Hallelujah! Greetings to you all (that is, all of our readers and partners in ministry) in the wonderful name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The Lord God has been good to us throughout the past week and He is good to us right now and He will be good to us for the rest of our life. Everything God says to us and everything He does in the world reveals the truth that He loves us and cares for us. From our own personal experience so far, we can believe that God’s love for us will never fail but will endure forever. We remain safe and secure in this troublesome world because God’s great love keeps us from all harm and dangers, as the writer of Lamentations stated that Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness (Lamentations 3:22-23). This is God’s promise to everyone who believes in His Son Jesus Christ. Therefore, let us live a life of gratefulness and thankfulness during this season of advent, as the Psalmist stated: Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever (Psalm 106:1; also refer to 1 Chronicles 16:34; 2 Chronicles 5:13; 7:3; Ezra 3:11; Psalms 107:1; 118:1, 29; 136:1).

The Lord has blessed us with a very relevant Scripture passage for our SftW meditation (2 Peter 1:3-7). Apostle Peter, who wrote this Epistle, was one of the favorite and faithful followers of Jesus Christ and he personally witnessed the life and ministry of Jesus ever since he was called by Jesus to be one of His disciples and an apostle. Peter was writing his Epistle to encourage the Christian community who were going through intense pain and suffering due to severe persecution from those who oppose the gospel as well as from the oppressive Roman political authorities. Peter’s intention was to encourage these Christian believers to live a godly life that would bring glory and honor to God. Peter urged the believers to trust in the power of God even in the midst of the unfavorable circumstances they face in life, which will ultimately bring a great measure of rewards in their life. This is where the divine power is benefitted to a Christian believer. There are so many spiritual lessons for us to learn from the writing of Apostle Peter, particularly from this passage, all of which will definitely reinforce our spiritual walk with Jesus. The key factor that reinforces our spiritual walk with Jesus is the divine power that is transmitted to us from God. From this we can understand that there is divine power and human power that works in our life. The key difference between the divine power and human power is that human power is awfully weak while the divine power is exceedingly super strong. Human power is insufficient to achieve anything worthwhile in our life – spiritually or materially – but divine power is an all-sufficient power (Omnipotent) and, by trusting in the Lord, we can achieve anything in this world or in the world to come. Apostle Peter stated that His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness (2 Peter 1:3). Peter assures us from his very own personal experience that God gives us everything that is necessary for our godly living. The huge mistake we all (those who follow Jesus Christ wholeheartedly as well as those who do not follow Jesus Christ at all) very often commit is that most of the time we depend upon our ability than trusting in God’s ability and power to do things, which means, we depend upon our own ability and power to handle the situations that come across our life (without knowing the downfall of its end result) rather than trusting in the Lord for solutions to the challenges we face in our life. Although human power has its origin from divine power, it is wrongly manipulated due to the sinful nature in us. The sin that is in us makes the spiritual strength in us weaker and weaker and consequently takes control of the God-given will-power that is in us. As a result, pride and stubbornness emerges in us and misuses our God-given abilities for wrong purposes.

It is time for us, the New Testament believers, to stop depending upon our own strength/power and abilities or any other form of earthly powers/resources in order to meet our needs.  We need to place our trust in the Lord God and in His great power who supplies for all our needs according to His riches and glory (Philippians 4:18-20). For instance: David, being the king of Israel, had more than sufficient riches and resources in Israel for his personal and his people’s needs, yet he trusted the God of Israel more than he depended on his own power or resources. King David wrote that some people place their trust in what they have or own (which is actually given to them by God – like people, possessions, positions, wealth, chariots and horses, and so on) but he and the people who believe in the Lord God Almighty place their trust in the Lord: Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God (Psalm 20:7); and elsewhere he stated in connection with his conflict with the Philistine giant that I come against you in the name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the armies of Israel (1 Samuel 17:45; also refer to Psalm 23:1; 34:10; Isaiah 58:11; Matthew 6:33). God’s strength, which is mentioned here as divine power (2 Peter 1:3a), is more than sufficient to provide you and I everything required for life and godliness. According Apostle Paul, the authority and potentiality of the divine power (God’s power) is displayed in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, as he stated while he was writing to the believers in Ephesus:

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come (Ephesians 1:18-21)

Apostle Peter urges the believers that they need to rely on God in every life-situation. While the apostles were ministering among the early Christians, somehow some of the false teachers infiltrated the early church and distorted the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ by sowing seeds of doubts in peoples’ hearts regarding God’s faithfulness and trustworthiness of His promises. It is not only the believers who went through trials and troubles but Jesus Christ Himself also went through similar trials and troubles during His earthly life and ministry, particularly after His baptism but prior to the commencement of His earthly ministry (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-15). During Jesus’ test and temptation, Satan tried to distract Jesus by offering Him so many worldly possessions and positions but Jesus overcame all the tests and temptations and rebuked Satan. Thus, Christ Himself faced trials and troubles throughout His earthly life and ministry but every time He went through an unfavorable situation in His life and ministry, He trusted the Lord God Almighty and with His divine power He overcame such situations. Similarly, we the faithful followers of Jesus Christ also ought to overcome similar tests and trials by trusting in the Lord God Almighty. In this world we have so many trials and troubles and we need to overcome it in the same way Christ did. Jesus warned His disciples (and us) that they will have troubles in this world: In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world (John 16:33). While so many ungodly practices distract and deceive many Christian believers every now and then, we need to trust the Lord God Almighty wholeheartedly and cultivate in us Christian virtues such as faith, goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, mutual affection, love, and so on, as Apostle Peter mentioned: … make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love (2 Peter 1:5-7). As faithful followers of Jesus Christ, we need to use these virtues as guidelines and practice them in our day-to-day life and ministry.

What we need to understand from the Scripture passage (2 Peter 1:3-7) we chose for our meditation is that (i) [initiation/action from God’s part] God promised that He will provide us with everything we need for our life and godliness (2 Peter 1:2-3); and (ii) [initiation/action from our part] in order to receive what was promised to us (life and godliness in addition to every other blessing He promised for us in the Scripture), we need to love and obey Him wholeheartedly and cultivate Christian virtues in us and live our life according to them and use them as stepping stones to receive all the blessings He promised to us. Let us read the Scripture passage again:

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.  For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love (2 Peter 1:3-7)

Dear brothers and sisters in the Lord, as we continue to strive hard to improve our day-to-day spiritual walk with Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior, let us pray to the Lord God Almighty, who enabled the apostles and early followers of Jesus Christ and the Church since its founding to be faithful to Him, to help us to trust and obey and be faithful to Him who called us out of darkness into His wonderful light (1 Peter 2:9; also refer to: Colossians 1:13; Titus 2:14). Apostle John wrote: For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16); and Apostle Paul stated that when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship (Galatians 4:4-5). Therefore, during this Christmas season, let us find life, love, joy, hope, peace and happiness and share them with everyone who is in need of them. Let Christ be born into our hearts and minds and let Him be in the centre of our Christmas celebrations. Also, let us spread the pleasing aroma of the Christmas message in and around where we live and beyond any physical or spiritual limit.

May the Lord God Almighty bless us all! Amen!