If you have your Bibles, turn to 2 Peter, chapter 1, could we stand up and read this? We’re going to read four verses together. I do just to remind us that what we’re about to do is not hear a person’s opinions and some thoughts that I have from the week, but these are the very Words of God that we’re about to read. So just in reverence for that, let’s recognize that these Words really did come from God, and let’s treat them as such and have a reverence for this that we don’t have for other people’s advice or other people’s thoughts. This is coming from God Himself.
2 Peter chapter 1: Simon 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: May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who has called us to His own glory and excellence, 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. [2 Peter 1:1-4 ESV]
Father, I pray that You would now open our eyes up to everything these verses scream out to us. May we treat them with honor, not just by understanding, but living them out. God, bless us. Please bless us this morning by letting us understand Your Word. In Jesus’ Name, we pray. Amen.
Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ. Remember, a couple of weeks ago we talked about Simon Peter. We talked about how he was an apostle, but it’s interesting because what he says here- Some would say an apostle, pretty much everyone would say, “Why that’s really the highest authority He gives a man here on the Earth.” He’s a sent one, a called one from God Himself, and yet, the interesting thing, as you know, when Peter writes, he doesn’t start off and say, “I’m an apostle.” He goes, “I’m a servant.” You know how we’re really into titles, and if any of you are doctors, you want to make sure people call you “doctor.” I am Dr. Chan, not mister. I don’t just have my master’s. Dr. Chan. I’m not, but if I did, I would make you do that. (Laughter)
But it’s so beautiful the way Peter starts off. He goes, “I’m a servant. The first thing you’ve got to know is I’m a servant of God, and that’s really all I need. I’m a servant of God, and I happen to be an apostle. I happen to be called by God to be starting this church and having this great calling.” But it’s interesting, because right after he says that, “Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ,” he says, “To those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours.” Isn’t that great? Here he is as apostle, and the first thing he wants to say is to make sure you understand that you have a faith that’s of equal standing of his. The first thing out of his mouth is, ‘I’m a servant, and yeah, I’m an apostle, but understand, we’re on the same level field right here. You and I, we’ve got equal status before God.’ And I just want us to think about that for a second because I’ve got to ask you, do you really believe that? Think about these words: those who have obtained a faith of equal standing. Do you believe that you have a faith of equal standing as Peter? Imagine if Peter, if we could resurrect him, and he were standing on the stage right here. You know Peter, “walked on water” Peter? That Peter? That walked with Jesus? That Peter that Jesus used to pen these Words? That Peter that Jesus used to really help establish His church? And he’s standing here, would you sitting in your seat believe that you have equal standing with him, or is there a side of you that goes, “Well, he’s got this super relationship with God…and…” We’ve got to end this. We’ve got to stop thinking that somehow- You’ve got to end this belief that you’re some less-loved child of God because I think a lot of people really believe that.
Over the years, I’ve heard people make statements many, many times, where people would go, “Well, that’s you!” As I talk about my relationship with God and His faithfulness and His goodness and this intimacy I have with Him, they go, “Well, that’s you. You’ve got this thing going.” Kind of like what I was saying I do with Tim sometimes. It’s almost like, “Well, that’s different. He’s a missionary, and he was a good kid, and he doesn’t struggle with this stuff. He’s different.” And Scripture’s going, ‘No, no, no, wait a second. This is Peter speaking, and he’s saying we’ve got a faith of equal standing.’ We’ve got to quit this mindset that I’ve got something over you, or Tim’s got something over you, or Peter’s got something over you because he himself says we’ve got a faith of equal standing.
I struggle with a lot of different things, but one thing that the Lord has blessed me with by His grace is I really believe that passage of Scripture. I really could look at Peter, and go, ‘It’s no different. I’m the same as him.’ Some of you know, one of my favorite verses is James 5:17, where it says Elijah was a man just like us. It talks about the great Elijah, the prophet, who called down fire from heaven, the one that prayed and it didn’t rain for three years. And then it says Elijah was a man just like us. I love that verse. It’s just that constant reminder. I can tell you right now, I honestly believe, you look at Moses, you look at David, you look at Abraham, you look at Paul, Peter, Elijah, and I seriously have a faith that goes, ‘They’ve got nothing on me.’ Seriously. I do believe that. I do look at my life, and go, ‘You know what, God, you could do those things through me if You wanted to,’ because I have a faith of equal standing with them. But I’ve got to ask you this morning, do you believe that about yourself? You’ve got to put aside your feelings and trust the Word of God. Some of you may go, ‘You don’t know what I’ve done in my life or what I haven’t done with my life.’ You’ve got to trust the Word of God. And Peter, here he says, “You’ve got a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of God, our Savior, Jesus Christ.”
Why is it a faith of equal standing? It’s because of the righteousness that Peter received from Jesus Christ. The Bible says in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 21, it says, “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.” [2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV] Remember what happened on the Cross. The Bible says that God made Him who knew no sin- Jesus was sinless, right? He’s perfect. Perfectly righteous, no sin, He’s just flawless, just pure, nothing, nothing, not an ounce of sin in Him. And it says that on that Cross, what God did was He turned Jesus into sin. He made Him sin. He made Him sin who knew no sin so that we, WE, could become the righteousness of Christ through Him. We changed places. Jesus took all of my garbage on that Cross, and then I took all of His righteousness. All of it. So when God sees me, it’s the righteousness of Christ that He sees. You can’t get any more righteous than that. That’s why Peter says we’re in the same place right now. It’s not like Peter got Christ’s righteousness plus Peter’s added to that. That didn’t really help any. That just screws things up, and that’s why he says, ‘Do you understand, we’re in the same place here?’ I know some of you have done some things in the past, and maybe part of you is going, ‘You don’t know. I’m not as righteous as you.’ And that’s a lie. It’s a lie because you don’t know all of the things that I’ve done. And it’s a lie because the Word of God says our righteousness isn’t from our efforts or our actions. You’ve got to trust the Word of God. Remember, we stood in reverence for God’s Word. It’s one thing to say, “Yeah, I revere these words.” It’s another thing to believe it in your heart that as you sit in your seat right now, if you believe that Jesus died on that Cross for you, and you really have made a decision to follow Him, then you have a faith that’s of equal standing as Peter. You are just as righteous as the one who penned these Words, Peter himself. You and I are no different because we’ve all taken on the righteousness of Christ because He took all of our sin upon Himself at once. It’s a pretty awesome promise.
And then he says these words: May grace and peace be multiplied to you. May grace and peace be multiplied to you. How many of you, were you just full of grace and peace this week? Was it just multiplied? Could people just see it on your face? I don’t see anyone with that much peace. Grace and peace multiplied to you. This is God’s desire for His children. It’s funny, some of you know our third daughter, Ellie, who’s the freak of our family. She’s just always laughing, does goofy things, and I can stare at her and just laugh. She loves to laugh. She gets in trouble at school for laughing, and I love that. It’s like, ‘Yeah, just laugh. Don’t let them stop you!’ Just laugh. Be goofy. And she went through this weird phase for a month or two when she was normal, and Lisa and I were like, “What’s going on with her?” And the last few weeks, it’s like, ‘Aw, Ellie’s back.’ She’s just as goofy as ever. Yesterday morning was the loudest I’d laughed in so long, just watching her try to catch a ball. It’s just hilarious, and you know how as parents, you just love to see your kids that way. When they’re just three and laughing and ridiculous and no cares in the world, just full of peace and grace. That’s what God wants of His children. He just wants His grace and peace all over us. And some of us aren’t experiencing that. It’s not multiplied to us. And here’s why. How do you get it? Does God just throw His grace and peace into you? What does it say? Look at the Word. Look what it says: May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus, our Lord.
So how do we get this grace and peace? It says you get it through this knowledge of God. Do you understand that? The grace and peace, it’s not- Some of us want to find grace and peace in other ways. Some of us want God to do something for us, and then we would get this grace and peace. And God’s saying, ‘No, don’t you understand that this grace and peace is multiplied to you as you know Him, and the more you know Him, the closer you are to Him, the more you’ll feel this grace and peace. The more you’ll have this in abundance.’ It’s directly tied to knowing Him, and I believe that there are some of us- And I’ve struggled with this. When I looked at this passage, it really opened my eyes to even some things in my own life. Sometimes, my grace and peace and my joy are directly related to how other people are doing and how they’re doing with their walk with the Lord and how ministries are going or how someone is my family is doing. When they’re down or they’re struggling or they’re wrestling with their sin, it brings me down. We tie it to these other things. If that were different, if this person would change, then I would be full of grace and peace. But what the Bible says is it’s not about that. It’s kind of like when the Disciples were sent out, and they came back with joy because the ministry was going so well. Jesus stops them, and goes, ‘Hey, don’t go rejoicing in that. Don’t rejoice because ministry is going well because it’ll go poorly some time. Don’t rejoice because you see some powerful things happen. Rejoice that your name’s written in the book of life. Rejoice that God knows you because that’s the one thing that’s stable.’
As you came in this morning, if I said, ‘Look, I’m Jeanie this morning, whatever you want, anything you want. Trick or treat. Here you go. What do you want? You can have it. God will grant you anything you want this morning, but you can only name one thing.’ What’s that one thing you would have asked for as you walked in this morning? Think about that.
Would you have asked for greater intimacy with Him, believing that greater intimacy with Him is the solution is all your problems, believing that greater intimacy with Him, a greater knowledge of Him, would lead you to this multiplication of grace and peace? Or honestly, as you came in, were you thinking that it was something else, that if this one thing would be fixed or this one thing would be changed that that would lead to this great fulfillment? Or do you really believe that it’s this knowledge of God and this relationship with Him and this intimacy with Him, that that’s the greatest thing that you could have on this Earth, and all of the other ways of chasing this grace and peace and fulfillment in your life are just going to frustrate you? Once you get that one thing, it’s not going to be enough. What Peter is saying is not just ‘I want’- God wants- I want for this grace and peace to be multiplied to you, but it comes in knowing God. And so often, we look for it in so many other things, but in your heart right now, do you believe- Think this through, do you really believe that knowing God more intimately would lead you to greater fulfillment and grace and peace than anything else on this Earth? Because if you believed that, you could have it. If you believed that, then you would spend more time pursuing Him and the things of Him. The last few weeks, we’ve had this sub-theme of our busyness and trying to just get rid of that and slow down so that- It’s not because all of these things are bad. It’s because it’s replacing that time with God where we grow in our knowledge of Him and we grow in this intimacy with Him. It’s not like I’m against all of the other mechanical- “Oh, I’m sorry I e-mailed you. I know you said we can’t e-mail.” I didn’t say you can’t e-mail. I’m just saying, ‘Let’s just be careful because these things are pulling us away from knowing God better.’ And as we do that, we’re going to get distracted from that, we’re going to lose our grace, we’re going to lose our peace.
I do want to read one quote to you. Quote of the week, John Piper from his Twitter account. You know what Twitter is, you get the little tweets. For those who don’t know, it’s like Facebook on steroids. You walk around and go, ‘I’m going to the store,’ and send it to a thousand people. And they’re like, ‘Oh, cool, John’s going to the store.’ And you’re keeping up on everyone else’s life. But there is a good use of it. Every once in a while, you’ve got this believer that will send out a thought that will get your mind back on God. But here’s the quote. I don’t have Twitter. Someone showed it me, something that he wrote. Quote: One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove on the last day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time. Wow! That was my same reaction. Wow!
I’m going to read it again. I love this. One of the great uses of Twitter and Facebook will be to prove on the last day that prayerlessness was not from lack of time. Pastor John Piper
Now, I don’t Facebook, I don’t Twitter, but I was still convicted because I started thinking about the other things I waste my time with, and then say things like, “I don’t have time to pray,” or “My prayer life hasn’t been good because of busyness.” Because I sure would hate to have a record of all the things my time went into. And I know some of you hear that and think, ‘Wow, if they really did keep a log of all the hours I spent on that versus my time with God…” See, this is what I’m concerned about. It’s not that these things are bad or that social networking is bad. It’s bad because anything is bad that keeps us from our time with the Lord, our time in prayer. Because it’s our knowledge of Him that’s going to lead us to grace and peace. God’s not saying, ‘Hey, get rid of all these other things because I’m against them all.’ God’s just saying, ‘I want you to have grace and peace, and that comes from knowing Me. So take some time to know Me. Know Me, because the more you know Me, the closer we are, the more peace you’ll have, the more grace you’ll experience.’ And that’s what He wants for His children. That’s why I love that verse. May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus, our Lord.
Verse 3: His divine nature has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. So if you’re living a godly life, why is that? If you’re living, and you have that relationship, that intimacy with God, why is it? It’s not because you were such a great person or you earned this somehow. It says that His divine power granted that to you. In fact, I love this phrase, He’s granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. So God’s divine nature has given everyone in this room who calls himself a believer in Jesus Christ, He’s given everything you need for a godly life. Do you believe that? Do you believe God has given everything you need for life and godliness? It’s in the Word of God. So then, the question is if you’re not living a godly life, whose fault is that? That’s right. Your wife. Your husband. Your kid. Your whatever. Your pastor. We do this. We blame, don’t we? And we say, ‘Well, if only my friends, they were supposed to hold me accountable…they didn’t call me just in time…’ I hear the excuses all the time, and I’m going, ‘Wait a second. Let’s stop here. What does the Bible say?’ God has given you everything, everything you need, all things that pertain to life and godliness.
Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 3, if you have your Bibles. I want to point something out to you because this has been a wrestle of mine. Sometimes, I pray to God as though He were stingy. Sometimes, I pray to God as though He’s like, ‘I don’t know if I’m going to give you power over that sin. I don’t know if I really want to. I’m holding back some of My power right now, trying to save up for the end times…’ You know, like there’s some sort of- You know what I mean? Is He going to give me this, is He going to give me that? And we talk to Him as though we have to talk Him into something rather than it being His desire. And He’s saying, ‘I gave you everything. I gave you freely.’ 1 Corinthians 3 verse 21: It says, “Let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future, all are yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” [1 Corinthians 3:21 ESV]
Paul is saying, ‘What are you fighting about?’ Well, I think this guy should…I think this guy…I think this, this, this…When you’re talking about people, he goes, ‘Don’t you understand? It’s not this quarrel over who’s better than who. It’s all about this God who’s given you everything. He’s given you life, death, the future, whatever is His is yours.’ Does this sound like a stingy God here? He’s saying, ‘Don’t you understand that the world or life or death or the present or the future all are yours and you are Christ’s.’ I hear him saying you are a child of God. Everything that’s God’s is yours. I love how he says in the chapter earlier, in 1 Corinthians 2 verse 9, he says, “No eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love Him.” [1 Corinthians 2:9 ESV] No eye has seen, nor ear has heard, no mind, no heart has imagined what God has prepared for those who love Him. You may think you understand how much God’s given you, and he’s saying your mind as never even imagined that well. You can’t imagine what I have in store for you. Crazy verse. God goes, ‘You have no clue what I have in store for you. No human mind has been able to conceive how great the things are that I’m about to hand to you. Because don’t you understand, life, death, everything, I love you. You’re My children. What’s Mine is yours. I’ve given that freely to you.’
2 Corinthians chapter 9 verse 8 says this: “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.” [2 Corinthians 9:8 ESV] What has God given you? God is able to make all grace. God is able to make all grace abound to you so that having all sufficiency. Do you believe that about yourself, that you have all sufficiency in all things at all times? That’s a pretty heavy statement. That you have all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. So whenever we complain, ‘Well, I didn’t have this, I didn’t have that…’ God’s saying, ‘No, no, no, you don’t understand…’ What does He say? I gave you everything. Everything. Everything you could ever need. All things at all times. All sufficiency so that you can abound in every good work. Do you believe that, again, about yourself? So if you are not abounding in good works, whose fault is that? It’s not God up in heaven going, ‘Well, I just didn’t want to give you too many good works. I don’t know want to empower you…’ No, no, no. ‘I give you everything. I give you life, death, whatever is Mine is yours…’ And that’s what he’s saying here in 2 Peter, ‘I’ve given you everything, all things that pertain to life and godliness.’ This is God’s blessing on us. But again, look at what he says in verse three: His divine nature 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. Again, how do you get this all sufficient, everything that pertains to life and godliness? Through the knowledge of Him. I can’t emphasize it enough. There he says it again. It’s through knowing Him. It says knowledge of God, but understand what the word knowledge means because we’re not talking about just knowing about Him.
I don’t know how many times I’m going to have to say this, but I really want you to get this. It is not enough to know the right things about God. The demons in hell have good theology. They do! They believe the right things about God. They know the right things about God. This is not about you coming in a room and me just telling you true things about God. That’s important. That’s part of it, but at some point, this is about knowing Him. This word, gnōstos, we’ve talked about this many times, is about a relationship. It’s about an intimate knowledge. In fact, Scripture uses the word in the sense that Cain knew his wife, and she bore him a child. So what is “know” there mean? A little bit more than head knowledge. I know a lot of you, but it’s just this idea of what do you by “know” here though? It’s not knowing about a person, it’s not an acquaintance. It’s about knowing. That’s why in the end, remember in Matthew 7:21, it says that many are going to come to Me and say, ‘But I did this, I did that,’ and what does God say to them? “Depart from Me. I never knew you.” You knew about Me. You knew a lot of things about Me. You even believed some of these things were true, but did you know Me? Was there a relationship there? You see, this grace and peace are multiplied to you as you know Him more and more. Everything that pertains to life and godliness is given to us as we know Him more and more. It’s through the knowledge of Him, through knowing Him. And so I’ve got to ask again, do you love Him, the Person? This is always what God’s wanted. The great command, even in the Old Testament, was not, ‘You shall know the right things about God.’ It’s “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind.” Otherwise, this is a religion to you, and I’m just a guy up here spouting off commands. That is not God’s desire, and that will get you nowhere. Do you see God as a person, and a person that you love? Do you love Him, or do you just love the idea of this Being and this power? That’s why I hope you didn’t come here this morning to tap into some sort of supernatural power, but you came here because you love a Person, this Person of God, this Person who created you and loves you and sent His Son to die for you so that you could take on His righteousness. And you fell in love with this Person, and you trust this Person, and you want to be led by this Person, and the more and more you know this Person, the more grace and peace you experience in your life. And when you’re separated from this Person because you haven’t had the time with this Person, it drives you nuts because He’s the love of your life. And you just go, ‘I’ve got to kick everything else out and get together with this Person, the Person of God, because I love Him. And the more I love Him, the more I know Him, the more grace and peace are just thrown at me, multiplied at me. And the more I just see that I have everything I need for life and godliness.’
Through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises. He has granted to use His precious- Aren’t those great words? His precious and very great promises. Did you read 1 Peter over and over a couple of weeks ago when I asked you to? Did you meditate, did you love it? Did you read those promises and go, ‘Wow, these are great! This is so precious!’ One of my concerns in churches and with Christians and followers of God is that sometimes it appears that over time the promises get boring to you. Ever met people like that? Where it seems like, ‘Yeah, I know I’m saved. I don’t have to go to hell. I know…’ It’s almost like, ‘Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,’ and I don’t get that because when I read, like reading 2 Peter- I’ve read it before. I know these promises, but as I read them again, I go, ‘Wow, this is awesome!’ Do you still do that with the Word of God? I’ve been a Christian almost thirty years now, and I will tell you I love the Word of God more than when I first believed. I love it more than I did last year. I love His promises. They’re more precious to me than they were a couple of months ago. Every time I read, I’m like, ‘I’m on equal standing with Peter. That’s awesome!’ And I think, ‘Wow, He’s given me everything. I can’t even conceive everything He’s given to me.’ That’s a good promise. These are precious promises. My fear- It saddens me when the Good News becomes old news to, rather than you getting more and more excited about your salvation all the time and more and more excited about the precious promises of God.
I find people do get bored with God’s promises sometimes, and consequently, they get more excited about other things in the world. See, when you’re not excited about God, you’ll be really excited about your new job or about your house or even about your kids. And you’ll notice that you can even become obsessed with these other things that aren’t necessarily bad. But your obsession with those things is a sign of something deeper, a symptom of something deeper, that that fulfillment is being met in God. There’s an old hymn I used to sing. Some of you probably sang it, too. “Turn Your Eyes upon Jesus” Remember that? Turn your eyes upon Jesus. Look full in His wonderful face, and the things of Earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace. I always remembered that phrase because I’d have moments where I’d be so close to God and so tight with God, and as I’m in that prayer time and I’m just locked in and just fellowshipping and enjoying His presence, I think to myself, ‘Why do I love all that other stuff? Why was I so excited to go surfing the other week, or why was I so excited about this, this, this, this? But when you look full in His wonderful face, and you’re right there with God, you go, ‘Everything else seems strangely dim.’ And I’ve always remembered that’s like that song I used to sing. I don’t care about anything else right now. I’m not all stressed out. I’m not all ‘I’ve got to have this, I’ve got to have this…’ I’m just going, ‘I’ve got this, and everything else just seems dumb right now. Everything else that I used to long for and strive after, and I’ve got to have, got to have, got to have…’ That “got to have” is a sign, it’s a symptom of something else that you’re missing, this relationship with God. Because when you have it, everything else just seems to dissipate, and this great and precious promise of God by which He’s granted to us His precious and very great promises, 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.
See, it’s these promises, that through them it says you may become partakers of the divine nature. Think about that phrase. This is just loaded, isn’t it? Four verses. And it’s saying, “partakers of the divine nature.” Through the promise, we can become partakers of the divine nature. When you and I are born, we’re just born with a human nature. We’re just flesh and blood, and then somehow through these promises, because these Words aren’t ordinary Words, through these great promises, we can actually be partakers, not just in our flesh and blood nature, human nature, he says you can be a partaker. The word is “koinōnos”. It’s a fellowship. Somehow, this isn’t just a human body. It’s a weird though that I’m a partaker of the divine nature, that somehow God is in me now, and somehow He’s empowered me, and He and I have the koinennia, this fellowship, this partaking of one another, like we’re joined together. See, this wasn’t true when I was born. This wasn’t true through all my life. This became true when I understood His divine promises, His precious promises, and I got it, and I believed it. And I believed in this exchange that could take place, that He would take my sin, and I would take on His righteousness. And then I would take His Spirit, and I’d become partakers of this divine nature. And that’s a great promise. And it says it’s through that that I escape the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. So because of that, I can escape. Is this what you want? Is this what you long for more than anything else, this fellowship, this partaking of the divine nature? Because this is what the people in the Bible wanted. Remember, like Moses said, ‘God, if You don’t go with us…I want Your presence with us…’ that was the idea in Exodus 33. He goes, ‘If You don’t go with us, I don’t want to go…’ Because the greatest blessing I could have is to have God with me. God with us. That was the beauty of Christ coming to the Earth. It was like, ‘Wow, God is with us? That’s insane!’ But some of us have gotten bored of that promise. It’s like, ‘Yeah, yeah, I know. God lives inside of me. I’m a temple of the Holy Spirit…’ What is that? This is insane. I’m partaking with God, and God is not just next to me, but He’s actually inside of me, and there’s a fellowship, there’s a mending, there’s a union with God. A partaker of the divine nature having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of the sinful desire. And because we’re partakers of God, we can escape the corruption of this world. See, what His Spirit allows us to do is live in another world. You ever see a person get trapped by sin? It’s like a whirlpool, isn’t it, like a vortex? You get deeper and deeper and deeper in it, and you’re just going, ‘I can’t get out.’ This is the corruption he’s talking about of our sinful desire. You know how you take that first drink, and it’s like, that little buzz, that feels good. Everything is better now. And you take another one and another one, then pretty soon, you get addicted. And pretty soon, you’re this alcoholic, and you just feel like you got sucked so far down in this whirlpool, you’re going, ‘How can I get back out of here?’ You smoke a little pot, and it’s like, ‘Wow, life is so much easier.’ And you get sucked in deeper and deeper, and you’re this addict now. It’s like, ‘How do I get out of there?’ Lust. You start looking at her and her and her, and then this one Web site and this other Web site. And then, pretty soon, it’s like, ‘I can’t get out.’ You get in this relationship, and it goes further and further and further, and the longer you stay in it, you just get sucked in. And pretty soon, you just feel trapped. And that’s the corruption of this sinful world, is yeah, it looks really good at first. I can do this, and it will make me look better. And you caught up and absorbed in the arrogance and this look you’ve got to have, and everything sucks you in down further and further and further. And the Bible says that somehow by the partaking of the divine nature, we can escape all of that. And that’s why we’re here in this room. It’s because God granted that to some of us. And He put that power in us, and the more we knew we knew Him, the more were able to escape. I’m not saying it’s not without effort because the next verse says make every effort. But we’ll get to that next week. I just want you to understand that God doesn’t want you to live that way. He doesn’t want His kids in bondage, trapped, feeling like they can’t get out. But it starts with you believing in these promises of God that He’s given you everything you need, and that there’s no temptation that will ever overcome you that you can’t handle. He’ll always give you a way of escape. The things you’re dealing with, other people have dealt with it to you, and they made it out by His divine power.
Some of you, maybe when I talked about knowing God- honestly, some of you don’t need to sing this morning. The worst thing you can do is just sing a few songs right now and end the day. Some of you know that you don’t know God. You know about Him because maybe you were raised in church, and you can quote a bunch of verses, but when you hear me talk about knowing a Person, knowing “gnōstos” knowing a Person, you go, ‘I don’t have that with God. I just think of Him as this Being up there, that I’ve got to do these things…’ Because that’s not Scripture. That’s not what He wants from you. He wants you to know Him, and you can know Him today. You can have that exchange of your old self and all that sin and take the righteousness today. You could walk in knowing nothing about God and walk out of here being on equal, the same standing as I, and having the same faith as Peter and everyone else in this room who knows Jesus. Isn’t that insane? That you’ve got a faith of equal standing as ours just like that because it’s not about us. It’s about the righteousness of Jesus. And He can put His Spirit in you that will help you escape the corruption of the sinful world. You’ve been trying to find fulfillment and grace and peace and all these other things, and God says, ‘It’s only going to come through knowledge of God, knowledge of Him.’ And maybe you came here wanting something else but maybe God’s opened your eyes, and you realized, ‘It’s not money, it’s not this relationship, it’s not all this other stuff. It’s knowing God.’ That’s what’s going to free you. That’s what’s going to give you the peace and the grace that you’ve been looking for. So if that’s you, you can get baptized today and begin this relationship with God. You can pray with someone. We’re going to have some prayer, some pastors and some counselors to pray with you. Maybe some of you say, ‘I do know God, but I’ve walked so far away from Him, and I’m stuck in this sin cycle, and I need to escape. Because I haven’t felt that peace and that grace in so long.’ In fact, let me ask you this. What’s that’s one thing in your life right now that you don’t want anyone else in this room knowing about? What is it? What’s the one thing in your life you don’t want anyone else in this room to know about? You’ve been living with the shame of that and hiding it. It’s kept you from really knowing Him and enjoying Him. This morning, I would just love for you to get it out and pray with someone. Get out of this little whirlpool that you’ve been in, and believe, not in me, but in the Scriptures and His great promises that you have power over that. You’ve got everything. All things that pertain to life and godliness. I’d love for someone to pray with you and remind you of God’s promises. So if that’s you, you don’t need to sing with the rest of us. In fact, it would be better if you’d spend some time praying with someone. You’ve got a bunch of people here that will love you, not judge you because we were all there. No one’s here to judge you. We’re here to release you and have you experience the freedom that God wants you to have.
