Bloom: Everything You Need | Week 2 | Bloom In Moral Excellence

What does it mean to be a "straight arrow"? In this sermon, Didi digs into 2 Peter 1:3-5 and the call to add goodness to our faith, moral excellence, nobility, and an incorruptible character. Using Daniel as our example, we explore how God's power, combined with our every effort, shapes us into people whose integrity stands out.

Transcript

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Good morning. So uh not too long ago I was traveling to Kingsport, Tennessee, and I passed through the town of Middlesbrough, Kentucky. How many do anyone know where Middlesbrough, Kentucky is? Anybody? Huh? Okay. So I'm going through Middlesbrough, Kentucky, and it has the sign at the front of the front of the town. It says, Welcome to Middlesbrough. And then there's this little other tagline that's connected to it. It says, Home of Lee Majors. So how many of you know who Lee Majors is? Anybody? Okay. Okay, all right. So Lee Majors is an actor. And he was the main character of a TV series from the 70s called The Six Million Dollar Men. Six Million Dollar Men. U.S. Air Force Colonel and astronaut Steve Austin. Yes, Youngins, he was the original stone cold Steve Austin. So the setup is that Steve Austin has this crash where he's barely alive, and they rebuild him. And they rebuild him by replacing his legs with bionic legs so he can run 100 miles an hour and he can jump all these high buildings. They replaced his right arm with a bionic arm that allows him to pick up these heavy things and to punch through walls and all that. He has a bionic eye, I think it's his left eye is bionic, and his left eye is like it's like a telescope. He can see things very far away. That's why he cost six million dollars. Because he was the bionic man. Now I remember, those of you who know the show, you're gonna lie, you'll know what I'm talking about. Do you remember whenever Steve Austin started to use his bionics, what would happen? It would slow down, wouldn't it? And then you would hear what?

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And then the music would. It was awesome. It was like 70s high-tech. It was like woo! Or whenever he put his eye on it, he'd be like you'd hear dad.

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So uh my family and I were visiting England a few not too long, it was in the 80s, I think, and my dad, knowing that I love Steve Austin at a flea market, he he found one of these. Check this out Steve Austin action figure. Yeah, and I had one of these, and so Steve Austin actually had like this button on the bank back, it was like a crank, so you push it, lift up the heavy stuff, or you could look through the eye and pretend you were looking things far away because you had the Bionic eye. I loved that thing. So here's the crazy thing. If you think about it, you the TV shows that you watch way back when, you know, the shows of the 70s, the stuff they they they you know felt like it was futuristic and you know amazing, in many ways are the things that we're doing today. I mean, think about bionics. Think about artificial limbs that are robotic. I mean, people are experiencing that right now. And you think about bionics, even in terms of like limb replacement or joint replacement, knee replacement, hip replacement, shoulder replacement, that is bionics. We're doing what used to be considered like unbelievable in the 70s. Now it seems to be commonplace. Now, heart transplants. I remember when they first came out, the guy that that did the first human heart transplant was this guy, uh, it was a South African doctor, Dr. Bernard. And he did perform the first heart transplant. Now, it seems like heart transplants are pretty common, are a pretty common thing. They are doing some amazing things medically. Now, speaking of heart transplant, I have something here on that. Came across this article, 2021 book called ER Nurses. The book is over a hundred personal stories of ER nurses all over the United States. One of the stories is about a nurse called Victoria Lindsay. Victoria served in the U.S. Navy as a gunner's mate for several years before she left and decided to become a nurse. She began working with heart transplant patients and now specializes in cardiothoracic surgery nursing. Lindsay tells her story about caring for a man named Ken, preparing him for a heart transplant. She said, she told Ken, whatever you were doing before, you need to really come at it from a different point and change. You need to be able to eat healthy and exercise to the best of your ability. Ken nodded, but still looked lost. Lindsay continued, not everyone who gets a new heart actually takes care of it. I've seen heart transplants ruined pretty quickly over the few years because the patients didn't control their diabetes. They end up basically throwing the whole heart away. She continued on. She said, I've had heart transplant patients come back in and say, you know what? I'm just not going to take the immunosuppression medication anymore. To which Lindsay replied, and I want you to pay attention to this. You do realize someone died for you, right? That this heart you've got could have gone to anyone, a little bit healthier or younger, someone who could have done something more with their life, but it was given to you. And now you don't want to take your meds? You do realize someone died so that you could have a new heart. Now tell me if that doesn't connect with what we know about what the message of the good news is all about from scripture. So we're we're continuing on our message series called Bloom, and what we're doing is we're focusing on the teachings of Peter when he wrote a letter called 2 Peter, and we're focusing on chapter 1, and we're just gonna be looking at seven verses, one through seven. Last week, Aaron walked us through verses one through four, and I love what Aaron said. He said basically these are four verses, but they're just packed with meaning. They're just packed with power, they're they're packed with life. These four verses are instructions given to those who were once spiritually dead, but now have a new heart. Instructions on how to live to care for the new heart. In these verses, Peter reminds Jesus' followers that their faith in Jesus has allowed them the great opportunity to know God. Know God not just in head knowledge, but to know God relationally. What is the word he used? He used epinosis. Know God from the heart. And because if you know God, because you know God is inside of you by his Holy Spirit, you can walk with God in life. You can talk to God through prayer, you can listen to God's word as you study the scripture, as you participate in the community of faith called the church, as as you learn to recognize God's verse speaking to you directly. Verse three and four are particularly powerful when it comes to thinking about living a new life with God, living with a new heart. Follow along with me as I as I read. Peter says, His divine power, his is God, the divine power, he's talking about the power of God, and practically speaking, in the application we're talking about, his divine power is referencing to the Spirit of God inside the heart of the believer. And he's talking to Christians in the first century, but this truth applies to Jesus' followers today, so he's talking to you. His divine power has given us what? Everything. Everything for what? Everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge. There's that word epinosis, our relationship, our heart knowledge, our getting to know God and God getting to know us as we live life together, has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory. The word glory means that which identifies. And when we talk about the glory of God, it's it's something that identifies God as God. Things that show that God can only do these things because he's God, right? So he's given us these things by by his own glory and goodness. I want you to take note of that word goodness, because that's going to be our word for this entire message series. Verse 4. Through these, he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate, you may have act act, you'll be able to participate, you have partnership in the divine nature. You can know God and God can know you, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. God has given you everything you need to have a godly life. You're living in this world, and you're called to be a Jesus follower. God provides everything you need to be able to do that. Now, the sentence actually can be translated more accurately. God provides everything you need for life, everything you need to have the life that He calls you to, and for godliness, to live life in a way that honors God. But you're gonna have to do your part because this is a partnership, just like the heart transplant patient, you're gonna have to commit to change. You're gonna have to commit to changes, to the life practices that keep your heart alive and well. And that's the prescription that we're gonna be working through from today right through to the end of this series. Peter is gonna give a list of things that we're called to give ourselves to, to commit ourselves to, so that we might do our part, do our part in living out the life that God has called us to live, to live by godliness. And the first thing is something that I've already just referenced to in verse 3. It's described as a characteristic of God, what what's said in verse 3 when he says, uh, we have known this through his glory and goodness. That word goodness is what we're gonna focus on. And goodness is a tricky word to translate from the original Greek into English. The word goodness really doesn't capture its full meaning. Mark Twain said the difference between the right word and the almost right word is like the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. You with me? Did you get that? That was pretty woody. Thank you, Tim. I love it. So the word here is arete in Greek. Now, those of you that are uh are well versed in French, you know the word arete also means stop in French, but here in the common Greek, we're we're talking about arete, and what that word, what that word means is more than just goodness. It's only used five times in the New Testament. It's used once by the apostle Paul. In Philippians 4 8, Paul tells Christians, he says, you know, these are the things you need to think about, whatever is good, whatever is noble, whatever is is true, and then he says, whatever is excellent, that's a rate. Excellent. Whatever is excellent, think on these things. And then Peter uses this word more often. In fact, you you get the sense that Peter really likes this word, because he uses it in 1 Peter and in 2 Peter, and the three other times, so once by Paul and four times by Peter, three other times that Peter uses that word, he uses the word to describe a characteristic of God. And then the fifth time he uses it is our verse for today, when he uses it a characteristic that we're to commit to as Jesus followers. Arate, what does that mean? Well, arate is is used to mean excellence, but excellence as defined by when when something fulfills its its proper purpose. So, what is the excellence of a knife? The excellence of a knife is to cut. And if you want to keep a knife excellent, what do you do? You sharpen it, you clean it, you you make sure it doesn't rust. What is the excellence of a horse? Well, the excellence of a horse could be to run and to run fast. So, what do you do? You you do things that care for the horse, you feed the horse, you train the horse, you exercise the horse. Why? So that it can be excellent, so it can run. And so if you want to kind of define this word and the way it's used right now, you could say, well, the word is is it could be translated goodness, but it also means moral excellence. It can mean being noble, it can mean being incorruptible, it can mean being virtuous, it means being excellent. You fulfill the purpose of your creation. And Peter says God is good. God is the number one example of what is good, what is morally excellent, what is noble, what is virtuous. God is incorruptible. No doubt, Moses no doubt Peter heard this passage of scripture when he was going to church, when he was going to synagogue, raised up on the word of God in the Old Testament. And no doubt he heard it, Deuteronomy 10, 17, where it says, For the Lord your God is the God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who does not show partiality nor take a bribe. The fact that God shows no partiality, that means he doesn't treat one person one way and another a different way. God is not prejudiced, he does not change in the way he operates when it comes to his relationship with people. He's always consistent to his character. He he does not show partiality, nor does he take a bride. He's not corruptible. He's not up to say, hey, if you do this for me, I'll do that for you. God is the ultimate example of what it means to be good, to be morally excellent, to be noble, to be incorruptible. Now I thought about the way we talk about this concept today, and I I sort of kind of racked my brain a little bit as to how we describe people like this with this character trait. And and one thing came to mind was something that my mother used to always say when she described someone she admired or someone she thought was uh was honest and good. She would say, uh, you know, that guy is a good guy. He is a straight arrow. How many of you ever heard that phrase? Someone be described as a straight arrow. Well, what does it mean? Practically, it means, uh, you know, an arrow that's straight. There's some picture here of a couple of arrows, right? Let's look at that. Those are straight arrows. Means you can trust them to fly true. When you aim it at whatever you aim them at, they're gonna hit. There's no bend in them, there's no break in them, there's no warp in them. Those are straight arrows. I looked up what the definition of a straight arrow means in Miriam Webster. This is what it said. He is a straight arrow, means the person is extremely honest, moral, trustworthy, and follows conventional, upright standards. It describes someone with high integrity whose behavior is considered beyond reproach, reliable and straight or unwavering in their principles. So we get to, so we haven't understand what what this word arete means, and we understand, okay, this applies to God. God is the straightest of straight arrows. Now let's talk about what Peter says here in our text. 1 Peter 1, 5. He says, for this very reason, what very reason is he referencing? Well, he's referencing to what he said in verses 1 through 4, that we can know God, that God has provided divine power that gives us everything we need for life and godliness, right? He said, for this reason, make every effort, make every effort to add to your faith. Faith is the starting point of the Christian life. Faith is where you are made right with God because you believe. Make every effort to add to your faith, here is our word, godly, goodness. To your faith, goodness, arete. Now I want to I want to sort of pack some of this a little bit here. What does make every effort mean? What does that mean? And you read that and you're like, oh wow, it's all on me, right? I mean, the immediate thought is oh, I I gotta get this done, I gotta do this. Make every effort in the context of what what Peter has already said does not mean that it's all on you, that you have to be perfect all the time. What it means is it means that you have to make a commitment to work with God in your life. Let me tell you a story that I think illustrates this so beautifully. It was a mom who had a boy who was learning to play the piano. He was six, seven, eight years old. She heard that a master piano player, a maestro, was coming to her town and was going to play a concert. Thrilled by the opportunity to expose her son to the potential, the the what could be if he worked at playing the piano, she bought a couple of tickets. The tickets were in chairs that were up front. And so she brought her son to the concert to listen to the maestro play. While they were waiting for the concert to begin, the mom began to talk to people around her. She knew folks from the community, she was engaged in this conversation, and she lost track of what her boy was doing. Next thing she looked, she looked to her right and he was not there. She looked to her right down where where she thought he was, and then to horror, she looked up onto the stage, and there he was, sitting on the bench, sitting at the piano, the grand piano. And he began to plink out the tune that he knew. Twinkle, twinkle, little star. Plink, blink, blink, blink. I don't I can't plink it, but you know what I'm saying. Twinkle, twinkle, little star. At that moment, to mom's embarrassment, she began to sink down in her chair. The maestro came on the stage and he walked up to the boy and he whispered in his ear, keep playing. Keep playing. Twinkle, twinkle, little star. And as the boy played, Twinkle, twinkle, little star, he put his arm around one side and he began to fill in the bass notes to the boy's song. And then he came around with the other hand and began to add beautiful complimentary harmonies and melodies that made the song absolutely mesmerizing. The result was spellbinding. Make every effort is Peter saying to you, look, God is whispering in your ear, just keep playing. Do your part to make every effort to be available to God, to be obedient to God, to learn to live scripture, to pray, to connect to God so that you might give yourself, you might take on a posture where you are submitting to God's word so that you by his power may learn to live it. And your playing twinkle, twinkle, little star, however imperfect, however stumbling, God uses to create a beautiful piece of music. Peter is telling you make every effort to submit to the way of the Lord so that by the power of God you will bloom in your faith. Make every effort is a commitment to work at it. It takes time, it takes process, it takes learning, it takes growing, it takes blooming. You will stumble, you will fall, you will mess up, you will learn again. But every effort means make the commitment that you know that by the power of God, you will add to your faith the goodness. Goodness. You will learn to become a straight arrow, a rete. You will access the divine resources made available to you, and you will add to your faith moral excellence, nobility, being incorruptible. You know, I've heard I've heard it said that this character trait is can be described as doing what's right when no one is looking. I think that's a good starting point. But I think we need to take this a little deeper. Because if we understand what Peter is saying, then what he's saying is this look, you do what's right because you know God is looking. You know that God is on the inside. You are experiencing epinosis, you are walking with God, you're learning what God loves, and you're learning what God hates. And you're seeking to align yourself in ways that you can learn to walk with God. If the excellence of a knife is to cut, if the excellence of a horse is to run, if the excellence of an arrow is to be straight, then what is the excellence of a person who is being made right with God, who has God on the inside, the Holy Spirit providing everything she needs for life and godliness. What does that look like? Well, what it looks like is going back to the cashier at Jungle Gyms and letting her know that she gave you a $10 bill when it should have been a $1 bill. Because you know that is pleasing to God. It's recognizing that though the road is empty, the speed limit is still 45. And 60 is seen by God too. It's stopping at the red light early in the morning when no one's around for miles and miles, and you know, waiting for the light, waiting for the light to change, because it's pleasing to God that you obey the laws of the land. Get a little more serious here. It's knowing God is watching you as you try to sneak away to scroll through your phone and look at the things that are pornographic. Because you know God is with you, and it's not honoring your commitment to Him who died to give you a new heart. You know, I when I was preparing this message, I asked myself, who's a who's a good example, a biblical example of this character trait? And one person came to mind immediately. A person that exemplifies a rete. It's it's a man called Daniel. Daniel's found the story of Daniel's found in the Old Testament. He was a straight arrow. And I want to say, if you want to pursue this character trait, then be like Daniel. Now we're gonna go all the life story of Daniel at this time, but let me ask you this. When I say Daniel, those of you that know the story of Daniel, what do you immediately think of? Daniel and what? The Lion's Den. Daniel and the Lion's Den. This is one of my favorite pictures of that scene. Daniel and the Lion's Den. And it's an accurate picture in one way that they capture Daniel as kind of an older guy. They capture the fact that Daniel is in the den of lions who want to eat him, but they're being prevented from eating him. He's in mortal danger, but he's at peace. And it's interesting that they have Daniel looking out the window because it was looking out, praying out of a window that got Daniel in trouble in the first place. How did Daniel get into this position? Well, simply put, it's because of Arete. Simply put, it was because he was morally excellent and incorruptible and virtuous. See, Daniel was taken as a prisoner of war, as a young man, and put into service in the government of Babylon. He was recognized as a talented, gifted young man that the Babylonians wanted to use as a civil servant, as a government official. And Daniel's life was a story of one who was honored because he was a quality person. One of the emperors said this about Daniel. He said, Now I've heard about you that a spirit of the gods is in you, and that illumination, insight, and extraordinary wisdom have been found in you. That was Daniel's life from the time he entered into service all the way to the end. Daniel was an exceptional human being, but it wasn't about his talent. It wasn't about his intelligence or wisdom. What was most outstanding about Daniel was that he was a straight arrow. He was uncompromising in his commitment to live, to honor God. He gave himself and made every effort to learn God's word so that he might live God's word in the very complexities of his life. And so in Daniel chapter 6, we're told there's a regime change in the government. There's a new emperor. New emperor does a re-org. Part of the re-org involves Daniel. Daniel is selected as one of three government officials who are put in charge of managing a hundred government officials and taking care of administrating the entire government, the entire country. He excels, he blooms in everything he did. Verse 3 of chapter 6, it says, Then this Daniel began distinguishing himself among the commissioners and satraps because he possessed an extraordinary spirit, and that the king planned to appoint him over the entire kingdom. Now, I know this sounds like a shock, but you know, working in government can get nasty. It was a nasty business. I know it's shocking to hear that. But that's what was happening with Daniel. The commissioners and satraps, the other officials, didn't like the news that Daniel was excelling so well and could possibly, no, they knew that was definitely going to be promoted to being prime minister, being in charge of all of them. And so they decided to undercut his career. First, they try to dig up dirt on Daniel. They try to find things they could could discover where they could bring it up to the king and say, no, you don't want to promote this guy because look what he did then. But there were no skeletons in his closet. There were no issues in the way he operated. Why? Because he was a straight arrow. He added to his faith goodness. So they said, Well, let's use his faith against him. They played on the emperor's vanity and said, Hey, you should issue a decree, an irrevocable decree that no one in the kingdom is allowed to worship anyone but you for 30 days. And if they don't obey that, then they need to be put to death. What these men were banking on was the fact that they knew that Daniel would not compromise on his commitment to God, that he would not turn to the right or to the left because of the danger. He would not adjust his practices because of the threat of his circumstances. And they were right. What happened? Daniel continued to do what he always did. He went to his room three times a day, morning, midday, and at night, and he went to the window. Open up the window that faced his homeland, Jerusalem, that reminded him that this is where God dwells, in his temple, that reminded that God is watching him, that reminded him that God was with him if he walked faithfully by God's law. He looked through the window and prayed. And that's why I think that picture we saw, we see Daniel looking out the window. He's continuing to rely on God. And so Daniel's enemies busted Daniel, brought him to the Emperor, who reluctantly had to follow the law, and Daniel was thrown into the lion's den, but God protected him. He was put in there at dusk. Emperor was so distraught what happened because he recognized that Daniel had been, this had been a setup, and Daniel was a good man, couldn't sleep all night, rushed to the to the lion's den in the morning and found out that Daniel was still alive. God's angels kept the mouths of the lion shut. How did Daniel get into the lion's den? How did Daniel get into a position where his life was threatened? How did Daniel get to a place where he was convicted of a crime, a capital offense? And the capital offense was being faithful to his God. How did he get there? He got there because he added to his faith goodness, moral excellence, virtue, integrity. He was incorruptible. And that character trait was developed over time. That character trait was built up on daily prayer to God three times a day, facing Jerusalem, being reminded that God sees him and he lives his life before God. He developed that character trait by making every effort to learn God's word, but not just to learn it, to have it as head knowledge, but to apply it to his daily living, to not compromise on what God had called him to do in life. He put into practice those habits that reflected that God was with him, that God is real, and that he was learning to love God more and more. Would you have been in the lion's den with Daniel? That's a question I think we all need to ask ourselves. If we're serious about the scripture, if we're serious about knowing that God has given us everything we need for a lot for life and godliness, and that we're called to make every effort to add to our faith goodness, to add to our faith a retail, are you making every effort? Is this a a commitment to your life to live consistently to God's word, to live in such a way that you reflect the truth that God is real and that he's watching you and that he is with you? In in later on in verses eight and nine of this of this chapter of first Second Peter chapter one, Peter lays it out where he says, here's basically the positive if you give yourself to make every effort to add, starting with your faith goodness, and then here's the negative if you don't. Here's the positive. He says, for if these qualities adding to your faith goodness, and then we'll go through the rest during the course of the sermon series, if 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. If these things are things that you're committed to, what you're going to discover is that you will experience usefulness and fruitfulness in your true knowledge, in the epinosis, in your relationship with God. Verse 9, here's the negative. Well, if you want to, you really want to make that impactful, then make every effort to add to your faith goodness. Because there's nothing that underfines your witness to your one than being inconsistent to what you say you believe. If you don't want to end up blind, short-sighted, experiencing amnesia about who you are in Jesus, forget that you're forgiven, forget that you're right with God, forget that you have everything you need to really know God and able to have life and live in a way that honors God, then don't make every effort. Be the heart transplant patient who won't exercise, eat right, and take medications. I'm gonna ask that we just take communion right now, if you have your communion. I'm gonna just do this together. First and foremost, let's all get ready by um taking out the piece of bread, which is on top, and then opening up the cup. Opening up the cup that will um help you be ready to drink the juice. Jesus asked his followers to remember what's most important regarding faith by taking communion. We eat the bread to remember that God sent his son into the world to die for our sins so that we might have life. And we drink of the cup to remember that his blood was shed to establish what he called a new covenant, a new agreement by which we can be made right with God, a new way that's open by faith. What I'd like us to do at this time is I'm gonna ask that we take the bread together. And after we take the bread, I want you to follow with me in a prayer. And the prayer is gonna involve you doing something. I want you to just put your hand out and put your hand out facing down. And facing down is a way to show that you're asking God to help you let go. And what I want you to think about, I want you to bring before God. I'm all praying and there'll be a moment of kind of silence for you to pray silently to God, to confess to God. I want you to think about those things you know you need to let go that are blinding you, that are keeping you short-sighted, that are causing you to forget who you are in Christ. Those things that you need to let go that that really are destroying your new heart. Maybe it's a habit, maybe it's a toxic relationship, maybe it's uh unforgiveness, maybe it's anxiety, maybe it's worry, maybe it's um generational sin. Whatever it is, this is the time. I want you to have your hand like this. I want you to prayerfully and ask that you prayerfully give it to Jesus, let go. So let's take the bread. Lord, we uh we stretch out our hands knowing that because of the death of Jesus, one died for us so that we might have life. But Lord, many times we we hold on to things of death. We hold on to things that blind us, we hold on to things that keep us short-sighted, and they hold on to things that that cause us to forget your love, what you've done for us, who you've called us to be, what you provide for us, everything we need for life and godliness. I pray right now, as we are, as we are here at this moment, that you would help us to let go. Let's take a look at the cup. And let's take a posture that's opposite to letting go. Let's receive, and we'll use two hands now. Because God gives double portion. Let's take two hands right now, and let's ask God to bless us with the gifts, with the resources that we need in order to live a life that's godly and good, to add to our faith a rete goodness. Lord, we just come to you and thank you for the promises of Scripture and help us to remember the truth of this word that you give us everything we need. Your divine power, your spirit within us gives us everything we need. Lord, we need we need help. We need faith. We need generosity, we need forgiveness, we need uh the ability to have mercy, we need the ability to to have hope, we need the ability to have discernment insight, to say the right thing in the right way for the right right reasons, wisdom. Lord, we we need your divine power in order to be able to add to our faith goodness. Thank you, Lord. Thank you that we can know you. We can Epinosis is the word. We can know you from our heart, we can we can have you in our lives to walk with us, to be with us, help us to remember that we're called to live each day, knowing that you are with us, knowing that you are watching, knowing that we're called to honor you. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen. If you have uh any prayer needs, please come forward and share them with the guys up front. If you want to talk about next steps of faith, they're available to talk to you about that as well. God bless. Have a great Sunday.