What is really the main message of Christianity

Rom 3:10-25

10 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; 11 no one understands; no one seeks for God.  12 All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”  13 “Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.” “The venom of asps is under their lips.”  14 “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.”  15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood; 16 in their paths are ruin and misery, 17 and the way of peace they have not known.”  18 “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

  19 Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.  20 For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.

  21 But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— 22 the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction:  23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,  25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

Something I read earlier today, reminded me that many fail to see or understand the true nature of man and God and misunderstand the message of scripture, the statement was “... the main messages of Christianity - love, compassion, acceptance and non-judging. ..." 

It is clear from the start that “None is righteous, no not one”, Eccl 7:20 “Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins. 1 John 1:8:  ”If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”  Eph 2:1-3:  ”1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience—  3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”

Truth be told if we are observant and honest about ourselves and others we don’t need the bible to tell us these things, we can find it out by the lies we tell, by the unloving ways we treat fellow men and women, how we so often take what we feel we deserve at the expense of others, the list could go on, we all know the adage “I’m only human” this being an admission that we fail at even what we consider to be right by our own meager standards never mind according to the perfect holy standards of God. What I am trying to highlight is that we have a problem: we are broken, all of us, some of us are broken in ways that are different from others, we are a deviation so bad that nothing good we do, can justify the wrong we do. Actually the problem isn’t even so much in what we do but what we are, we don’t become sinners by doing sin, we sin because we are sinners. Our nature is twisted so we do twisted things. Rom 5:12 “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. ” It isn’t a choice it is a fact of our nature, we inherit it.

The problem with our sin is that it separates us from God, like any criminal who commits a crime a penalty has to be paid, that penalty is of course death : Rom 6:23 “For the wages of sin is death,”  Death is a word much misunderstood and I don’t have the time here to go into depth other than to say it is not a pleasant thing or even the absence of life but something far worse according to Jesus’ words in Matthew 13:49-50 “49  So it will be at the close of the age. The angels will come out and separate the evil from the righteous 50 and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

The solution to this problem cannot be found in ourselves, we cannot lift ourselves up by our own bootstraps, we can only be rescued from our fate of death by someone who does not deserve the same death taking the punishment: Rom 3:24-25 “24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,  25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.“ Christ brings us that redemption, only an infinite omnipotent God can take an infinite punishment and rescue us from what we have earned.

THAT is the main message of Christianity, in fact, that message is there since the fall of man, there needs to be a sacrifice of innocent life to make a covering for us Gen3:21 “And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them.” and before you wonder where is the innocent life here, ask yourself where the skins came from.

Whilst God does rain His blessings down on the just and the unjust, and we all benefit from His hand and the remnants of his nature in our lives, and have some level of love and compassion it is so broken that mostly we do good things for our own benefit, i.e. we give love to receive it, or we do charity to feel good about ourselves, true love and compassion which are sacrificial and not seeking reward of any kind, and are often the cause of persecution, are out workings of Christ’s work in us.

The other part about ‘acceptance and non-judging’ needs to be understood in a bit more detail and not taken as universally applicable, there are some things we are to accept and some things we are told that are not acceptable, there are some things we are not to judge and some things we are to judge, we are to rebuke sin, but we are also to encourage those that have fallen that there is forgiveness if they repent, this doesn’t necessarily mean amnesty in this world but it means amnesty for eternity. If one who comes to faith has committed a crime, they should pay the price for that crime. We have to accept that we have sinful nature but that doesn’t make it acceptable to sin, it only makes it understandable.  We are not to judge the faith of one another, only God can do that, but we are to judge the works we do and challenge whether those works evidence faith or not, and we are to encourage one another to better works.

Even though it may be understandable why we sin we should nevertheless strive not to, we shouldn’t take ‘sin’ and call it ‘not sin’ even though our very human nature makes us incapable of not sinning. We are not to justify our sin or our nature by words such as ‘That’s the way I am’ or even ‘That’s the way I was born’, we are called to fight the fight against our sinful nature, though we won’t win the war until we cast off these bodies we live in and are resurrected to the new life. We are called to cast off our nature and put on the nature of Christ. Rom 7:21-25 ” 21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand.  22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being,  23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members.  24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?  25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin. “  Paul's point here being that there is a battle, a conflict, going on within us and that victory is found only in God through Christ. In this life we won’t succeed perfectly, but we must nevertheless set the goal and aim at it with all strength, walk forward with all might and when we fall stand up again and continue the fight against our sinful nature. This is not something we can do in our own strength, we need to rely on Christ to provide us strength and perseverance, and we need to trust in Him and in Him alone anything we add is as filthy rags (menstrual cloths). Isaiah 64:6 "We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment."

More than that we are called to reach out in love to those still trapped and blind in their sin and call them to accept the work Christ has done, and turn away from their sinful lifestyles, and strive to live lives worthy of God’s perfect standard.  What kind of love stands by and allows another to continue unwittingly on the wide road that many follow that leads to the fiery furnace. It is not love to let them go their own way, no matter how much they kick and scream that they want their own way. It is love to try to turn them onto the narrow path through Christ that few will enter by even when they mock, insult, outvote and persecute. Matt 7:13-14 “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many.   14 For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.”

A final note we are to call sin what it is and not find it acceptable, but we are to love enough to share God's rescue plan with those that fall and practice it, share the truth in love. 

Heb 11:1-12:2 Heroes of the Faith

Intro

I want to begin by emphasising that faith is not something that comes from ourselves it is a gift of God, also we see many places in scripture that faith without ensuing works is dead, as James put it somewhat ironically ‘Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.’ As if anyone can show anybody else something without demonstrating it. Yes faith does have a component of belief,  confidence and trust in God, but if it doesn’t work itself out into what we do and say in our relationships to God and to others we are deceiving ourselves and do not have true faith. We can do lots of things without true faith and lots of people do, that is why Jesus one day will say ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ (Matt 7:23) On the other hand in the parable of the sheep and goats in Matt 25v31-46 the only difference is what they did.

So whilst good works can disguise us as being of the faith, not doing good works is evidence that we don’t have faith.

Having said that lets look at Hebrews 11:1-12:2.

1 Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  2 For by it the people of old received their commendation.  3 By faith we understand that the universe was created by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible.

  4 By faith Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous, God commending him by accepting his gifts. And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.  5 By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God.  6 And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.  7 By faith Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household. By this he condemned the world and became an heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.

  8 By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going.  9 By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise.  10 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.  11 By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised.  12 Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.

  13 These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth.  14 For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland.  15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return.  16 But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

  17 By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act of offering up his only son,  18 of whom it was said, “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.”  19 He considered that God was able even to raise him from the dead, from which, figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.  20 By faith Isaac invoked future blessings on Jacob and Esau.  21 By faith Jacob, when dying, blessed each of the sons of Joseph, bowing in worship over the head of his staff.  22 By faith Joseph, at the end of his life, made mention of the exodus of the Israelites and gave directions concerning his bones.

  23 By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful, and they were not afraid of the king's edict.  24 By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter,  25 choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.  26 He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward.  27 By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible.  28 By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the Destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.

  29 By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as if on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned.  30 By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days.  31 By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.

  32 And what more shall I say? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets— 33 who through faith conquered kingdoms, enforced justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,  34 quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, were made strong out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight.  35 Women received back their dead by resurrection. Some were tortured, refusing to accept release, so that they might rise again to a better life.  36 Others suffered mocking and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment.  37 They were stoned, they were sawn in two,*n1 they were killed with the sword. They went about in skins of sheep and goats, destitute, afflicted, mistreated—  38 of whom the world was not worthy—wandering about in deserts and mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

  39 And all these, though commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised,  40 since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect.

12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,  2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Abel

Gen 4:1-5  1 Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, saying, “I have gotten a man with the help of the LORD.”  2 And again, she bore his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, and Cain a worker of the ground.  3 In the course of time Cain brought to the LORD an offering of the fruit of the ground,  4 and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the LORD had regard for Abel and his offering,  5 but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell.  6 The LORD said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen?  7 If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

We don’t know who taught Abel and Cain to bring an offering or what that offering was supposed to be, it could have been Adam and Eve, it could also, and is more likely, to have been a direct request or teaching of the Lord for them to bring an offering, as He was clearly still speaking to men directly unlike today where he speaks to us through the words of scripture. We often spend too much time debating what the difference between the offerings of Cain and Abel were and point to the content of offering as the blame when the real issue was the state of their hearts. Abel brought his offering in faith whereas Cain did not, and when God spoke to Cain to ‘do well’ he would not turn away from the sin, clearly his desire was for the things of the world and not for the things of God, the offering was most likely brought with the wrong attitude, or just because that is what was required, rather than with an attitude of bringing joy to the Lord and recognition of the need for something, or someone, to die in his place. Because he would not repent and do what he had been asked he followed the sin that was crouching and murdered his brother. The only reason we highlight Cain’s failure and what his attitude was, is because that is all we really have as a contrast to understand how Abel’s offering was brought in other words what Cain didn’t get right Abel did.

Enoch

Gen 5:21-24 21 When Enoch had lived 65 years, he fathered Methuselah.  22 Enoch walked with God after he fathered Methuselah 300 years and had other sons and daughters.  23 Thus all the days of Enoch were 365 years.  24 Enoch walked with God, and he was not,  for God took him.

We know very little from scripture about Enoch other than that he lived on earth for 365 years and then God took him and one reference in Jude 1:14 14 It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord came with ten thousands of his holy ones,  15 to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” We don’t know what pleased God so much about Enoch clearly he was a prophet of God as we see in Jude, considering that in those times people were living into their 800’s and 900’s the fact that he was taken so early must have been significant and it would have been noticed by his parents and siblings and other peers. V6 of Hebrews 11 reminds us that ‘Without Faith it is impossible to please God’ in other words everything we do outside of trusting the Lord for His guidance and His strength, and His ability infused into us is displeasing to the Lord or as scripture puts it ‘as filthy rags’ (Isaiah 64:6) the rags spoken of being menstrual cloths.

Noah

Gen 6 11-22  11 Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence.  12 And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.  13 And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth.  14 Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch.  15 This is how you are to make it: the length of the ark 300 cubits, its breadth 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits.  16 Make a roof for the ark, and finish it to a cubit above, and set the door of the ark in its side. Make it with lower, second, and third decks.  17 For behold, I will bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life under heaven. Everything that is on the earth shall die.  18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall come into the ark, you, your sons, your wife, and your sons' wives with you.  19 And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every sort into the ark to keep them alive with you. They shall be male and female.  20 Of the birds according to their kinds, and of the animals according to their kinds, of every creeping thing of the ground, according to its kind, two of every sort shall come in to you to keep them alive.  21 Also take with you every sort of food that is eaten, and store it up. It shall serve as food for you and for them.”  22 Noah did this; he did all that God commanded him.

1 Pet 3:19-20 18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,  19 in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison,  20 because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight persons, were brought safely through water.

Many know the story of Noah fairly well and when we consider how long it must have taken to build the ark, that probably there was never even any rain before the flood, how must Noah’s preaching have been ridiculed, how must people have looked at the ark and laughed, some think that 120 years mentioned in Gen 6:3 regarding the number of days of men, may be the length of time that Noah was building and also preaching (1Pet 3:20) and therefore the time that God was giving for others to repent of their evildoing, if that’s true 120 years and not one soul turned, how strong must Noah’s faith have been, we would hardly do something for a few weeks or possibly even a few days before we give up. Yes we don’t have God speaking directly to us, but what things that we know we should be doing do we give up so easily when we don’t see results, what things that we do that we shouldn’t be doing do we struggle to give up because they hold us, or we hold onto them, stronger than the wisdom found in God’s word in other words our faith isn’t strong enough to overcome. Whether it was 120 years of building and preaching or just a few years Noah’s faith is a tremendous example to us of perseverance in the face of ridicule, hatred, and peer pressure.

I want to remind us at this point of 12v1,2 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,  2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Let’s think on these examples to strengthen our resolve and encourage us to hold onto the Faith that the Almighty God has given us to do that which he has commanded.

Next week we’ll look at Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and Moses

2 Peter 1v5

2 Peter 1 v3-8 ESV
3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, 4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.  5 For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, 7 and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  8 For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

To quote Matthew Henry “In these words the apostle comes to the chief thing intended in this epistle--to excite and engage them to advance in grace and holiness, they having already obtained precious faith, and been made partakers of the divine nature. This is a very good beginning, but it is not to be rested in, as if we were already perfect. The apostle had prayed that grace and peace might be multiplied to them, and now he exhorts them to press forward for the obtaining of more grace.”

The word ‘virtue’ could also be translated as ‘valour’ or ‘excellence’ something that is praiseworthy, in other words beyond just having a strong conviction of the truth that conviction should be supplemented or ‘fully supplied’ by outward behaviour that displays our character, a character based on the fact that we are partakers of the divine nature. In addition knowledge should be mixed in, the knowledge here is not so much knowledge of Christ but rather knowledge of his will which we find in the commands He gives us. 

This and the next verses are not sequential in nature, I mean we don’t first receive faith then get virtue and only then knowledge and so on, but these things all need to feed into us and as we grow all of these characteristics should be more and more evident in us. John Gill points out that the word ‘and’ here implies something like a chorus or symphony, individual voices and instruments mixing together at the same time to create a perfect harmony.

Calvin puts it this way “Add to your faith virtue, or, Supply to your faith virtue. He shews for what purpose the faithful were to strive, that is, that they might have faith adorned with good morals, wisdom, patience, and love. Then he intimates that faith ought not to be naked or empty, but that these are its inseparable companions. To supply to faith, is to add to faith. There is not here, however, properly a gradation as to the sense, though it appears as to the words; for love does not in order follow patience, nor does it proceed from it. Therefore the passage is to be thus simply explained, “Strive that virtue, prudence, temperance, and the things which follow, may be added to your faith.”

We are not to misunderstand that by Peter encouraging us to add these things that we think they come from our own effort, as taught elsewhere in scripture these things are all gifts from God and of the Spirit, they don’t come from our human nature but by his nature in us.

When we find ourselves failing and lacking in these things we must recognise that we cannot draw these things out of our own nature, strength or activity, to use a well-known phrase we can’t “pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps”, we need to go to the source and ask for these things to be poured into us or perhaps rather poured out of the new heart which he has given us, and into which if we are truly saved we are growing into. We need to fill ourselves with the water of life which he pours into us, we need to overflow with these things in ways that cause our brethren to be encouraged to praise God and strain towards the goal of being more like Christ. We need to put ourselves in the presence of others who live this way so that we also are enthused into life, but I want to stress yet again we are never to think any of this is our own works, we are not seek praise for ourselves, but we are to strive for our upliftment into the body of Christ as we become joined with Him in holiest matrimony as his bride.

Let us live for Christ out of the Life he has already put in us.
Amen

2 Peter 1v4

1 Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ:   2 May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.   3 His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence,  4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

The 'by which' in v4 could refer to the divine power of God or to the knowledge of him or even to 'his own glory and excellence' but like a series of dominoes, since the latter two are a result of the former working in us I don't think it's necessary to argue the matter although some others have seen fit to do so, at this point I think it's more important to focus on the ensuing dominoes which bring more explanation.

God has granted us his precious and very great promises: we know that the bible is full of promises but we need to understand the weight of this. We so often make promises because our simple yes or no doesn't seem to bear enough weight, and sometimes we feel a yes isn't a yes, and a no isn't a no unless backed up by some greater force of oath or promise as if that really makes a difference. In truth very often whilst we make many promises we also have to break many of them sometimes due to circumstances beyond our control, and in truth we should be very careful of making promises or even saying yes or no apart from throwing in a caveat. God's promises however are not subject to being 'out of his control' as everything is under his control, that there is a 'very great promise' is not God trying to ensure us of his intent, but rather to make us understand how valuable the gift he gives us is, there is no doubt that what God says He will do – he will do.

And so what is it he has granted us, 'that we can be partakers of his nature'. This is not a wholesale statement saying that we will be like God in all ways, that cannot be for we are creatures and whilst we will continue to eternity we are not from eternity, I don't think it means we will become all knowing or all powerful either. In other words we don't become like God in every way, but we do become like him in that we will display his glory perfectly and we will be without stain looking back at the end of v3 'called us to his own Glory and excellence'. In a sense we get to taste and share in his nature, we don't get all of his nature.

The last part of this verse focuses on what we have escaped from and therefore what we need to realize we are no longer enslaved to i.e. the corruption of our sinful desire, it is not that our sinful desire is no longer with us now, unlike what some popular speakers like to tell their listeners, but our sinful desires and the fact that we keep following them into sin no longer have the power to corrupt us. Somehow we are like an item that has been covered with a self cleaning layer of protection, we keep dragging ourselves through the mud and filth of sin but when we are raised there is no sign of stain. That covering of course is Christ and because of his holiness no sin can stick to him and because his blood covers our sin the result is we escape the corruption that would otherwise cause us to rot and that would ultimately make us unsightly in eternity only fit for the eternal fires of God's wrath. In closing before we think Peter is giving license here to sin let's take a peek ahead at v5-8:   For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge,   and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness,   and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Amen

2 Peter 1v3

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, (ESV)

We see that by God's power we have everything we need to live and more than that to live Godly lives, in truth once we have turned from Simon's into Peter's through faith and are growing by the work done in us by Christ's sanctifying work which leads to and is guided by a greater intimacy with God, we find that the exercising of our works of faith is amplified by His divine power which is infinite both in strength and duration. It is sufficient, no more than sufficient, for anything we need and again we see that it is based on and comes by intimacy with him, and again it is not initiated by ourselves but by his calling us. And what does he call us to ‘to his own glory and excellence’ in other words echoed elsewhere to be perfect as He is perfect.

I want to stress again that this perfection is not something we can claim as being a result of anything we do for we are clothed with Christ's righteousness it is 'HlS OWN glory and excellence’ which he gives to us freely not something we become in and of our own strength. It is his glory It is his excellence. This should give us a sense of responsibility in that we need to recognise our own unsuitability and inability to attain, but it should give us a sense of comfort and peace and joy knowing that He does this work for us, this should free us to do the work He calls us to knowing that it relies not on our own strength but his, if we move forward trusting in Him he provides the acceleration and power to reach His goals. 

The fact that He chooses to use us as part of achieving His will and proclaiming His presence in this world should give us a sense of awe and joy that surpasses any fear, pain and sadness we may feel in this temporary abode that will soon be over as we pass into our eternal home bathed in his Glory and grace.

Crash!!!

For those who haven't been following elsewhere, I upgraded to a new mountain bike a week and a half ago. I've done a few short rides on it, and it is a lot nicer than the entry level MTB's I had (which have been passed on to other entry level riders), much easier to get up hills and over obstacles, and definitely a lot smoother on the rippled dirt roads. (Some say it better be for the money I paid for it)

Specialized Camber Carbon Comp

After some patching up

Unfortunately, though there are days off this week, I won't be riding (much), because of what happened on Saturday morning. The damage to me:. grazed face, broken pinky finger, cuts on nose from glasses, the glasses have some deep scratches on the lenses. The helmet also has a deepish impact 'injury'. There are some grazes on my knees and forearms, and my right shoulder has been aching as if it's had a good hard bump. The bike as you can see looks almost perfect but I have managed to put some scratches on the handlebars and lever mounts.

Yup I haven't washed the bike yet, I'll do it later today.

What happened? Well I don't remember.... but the GPS tracks I have give some circumstantial evidence.


The green line above is speed and the grey line is altitude, as you can see going down hill at nearly 40Km/h suddenly drops to 0 then I continue a bit more down before turning around and coming back up. This doesn't show time linearly so I can't really see gaps where I was stationery but actual riding was 34 minutes and I got home almost an hour after I left. It is also apparent, based on the speed up the hill, that I rode home, but again I don't recall that. Also I came home with some toilet paper I didn't leave with so someone must have helped me, also looking this morning I must have drunk from my juice bottle but I don't remember that. In fact I only start remembering in sequence properly after I got into my friend Alan's car, who took me to the doctor.

The rubber ring on the shock which gets pushed up and records maximum depression was pushed up quite high which indicates that I probably rode into a hole and got thrown forward hitting the dirt with my face. For what it's worth this is a section of track I know fairly well I've ridden it dozens of times as I nearly always start MTB rides down this hill.so I really don't know what unexpected obstacle I might have hit. Maybe I'll take a (slow) ride or walk there to see if there is any evidence of what might have happened.

So some lessons learned?

• Always wear protective gear, judging by the impact on the helmet without it I would have a cracked skull, without the glasses my eyes might have been damaged. With a full face helmet my face wouldn't have got grazed (or at least not as badly).
• There are some good people out there, the unknown person who helped could just as easily have been someone who took advantage of my unconscious/addled state and robbed me, but I came home with everything I left with as well as the tissue that had been used to mop some of my blood off my face and arms.
• I'm only human, broken and frail both in the physical/mental sense and the spiritual sense.

Despite what many may think, that it was just good luck or fortune that I came home relatively safely, I know there is a God who cares for me, and who had this incident in His plan, and that He works only for the good of those He has chosen. I don't know what exactly the purpose of this is, and I may never know. I have peace about that, there is no point fretting about why God does things, we may never understand His purposes completely and who are we to question Him, who created all from nothing, when He chooses pain to refine us more into his likeness. Whether this was beneficial for me or whether it is beneficial to someone else at my expense matters not to me. I can only thank Him for working through me and perhaps I will know the blessing this has brought when I meet with Him in glory.

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33 ESV)

2 Peter 1v2

May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. (ESV)

As I said last time we so often gloss over the greetings and miss out on much value that God has for us in both the heart with which the greetings are toned and the teaching that is in them, last time we saw how the words of Peter in v1 put his stamp of apostolic authority on what he is about to say but also highlights the equal value of those he is writing to ‘A faith of equal standing with ours.’ And the humility with which he is about to appeal to the readers recognizing the foundational truth that righteousness comes by Christ alone and not any work of their or our own.
To this he now adds that his desire for the readers is that we may continue in grace and peace, that such grace and peace would be multiplied to us in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
It is often said that grace is the active work that is done for and to us that we don’t deserve, in the sense we are looking at it now it is specifically the fact that Christ works in us through sanctification which builds upon itself in a multiplicative way, the more we receive grace the more we realize how much more we need, it’s a bit like looking through a keyhole and seeing something of what is happening but not getting the whole picture but as Christ works in us we become more perceptive of our blindness and failings and thus need more and more grace shown towards us to lift us up, in a sense God gradually pulls us through the door so that we get to understand more and more of His Glory and understand better the disastrous effect our sinfulness had on that relationship, and yet because we see more of his glory and receive more of His grace, in the fuller awareness we cannot help but leap in joy and praise as what lays behind us becomes comparably insignificant.
Peace is I think both the peace that denotes the restoration of the relationship between ourselves and the Godhead as well as the effect of that peace on our brothers and sisters around us, peace in this sense is not a quiet cessation of hostilities, but a joining of enemies that results in a greater work spilling exponentially over into the hearts and minds of those around us, who see mortal enemies now able to live and work in harmony. We see different parts joined together in a way that works as a whole, we see broken parts being supported by other parts, many also broken but in different ways. And the lifeblood flowing through this wonderful organism is Christ’s and at the centre of it is the cross.
All of this has it’s root founded upon the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, we cannot leave this out, without a foundation no building can stand when the storms come, it will wash away from underneath or it will blow over as it has nothing to keep it on the ground, it will crumble as the ground shakes as walls come apart. The weak walls even when cemented together cannot hold under pressure if they have no grounding that transmits its strength up the heights and breadth and width of the structure. It’s also important to note that a foundation is not just a simple laying of a border and a slab but the very design of the building on top of it is taken into consideration, it is no use simply building the outer wall and then building other load bearing walls inside, eventually the floor will cave in and these other walls will collapse, God has created a design in the foundation that we must not waiver from, or we will fall into destruction, we cannot simply willy-nilly put up a wall where God did not design for one to be, it’s also a bit pointless not building a wall where God designed one to be as it will leave a gap in the structure that would be important when the roof or the next level is put on. We need to ground our faith on the plan and purpose of God and not try to twist it to our own ends.
As you will see later this is all important introduction for the warning which is to come in this book, we need to grow in our knowledge, we must not run around in ignorance, it will lead to many being pulled around by false doctrines, we need to dig into God’s word and see where he has planned for us to stand, rooting ourselves, and allowing ourselves to be built upon by the next layer or generation of believers as the builder builds His temple the Church. And all of this whilst we seem to be busy applying our own strength is amplified by God’s strength as he provides all that we need to accomplish His purpose and plan.