He Has Shared It with Us!!!
2 Pt 1: 1-11 New King James Version (NJKV)
Purpose:
To understand that God has shared His divine nature in us
1 Simon
Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ,
To those who
have obtained like precious faith with us by the righteousness of our God and
Savior Jesus Christ:
2 Grace
and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord,
3 as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain
to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and
virtue,
4 by which have been given to us
exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine
nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
5 But also for this very reason,
giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge,
6 to knowledge self-control,
to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness,
7 to godliness brotherly kindness, and
to brotherly kindness love.
8 For if these things are yours and
abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of
our Lord Jesus Christ.
9 For
he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten
that he was cleansed from his old sins.
10 Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call
and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble;
11 for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into
the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
This
is the Word of God,
for
the people of God.
Praise
be to God.
Amen.
He Has Shared It with Us!!!
2 Pt 1: 1-11 New King James Version (NJKV)
Purpose:
To understand that God has shared His divine nature in us
Outline
I.
Introduction
Talk about dreams. What
is a day dreamer?
II.
What is sin?
III.
Explanation of the biblical text, 2 Pt 1:1-11
IV.
Conclusion[s]
V. Listening of the CD: Jeremy Camp, I will follow, song 9
He Has Shared It with Us!!!
2 Pt 1: 1-11 New King James Version (NJKV)
Purpose:
To understand that God has shared His divine nature in us
Have you
ever asked to yourself why do we dream?
Or what is a dream? First no one knows why we dream. There are speculation
and theories in some disciplines such as psychology but no single consensus has
been reached.[1] What
I have found is that if something really impacts me through the day or triggers
my memory to something good or sad or even ugly that I have experienced in the
past, I dreamed with something related it at night. Also, I have discovered
that sometimes God communicates to me through my dreams. For example, when I
need to surrender something or someone to God that I have been holding it, I
dream with it. Or when I need to do something that I have been afraid to do.
Other times, simply God wants me to be still and recognize, watch, and wait how
He takes care of things. My dreams can be so realistic that I have awaked even
with tears. Other times, I have awaked sweating and with fear because someone
was chasing me trying to catch me and who knows what else!!! I remembered that once,
I dreamed with a family having a picnic and swimming in a beautiful landscape.
Other times, my dreams are confusing and not very clear. One day, I dreamed
that my youngest son was a bug with a human head. It seems like dreams are able
to reflect our emotions.
What about day dreaming. Are we
daydreamers? I have been a day dreamer my entire life. Yes, I like to
dream, and to plan, and to dream again, and to plan again. When I am awake and
totally conscious of myself. I am a big day dreamer and when I dream, I dream
big. On one hand, it has brought me
headaches and hard times because I used to be unrealistic. That means I used to
daydream with things I could never reach such as I wanted to be Miss Mexico.
Well for obvious reason I couldn’t reach my dream. I couldn’t be Miss Mexico.
However, my frustration and
disappointment of not being Miss Mexico didn’t stop me to keep dreaming.
Actually, my day dreaming interest has evolved from unrealistic to idealistic.
Here, we have a tremendous difference. To be unrealistic, is to be out of the
reality such as my situation to become Miss Mexico. And, to be idealistic, is
someone who has high morals or intellectual values; elevate in nature or style;
a grand purpose.[2]
I really believe with all my mind and my heart that each person in GUMC
is an idealistic person. And, I am going to add two words to the definition:
Christian and ethics. We are good
people. People with high Christian morals and ethics with great purpose because
God has share His divine nature with us and His dreams with us.
How do we
know such good news are real and not unrealistic? Because the Holy Spirit lives
inside us. God has shared with us, the same Spirit that resurrected Christ from
the grave. If we have the spirit of God in us, then we have to be willing to
change our earthly distorted morals and ethics for the good and perfect morals
and ethics of God. However, here is the bad news. We have a big problem that
sometimes gets in the middle of our transformation and obedience. It is the terrible. It is the horrible. It
is the detestable sin. Sin is an ever-present reality that enslaves the
human race and has corrupted God’s created order. It is the basic corrupting
agent in the entire universe. In the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible, the meaning
is revolt, a deliberate act of
disobedience against God.[3]
Now, that we share God’s Spirit, we have the understanding of something very
important. We need to understand two very important matters,
1)
Sin is the same yesterday, today, and
tomorrow
2)
God doesn’t change. He doesn’t
compromise.
Now, the good news is that Jesus has
brought us freedom from sin. We have been forgiven and reconciled with God.
That is why, we are aware that Holy Spirit lives in us. Now, we have the great
opportunity to apply God’s dreams in our lives.
Here is the apostle Peter writing to
some churches in Asia Minor, Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, and Bithynia.[4]
False teachings have reached some of the churches. Peter is reminding them that
Christians share the power of God. That is, Christians have everything that is
needed to live a godly life, a life according to God’s moral and ethical
standards. However, they have to be willing to do it. The manifestation of this
godly power is through obedience to the
will of God.
Are you familiar with the saying, Knowledge
is power? Well, I think is clear and understandable how this saying is
very well related to our Christian lives. The knowledge of Christ brings divine
power to our lives, because the more we know Jesus, the more we know the
Father.
My dear ones, God has not left us
alone. Actually, it happens the contrary, once we have accepted our salvation
and are more aware of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in us our
transformation begins. Our dreams evolve. Our dreams have passed from earthly
selfish dreams to divine and remarkable dreams. We have exchanged our dreams for
God’s dreams and they are better. Now, we are able to materialize our dreams
because we have divine power. God has shared His power with us. Now, we have
direction and purpose in our lives. Mainly, we have spiritual and emotional
stability in the assurance that God has shared His Spirit with us.
Listen to the CD, Jeremy Camp, The Same Power, song 9
[1] http://psychology.about.com/od/statesofconsciousness/p/dream-theories.htm
(Accessed on 3/3/2016).
[2]
Ibid.
[3]
Achtemeire Paul J., Revised Edition
Harper Collins Bible Dictionary, (New York, NY. HarperCollins Publishers:
1996), 1026-1027.
[4] The New Interpreter’s Bible. A Commentary in
Twelve Volumes, Vol. XII, (Nashville, TN. Abingdon Press: 1998), 325.
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