2 Peter 3.18 As we have talked about our church recently, we've mentioned goals. We need to have some clear goals to work toward. In the last blurb from the session we asked you to pray about this - and I hope that you are. It has occurred to me, though, that having the right kind of goals will be worthless unless we are the right kind of people. What good are the right goals, goals from God, if we do not pursue them in the right way? And so, a necessary ingredient in our plans for the future is an old-fashioned word: piety. Sadly, this word has a bad reputation. It has that sense of being religious but in an odd sort of way. But real piety is about knowing Jesus and working hard to follow Him. We need to be pious people as we pursue God's plans for our church. And that is what our text is about, developing piety. We will meet with success as a church only if we pursue the goals that God has for us as a pious people. Our topic this morning is piety. Let's see that the Spirit has to teach us about this.
'Grow in grace'. I have to confess to you that this command of Peter has baffled me over the years. What does he mean? What could 'growing in grace' actually look like? Fortunately, there have been some breakthroughs recently. Listen to something from Luke. 'Jesus increased in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.' The part that I want to point out to you is this. 'Jesus increased ... in favor.' Believe it or not, that's the same idea that we see in Peter. In fact, what is translated 'in favor' in Luke, is translated 'in grace' in our text. They're actually the same words in the original Greek. Both Peter and Luke are talking about growing in favor with God. Now, that's something that I understand. The Old Testament is filled with statements about the favor of God. Here's a familiar one. 'But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.' Here's pious Noah living faithfully in an evil generation. God sees that and responds with a blessing. 'Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.'
This favor with God is not something that stays the same all the time. It changes. Sometimes it grows. 'Jesus increased ... in favor.' Peter commands that we grow in favor. But there are also examples of those for whom God's favor diminished. Saul, the first king of Israel, is a good example. He was greatly favored and thus blessed by God when he began to rule. But by the time of his death, he had forfeited God's favor. Each of us is either increasing or decreasing in God's favor. This is not to say that His love for us changes. It does not. It cannot. That is set. But His favor is different. Favor with God can grow or fade.
Now is a good time to ask a question. And the question is, 'Why?' Why was it that Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord? Why was it that Saul lost favor with God? What do the Scriptures say? It was a matter of their choices. We see the fruit of Noah's choices in this: 'Then the Lord said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation.”' Noah repeatedly chose to be faithful. That's why God could call him righteous. And that's why he found favor with God. We also see the fruit of Saul's choices: 'And Samuel said to Saul, “You have done foolishly. You have not kept the command of the Lord your God, with which he commanded you. For then the Lord would have established your kingdom over Israel forever. But now your kingdom shall not continue.”' Saul chose differently than Noah. As a result he lost God's favor. God's favor grows in our lives or it diminishes because of our choices. Wise choices, like Noah's, lead to growing in favor with God. Foolish choices, like Saul's, result in a loss of that favor.
Let me pause here to emphasize this point. Our choices are so important. We flourish in God's favor or fail to do so because of the choices we make. This is why some Christians seem to do so well and thrive as people - and other Christians don't. It's the choices that we make. I hope this strikes you as a very sobering thought. The quality of your life right now is due to the choices you have made. I want you to feel how important your choices are. Your experience of God's favor depends on your the choices you make day by day.
This leads to the second part of our text. Peter not only commands growth in favor. He also commands growth in knowledge. 'But grow in the ... knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.' My point here is simple: favor and knowledge are related. You will grow in favor if you choose to grow in the knowledge of Jesus. Remember, it's all about Jesus. It always comes back to Jesus.
Knowing Jesus is like knowing your best friend, except better. But like all friendships, knowing Jesus is not set in stone. Some friendships grow while others fade. Friends get closer or they drift apart. So, knowing Jesus is not like knowing your math facts. Once you know two plus two is four, you know it. Knowing Jesus is something that can grow - and thanks be to God for that - but it is also something that can fade. Peter helps us to understanding how to grow in knowing Jesus. He did that when he described Jesus as, 'our Lord and Savior'. If you are going to grow in your knowledge of Jesus, if the friendship is going to become closer, it will be because what those two titles are all about becomes more and more real to you.
I have a stationary bike in my basement. One of my goals is to ride it each day. While I ride I'll either read something, or listen to a lecture or sermon on my iPod wannabe. One day this week I decided to listen to a sermon by someone who was new to me. I didn't know it when I chose this sermon, but the text for the sermon was Psalm 73. That's one of my favorites. I've studied it a good bit. So, I'm thinking that I won't hear anything terribly new, but I'll give it a listen anyway. But, as He is wont to do, the Spirit surprised me. He used that sermon to point out some sin in my life. It was the sin of self-pity which was rooted in jealousy. And it was a sin that was on the way to making me bitter. I had known that something wasn't right, and I had prayed about it earlier in the week. The Spirit answered my prayer through that sermon. As a result of what I had heard, I agreed that I had fallen into sin. I confessed it as such and repented of it. And I gave thanks that it had not yet moved into bitterness, that the Spirit had graciously dealt with me before that happened. The next day, I'm on the bike again, listening to someone else giving a lecture on spiritual warfare. In the middle of his lecture, this speaker spends a good bit of time on the topic of bitterness and the great dangers associated with it. The Spirit wasn't done with what He had started the day before. I was able to see, much more clearly, this foul sin called bitterness. I, again, but with more fervency, gave thanks that the Spirit kept me from becoming bitter.
Why am I telling you this? It was through these experiences that I came to understand a little better what it means that Jesus is my Savior. I could point to the bitterness that awaited my self-pitying and jealous soul, and say, 'Jesus saved me from that!' That's what Peter's talking about when he tells us to grow in the knowledge of Jesus as our Savior. You grow in this knowledge as you see what it means that Jesus saves you from sin. Sometimes He rescues you from the consequence of some sin you've already committed, like my self-pity and jealousy which were forgiven. And sometimes He rescues you from falling into a sin, like that bitterness. But growing in the knowledge of Jesus as Savior won't happen if 'sin' refers to some of your slip-ups from long ago or just a vague notion that 'Uh, yeah, I guess I am a sinner'. You grow in your knowledge of Jesus, the Savior, as you see each day's very specific sins exposed and then dealt with by the Spirit. That's how Jesus as your Savior becomes more and more real.
All of this is tied to Jesus as Lord. When the Spirit pointed out my sin through that sermon on Psalm 73, I had a choice. Remember what my sin was: self-pity rooted in jealousy. There was something that I wanted, something that I thought I had a right to, something that other people had, that I did not have. I wanted that. I demanded that. And when I didn't get it, I came close to imploding. I came close to that awful sin of bitterness. But I do not have that something because of Jesus' plan for me. So, when the Spirit pointed all of this out to me, I had a choice. I could hold on to my demand - I could have ignored what the Spirit was saying or I could have justified my demand in some way - or I could submit to Jesus as my Lord. At that moment, the crucial question was, 'Who is Lord of my life - Jesus or me?' Time to choose. Interestingly, once I had made my choice to submit to Jesus, I felt a change. My joy was restored. That had been the tip-off that something was wrong. My joy was missing. That's what I had prayed about earlier in the week. Something felt wrong. And the Spirit answered that prayer by pointing to my sin and then dealing with it by the Gospel.
This is what it means to grow in the knowledge of Jesus as Lord of your life. It's not some one-time decision that you made in the distant past. It is a choice - or better - a series of choices that you make each day. Who is Lord of my life? That is a question that you answer every day in the details of life. And as you answer that question with wise choices you grow in the favor of Jesus.
So, do you see that a pious person is that Christian who works at obeying the command of our text? He is growing in favor by growing in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And he grows by the choices that he makes. We need to be this kind of people, a pious people, if we are going to be able to pursue the goals that Jesus has for us as a church. Any other kind of person could never pursue those goals in the way they need to be pursued.
I have one last thought. I've told you that our future as individual people, our future as a church, depends on choices we make. By itself, that sentence should terrify you. Does anyone here really believe that he is able to make wise choices - forget all of the time, forget even most of the time - how about just much of the time? If anyone here has that much confidence in himself, he either does not know what a good choice really looks like, or he doesn't comprehend how much evil remains in his heart. Everything depends on our choices, but we are incapable of making good choices even just much of the time. That is scary. And that's why it's so good that we have Jesus as Lord and Savior. My being able to choose wisely when the Spirit used Psalm 73 to confront me in my sin was not because I'm so good or wise or anything like that. By no means! If I were that good, I wouldn't have found myself in that mess. No, it was the work of the Spirit of Jesus in my life. Because of Him, I chose wisely. By His Spirit, Jesus guides His people into wise choices. That is part of His favor to us. But, remember, this favor is not automatic. It is not set in stone. And it becomes ours only by the power of the Spirit.
And brings us back again to something I've mentioned before. You need to put yourself in the place where the Spirit does His work. If you would be pious, if you would have Faith Reformed be a faithful church, if you would have any hope of making wise choices, then you need to give yourselves to things like Bible reading and prayer. It's when we give ourselves to the Spiritual disciplines like these that the Spirit does His work in our lives. It is only then that we are able to choose wisely. For the next few sermons I plan on taking a closer look at these basic building blocks, the Spiritual disciplines, so that we would grow as pious people who pursue Jesus' goals for our lives and our church in Jesus' way. That is the only road that leads to success.