1"Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ." This letter reads as a final testament. Peter will say in a few verses that he knows his death is near, and like Moses in Deuteronomy he uses what time he has left to hand on what matters most. The first thing he wants his readers to know is their standing. He writes to those who have 1"a faith of equal standing with ours." A believer who came to Christ last month holds the same standing before God as the man who walked with Jesus on the lake. The false teachers had been implying that ordinary believers fell short, and Peter closes that door in the opening line.
The next nine verses are one long sentence in Greek. Two gifts are named, power for the present and promises for the future. 3"His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness." God has already supplied what we need to live and be godly, and he has made promises about what is coming. The Bible Speaks Today commentary insists the two must be held together. The phrase 4"partakers of the divine nature" is among the most daring in the New Testament. The Christian tradition has read it as being transformed by God's own moral character, which is very different from becoming divine in essence.
Then comes the turn the paragraph has been building toward. 5"For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith." The phrase for this very reason is the hinge. The effort is asked for because the provision has been made. A person who has been given everything needed for life and godliness is free to grow, with the confidence that the supply came first.
The list runs from faith to love, eight qualities, and ends at the virtue the Tyndale commentary describes as putting the interests of others above one's own. Two different Greek words for knowledge run through the passage. *Epignosis* in verses 2, 3, and 8 is the knowledge of God and Christ that makes a person a believer, a gift given in full to every Christian at once. *Gnosis* in verses 5 and 6 is the knowledge built up over a lifetime by application. Assurance of standing is settled and equal for all, and maturity is a lifelong road.
Growth is the natural condition of knowing Christ. 9"Whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins." The last phrase is the surprising one. The diagnosis of a stalled Christian life is forgetfulness. A person who stops growing has forgotten what happened to them, and Peter treats the memory of forgiveness as the soil the virtues grow in.
10"Confirm your calling and election." The Bible Speaks Today and Tyndale both point out that Peter treats the qualities as confirming salvation. The road ends in a generous welcome, for 11"an entrance into the eternal kingdom" is 11"richly provided."
Ask which quality on the ladder has been most neglected this week, and what you need to remember about being cleansed.
Prayer
Father, your divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness. Thank you for your precious and very great promises. Make us diligent to add to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, steadfastness, godliness, brotherly affection, and love. Keep us from forgetting that we were cleansed from our former sins. In Jesus' name, amen.