2 Peter 1:1-4 – Embracing Divine Knowledge and Living a Godly Life

SPEAKER 03 : 0:03

The foundation, ye saints of the Lord, is laid for your faithful.

SPEAKER 02 : 0:17

Welcome to Through the Bible. We’ve got some amazing truth to cover today, including how to have peace with God, how to know God, how to escape the pollution of the world, and how to have everything we need for life and godliness. Well, I’d say it’s a pretty important list, wouldn’t you? I’m your host, Steve Schwetz, and we’re going to begin joining Dr. J. Vernon McGee in the book of 2 Peter in just a moment as the Bible bus travels through the New Testament. And, you know, we’re so glad that you’re making it a priority to study God’s Word with us. God’s doing amazing things through the proclamation of his word, both here in North America and around the world. In fact, before we jump into our study, let’s hear a few letters from fellow listeners who tell us what studying God’s word together means to them. First is a Facebook post from Barbara who shares this. Lately, I found myself more thirsty for the Word than I’ve ever been. I was raised in church with a family made up of pastors, teachers, missionaries, and preachers. My mind was filled with the scriptures and stories of the Bible for as far back as I can remember. Different circumstances that have presented themselves lately have put me in a position of not simply desiring God’s Word, but more desperate for it than ever before in my life.” God has been faithful to His promises in each and every circumstance, faithful to reveal Himself in the most undeniable ways, even in hopeless situations, through His Word and through the answering of so many of my prayers right before my eyes in recent weeks and months. I am beyond thankful for this resource and cannot begin to describe the benefit and blessing this ministry has been in helping me to keep my soul constantly full and overflowing with the living water of God’s Word. I listen to Dr. McGee through the app almost daily as I’m driving and working and fall asleep many a night listening to his preaching. Thank you for making this resource available and for making it so easy for so many people to have free access to God’s Word through the various platforms and channels that you use. It has been a remarkable blessing to me, and I pray often that God will continue to use this ministry as a vessel to bring His Word to so many more. Dr. McGee has been my constant daily teacher for almost nine years now, looking forward to every study until the Lord takes me home or returns for His church. And thanks for sharing, Barbara. And don’t worry, you’ll always have a seat on the Bible bus. And here’s what Will recently emailed to us. I started my five-year journey on the Bible bus on January 11, 2020, and finished on Friday, December 20, 2024. This program has been a blessing to help guide me and give me understanding. During the COVID lockdown, God said, now I have your undivided attention. After COVID, I fell behind, didn’t feel like continuing, got busy, but the Lord kept me focused. I’ll continue to help gas up the bus and even help with new tires. Thank you for all that you do and may God bless this ministry. Well, thanks, Will. Your support helps keep the Bible bus rolling along in more than 250 languages all over the world. And now our last note comes from Ann, who tells us this. I love through the Bible and have for years. I used to ride for free. I was broke and you let me on the bus without fare. But today I pay what I can monthly because this program was an answer to prayer and helped me know about my Christian faith. But unexpectedly, it also made me fall in love with Jesus. He is mine and I’m his. Thank you. What a great note, Ann. Thanks for your partnership with us. And what about you? Is God calling you to pray for more listeners to join us or maybe provide for the Bible bus as we journey together through God’s word? Well, you can click on Donate in our app or visit ttb.org or call us at 1-800-65-BIBLE. That’s 1-800-65-BIBLE. Let’s pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for the precious gift of your word, which teaches us how to live in peace with you and equips us for every good work. Lord, as we study, we ask that your spirit would guide us, you would open our understanding, and you draw us closer to you. May your word transform our hearts, renew our minds, and lead us into a deeper walk with you. In Jesus’ name, amen. Here’s our study of 2 Peter on Through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee.

SPEAKER 01 : 4:32

Now, last time I spent a little time, more than I ever have on any other book, I think, In introductory matters, pointing out that this book of 2 Peter has been criticized probably as much as any book in the entire Bible. In fact, there is here in Southern California a head of a New Testament department in a so-called conservative seminary that says he doesn’t believe 2 Peter should be in the Scripture. Well, I want to say that I think there’s an abundance of evidence that it belongs in the Word of God, both internal and external. Now, one of the advantages that has been in the fact this book has been attacked is that it has caused fundamental and conservative expositors and scholars down through the years to defend the book. And probably no book right now has as much defense as this epistle. And if there’s one epistle I’m sure of, and I’m sure of 66 books of the Bible, if there’s one of them I’m more sure of than another, and I don’t think that’s true, but it would be 2 Peter. Because of the fact that so much evidence has been adduced to confirm our faith in this. And we find the evidence of it as we go along. The greatest argument that’s been against it was because it doesn’t sound like his first epistle. Well, he just happened to change the subject. He’s writing now his swan song. And it’s very interesting that 2 Timothy is very much unlike Romans. But I’ve never heard even the rankest critic say that Paul didn’t write both of them. And yet the subject matter is entirely different. And you have that same thing here with 1 Peter and 2 Peter. The subject matter is entirely different. Now, we saw last time the great emphasis is upon knowledge. In days of apostasy, the only way you can fortify yourself is with a knowledge of the Word of God. And he makes it very clear, and I’ll read this first verse again, Simon Peter says, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ. Now, God has made his word available today to probably more people in the world at this moment than at any time in the history of the world. You can turn on your radio in practically any section of this country today and hear a good message. Now, we’re not on every section, but there are a lot of good programs today. And the Word of God is going out. And these programs that are good programs are reaching out into the world. They are being put in other languages. And a friend of mine said, I often wondered how that southern accent would sound in Spanish. Now he says, I sure would like to hear it in Chinese. Well, I won’t be the one doing the speaking, friends. But I heard about the man that does the Spanish broadcasts. And they tell me that He even tells these stories that I tell and then he laughs at them right on the broadcast. Well, that’s great. But it’s not my voice there. It’s somebody that can speak Spanish. And we’re rejoicing the word of God’s getting out. And my friend, if you’re not a believer today, don’t say you’ve got some mental reservations. You don’t have any. You’ve got some sinful reservations. It’s when the heart will turn, then God will lift the veil. Anytime you are ready, God’s ready. And he will save you. And I believe that today it’s whosoever will may come. And that God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever, believe it, And that’s all he asks you to do. Doesn’t even ask you to clean up when you come to him. But he’ll clean you up if you really mean business with him and come to him. Now, will you notice, I come down now to verse 2. He says, “…grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.” Now, I’ve been over these two words, grace and peace, so many times. And I was in 1 Peter. I’m not going over it here other than to say again that it’s always put in this order, grace. You must know and experience the grace of God. That is that God saves you, not because of your merit, your character, or anything in you, but he saves you because of your faith in Christ. And it’s because Christ loves you enough to die for you on the cross, to pay the penalty of your sins, to make it possible for a holy God to reach down and save you. Therefore, God saves you by grace. He just saves you when you trust Christ. No merit or anything. Now, when you know that, then you can experience the peace of God. And that’s what Paul meant in the fifth of Romans when he said, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, the marvelous thing here about Simon Peter, and there have been so many that have called him that ignorant fisherman. I want to tell you, as we saw in the first epistle, he deals with more doctrine than any of them in such a brief time. He takes up all controversial matters, handles them in a masterful way, and he does that same thing here. And he is one of the writers in the New Testament that used arithmetic. You notice what he says? Grace and peace be multiplied. Now, he’s talking about multiplication here. And what a wonderful thing it is. He says, not only should you experience the grace and peace of God, but he says, I hope it’s multiplied. And Paul didn’t go in for mathematics, but he says God is rich in grace. and that the peace of God just passeth all understanding. But Simon Peter gets right down where the rubber meets the road and takes out the multiplication table and says, these two, I hope they’re multiplied to you. How wonderful this is. How will it be multiplied unto you? Through some vision you have? Some lazy method that so many are using today? Oh, no. Through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord. Now, we’re back to this word knowledge, and I’ll be talking about it again and again in this epistle because it’s so important, my friend, the knowledge of him. Paul said that I might know him and the power of his resurrection, etc., etc., that I might know him. And you will find that Christianity is a person. And it’s not only to believe in him, but to know him, to know him, friends. He’s the living Savior right this moment at God’s right hand. And I want to know him. That’s the important thing. I want to know Christ. And you remember that it was Daniel that said, but the people that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits. You’re not going to do anything for God. And you are not going to be able to serve him until you know Jesus Christ. Now, how does this knowledge come? Well, we’re going to see. Peter won’t leave you in doubt on that. He won’t let you be hanging in air when he gets through with this epistle. That is a knowledge of the word of God, the sure word of God. We ought to have a more sure word of faith. And that’s the thing that he’s going to talk to us about a little later on. But here now, he’s talking through the knowledge of God. And you remember, it was Job in the 22nd chapter, 21st verse, “‘Acquaint now thyself with him, and be at peace.'” How wonderful, you see. And Peter’s talking here about a knowledge of God. Now, may I say to you, and I think that probably we can look at it like this. I want to take someone that has lived and is now passed on. If you should ask me, you’d say, did you know the late President Eisenhower? And I’d say, no, I didn’t know him. Well, you certainly heard about him. Yes. You saw him, didn’t you? I said, yes. I said, I even saw him play golf. Very few ever saw him do that. I didn’t see him hit. But one time, and the Secret Service man glared at me, so I had to get out of the territory. But I saw him hit a ball. And he didn’t do much better than I do when he hit that ball. But the interesting thing is, I didn’t know him. If he was living today and walked into my study right now, I think I would know him. Well, I’d recognize him. Well, I didn’t know him. I never knew how he felt about certain things. And I imagine that Ms. Eisenhower knew him pretty well. I suspect that his loved ones knew him, but I never knew him. And now what we’re talking about here is the knowledge of God. And this is epigenosis. Now, Peter will use that several times, and other times he’ll use just gnosis. But epigenosis means a super knowledge. It means the knowledge that comes by the Holy Spirit taking the things of Christ and making them real to us. I believe that you can know Jesus Christ better than you can know your closest loved one. I believe that you can know him so that you can go to him and tell him things that you wouldn’t even dare tell your closest loved one. You can talk to him. May I say to you, to know him is life eternal. That’s the important thing. Now, that comes through a birth, born again, as Peter says, not with corruptible seed, but incorruptible of the word of God that liveth and abideth forever. Well, when you’re born, you’re just a little ignorant baby. And we need to know him. We need to know him. I never shall forget hearing the late Dr. Herbert Bieber make this statement many years ago at Winona Lake. He said, after I was saved, I went to seminary to find out what had happened to me. That’s good. May I say to you, he went to seminary to find out what had happened to him. My friend, you can trust him and still not really know him. And then there are a lot of make-believers today. And he’s going to talk about those later on. And it’s very important to make that kind of a distinction. Now, he says here, and I read it again, grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord. A little later, he’s going to tell you where you can get that knowledge and the only place you can get it. And it’s important to know that. There was a sign in the science building in my college. And I don’t remember anything I learned about science. But I never will forget this sign that was in the bulletin board. And to me, it sure hit home. And this is it. Next to knowing is knowing where to find out. You want to know where to find out about Jesus Christ? In the Word of God, the book we call the Bible. And that’s the only place you’re going to know him, friends. You can’t know him out in nature today. Oh, you can find out something about his power and his wisdom. And you can know him maybe through some experience that you’ve had or in some meeting. But you’re not going to know him personally apart from the Word of God. I come down now to verse 3 here. according as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness. Now, he by divine power, he’s given us all of the things that you and I need That has to do with life. That is really living it up. I don’t know about you. I’ve always wanted to live it up. I want to live. And that doesn’t mean the way the world thinks of it. It doesn’t mean to go out and paint the town red. You always run out of paint when you start that sort of thing. Life and godliness. Don’t say today God hasn’t made an arrangement. for you to live for him. He’s made every arrangement for you unto us that pertain unto life and godliness. Here we go again through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue. Again, it’s only through the knowledge of Christ that we can really learn to live down here. and grow and become a godly person. The only way in the world that you can become the kind of person, a fully developed personality, well-developed personality. The only way in the world that you can become that kind of a person is through knowing Jesus Christ, the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory. And that means to be like him and virtue. Now, that word virtue, and I’m going into just a little detail about that word. I have spent a lot of time with some of these words here because they’re important. Now, virtue doesn’t mean what it means today. That is, it’s not confined to chastity. That’s what we think of today. We say she’s a virtuous woman. They say there are very few of them around today. I heard the other day in one high school in Los Angeles that 90% of the girls were not virtuous. Well, we think of it as chastity, that it’s in that direction. Actually, this word is not in that direction. It was a good Latin word, and it has to do with excellence and with courage. It means that you have the courage to excel in life. You don’t have to live a little mousy Mr. Milk Post life and be a yes man to everything that comes along. You can stand upon your hind feet and you can state your position and stand for God. We need that virtue today to glory and virtue. And the only way we can do it is through knowledge of Christ. This is the formula he’s giving to us here. Knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue. Now, he begins here in verse 4, something that’s quite interesting. He’s going to give us a chain. He’s preparing us for it. It begins down a little farther. But let me read verse 4 now. “…by which are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises.” Nobody but Simon Peter had ever said that, precious promises. He talked about the precious faith that we have. Now he talks about the precious promises. that have been given to us. Now, they’ve been given to you and me some glorious, wonderful promises here in the New Testament, by which are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises, that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature. Now, one of the promises is that of eternal life. He that hath the Son hath life. and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, thou shalt be saved. And you’re born again, not of corruptible seed, but incorruptible. Word of God that liveth and abideth forever. Now, you might be partakers of the divine nature. That is, that you might be a son of God. What a tremendous truth this is. This is something that’s overwhelming. When you’re born again, you are given the nature of God, friend. You long for the things of God. Don’t tell me that the Christian life is a series of little do’s and don’ts today. And if you don’t do this and you don’t do that, you’re living the Christian life. My friend, you’re partaker of the divine nature. And you want the things of God. That’s the thing that’s important. Now he says, having escaped the corruption that is in the world today. Well, that in and of itself is a tremendous statement, by the way. A little later on, he’s going to talk about these make-believers, and he says they have escaped the pollutions of the world. The corruptions of the world is that which is inside of you. Pollution is what’s on the outside. What a difference there is to escape the corruptions. We’ve got a great deal going today about anti-pollution. A great many people think if you clean up the environment, it will make nicer people. It won’t do a thing for them, my friends. The religious people go through an anti-pollution program. They go through little rituals, little washings, little this, little of that, little of the other thing. And how many people are like that today? But my friend, if you’re going to escape the corruption of the world, you’ve got to have a new nature down there. You have to be born again, partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. And my friend, you can be religious to your fingertips, and you can be as corrupt as anyone possibly can be. And I want to tell you, there’s some people, when you see them on Sundays, And then see them again on Monday. They don’t look like the same folk by any means. Why? Well, they have been through an anti-pollution program on Sunday. But the anti-corruption program is when Jesus Christ comes into your heart and into your life, friends. You become a partaker of the divine nature. Now, next time, we’re going to see a growth and a development here that, in my judgment, is one of the most remarkable sections of the Word of God. So until next time, may God richly bless you, my beloved.

SPEAKER 02 : 24:16

Well, that’s a great teaser for our next study. Meet me here, and we’ll get on the Bible bus together. Until then, if we can help you find a Bible study resource to deepen your study of God’s Word, as I mentioned earlier, if you’d like to know more about how you can support this ministry through your prayers and financial giving, call us at 1-800-65-BIBLE or visit ttb.org. Again, that’s 1-800-65-BIBLE or ttb.org. And you can also support us by leaving a review and a five-star rating in your app store. This really does make a difference. And your generosity and feedback help us continue sharing God’s word with listeners around the world. So thanks for partnering with us in this ministry. And of course, as always, we love to get your letters. So you can write to us at Box 7100, Pasadena, California, 91109. In Canada, Box 25325, London, Ontario, N6C 6B1. And when you’re in contact, please tell us how you listened to Through the Bible. Not only do we want to know, but this little bit of information really does help us to make wise ministry decisions as we strive to be good stewards of the resources that God provides. I’m Steve Schwetz, so grateful for your company on the Bible Bus and your partnership in taking the whole word to the whole world.

SPEAKER 03 : 25:28

He washed it white as snow

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