Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Evening Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/ev/ev20111023.htm

THRU THE BIBLE EXPOSITION
2 Peter: Effective Christian Growth For Combating Spiritual Apostasy
Part I: Understanding The Foundation For Apostasy-Proof Spiritual Growth
(2 Peter 1:1-4)
  1. Introduction
    1. We believers who live in a world of growing spiritual darkness constantly need to avoid errant thinking and actions that tend toward apostasy that we remain true to the Lord and His Word, Jude 3.
    2. The epistle of 2 Peter addresses this need, and 2 Peter 1:1-4 describes the foundation for apostasy-proof spiritual growth that we do well to understand and apply for our own edification (as follows):
  2. <+@>Understanding The Foundation For Apostasy-Proof Growth, 2 Peter 1:1-4.
    1. The purpose of the epistle of 2 Peter "is to call Christians to spiritual growth so that they can combat apostasy as they look forward to the Lord's return," Bible Know. Com., N. T. , p. 862.
    2. Accordingly, 2 Peter 1:1-4 describes the foundation for such apostasy-proof spiritual growth, a foundation we do well to understand that we might grow in Christ in alignment to it (as follows):
      1. First, we believers have received the precious doctrinal content of the Christian "faith" as had the apostles as described in the New Testament writings, 2 Peter 1:1a,b:
        1. Peter as a slave and apostle of Christ belongs to the Lord we trusted to be saved, 2 Peter 1:1a.
        2. Accordingly, like the apostles, we believers who read Peter's epistle are recipients of the same precious doctrinal content of the Christian "faith" the apostles received, 2 Peter 1:1b: (1) Some claim the "faith" that Peter's readers received of God (2 Peter 1:1b) was the ability to believe the Gospel to be saved, the Calvinistic view that God gives an immediate gift of faith for one to be saved, Ibid., p. 863. (2) However, Jesus marveled at the unbelief of the lost in His day in Mark 6:6, showing that people were responsible to author faith themselves, for otherwise there would have been no need for Jesus to marvel at such human unbelief! (3) Indeed, this view is supported by way of 2 Peter's "strikingly similar" content to that of the Epistle of Jude: ((a)) 2 Peter and Jude are so similar in content, scholars have debated whether Jude used 2 Peter, or whether 2 Peter used Jude, or whether both epistles borrowed from a common source, Ibid., p. 861. ((b)) Well, Jude 3 uses the word "faith" in its introduction only in the sense of the doctrinal content of the Christian "faith", and ((c)) that doctrinal content had been "entrusted" to the saints, Jude 3; Ibid., p. 919. ((d)) Peter at 2 Peter 1:1 claims his readers as the apostles had "received" (NIV) a "like precious faith" (KJV), and "received" from the Greek word, lagchano, means "to obtain by lot or divine will," Arndt & Gingrich, A Grk.-Engl. Lex. of the N. T. , 1967, p. 463. ((e)) Thus, like Jude 3 speaks of doctrinal content that had been entrusted to the saints, 2 Peter 1:1 notes believers had received it by lot or divine will, receiving doctrinal content based on God's foreknowledge of our faith, cf. 1 Peter 1:1-2.
      2. Having received that doctrinal content of the true Christian faith, we believers can have God's grace and peace multiplied to us in experientially coming to know (epiginosko, Ibid., p. 290-291) God and Jesus our Lord in our Christian lives through applying that doctrinal content in living, 1 Peter 1:2.
      3. In fact, the divine power of the Holy Spirit of God indwelling us believers (Romans 8:9) has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness in the Christian walk, 2 Peter 1:3a.
      4. All such life and godliness that is so opposite apostasy arise in our experience through experientially coming to know (epignosis, Ibid., p. 291) the Lord in our Christian walk as believers, 2 Peter 1:3b.
      5. We get to know the Lord this way as we rely on the indwelling Holy Spirit (2 Peter 1:3a) provided via extensive Biblical promises (2 Peter 1:3b) that make us partakers of the divine nature of God in the sense that we think and act like the Lord does through the Holy Spirit's power, 2 Peter 1:4a; Gal. 2:20.
      6. This causes us to escape the corruption in the world by lusts typical of apostasy, 2 Pet. 1:4b with 2:1-3.
      7. Thus, we become immune to apostasy by experientially thinking and acting like God does through the Holy Spirit's power as we rely on Him to apply the doctrinal truth we received of the Lord as believers.
Lesson: The basis for becoming apostasy-proof as a believer is to rely upon God's gift of the indwelling Holy Spirit to adhere in our lives to the doctrinal truth we received from the Lord. (2 Timothy 1:13-14)

Application: Avoiding apostasy comes by trusting God in living to adhere to His truth, so may we do so.