Be Diligent

We can all give thanks to God for who He is and what He does. God will do things because He is faithful and true to Himself. Now that we come to read His word together, you and I know that it is through preaching that faith comes. I know that there are a few here that God has already spoken to this morning. It matters what fruit you have in your life. It matters whether our lives are being lived according to God’s will to His purposes or for ourselves.

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2 Peter 1:8-11

‘Give diligence’. Two words meaning work hard at it, focus upon it. Don’t let there be any needless intrusion of what is going to make you go the wrong way. On Friday we looked at a man called Asa who started off well, but things went wrong because in the end He didn’t really rely on God. It came to the point where God had to send someone to say something to him because Asa, at that time, had done a deal of his own strength instead of relying on God as he had done earlier on in his life. We saw how 580,000 of his soldiers knocked out a million of the others because he relied on God completely. There came a time where he did a league with the King of Syria. God sent him a prophet.

2 Chronicles 16:7-10

Asa’s reaction to this is interesting because God was speaking to him through Hanani, and one’s reaction when God comes to you is either to embrace what He’s saying, or to push Him away.

He took it out on the people because the man of God had come to Him and pointed out a few things. Jesus was aware that when He came to people they could either hear what He said or ignore it. God has been speaking to people in this hall latterly. I want to know what you’re going to do with the word that God’s spoken to you, because it matters what we do with the Word He’s given us. This following parable talks about God seeking fruit from a life because the fact of the matter is that either you going to accept and act upon what God is saying, or you’re going to put up the barriers and perpetuate that you’re going to live for yourself. The Holy Spirit is being faithful and coming to you with that Word, or prompt in your heart. This parable is to do with the nation of Israel but it applies to a life.

Mark 12:1-5

I wonder how many times God has spoken to you but you’ve stopped that word from coming into your life. Even though it keeps coming back you keep pushing it away. He sent servant after servant to collect what was rightfully his.

Mark 12:6-14

Jesus, the owner of the vineyard if you life, was talking to the very people who were going to kill him. How much does it take for God to keep coming with His word for you to accept His word? He’s gracious and loving. It is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance. God is speaking to people about their lives at the mountain. At the end of this parable Jesus spoke about the stone. Little did they know that it was Him that would become the corner stone of the church. He was talking to Jews but it extend beyond this to the gentiles too.

Ephesians 2:19-23

The church is fitly framed together with Jesus Christ as the corner stone. After Jesus’s death and resurrection it was clear as to how the church was going to be formed. We are part of His church. God is coming to your life and asking you ‘where do you fit in?’ What is the fruit in your life? It is God’s word coming to you. God won’t force Himself on you, He’s gracious and patient. He’s here this morning.

1 Corinthians 3:16

Here in these verses Paul points out that we are the temple of God and that the spirit of God dwells in us if we are a Christian.

1 Corinthians 6:19-21

You and I have been bought with a price and the price is Jesus’ life. In the parable they didn’t reference His son. Here now I’m asking you what the fruit of your life is? What are you doing with the words God is coming to you with by the Holy Spirit? What is the effect of the word in your life?

2 Peter 1:1-4

He’s writing to people who have heard that word and are partakers of the divine nature. But he now adds these words:

2 Peter 1:5-12

Always keep an eye open to the end of the sentence in the epistles. As far as you’re concerned this is telling us that there is something that we need to do. We can’t just respond in a meeting and be grateful, although that is wonderful, we must also act on this. We need to know what we must do going forward. God may be speaking to you, but this is very clear from Peter, you’ve got to give diligence. This word is used twice. What does it mean to be diligent? It means that I don’t respond in here and then live anyway out there. We have to be practical about this. I’ve got to prioritise my time and link up with the right people. I need to make sure that I don’t do things that will get me into trouble again. There’s a way of living and of establishing God’s word in your heart.

2 Peter 1:4

You’ve escaped that. It could be you need to escape from that, but God’s power is such that you can escape from that.

2 Peter 1:5

What does virtue mean? Another word for virtue is morality or moral excellence. Add to your faith. You add to your faith. Don’t assume that in here it will happen just in here. If you accept the word God gives you the power to live right, but then you have to live right. We must also add to virtue knowledge. What sort of knowledge are we talking about here? We’re talking about the Bible. We’re talking about taking every opportunity to understand the Bible. We must all know this book inside out. We’re not talking about the letter, we’re talking about opening your heart to let the Holy Spirit in.

This is the book we live by. God is faithful. People are saying now that we should read this word together – great. We must follow the lead God is giving us that we must get involved with this book. ‘Add to knowledge temperance.’ Another word for temperance is self-control. You add self-control to your life by not getting into situations where before you were out of control. You might be thinking that this is all works, it should be faith. There are practicalities of life. God has opened the path for us, but we have to walk down it. There is no way that God isn’t going to see you through at this time. He will, He’s your heavenly father. ‘Add to faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge temperance and to temperance patience’.

We are to be patient. We’re to accept as God shows different things in our life of what we need to do. ‘Add to patience godliness.’ Being godly means being set apart, having the things of God in your mind, listening to and talking about the right things and not being ashamed of the gospel of Christ. ‘And to godliness brotherly kindness’. We must care for each other. We shouldn’t cash in on a conversation that is pulling someone down, but we should cash in on a conversation that if lifting up God’s work in a life.

2 Peter 1:8

You won’t be barren. There’s a sense in which God has been faithful throughout everything in the last weeks, in the last months, in the last years. There’s no way that God has not been faithful. Where are we at this morning? I think we’re at the point where God is being faithful in speaking to us, and He is by His Holy Spirit confirming His word in our hearts. You could push Him away, He’s not going to force. He is all love and patience, but isn’t it better to open your heart to what you know He is speaking to you about.

2 Peter 1:9

There’s power in the name of Jesus.

Everything Revolves Around Him

God is not going to walk away from what He has started in your life. The initiator of the faith that you have is Jesus. The one who will take you right through your life until you see Jesus face to face, is Jesus. The whole world exists and goes forward because of Him. Everything but everything revolves around Him.

I want to look at some verses which are talking about the end of time and what will happen. These verses in Revelation 21 talk about New Jerusalem, or the Bride of Christ, or New Jerusalem as a bride adorned for her husband. I’m reading these verses in Revelation because I want to place in your mind where everything in time is moving towards and we will come down to the specifics in your life and my life towards that end.

Revelation 21:1,10,23,27

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It matters that your name is written in the Lamb’s Book of Life because all of time is going forward towards New Jerusalem. It’s as if I have in my pocket a passport saying “Citizen of New Jerusalem, Citizen of Heaven.” I’m just passing through here.

Hebrews 11:1

On Friday we looked at how faith was fundamental to all the heroes of faith listed throughout this chapter.

Hebrews 11:33 – 38

It’s a tremendous catalogue of what people did, in faith, through faith, in God. This planet wasn’t worthy of such people.

Hebrews 11:39 – 40

In other words everything revolves around Jesus Christ. The Old Testament and New Testament are all one in God. The fulcrum, the centrality of time and eternity being Jesus Christ. Everything revolves around Him. The fact that you’re breathing, the fact that you see such wonders of creation; it all revolves around Jesus Christ.

Hebrews 12:1 – 2

I want to examine these two verses.

You’re in race, I’m in a race. That doesn’t mean we elbow each other out of the way. It’s not a competition. But there’s a race because there’s a definite goal. The aim is definite, we’re looking unto Jesus. Jesus lives inside me by His Holy Spirit and everything revolves around Him. My aim is Jesus.

I want to please Him. I want to live my life as He wants me to live it. The race is set before us. God has appointed that pathway, that lane that we’re running in, and His hand is upon your life. This means that you, by the love of God, have had faith put into your heart. And He will increase that faith. This race is not a sprint.

You might be thinking, hang on, I’ve already been saved from sin, I know about Calvary. But you know that it’s still possible to focus on things that are wrong. When you set off on a race in the Olympics you don’t start with a rucksack, you don’t stray into other lanes, you are focussed on your lane with nothing else restricting you.

2 Corinthians 7:1

So I don’t get involved with a friend who’s going the wrong way. Nothing’s going to pull me away.

1 John 3:2 – 3

So this passport in my pocket which says “Citizen of Heaven: Peter Linnecar” brings with it responsibilities before God. I’ve been set free so that I can make the right choices in life to go the right way. And He’s put the power in me that I can live the right way.

And in the race, you know that if you run with patience, that distance will be covered until such time as you see Him face to face.

Hebrews 12:1

That isn’t a cloud of people watching you, it’s a cloud of witnesses to the Power of God, people who have proved God, and have known God’s power through faith.

Hebrews 11:6

It isn’t that God dangles a carrot of faith in front of you and just as you’re about to take it He whips it away. God plants faith in a person. It may be for some that it’s a case of getting to an end of yourself. If this is the way it is for you, then it’s God that brought that about. Without faith you cannot please God.

Ephesians 1:9 – 10

Everything revolves around Jesus Christ

To repeat, everything revolves around Jesus Christ. Everything in your life which is of importance is what involves Him. This means that your focus, your outlook, revolves around Him. What does God want for me in my life? What job I do, who I marry, everything revolves around Him. So if I’m straying from my lane then I won’t progress in the race. Sometimes we meander from our lane and God has to bring you back to where you were before. God loves me.

Hebrews 12:2

Hebrews 1:1 – 4

That’s why I said on Friday, those heroes in Hebrews were all looking forward; they couldn’t look back to Jesus’ first coming as we can. We’re looking at it in a different way. We know what happened. Jesus came. We know that He died on the cross; we know that He was raised from the dead. So if you think He’s forgotten about you, He hasn’t.

There’s no planning or committee meeting going on in heaven. Christ sat down. It was finished. The work on the Cross was finished. There’s no mistaking or miscalculation. On 10th September the plug goes on at Cerne in Switzerland where these particles will collide as they try to discover the origin of matter. We know that the origin of matter is Him. And what we’re discovering is more and more and more how much He loves us.

Hebrews 12:3

We’re talking about a man who was here for all eternity. He could do anything, He was God, Son of God, and yet He was pinned like a butterfly in a tray.

Matthew 27:39 – 43

With one blink of a millisecond God could have wiped them out. He didn’t.

Mark 15:31 – 32

Luke 23:35 – 37

You know as well as I do that if you’re not a Christian your reaction to that would have been one of vengeance and anger. If you’d have had the power, if I’d have had the power, we’d have just flicked them out. But God’s love is greater than anything man can comprehend.

You know He put up with all that because He loved you. You were, in a sense, on His mind at that point. Because it says the joy that was set before Him. That joy is New Jerusalem and the Church. For the joy that was set before Him, He went through that for you and me. And when He was mocked He didn’t throw it back. But He committed Himself to God who is a righteous judge.

And in the next few verses He explains that God organises the circumstances of your life. Everything is organised so that as you go through life you discover more and more that you can trust God to provide for everything for you.

There came a time when He put faith in your heart and you know the way you’re going. If you’re trying to pull someone away from the pathway that they’re trying to live – don’t.

Hebrews 12:5 – 6

Don’t be surprised, if you stray from the path, that circumstances arise which force you to get back on track.

Hebrews 12:5 – 9

There is a way of life I’m going to live which is pleasing to Him. “No one’s going to tell me what to do” – fine, how about God?

Hebrews 12:10 – 13

I have a choice in my reaction to circumstances in life. I can meander and become bitter and allow that to affect others. Or I can run with patience the race realising that everything that has happened in life is for my good, and this will yield the fruit of righteousness in my life.

We should work together, helping each other, running this race patiently. Whether we’ve known each other for 30 years or three weeks we should always help each other. And woe betide this church if people come to visit and we don’t welcome them.

Whatever you need in your life God has the answer lined up, He’s heard your prayer. No prayer is just a vague hope, God hears, He knows. He’s there, He knows.

The focus of my life doesn’t depend on works but I can’t expect God to bless me if my intention in life is not to focus on Him in the way I run my race. God loves me and is a God of love. He had you in His heart before the world began. Time and eternity are no big deal for Him. Everything begins and ends with Him.

Hebrews 12:8 – 13

You’re here because of what God is speaking to you. I know He is. It’s a wonderful thing. And as we hear more of what’s going on elsewhere, God’s there. What will be your response? I think a good response would be, “Yes, this is me; this is where I’m at.” You may realise that you’ve been meandering; it’s time to get back in God’s way. He’s given you the faith to believe in your future in Him. He’s the author, originator, He’s started His work in you and He’ll complete it. His work is that when you see Him you’ll be like Him.

Now He’s conquered death and is seated at the right hand of God and He’s sent His Holy Spirit, and He’s here.