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“The Divine Guarantee | Add To Your Faith”
Categories: Add To Your Faith | 2025
One of the reasons why we experience paralysis by analysis is our intense fear of regret. We don’t want to miss something or make the wrong choice. We don’t want to start a project the wrong way and wish we’d done it differently later on - so we don’t start at all. We don’t want to choose to eat at a mediocre restaurant (looking at you Chili’s) only to realize later that we should have eaten at Outback - so we sit in the car with the engine running trying to think of all the restaurants in town. We don’t want to make a bad choice. We don’t want to waste our time. So, we freeze.
Again, the same is true when it comes to spiritual growth. Sometimes it’s hard to determine what area of my spiritual life should take priority. We want so badly to make the best choice that we end up making no choice. Our fear of regret leaves us paralyzed and spiritually stunted. That’s what makes this little passage in II Peter so helpful. In it, Peter calms our fears about regret. He instructs us to add to our faith virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love (II Peter 1:5-7), and then he offers a little reassurance...
“For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.” - II Peter 1:8
I think that’s a wonderful little piece of confidence we can carry with us. If we focus on adding and increasing these seven qualities we can be sure that we will always be useful and fruitful in the kingdom. “Seven-Quality People” always make their mark on the kingdom. Peter adds even more reassurance a few verses later,
“Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you.” - II Peter 1:10-11
That’s why Dan and I are encouraging you to focus on these seven qualities this year. Peter guarantees that Christians with these seven qualities are useful, fruitful, and will undoubtedly receive an eternal reward.
- Jonathan Banning
