A Year To Grow!
Text: 2 Peter 3:18
By: Ken McKinley
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All week I contemplated and prayed about whether I should preach one more Christmas sermon, or a New Year’s sermon. And since this is the last Sunday of 2010, I thought it might be fitting for us to look at the last words that Peter wrote, probably shortly before his death. So it’s not a Christmas sermon, but it’s not necessarily a New Year’s sermon either. But I believe it’s the right sermon.
Now tradition tells us that Peter was crucified outside of Rome sometime between 65 and 68 A.D. during the reign of Nero – As the guards laid him on the cross and readied to drive the nails, he said that he wasn’t worthy to die in the same manner as Jesus so the crucified him upside down. When he wrote this letter, he knew his time was short and so what he wrote should be of great interest to us, at least I hope it is. And let me just tell you; as I was studying this text, I was thinking to myself that I need to be studying something on shrinkage rather than growth, with all the good food I’ve eaten over the past couple of days, but of course Peter here is talking about spiritual growth, and as we come to the end of 2010, and look forward to 2011, I hope that each one of us here today is resolved to grow spiritually. And if you know much about Peter, then you know he’s somebody who could speak of spiritual growth. This was the guy who the Lord rebuked by saying, “Get behind me Satan!” Peter was the guy who denied the Lord 3 times even though he swore that he would never deny Him. Later on he even gets rebuked by the Apostle Paul, in public no less. But by the time he wrote this, Peter had been walking with the Lord as a Christian for about 30 years. He had grown a lot.
Now there are basically two things that he tells us here. We are to grow in grace and we are to grow in knowledge. And I want us to look at those two things, but we’re going to look at them in the opposite sequence that Peter mentions them, and the reason I’m doing that is because I want us to see the emphasis that’s put on grace before knowledge, so I’m actually going to end with that instead of being with it.
So… first of all we are to grow in knowledge. But what kind of knowledge? Well he says, “The knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” But what’s that mean exactly? Does Peter want us to learn historical facts? Does he want us to learn certain doctrines about Christ? Or does he want us to get that heart knowledge, where we know Jesus relationally? Well; I have to tell you, I think he means both. We are to grow in knowledge about Christ & we are to grow in knowledge that is relational to Christ. We need to remind ourselves over and over again about the basic truths about Jesus. His virgin birth, His life and ministry, His teachings, His death on the cross, His resurrection and ascension into heaven, His being seated at the right hand of the Father, and what all of those things mean to us. You know several studies have been done that show that Christians rarely read their Bible’s anymore, and it blows my mind how so many who claim to know Christ are content with a half our service on Sunday morning and a half hour service on Sunday evening and to be in the world without ever cracking open their Bibles during the week. I don’t know… that doesn’t seem to be enough to grow us up in our faith. We live in an age where we have more access to Christian literature and sermons and Christian teaching than ever before. And yet study after study shows that we are probably the poorest educated followers of Christ in history. We can’t articulate Biblical doctrines, we can’t adequately defend our faith against the worlds attacks.
We have a whole library of Christian books in there… and I just made a check out list and set it on the lectern in there. Please feel free to use that resource. If none of those books are of interest, I can give you a list of books that I recommend on a variety of Christian subjects. Number one on that list is the Bible.
We need to grow in the knowledge of the Lord, and one of the best ways to do that is by reading… reading books, WITHOUT PICTURES. Even within our own, human legal system, lawyers will tell you that ignorance of the law is not an excuse for breaking it, and WILLFUL ignorance will often result in a stiffer penalty than just plain ignorance will. In other words, there are some within the world who don’t know, because they don’t have the opportunity to know, but then there are some in the world, who don’t know, because they chose not to. The resources are available, but they chose not to know. Now I know there are some who would say, “I don’t like to read.” And all I can say to that is, “Take it up with God. He’s the One who chose to put His Word into book format.”
So first of all, Peter wants us to grow in the knowledge of the truth’s we find in God’s Word, doctrines and teachings about Christ, and from Christ, and concerning Christ. But also we need to grow to know Him better. Grow in our relationship with Him. I hope we all know Him as our Savior, but do we know Him as our Lord and King? Do we know that in every situation He rules over us, and not only us but over all our enemies. Do we know His sovereignty and power? Do we know Him as prophet? Do we know what He’s saying to us in the circumstances and situations of our lives? What is He teaching you in what you’re going through? Do we know Him as our Priest, who forgives us of our sins and gave Himself as an offering for them? Do we know Him as our Friend, who sticks closer than a brother?
These things are what Peter means when he says we need to grow in knowledge.
But Peter also said we need to grow in grace. You see; you have to be given grace before you can grow in it. And we need to grow in grace; in our understanding of it, and of its implications for our lives, both now and in eternity. And when you grow in grace, you grow in your appreciation of the Gospel… of what it means that He died for you and me, even though we were unworthy, undeserving… that’s grace. And I’ll tell you what else you get when you grow in grace… you get assurance. You get peace. You get joy… joy unspeakable and full of glory. And I’ll tell you why. Because when you understand grace, you understand that your salvation, and your justification and eventual glorification isn’t based on you, or anything you do. If I die sometime in the New Year, I know that I would immediately be in the presence of the Lord, I have absolute assurance of that. Because my trip there has been bought and paid for by the blood of Christ. It’s not based on anything I’ve done. It’s not based on how good I preach, or how many good deeds I’ve done in my life. It’s not based on how much Scripture I can quote, or how many tithes I’ve paid. It’s based solely on the grace of God. It’s based on the fact that He died for me… and for you too. Jesus did it all, that you and I would be saved.
The Apostle Paul said it this way, “Where sin abounds… grace doth much more abound.” And let me just tell you… sin abounds. You know it, and I know it. We’re Baptists after all. We know sin abounds. In our world, sin abounds. In our community, sin abounds… here in this very congregation, sin abounds. But grace much more abounds! What Paul was saying was that no matter what you’ve done in your life, no matter how bad of a sinner you were, or how bad of a sinner you’ve been. You CANNOT thwart the grace of God. Your sin and my sin is not more powerful than God’s grace and it borders on supreme arrogance for us to think that our sins are too great for God to forgive us. Our sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus just as easily as Paul’s were or Peter’s were.
Turn with me to Romans chapter 7 (Read Romans 7:18 – 8:1). Do you know what Paul’s saying there? He’s saying sin abounds, but grace much more abounds!
Yes there is wretchedness, and yes there is sin, but grace much more abounds!
I want to grow in that, and I want you all to grow in that. I want you to understand the grace of God, and experience the grace of God, and know it and live it, and share it with everyone you know. Not so that we can say we’ve got this number of people sitting in our pews on Sunday morning… so that they can be saved. So that they can be rescued from an eternal hell.
Remember that doctrine? There’s a heaven to gain and a hell to avoid. I know there’s a lot of folks who don’t like it, and a lot of folks don’t want to hear about it… but isn’t that why we do what we do? Do we believe that anymore?
You say, “Now wait a minute… I thought you were talking about grace.” I am! And when you see the terribleness of hell, it makes grace all the more amazing.
I want us as a body of believers to grow in grace, and I want you all to grow in grace individually. I want 2011 to be a year that grace abounds in our hearts, in our minds, in the things we do and say, in the way we treat people, in our relationships, in our work, our jobs, our school. I want us to be able to look back at 2011 and say that we grew by leaps and bounds in grace. You say, “How will we know? How will we know if we’ve grown in grace?” Well grace not only gives you assurance, and peace and joy and comfort… but it also takes something away from us… grace removes our pride. You see; when we understand its all of grace, and not about us, or because of us, our pride shrinks and our humility increases. Turn with me; really quickly to Philippians 2:1-8 (Read).
You see church; we don’t deserve to be in the kingdom, we’re part of it only because of God’s grace. We deserve wrath and judgment, and eternal condemnation. And so I pray, and boy do I pray, that all of us, that me and all of you, would grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in the coming year. That we would know Him, and see in Him the perfect example of God’s grace, manifested in human flesh. And that we would be more and more like Him, to the glory of God the Father.
Let’s Pray
