail, important as the detail is, and let's begin by looking at the skeleton thought flow. He is urging upon us to make progress. He's going to say in this verse 5 here, for this very reason, add diligence to supply all these extra things and qualities that are essential if we are to make progress as people.
And he will return to that great emphasis and repeat it in verse ten. Therefore, give diligence, but this time he's in even more insistent, give the more diligence. To add all these things, and thus to make our calling and election sure. So here, central to these verses, the repeated, the doubly repeated emphasis, we are to give all diligence, we are to give the more diligence, to give diligence to add this, this, this, this, this, and this to our character, to develop us as persons ready for that great eternal kingdom.
And we are to give even the more diligence, in so doing to make our calling and election sure. If they are the central bits, let's go back to the beginning and see the thought flow. Says Peter in verse two, grace to you and peace be multiplied. Verse three, seeing that. In other words, he's giving us the reason, the grounds for grace and peace being multiplied. Peter wishes that grace and peace be multiplied to us, but on what ground does the dear old boy say so?
Is this just a pious wish? No, no, indeed. He can issue his prayer and benediction that grace and peace be multiplied because he has substantial grounds for saying so. Seeing that the divine power has granted us all things. All things have been given. That is the grounds upon which he now wishes us that grace and peace be multiplied. That is a glorious connection of thought, if you can get it. I repeat, when he says grace and peace be multiplied, it isn't like we sometimes begin a letter, dear income tax inspector. Well, that's what how you begin letters, isn't it?
Dear income tax inspector. I don't mean dear income tax inspector, anything but dear, but, you know, polite to say dear income tax inspector. And you say apostles have a habit of starting up their letters with some such pious sounding phrase as grace and peace or something. No, sir. Peter has in mind each one of us as human personalities bound for an eternal kingdom. In one sense, that is a solemn thing, a breathtaking thing with all its potential. Can I really, in this fallen world, this difficult world, can I really and sincerely pronounce upon you grace and peace?
When you face such a vast program, I can indeed, says Peter. I can wish you grace and peace on this ground that all you need for that great eternity, all the resource you need to prepare yourself for that great eternity, has in fact been given. Grace and peace, therefore, seeing that, on the ground that all these things have been given. Well, you say, if everything's been given, for that, uh, necessary for that great eternity, all I've got to do is to sit down, get a few more better comfortable chairs than they have in Abseley, but anyway, to get a comfortable chair, sit down and, and, and, and, and do nothing.
You say, well, everything's been given. Oh, no, no, no, you've got the argument the wrong way round. All the potential has been given. But you have for that very reason, because all the resource is there, for that very reason, do pray on your side, contribute all the diligence you can muster, to add, to supply this constant increase in quality, in character, in the development of our personalities.
You say, but why should I? Why should I bother? Well, for if you do this, such and such things follow. But if you don't, for he that lacketh, says Peter, certain other things follow. You see, it's possible to be a believer in the Lord Jesus, to have all the resources, but not to cooperate with God and add what we're meant to be adding. So give all diligence and in the power of your faith supply, for if you do it, this, this, and this will follow.
If you don't do it. And thus, having given us the positive and the negative, now he repeats the lesson, as we see. Therefore, give all the more diligence to make your calling and election sure. And once more, for if you do it, certain things follow. And now both of them positive, for in so doing it, this will be the result. That's a very simple little scheme, isn't it, of logic?
You could almost remember it. And if indeed you were the kindergarten, uh, uh, of the prep school, I should get you all reciting it, you know, after me, ladies and gentlemen, one after the other. Grace and peace, on the ground that all these things have been supplied. For the very reason add all dil- give all diligence and supply, for if you do, for if you don't. Therefore, give all the more diligence to make your calling and election sure, for if you do... for in this way, this is what will follow eternally. It's an easy scheme, isn't it?
You'll please Peter enormously if, when you see him in glory, if you do, and get anywhere near him, because there'll be a lot of folk wanting to talk. You say, Peter, delighted to see you. Peter. Now, wait a minute, Peter, stop your singing for a minute. Peter, grace and peace be multiplied to you on the ground that, uh... and for the very reason add all diligence, for if you do, for if you don't, therefore give all the more diligence, for if you do, for in so doing, and you'd see a smile come round the old apostolic beard. Well done, my boy, you'd say, well done.
So you got hold of it. Oh, good for you. Bless you, my dear brother and sister. Yours will be a happy eternity up here. Good to get hold of the major drift, isn't it? Well, let's take his advice, and let's start at the starting point. And we come to our text, and we are to think first of the starting point. Where do we make this progress from? Where is our starting point? He addresses us as Simon Peter, says he, and I suggest to you, in answer to my own question, that he has been quite deliberate in talking of himself as Simon.
You see, he was born and named Simon. He wasn't always Peter, was he? He got that second name Peter when he came to Christ. For looking upon him, he said, thou art Ceph- thou art Simon, thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation a stone, uh, in Greek Petros, English Peter. It was a change made in him when he found the Savior. We have what we call in this country Christian names.
I don't know what yours is, Polly, perhaps? That ain't a very Christian name, is it? Well, let's say Mary then. And yours, your Christian name, sir? Do you say it's Maximilian? That ain't very Christian either. Uh, Joseph may be. Why do we call them Christian names? Well, it goes back to a long old, uh, habit years ago when all Irishmen were pagan without exception. And the missionaries came and they preached the gospel, and some of our dear forebears trusted the Savior. And when they trusted the Savior, those early missionaries thought it would be a nice thing now if they indicated the fact that they'd found the Savior, they'd become believers, they were now Christians, if they gave them a Christian name alongside of their old pagan name.
The possession of a Christian name ought to mean that you are a genuine Christian, that you have personally come to Christ, you have personally trust. You have been born again. You have become a child of God. I dare say with all Christian names of a sort. May I ask in passing what it means as far as you're concerned? Peter, you see, is about to talk to us about this marvelous aspect of God's salvation. That God's salvation enables a man to partake, to share with God the divine nature.
We're not born that way. We're born creatures of God. If we're going to make true progress for eternity, this is where we start. By being born again, so that now, instead of being just creatures of God, we become children of God, with the very life of God, and with that life, because it is God's life, it brings God's very nature with it. The divine nature. Be a cruelly deceptive thing, wouldn't it, to have a Christian name and not have the life of God, the life of Christ, the new birth.
Simon Peter, then, by his own name, reminding us of his experience and what can be our experience as we come to Christ. As men and women, creatures of God, we come to Christ and receive from him the gift of eternal life that is the very life of God, and with it the nature of God. And then, says Peter, he writes to us who have obtained, and now for the moment I read the revised version, who have obtained a like precious faith with us in the righteousness of God, our God and Savior Jesus Christ. Notice, as we pass by, incidentally, this high title and description given to our Lord, our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
He is not only our Savior, but our God, our God and Savior Jesus Christ. But what do those phrases mean? Have obtained like precious faith. Now here, ladies and gentlemen, as you probably know, uh, serious Christian thinkers disagree as to about what these words really mean. So I give you two of the, uh, more serious suggestions, and you must, uh, take your pick, so to speak. I've indicated which one I think is right. I do so in all humility. You'll see, if you're leader in your class has told you different, well, never mind, a good man has probably got very good reasons for it, do you see?
I must, uh, tell you, however, which one I prefer and why. One view is that Peter means that you have obtained like precious faith, meaning faith that is as precious to you as it is to me. That the gospel means as much to you, oh, how precious it is. And it means so much to you as it does to me. Well, I hope that's true anyway. And if we have become Christians, certainly the gospel ought to be as precious to us as it is to the Apostle Peter. And then, uh, people, some people feel, uh, it goes on to say, uh, you have obtained like precious faith, faith in the righteousness of Christ.
What is your faith in? Oh, my faith is in the righteousness of Christ. And those who feel it means that, of course, could perhaps cite other passages of scripture that say that kind of thing, if not in those exact words. I don't think you'll find those exact words that we have to believe in the righteousness of Christ anywhere else in the New Testament, actually not stated in that fashion. But what, um, uh, the expositors who favor this interpretation feel it means is that when we came to Christ, we abandoned faith in our own righteousness. And there is the glory they feel of the gospel. And instead of putting our faith in our own righteousness for salvation, we put our faith in what Christ has done, his great act of obedience unto death, and thus are constituted ourselves righteous through what Christ has done.
Now, as to the, uh, fact that the gospel is equally precious to all believers, and that all true believers have their faith not in their own righteousness, but in what Christ has done, as to the fact, of course, those things are true, and I have no quarrel or very little quarrel with, um, that as a statement of what is possibly true. On the other hand, I myself don't think it Peter was saying this. I think he was saying this. Not faith in the righteousness of Christ, but in or through the righteousness of Christ, that is the justice, the fair play, the fairness that Christ has shown.
This is saying that Christ in his dealings with men is fair. He is just. Doesn't have favorites. And in the fairness, the justice, the righteousness of Christ, Peter is able to say to the believers, you have obtained faith, not so much that is equally precious to you as anybody else, but is of equal value as anybody else's faith. The word translated like precious or of equal value is in fact in Greek a political term. In the cities of the Hellenistic world, you might get citizens in a city who were not of equal status.
In Tarsus, for instance, where Saul, uh, was born and brought up, the citizens there were not of all equal status. Saul, for instance, was a Roman citizen. That carried special privileges. Other people in his city were not Roman citizens. They didn't have the same status, they didn't have the same privileges, they didn't have the same opportunities. They were of inferior status. What Paul is, Peter is now telling us here is, as I understand it, that if you have trusted Christ, your faith gives you equal status with all other believers.
It isn't the fact, for instance, that Jews, if they believe, are already one rung up of a higher status than Gentiles, if they believe. No. Jew and Gentile in Christ all enjoy the same status, all enjoy the same provisions, all enjoy the same salvation. It isn't that for some of us, well, we're allowed a little bit of the salvation, but big important people like Peter are allowed a lot more, no? Faith in Christ gives all equal status. Why is that important as a starting point? Oh, it is indeed.
You see, you or I might be tempted to think, ah, well, yes, I ought to make progress, but you see, I don't have a chance compared with Peter. Why? Well, he has a much more better grip of God's salvation. He's got more resources than I have. As far as God's salvation is concerned, that is not true. Faith brings him of equal status. You are equally a child of God as Saint Peter himself. Nothing less.
The eternal life you have is not a, a, a, an inferior quality to the eternal life Peter has. The justification that you enjoy in Christ is equally valid as Peter's. The Holy Spirit is the same Holy Spirit. Christ is fair. Oh, there are differences in us, that's another story. But in the salvation available to us, in the resources available to us, faith brings us equal status with all believers. So then, grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, seeing that his divine power hath granted to us.
Now we turn from the starting point to the resources. What resources have I for this great, uh, campaign, for this great scheme of progress. Well, first of all, his divine power has granted unto us all things that pertain to life. And then his divine power has granted unto us all things that pertain to godliness. I submit to you that in that context, life is not just physical life, and the question of God has given us houses and, and warmth and food, carrots, bread, meat, uh, uh, uh, and all we need to get through this life, though in his mercy he does that.
And our great voyage to eternity starts with those humble things, doesn't it? Let's thank God for those provisions that he has given us there, that give us the opportunity to think about spiritual things, whereas some dear souls at this moment are so preoccupied with just staying alive physically, aren't they? That they scarce have time to think about eternal things. How favored we are there in our circumstances. Alas, if it should be that because we have such wonderful physical resources and blessings, that we get so preoccupied with them, that we forget that they're only there to help us as a basis on which to build our spiritual lives for eternity.
Now, I rather think that in this verse, however, all things that pertain to life, you'll see the first resource that you'll need if you're going to make this kind of progress for eternity is spiritual life. Some people have the idea that you just start off as a creature of God with physical life and one's natural endowments, and by the grace of Christ, you so try to improve yourselves that in the end you'll qualify for heaven. That's a disastrous mistake. I haven't got to the starting point yet, nor to the elementary resource. The elementary resource is to receive spiritual life. It's eternal life that we lead, the life of the ages, the very life of God.
Said our Lord that except a man be born again and never see the kingdom of God. More easily might a cabbage sit with you and enjoy your music by Beethoven, as an unregenerate man understand the conversation of heaven. Our first requirement, therefore, and our first resource, and this is given. We don't have to earn this. This isn't a question of development. This is our resource that's given. It is the gift of life. And once we have received life, then there stretches out our developing experience, here summed up under the term godliness, and all that is required by way of spiritual strength and guidance, so that we can now, as believers, live a godly life, that resource is given us as well.
And it comes, says the apostle, through the knowledge of him who has called us. We'll come back to the phrase at the end of verse three in a moment, called us by his own glory and virtue. Let us now, uh, look at verse four, whereby he has granted unto us his precious and exceeding great promises, that through these you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. I want now to talk about this matter of promises.
Why does God make us promises? To some people, when they first encounter Christianity and they've thought about it a while, it seems to them Christianity is all pie in the sky tomorrow. It's all promises, you see. Why can't I have it now? And the temptation is to say, yes, you see, I want life now. I want to enjoy it now. All those promises about an eternal kingdom, well, they may be okay, but I want life now. And salvation seems to be all promises for the future. Well, certainly it has a lot to say about promises for the future, certainly does. Why does God deal in promises? I suggest to you, because of the way we are made.
Examine your heart, and I think you'll agree with me that as an essential part of our human personality, we have desires. Quite right, we should have. Isn't that so? You just told me you want, oh, oh, oh. You've got some desire then. Very right you should. That's how we're made. We're not just like a milk bottle on the step, just standing there. I've observed that with milk bottles, unless the dogs disturb them. They're there today. If you don't take them in, they'll be there tomorrow. Haven't got a desire anywhere in them. They're just static old things, milk bottles. No desire. They stay where you put them. We're not like that, or at least I hope we aren't, are we?
We have desires. And we're not content with the immediate now. We're wanting. Yes, and I tell you, you're wanting to make the best of life, aren't you? Of course you are. And the best of life isn't just a split second now, is it? It's what you're going to do. It's the future you hope for, and all the enjoyment one day you will enjoy. And that's how God made us, with desires, so that when he goes and puts his great promises in front, we say, oh, marvelous, yes, I want that. Like a baby when mother holds out a big bun or a sweet, and the baby comes.
So God holds out in front of us his great promises because he's made us with desires, and he wants to draw those desires, and by means of using our desire to get us on the move forward, develop us. Pity the man or woman who no longer has any desires, who's sitting in the old armchair, going backwards perhaps. You're nearly dead if you don't have desires, aren't you? Only the question is, what are you going to focus those desires on? Your desires, by God's grace, will make a saint of you for eternity.
Or if you get them on the wrong focus, they will seem to give you enjoyment, but progressively enslave you, and in the end bring you down to the morass of an eternity without God, a human personality that has perished. Oh, how important a thing desire is. And God, in order to get us moving, has given us exceeding great and precious promises so that they will provoke our desires to go after him and get us moving. What is your life's desire really?
Could you sum it up? Do you know where you're going? Or you do have a desire one day and the desire go somewhere else the next and sort of will of the wisps going any old where. Have you a central desire? Peter wants to get your desire centered on the promises of God that will bring you eventually to a glorious eternity of fully developed potential. For that reason, our conversion, says Peter, had this element in it. He called us by his glory and virtue. Now, people come to Christ initially for all sorts of reasons, don't they?
Some come because they are lonely and despair and need a friend, and our Lord is a friend, loves to be a friend. Some come out of fear of hell, wishing to escape the judgment of God. That is a good and valid reason for coming, to flee to Christ for refuge. But let's pray that somewhere along life, God has called us by this thing too, as he called Peter. He gave Peter a sight of Jesus Christ as a man. And as Peter came in contact with Christ and saw the glory of his personality, it, it flamed those desires in Peter.
One minute it made Peter feel wretchedly sinful, and he was inclined to say, depart from me. But the next minute, oh, he wanted to follow Christ and left his nets. If it was possible for a man to be like this, then Peter wanted to be like this. It is important that sooner or later that element shall come into our thinking, shouldn't it? You see, it might be possible to come to Christ merely to get, um, deliverance from eternal punishment and then not be interested in Christ himself, or even in being like Christ. To be left with no desire to make progress. That would be a disaster, wouldn't it? God hopes that getting our sights on Christ and getting to know Christ and seeing Christ behave, we should find our desire going out to him, not with mush piety, but manfulness, saying, yes, that's what I would like to be, and come eternity, pray God, I shall be more like him than I am at the moment.
Drawn, called by his virtue and glory. But you see, to find him having that kind of effect on our lives, we shall have to get to know him, can't we? Finding out what Jesus Christ is really like. That will mean very deliberately courting his company and studying the records of his life. Yes? So then, we are to escape the corruption that's in the world through lust.
Lust is desire gone wrong. There's nothing wrong with desire itself, but oh, what a world it is around us, and you particularly, young Christian folks. The world, the old golly box, the press, literature, your friends, oh, how the world keeping up with the Jonesism, all the glittering things in this world play on us middle-aged, don't we, don't they?
And our desires of what we really want in life. Until the pe- the appeal of Jesus Christ become very dim. And we lose our incentive for progress. When desire goes wrong and becomes in that wrong sense lost, in the end it leads to corruption. An old apple on a plate that's gone bad is a funny looking thing, isn't it? And it's a bit of a sorry mess. And who shall describe a thing that once was a human personality, but it missed salvation?
It exists eternally, but it's perished. It depends on what you do with your desires and where they're focused. Well, now, if we then, uh, have this resource so that we may escape this fearful pollution in the world through lust and corruption and make for eternity, now what have I to do? You say all things have been given that pertain to life and godliness. I don't have to do anything. Oh, come, you do. Suppose I took you to Switzerland, and I said, you know, I- I- I- I'm going to make you a lovely present.
I'm going to teach you to ski. When you take a look at the mountain, you say, but I could never get up there. I said, never mind, I provided everything. See, mm, chairlift to get you right to the top. Ah, yes, you say, but I haven't got any skis. I'm going to give you the skis then. Ah, yes, you say, I still couldn't do it because I haven't got those flapper things that you wave in the air, uh, with circles on the bottom. Uh, you see, well, I've got a pair of those too, so you can wave them in front of the TV cameras, uh, you see. I was saying, yes, but I, I still can't do it because I haven't got the bob, uh, the bonnet and the, and the goggles. I have got them as well. I've given you all things necessary for skiing. Oh, you say, that's marvelous. Now I've got everything I need for skiing, so all I need to do is to sit down here on top of the mountain, isn't he?
Well, of course not. For the very fact I've given you all things you need for skiing, you'll never ski unless you add all diligence to use those things. I can't ski for you. You're going to ski, you'll have to ski. And learning to use those flappity things and the skis and get down the mountain without a broken neck, that's quite an occupation and will take you some hours, days, months, or years. As you learn to ski. God has given us all things that pertain to life in godliness.
We'll have to use the resources. I've got to learn to become a saint. Can't do that by just sitting down in, or lying in bed. It's got to be developed. But you say, when I came to Christ, I had the divine nature. Well, glad you did. So what? Without that divine nature, you couldn't develop as God wants you to develop. But the fact that you've got the divine nature doesn't mean you're going to develop, um, automatically, does it? Take human nature. When I was born, so I'm reliably told, I looked a funny sight.
Perhaps I still do. That's beside the point. When I was born, couldn't say a word. I used to sing for my sisters. Good at those things, but when I was born, couldn't say a word. For some many months, I couldn't say anything. Ah, but you know, I had the potential for speech. Why? Because I had human nature. Now, had I been a gorilla, I wouldn't have had the potential for speech, would I? The fact that I had the potential for speech was because I was human. I had human nature.
But I had to learn to speak myself to develop the potential. If you look at all these things that we're meant to add, you will see that they are all things. There's the potential in the divine nature, but you'll have to work at them. You may care to think about them in your question time. Virtue, meaning sheer goodness. You say, goodness at what? Well, goodness at everything. Goodness at your work. What would you think of me if I said, sat in bed and said, I'm very good at photography?
They said, well, what photography? Well, I never do any, but I'm very good at photography. Nonsense man. How can you be good at photography if you never do any photography? To be genuinely good, good at behaving. Well, you'll have to get out and live then and do some behaving. Yeah. Knowledge. We have the divine nature, we have the Holy Spirit. You won't get Christian knowledge automatically. Some will come through experience of life, and some will come through your fellow Christians, and a great deal of it will come through God's book. You don't get it automatically because you've got the divine nature.
You've got the divine nature and the potential to understand God's word. Actually, to understand it will take a lot of effort. Yes, and temperance in the sense of self-control. I shouldn't need any self-control if it weren't for some of my brethren. But then, praise God for my brethren because they give me opportunities for developing some self-control. And endurance, patience in the sense of stickability. I can't have that in bed, except enduring the bed itself. If I'm going to develop endurance, I've got to have a job or something, and when it comes difficult, learn to keep at it, to keep at it, to keep at it.
All these things, therefore, I suggest to you, are qualities that can only be developed in actual living. And so God sends you to a hospital to work, and you to a school to teach, and you, mother, to have a family to bring up, and me to do I don't know what. Tasks sacred, tasks secular, given us in order to give us the practice necessary to develop our personalities and add these things. We don't add them just in church. The dustbin man adds these things to his character as he learns to do the dustbins and carries on with the difficult and unpleasant job, but he does it faithfully.
God bless the man who's building character for eternity. And if I'm skiving at work, oh la. Oh, but you say it isn't the Lord's work, this is my boss. Oh, oh, oh. Come, come. You can't afford to waste that sixty minutes. That week's work for your boss is God's gift to you as the practice ground to develop qualities like this for eternity. Pray God we don't put eight hours a day down the drain because we say it's secular work. That too is the exercise we need, to add these things.
If you do, if you add them, what? Let's go back, if we may. Sorry. If we add them, they make us to be not unfruitful where the knowledge of Christ is concerned. You say, is it possible that my knowledge of Christ should leave me unfruitful? It is, sir. I know Christ as Savior. He's forgiven my sins, and that's all I've bothered. What about progress for eternity, development of my spiritual moral character?
Oh, I haven't bothered. To that extent, my knowledge of Christ is unfruitful. If I don't do these things, if I lack these things, well, I'm blind, am I not? I can't see the great eternity in front of me. I'm fooling around and playing about and getting nowhere with eternity fast coming on, and I'm not really preparing. I'm not developing myself for it. So let's give all the more diligence to make our calling and election sure. Peter is not casting doubt on the calling and election of true believers. But if I'm a called man, and if I've been chosen, I shall give evidence of it in my life, can't I?
If Jesus Christ has called me by his virtue and glory, I shall show evidence of that by an evident desire to become like Christ. And if I have no desire to become like Christ, that raises the question, has Christ ever called me? And he's not only blind, but he's forgotten the cleansing of his old sins. You know, the Israelites, when they came out of Egypt, they began to make good progress towards the promised land, and then, oh, a half a dozen things happening here and there, they suddenly forgot where they were going and meandered around, around, around in circles in the wilderness, fast getting nowhere, and forgot that they were meant to come out of Egypt.
In fact, some of them proposed going back again. And others just content to wander in the wilderness without stretching out to the promised land. It is possible, isn't it, for a believer, redeemed, yes, and was meant to be pushing ahead towards the great eternity, to forget the cleansing of his old sins and presently go back into the world from which he came. To forget that the whole scheme of salvation was not merely to free me from guilt, but to deliver me from my faults of character and make me more like Christ. That's what the scheme is. If I'm not making that progress, then I've forgotten, haven't I, what the scheme was about.
So give the more diligence to make your calling and election sure. If you do it, you'll never stumble. That doesn't mean you'll never sin. In many things we all offend. It means you'll never come a cropper. And what coming a cropper means in this context, theologically explained, we shall see when we come to chapter two and three. Some dear believers get carried away by the false teaching of false teachers and really come a cropper, even though they're true believers. But if you do it so doing, adding these things, there shall be ministered to you what?
Well, not entry into the kingdom, for entry into the eternal kingdom is guaranteed to every believer simply because he is a believer. But entry ministered richly. The rich bit depends on our making progress, doesn't it? What do you think entry into the eternal kingdom is going to involve? Who's I'm going to be inside the door, safe and secure from all alarms eternally. So you are, my brother or sister, if you are a real believer. But how do you picture heaven? Kind of a big palace with four hundred and thirty seven thousand rooms?
And you'll be content to get inside the front door and sit on a stool or something? Is it merely spatial? Well, certainly it will be spatial. Will it not be more? The enjoyment of it? And all the wonderful activities that God will lay on. How much shall I be able to enter into those things? You'll be able to enter into them in proportion as you have added these things to your characters. When I try to illustrate that to myself, I find myself very hard up for analogies that are suitable.
So, with the permission of my friends, I bore them once more by using the analogy that I commonly use to help myself understand. The eternal kingdom, I liken it to some marvelous Christmas party. Well, you can see how naive I am, can't you? Like parties anyway. Hm? I remind myself that God doesn't have to work for a living. What he does, he does for sheer fun. Doesn't he? He doesn't have to work for a living. All his glorious and marvelous schemes that he has for all eternity, for the sheer joy of doing it. And oh, to be able to enter into them. Well, at my Christmas party, there were present his nibs, nine months old, sitting up in his high chair.
Nine-year-old, year old, seventeen-year-old, year old, beautiful young lady, and of course, Ma and Papa. They were all at the party, and they all enjoyed it immensely and to the full. There was his nibs, nine months old, sitting in the high chair. He'd managed to get hold of the soup spoon, and he was dipping it in the cream and having it all around his chair and around his hair and on the floor. Oh, he had a marvelous time. And when he'd exhausted all his potential, mum took him off to bed. He'd been at the party. Occasionally he looked over the edge and saw his brother on the carpet doing he didn't know what and wasn't interested anyway.
Actually, the brother wa- was playing trains with father. Father doing all the playing. And... nine-year-old, he wasn't messing around with cream. Playing trains. He was at the party. He was a bit more at the party, wasn't he? Than the nine-month-old. Seventeen, sweet seventeen, and now very beautiful. She wasn't sitting on the floor. I tell you, she wasn't. She'd bought the very best dress out of Rini's downtown, and she wasn't going to crumple that by sitting on the floor playing trains because they were expecting guests, and seventeen-year-old had found out that life had potential beyond playing trains. What ho! And she was in for this potential.
She was at the party. Oh, tremendous things happened there. I won't tell you what. And mum and dad who've seen all those things and could enjoy them. Ah, they had a deeper enjoyment brought about by long experience and the development of love for their children and love for one another and patience and kindness and self-control. Oh, how they enjoyed the party in a way that their little children didn't, and they were all at the party. We shall, who trust the Savior, all be in glory. But whether we're there, just there, and enjoying the minimum, or whether the entrance into all that's going on is ministered to us richly, will depend in part on how we have developed our personalities by God's help in this present age.
Now, I have taken a lot of time, and my, uh, my, my commander in chief tells me that you're going to be screwed down now in these questions, uh, for a quarter of an hour and made to stop forthwith. Do not despair, because the afternoon sessions will not require you so many questions, actually, and you may take what questions of this morning's half you don't finish in this quarter over into the third section this afternoon, and perhaps also into the fourth. Questions on the second session. The process and importance of spiritual growth.
Question one: The process of progress. Part A. According to verses five to seven, is progress automatic? Or does it depend on a crisis experience? Or is it a long, drawn-out process? According to verses five to seven, is progress automatic? Or does it depend on a crisis experience? Or is it a long drawn out process? Part B. Can I myself do anything about it, or do I have to wait for the Lord to take the initiative?
Can I myself do anything about it, or do I have to wait for the Lord to take the initiative. Part C. Give a brief description, with illustrations if possible, of the seven things which we have to supply. Give a brief description, with illustrations if possible, of the seven things which we have to supply. Question two: The importance of progress. Part A. Is it possible to know the Lord Jesus and yet for that knowledge to be ineffective and unproductive?
Is it possible to know the Lord Jesus and yet for that knowledge to be ineffective and unproductive. Part B. In what sense is it possible for a believer to forget the cleansing of his past sins? In what sense is it possible for a believer to forget the cleansing of his past sins? Part C. Why do I have to make my calling and election sure? Are they certain?
Why do I have to make my calling and election sure? Are they certain? Part D. Is stumbling, chapter one verse ten, the same as sinning? If not, what is it? Is stumbling, chapter one verse ten, the same as sinning? If not, what is it? Part E. All believers will enter the eternal kingdom. But what does it mean to have the entrance into that kingdom richly supplied?
Will all believers have this abundance- abundant entrance? What does it depend on? All believers will enter the eternal kingdom. But what does it mean to have the entrance into that kingdom richly supplied? Will all believers have this abundant entrance? What does it depend on?
