What's Your Purpose?

Subject: Spiritual Growth 

Theme: acknowledging God’s purpose for Believers stimulates our pursuit of real spiritual growth.

Introduction:

Simon Peter, 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 Saviour Jesus Christ: 2, Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, 3, According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue: 4, Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. (2 Peter 1:1–4)

Purpose is the reason we do what we do. It answers the questions of "Why were we created?" and "Why do we exist?" Knowing our purpose certainly motivates us to action and affords us deep rooted justification for our actions. Purpose explains our intentions and objectives providing fortitude and resilience in the face of incredible difficulty and obstacles. In some respects a just and righteous cause is worth laying down our lives to preserve or to secure for others. So, we all would agree that knowing and understanding our fundamental reason for existing is a potentially empowering awareness. Purpose is the point of daily living. So...what's your purpose? Why are you here? Do you know the core meaning of your existence? Would you like to know more...to discover your "WHY"?

Living with purpose has become the pursuit of many people as they attempt to find meaning and significance through their relationships, professional goals, a worthy cause, and educational endeavors. While a measure of fulfillment and satisfaction can be realized by these common approaches, lasting and deep fulfillment comes through a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. You see, God made us for His glory, His pleasure, and His purposes. The highest satisfaction in this life and eternity can be found exclusively in our walk with Him. In fact, God's plan of redemption and spiritual development encompass this extraordinary idea of His purpose for us in Christ Jesus. As many have observed on numerous occasions, building a life that reminds God of His darling Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, is no small undertaking. If our estimation of the Lord Jesus is anything near the Bible’s presentation of Him then you understand this is a monumental task! Assuming the responsibility of genuine spiritual development is not only our obligation, but also a part of God's special design for each of our lives. It is a part of our purpose...why we are still on the planet. In this lesson you will see that God provides us with a grand purpose and a path to realizing His design experientially--that is, day by day. Let us begin by entertaining His purpose....

Lesson:

I.                   God Provides Purpose; Notice Why We Have God’s Provisions (2Pet. 1:3, 4).

A.     To live a godly life (2Pet. 1:3).

                                                 1.      Just as His power saves us in the first place, so His power energizes us to live holy lives from then on. The order is—first life, then godliness.

i.         The gospel is the power of God to save from the penalty of sin and from its power! It delivers from damnation and from defilement. “Godliness” means to be holy and to live reverently, loyally, and obediently toward our great God. It is an attitude of reverence and respect toward Him (1Tim. 2:2).

ii.       When people truly believe, Christ begins to fashion them into a community of faith, the church body of Christ (Eph. 2:1–3:11; 1 Pet. 2:9–10).

i.         His ultimate purpose in the gospel is to create a new people who live out the message, relationships, and values of His kingdom, a kingdom in which justice replaces injustice, community replaces rugged individualism, and compassion reigns over competition and neglect of others.

ii.       Thus the gospel is not merely a private relationship with God, but a public expression of godliness as well. The good news about Jesus certainly affects one's personal life, transforming individual attitudes and habits. But it challenges us to look beyond our own self-interests to the interests of others, both those in our network of relationships and in the world in general (Rom. 12:3–8; Eph. 4:1–16; Phil. 2:1–11). To embrace the gospel is to live no longer for oneself, but to live for Christ.

                                                 2.      Moreover, Christ has commissioned us, His followers, to spread the good news about Him throughout the world (Matt. 28:18-20; Mk. 16:15; Luke 24:46-48; Jn. 20:21; Acts 1:8; 1Cor. 15:58).

i.         This involves both the verbal proclamation of gospel truth and the demonstration of gospel reality in the lives of believers.

ii.       Both can happen in a variety of ways: through preaching and teaching, through Christian worship and daily disciplines of spiritual life, through works of mercy and programs of compassion that meet basic human needs, or through believers taking moral stands.

B.     To answer our call to glory and virtue (2Pet. 1:3).

                                                 1.      The power to live a holy life comes through the knowledge of Him who called us.

i.         Christ called us by revealing to us the wonders of His Person. Christ attracts people enslaved by sin (2Pet. 2:19) by His own moral excellence and the total impact of His glorious Person.  Saul of Tarsus was called on the road to Damascus when he saw the glory of God in the exalted Christ.

ii.       A later disciple testified, “I looked into His face and was forever spoiled for anything that was unlike Him.” He was called by His glory and excellent virtue.

                                                 2.      Christ called us to this life of godliness by His own glory and virtue (1 Peter 1:15).

i.         Just as a baby has a definite genetic structure that determines how he will grow, so the believer is “genetically structured” to experience “glory and virtue.” One day we will be like the Lord Jesus Christ (Rom. 8:29; 1 John 3:2). We have been “called... to His eternal glory” (1 Peter 5:10), and we shall share that glory when Jesus Christ returns and takes His people to heaven.

ii.       But we are also “called... to virtue.” We have been saved so that we might “show forth the praises [virtues] of Him who hath called [us] out of darkness into His marvelous light” (1 Peter 2:9). We should not wait until we get to heaven to become like Jesus Christ! In our character and conduct, we should reveal His beauty and grace today.

C.     To escape the corruption in the world (2Pet. 1:4).

                                                1.      No wonder Peter says the promises of God are precious and exceeding great! These promises enable the believer to escape the corruption that is in the world through lust.

                                                2.      God has promised all that we need to resist temptation. When passionate cravings come, we can claim the promises. They enable us to escape from the world’s corruption—its sexual sin, its drunkenness, its filth, its misery, its meaninglessness, its treachery, and its strife.

                                                 3.      Because we possess this divine nature, we have “completely escaped” the defilement and decay in this present evil world. If we feed the new nature the nourishment of the Word, then we will have little interest in the garbage of the world. But if we “make provision for the flesh” (Rom. 13:14), our sinful nature will lust after the “old sins” (2 Peter 1:9) and we will disobey God. Godly living is the result of cultivating the new nature within. –The Bible Exposition Commentary

II.                God Provides a Path; Notice How We Access God’s Provisions (2Pet. 1:2, 3, 4).

A.     Through Personal Saving Knowledge of God (2Pet. 2, 3).

                                                 1.      In his first epistle, Peter emphasized the grace of God (1 Peter 5:12), but in this second letter, his emphasis is on the knowledge of God. The word know or knowledge is used at least thirteen times in this short epistle. The word does not mean a mere intellectual understanding of some truth, though that is included. It means a living participation in the truth in the sense that our Lord used it in John 17:3—“This is life eternal, that they might know Thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom Thou hast sent” (italics mine). –W. W. Wiersbe

                                                 2.      “Knowledge” (vs. 2) implies an intimate and personal relationship. It is the means by which God’s grace and peace may be received and experienced.

                                                 3.      Through the knowledge of God (1:2, 3): “Knowledge” or “full knowledge”, is more than recognition or an intellectual or theoretical knowing. Epignosis is a technical term related to the conversion experience which designates a specifically Christian, saving knowledge of God. This “full knowledge” is based on the truth concerning who Jesus is. It is a personal, dynamic, living, and growing knowledge which transforms the life of the “knower” to correspond to the One known.

B.     Through Partaking of the divine nature (2Pet. 1:4).

                                                 1.      The same promises of God enable us to be partakers of the divine nature.

                                                 2.      This takes place primarily at the time of conversion. When the sinner believes on Jesus Christ, the Spirit of God uses the Word of God to impart the life and nature of God within. A baby shares the nature of its parents, and a person born of God shares the divine nature of God. The lost sinner is dead, but the Christian is alive because he shares the divine nature. The lost sinner is decaying because of his corrupt nature, but the Christian can experience a dynamic life of godliness because he has God’s divine nature within. Mankind is under the bondage of corruption (Rom. 8:21), but the believer shares the freedom and growth that is a part of possessing the divine nature.

i.         Nature determines appetite. The pig wants slop and the dog will even eat its own vomit (2 Peter 2:22), but the sheep desires green pastures. Nature also determines behavior. An eagle flies because it has an eagle’s nature and a dolphin swims because that is the nature of the dolphin. Nature determines environment: squirrels climb trees, moles burrow underground, and trout swim in the water. Nature also determines association: lions travel in prides, sheep in flocks, and fish in schools.

ii.       If nature determines appetite, and we have God’s nature within, then we ought to have an appetite for that which is pure and holy. Our behavior ought to be like that of the Father, and we ought to live in the kind of “spiritual environment” that is suited to our nature. We ought to associate with that which is true to our nature (see 2 Cor. 6:14ff). The only normal, fruit-bearing life for the child of God is a godly life. –Wiersbe, Warren W.

                                                 3.      Then as we live in the practical enjoyment of what God has promised, we become more and more conformed to His image.

i.         For instance, He has promised that the more we think about Him, the more we will become like Him (2 Cor. 3:18).

ii.       We make this promise a reality by reading the Word, studying Christ as He is revealed in it, and following Him. As we do this, the Holy Spirit changes us into His likeness from one degree of glory to another.

                                                 4.      A transformed group of disciples stood beside a transformed Peter as he announced some weeks later: “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:36)

No timidity in his words. No reluctance. About three thousand people believed his message.

The apostles sparked a movement. The people became followers of the death-conqueror. They couldn't hear enough or say enough about him.… Christ was their model, their message. They preached “Jesus Christ and him crucified,” not for the lack of another topic, but because they couldn't exhaust this one.

What unlocked the doors of the apostles' hearts?

Simple. They saw Jesus. They encountered the Christ. Their sins collided with their Savior and their Savior won!…

A lot of things would happen to them over the next few decades. Many nights would be spent away from home. Hunger would gnaw at their bellies. Rain would soak their skin. Stones would bruise their bodies. Shipwrecks, lashings, martyrdom. But there was a scene in their repertoire of memories that caused them to never look back: the betrayed coming back to find his betrayers; not to scourge them, but to send them. Not to criticize them for forgetting, but to commission them to remember. Remember that he who was dead is alive and they who were guilty have been forgiven. – Lucado, Max: Six Hours One Friday

Conclusion: Acknowledge God’s Provisions for Spiritual Growth; Such spiritual wealth should stimulate progress in spiritual maturity. It is vitally important that we know what we have in Christ!

Peter opened his letter with a description of the Christian life. Before he described the counterfeits, he described the true believers. The best way to detect falsehood is to understand the characteristics of the truth. Peter made three important affirmations about the true Christian life.

1.       The Christian Life Begins with Faith (2 Peter 1:1–4)

2.       Faith Results in Spiritual Growth (2 Peter 1:5–7)

3.       Spiritual Growth Brings Practical Results (2 Peter 1:8–11)–Wiersbe: The Bible Exposition Commentary

Yes, when it comes to spiritual growth, the Lord has a grand purpose for each of our lives. He wants us to have the glorious privilege of being like His excellent Son, Jesus Christ. Beloved, this is why we are here to glorify God through godly change becoming increasing more like our Lord Jesus in character. Yes, having goals related to our families, career, education, or noble causes are good, but godliness is tied to our very reason for existence. It behooves us all to cooperate with the Lord concerning His ultimate design for our lives and redemption—Christlikeness. Truly, this is our “WHY!”