Peter's train of thought (Part 1)

...applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, ⁶and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, ⁷and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. ⁸For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Peter 1:5-8 (NASB)

When I encounter lists like this, I am often given insight into how I am approaching the Scripture. My usual tendency would be to read the list and think, "Hmm, yes, that's a good thing... okay, that is too... yes, this is a list of good things." I think that this attitude reveals a lack of trust in God's Word. A better approach is to believe that there is a train of thought: that each word and each phrase is inspired by the Holy Spirit; that each word and phrase was chosen for a precise purpose. That is the approach that I have tried to take with this passage.

What does it mean to "supply" (verse 5)?

In the context of the 1 Peter passage, it is important to note that "supply" is the operative verb for each of the actions. "...in your moral excellence [supply] knowledge, ⁶and in your knowledge [supply] self-control..."

My first note on this passage has to do with the word translated "supply" in the NASB. The Greek word is "epichorēgēsate." It is an imperative verb (command). This is the only place in Scripture where the imperative form of the verb "epichorēgeō" appears. The word means "literally, to supply the cost of leading the chorus or of theatrical entertainments."¹ The verb is used in other places, but not in imperative form. For example, 2 Corinthians 9:10 says, "¹Now He who supplies (epichorēgōn) seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness..." Again in 2 Peter 1:11, "for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied (epichorēgēthēsetai) to you."

These are things that faith needs in order to "render you neither useless nor unfruitful." We were saved so that we would bear fruit (John 15:16). So these things that are "supplied" to faith are vital, not as a source, of faith, but as a confirmation of the validity of our faith.

Why does this word mean in this context?

"in your faith supply moral excellence..." Basically, what I think Peter is saying here is: You have faith, but make sure your faith is of a certain kind, so as to check the validity of your faith. Make sure that your faith is the kind of faith that is has moral excellence. However, make sure that this moral excellence is the kind of moral excellence that has knowledge. Make sure the knowledge is knowledge that has self-control. Make sure that the self-control has perseverance... etc.

There are many kinds of faith. Only some are accompanied with moral excellence. But only some of those moral excellencies are based on knowledge... etc. Graphically, we can represent this chain of thought as shown below:


Why in this order?

So what is Peter's train of thought here? I think it might be something along these lines:

Faith... supplied with moral excellence

Peter is not interested in a faith that is not supplied with moral excellence. 1 John 1:6 says, " If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth." If your new-found "faith" does not result in a changed relationship to sin, or darkness, then your faith is not saving faith. However, how are we to know what moral excellence is?

Moral excellence... supplied with knowledge

Although most moral standards have numerous similarities, how are we to know what the standard is to which we are called? The answer is by knowledge of God's Word. In the Bible we find what is pleasing to God, and what is not. But is there a pitfall here as well? Can we have this knowledge and still be lacking in genuine faith?

Knowledge... supplied with self-control

Yes, there is a great danger in stopping here. James 1:22-24 warns, "²²But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. ²³For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; ²⁴for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. "
Likewise, Paul says in Romans 2:13 "for it is not the hearers of the Law who are just before God, but the doers of the Law will be justified. " Paul goes so far as to say, "...but I pummel my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified. (1 Cor. 9:27)" So certainly, now that we are self-controlled to obey, our faith must be genuine, right?

Self-control... supplied with perseverance

This connection is a little bit harder. The Greek word here, hupomonē, means "a patient enduring, sustaining, perseverance" (Strong's) I think Romans 8:25, which uses this same word, helps us to see why our self-control needs perseverance.

²³And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. ²⁴For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? ²⁵But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance (hupomonē) we wait eagerly for it. -Romans 8:23-25

Self-control must be supplied with the patient perseverance that hopes for the return of Christ, and final freedom from sin that will come at that time. We must patiently endure through our sin, and the sin of those around us. Self-control will only lead to despair if we are not patiently waiting for what is mortal to be swallowed up by life. (2 Cor. 5)

Is that finally enough to supply genuine faith? Well, the list continues, but I think it will have to wait for another post.... (to be continued)

1 Greattreasures.org

Waiting patiently with eyes of faith

⁵I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
⁶my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning. (Psalm 130:5-6)

I do not know how frequently I will include a background story (i.e. what caused me to think about the subject at hand) in my posts, but for this post I felt that sharing would benefit the purpose of the blog, namely, to help the readers and me come to treasure Christ more as he is revealed in Scripture. I would like to share the story to demonstrate my wrong perspective about seeking the Lord, and then I would like to share some thoughts on Psalm 130 that will hopefully introduce a more Biblical understanding of seeking the Lord. That is, seeking the Lord by waiting patiently with eyes of faith.

The wrong attitude: seeking the Lord in impatience, fear, and unbelief

This week, I learned some hard lessons about what it means to "wait for the LORD." School is done for the semester, and my summer job does not start until Monday, so this week I spent a considerable amount of time reading my Bible and praying, and really seeking to be filled more with the Spirit. Until yesterday, I had been disappointed by the outcome of all my study and prayer. I felt that the Lord did not want to meet with me. However, something I read in "Charity and its Fruits" by Jonathan Edwards compelled me to look up "wait" in my Bible concordance. After looking at a few other verses in the Psalms, I came across Psalm 130, and the Spirit convicted my heart. My attitude was not that of the Psalmist's.

My (then unrevealed) attitude was, "Father, I am seeking you, and you promised that you will draw near to me and fill me with your Spirit if I draw near to you. So here is my plan: I spend my week off praying and reading a lot, and you show up now because this week I am spending more time with you than I probably will for the rest of the summer." Now, there is nothing wrong and everything right with standing on the promises of God in his Word. My problem was that I was not reading the promises in the light of the rest of Scripture, and was trusting that God would do what he promised... in my timing.

I see at least three things wrong with my attitude: impatience, fear, and unbelief.
Impatience. Sometimes, when I have really sought God about something, the answer has been delayed. And in the delay, I have gotten impatient, my fervency for my prayer to be answered has waned, and I have let the desire to have the prayer answer die.
Fear. I was afraid that my desire would wane again this time. So the "remedy" that I prescribed for myself was to get God to act in my timing, while the desire was fresh.
Unbelief. My impatience and fear were rooted in my unbelief. I did not believe that God truly wanted to meet with me, simply because he was not doing it in my timing. Since God's promises were not meeting my format, I rejected the promises. In response to one verse, I literally said, "I don't believe it!", and stormed away from my Bible. However, that was not where the act of unbelief began, but was merely the manifestation of it. (See Matthew 12:34)

The right attitude: seeking the Lord by waiting patiently with eyes of faith

I think that Psalm 130:5-6 tells us how to seek the Lord, and gives an attitude perfectly opposite to the one I had. I'll quote the Psalm again:

⁵I wait for the LORD, my soul waits,
and in his word I hope;
⁶my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning. (Psalm 130:5-6)

There are a few key things I would like to point out in these verses:

1) Hope

a) The nature of hope. Hope can be a confusing word. The meaning of this word here is not some vague "I hope I win the lottery" kind of hope. This is a hope that is founded on something of which we are certain, but has not yet happened. This can be seen in multiple places throughout Scripture, but let us just look at two:

⁵ Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my salvation (Psalm 42:5)

Notice the ever-so-important word, "for". "Hope in God; for I shall again praise him." Why does the Psalmist hope in God? It's not because there is this vague, maybe-it-will-happen, uncertain desire for the future. He hopes in God because he knows that he will again be able to praise God in the house of God (see the rest of the Psalm for that context). Again,

⁵For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence,
for my hope is from him.
⁶ He only is my rock and my salvation,
my fortress; I shall not be shaken.
⁷On God rests my salvation and my glory;
my mighty rock, my refuge is God. (Psalm 62:5-7)

This is an assured hope! The variable pertaining to our hope in God is not whether or not he will answer us, but when he will answer us (that belongs in point 2, but keep it in mind)

b) The object of hope. In Psalm 130, the Psalmist hopes in the word of God, that is, the promises of Scripture. The Psalmist is saying, "Yes God, I believe that what you have promised in your Word is true!" He hopes (as defined above!) that God will be faithful to do what he promised (in this context, the promise seems to be the redemption of Israel), even though the Psalmist may not be experiencing the promise. But how does that work? Does not the fact that he is not currently experiencing the promise mean that God is a liar? The Psalmist does not seem to think so. It is because he understands that we are to wait on the Lord.

2) Waiting

Now that we know what kind of hope to have in the Lord, we can see what kind of waiting is associated with that hope. This is so exciting! We know that the Psalmist is waiting on the Lord, and that he hopes in his Word. What kind of waiting is associated with something that one knows will happen? Maybe a waiting like this:

⁶my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.

This verse gives a God-inspired analogy to how we are to wait on the Lord: even as a watchman waits for the morning. Now, how does the watchman wait for the morning? He patiently waits for the morning knowing that it will come! It may seem like it is a long time coming; there may be times when he thinks he sees that faint glow on the horizon, but it turns out to be his imagination, or maybe a torch in the distance; but in the end, no matter how many disappointments, no matter how long it seems, he knows that the morning is coming. And the morning always does come.

Why "Waiting patiently with eyes of faith"?

I trust that the "Waiting patiently" part is clear at this point. However, maybe it seems at this point that the title of this entry should be "...with eyes of hope". I would like to show the faith-hope connection onto which, if you are familiar with your Bible, you have probably already latched:

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

When the Psalmist states "in his word I hope", this is a statement of faith. Faith is the assurance [the steadfast holding onto the promise] of things hoped for. "By FAITH I hope in your Word! By FAITH I hope that the sun will rise, because it has always been true to rise, and has not failed me yet!" Faith is what keeps our hope alive when the dawn seems long in coming.

Why must we wait?

This was my question. "Okay, I understand that we are to wait with eyes of faith, but why must we wait?" There are a number ways to answer this question. Ultimately, we must wait because "Our God is in the heavens; he does all that he pleases." (Psalm 115:3) He does not do all that we please, but all that he pleases. But that truth may not be help you; it may not be encouraging to hear "The sun rises when it pleases" when you are floundering in the dark!

The question to ask, perhaps, is not only "why must we wait?" but also "why is it worth waiting?" How can we know that the sunrise with be worth the night watch? The sun will rise when it pleases; is that a good thing for us? I would like to encourage you with the promises of God; promises about how he will always relate to us. Waiting on the Lord is worth the wait because he rejoiced to act for our good:

• ...he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. (Hebrews 12:10-11).
• No good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly. (Psalm 84:11)
• God works all things together for our good (Romans 8:28)
• ³⁹ I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them. ⁴⁰ I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. ⁴¹ I will rejoice in doing them good ... with all my heart and all my soul. (Jeremiah 32:39-41)

We can rest assured that, although we may not now understand why we must wait, the waiting is worth it, because it is for our good. One more promise to consider:

From of old no one has heard
or perceived by the ear,
no eye has seen a God besides you,
who acts for those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

Let us pray for our Father to increase our faith, so that when the dawn does seem long in coming, we can look with the eyes of faith toward the dawn and be assured of the thing for which we are hoping, even as we wait patiently in the night.

Content and purpose of this blog

It seemed to me that I should write an introductory entry about the content and purpose of this blog. I wanted to do this not only to inform any potential readers about what I am doing, but also to help me get a firmer grasp on what I am trying to accomplish through the blog. I think this introduction might be longer than any subsequent entry, but we will see.

I think the best way for me to explain what my hopes are for the content of this blog would be to give an exposition of the the subtitle of the blog:

"God-ward reflections as seen in a dim mirror."

There are several of reasons why I want to give an introduction in this way. I thought of more reasons, but I am trying to control myself:

1. Expository writing will be my form of choice for most of the blog, so it seemed to me that the introduction should be expository as well. It will help you, the reader, to get a feel for my writing style (or lack thereof). This will demonstrate the format of the blog.
   
2. I tried to choose a subtitle that would give the reader an accurate summary of the direction that I am wanting to take the blog, so as I write about the subtitle, I will also be explaining the desired content of the blog.
   
3. Because I wrote the subtitle, analyzing it goes beyond exposition into introspection. Introspection is something that I hope will be a result of my writings.
   
4. I get to over-analyze something, which, if you manage to read through to the end of this entry, you will notice that I enjoy doing.
5. In future entries, I hope to tackle much heftier theological phrases than this, so this will be a fitting way to ease into deeper topics.

In summary, I will be demonstrating the format and the content of the blog simultaneously, extracting a desired result from the entry, doing something I enjoy, and easing both you and me into deeper theological topics. (I would dare say "Efficient, yes?" if I had not written over 200 words just to explain why I am doing it this way!)

So here we go... (I am going to start with the word "reflections" since it is a noun; starting with adjectives is kind of hard...)

"...reflections..."

My entries will consist of reflections, or meditations, or observations; any of these could be an accurate description. These thoughts will primarily come from reading the Bible and also from reading books by Christian theologians. I may also write about thoughts pertaining to conversations that I have, or things I have noticed outside of literature. However, I do not think that either of the latter two sources will demand much focus in my writing.

I chose the word "reflections" because what I want to write about is not "Today my phone died," or anything like that; I want to look at truth, reflect upon it, write about it, and while doing so become a reflection of it. The thoughts that I will be writing will be meditations on truths and concepts revealed in Scripture that theologians have gazed upon for centuries, and in their gazing, have both had and become reflections.

"God-ward..."

The term "God-ward" means two things in this context. The first meaning is that the object of my reflections will be God as he is revealed in Scripture and, as subsidiary sources, in other books by Christian authors. The second meaning is that my hope and prayer for this blog is that it will draw both you and me "God-ward" i.e. to draw us closer to God, again, as revealed in Scripture. I would write more about all that means, but maybe I should save that for another entry...

"...as seen in a dim mirror."

This phrase alludes to 1 Corinthians 13:12. I see God, even in his inspired Word, through the dim mirror of my soul. I neither see him perfectly, nor reflect him perfectly. So, if you are reading this, please check what I say against Scripture. I make no claims to be an expert in theology, and even if I did, I would not be above error. So please remember this is being written by (and read by!) a dim mirror.


Now, as you may or may not recall, that was the first of two topics that I mentioned I wanted to discuss, namely the content of the blog. (Look back at the first sentence. Did you remember?) However, do not lose heart, because the purpose will be much shorter. As I see it, there are three purposes, with each subsequent purpose being the "why" behind the previous purpose:

1. (Why do a blog?) This is for school. I freely admit this. I am doing an Honors senior project and this is a part of it. However, the project was very open-ended, and I elected to do a blog, and do it on this topic.
   
2. (Why do this for school?) I have wanted to write a blog about theology for about four years now, but have neither been able to justify the time commitment, nor scrounge up the courage to do it.
3. (Why write about theology?) Oh, my, this could be another entry as well. To put it as succinctly as I can: I want you and me to treasure Jesus Christ more than anything else, and I want us to treasure him as he is revealed in Scripture, so that we will not hear "I never knew you" when we stand before him. What we know or think about God, our theology, is vitally important if the words of Jesus are true: "And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent." (John 17:3) My hope and prayer is that, through this blog, we may be able to say with a little more confidence:

   ⁷But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. ⁸Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ ⁹and be found in him..." -Phil 3:7-9