Imagine you receive a call from the management of the British Commonwealth Team. They want to offer a position on the team. You can choose the sport. The one you've always dreamed of playing! And this offer comes with no conditions on your part. They know you are no athlete so your position is not based on how you perform. No, it is a lifetime contract that will never be revoked. Whatever you do, however you perform you will always be able to say you are a key player on that team. So after the initial shock and excitement, how do you respond?
Do you do nothing? You know your status is that of a commonwealth athlete and nothing can change that so why bother to do anything else? Or do you make the most of the amazing gift you’ve been given and attend every training opportunity possible? Keep your fitness at its peak. Give 100%. I’m sure you’d agree that only by taking the latter approach would we make the best of the opportunity and fully show our gratitude to what we have been given.
As Christians I think we can sometimes respond to God’s grace in the former approach. We know God has given us an amazing gift of lifetime membership into his kingdom. We know he has called us to himself, forgiven us for all the wrongs we have done. We know he has given us new birth and new life safe in him. We know our status has changed from sinner to righteous. But yet we do nothing to further our growth as Christians. We do nothing to demonstrate our gratitude for all God has done for us. We sit content in our salvation.
However, in his second letter Peter wants to challenge us that our response should be something more. We should not want to rest content where we first started as Christians but instead, in verse 5 of chapter 1 he says to us to “make every effort to supplement your faith”. His challenge is to get us to see that we can’t just wait around for God to wave his magic wand to make us Christ-likeness and sinless. He doesn’t work like the fairy Godmother in Cinderella. Instead God expects us to play our part and work at growing in Christ-likeness/godliness. He want us to “do” and take action.
In 1 Timothy chapter 4 verse 7, Paul ups the challenge. He write to Timothy to encourage him to be a good servant of Christ. He writes this, “Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly.” Paul’s goal for Timothy is that he would train himself to be godly. The word train is derived from the very ancient Greek world from which we get the English word gymnasium. By New Testament times it referred to exercise and training in general. In a sense, Paul is saying, “gymnasticise yourself for the purpose of godliness.” He’s calling for a spiritual workout. And Paul values this spiritual workout so much more important than any other physical or mental preparation we might do. He goes on to say, “For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come.”
But do we have this attitude towards our godliness? Do we give our spiritual wellbeing the same serious commitment and discipline? Many of us will understand this in physical terms. If we want to lose weight, we make a commitment to follow a specific diet. We decide what foods we are going to avoid, we make goals. We might start training at the gym or join an exercise class. But I’m not sure we consider our spiritual lives in the same way. I know I don’t.
Of course we must consider this area of being discipline in godliness with the right motivation. One reasons I think we avoid speaking openly about the need to be disciplined is a fear of legalism. If we consider spiritual discipline as a series of rules to follow, in a desire to be godly and remain in God’s good books, we will have missed the point and be on the road to utter failure. Back in 2 Peter 1, Peter starts verse 5, by saying “for this very reason”. To remind us that we are not striving to gain entry to God’s kingdom or to keep hold of our salvation. Instead we make every effort in response to and because of everything that God has done for us, promised to us and the immense privileges he has given us. In the same way we would want to make every effort in response to an amazing, we should also be striving to be the best we can be in the response to God’s amazing gift of grace.
So what are the disciplines of godliness we need to train ourselves in? Come back tomorrow for part one!
