SPEAKER_00: Please stand with me for the reading of the word.
SPEAKER_00: From 2 Peter, His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us as precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desires.
SPEAKER_00: For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue and with virtue knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.
SPEAKER_00: For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: The grass withers the flower face.
SPEAKER_01: But the word of our God will send forever.
SPEAKER_01: The word of our god of our currentness.
SPEAKER_00: He had this quote that I was found was really kind of clever.
SPEAKER_00: He said, People often say motivation doesn't last.
SPEAKER_00: Well, neither neither does bathing.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we recommend it daily.
SPEAKER_00: I thought that was pretty clever.
SPEAKER_00: I found out this year uh that you know the second Friday of January is, I guess, the official quitter's day of New Year's resolutions.
SPEAKER_00: I I don't know that personally.
SPEAKER_00: I've not quit.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I was told that.
SPEAKER_00: But uh, you know, you think about that, and you have all this motivation, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's the new it's the end of the year, and you're like, okay, that was that year was a wash, so let's look forward and you have this new motivation, and you get into it, and kind of like Zig says, uh, motivation doesn't necessarily last.
SPEAKER_00: Uh you have to continue to work at it daily.
SPEAKER_00: So my question to you all is what motivates you?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: If we think about a motivation as a reason, a desire, or a willingness to do something, what motivates you?
SPEAKER_00: Is it external?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Money?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Is it intrinsic?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Internal?
SPEAKER_00: Is it for pleasure?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's a fear?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's uh a social thing.
SPEAKER_00: What Peter is doing this morning is offering up reasons and ways to strengthen our motivation to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Our callings are unique.
SPEAKER_00: The calling for Claude this morning, right, was I was thinking through what to preach on that uh specifically talks to Claude, but also talks to all of us.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: But callings are unique.
SPEAKER_00: And in this sense, Claude has been called specifically to Kaaba Park to care and love for the members here at Kaaba Park.
SPEAKER_00: But motivations and the grand scheme are the same.
SPEAKER_00: Our motivation is to live for Christ, it's to experience Christ.
SPEAKER_00: It is Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And so this morning I want to spend us a little time of seeing what that motivation is, right, through Christ's divine power, through his promises, and through fruitfulness.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So Peter starts us off in verse three.
SPEAKER_00: His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence.
SPEAKER_00: Now, we had a big tree in our yard a few years ago, and we cut it down, and we had a natural area kind of where that tree was, and we wanted to put sod down, so we need to get the tree out.
SPEAKER_00: Now I was a little cheap.
SPEAKER_00: Figured, well, hey, we'll just kind of dig around this tree and we'll get it out, and I won't have to pay for someone to remove it.
SPEAKER_00: Well, this tree at the base is about after we cut it, it was about 40 inches in diameter.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we get an excavator and we start digging out around this root ball that is about the size now of a Tesla.
SPEAKER_00: And the hole that we dug was about what you would expect for a 50,000-pound meteorite to have crashed into the earth.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we dug out a huge hole, and all that is left is this ginormous root.
SPEAKER_00: And so I was like, okay, well, this thing should just come right out.
SPEAKER_00: So, you know, when you see in those truck commercials, they're pulling stuff out of the mud, it might be like an all-terrain thing.
SPEAKER_00: Well, this is not one of those commercials, this is what they don't show you.
SPEAKER_00: You've never seen a commercial with a truck trying to pull a tree out of the ground because it doesn't work.
SPEAKER_00: So we had my GMC Sierra hooked up to it, and then we had my dad's 2500 RAM hooked up to it.
SPEAKER_00: All right, and we're like, let's pull it out.
SPEAKER_00: And doesn't happen.
SPEAKER_00: Keep trying, keep trying.
SPEAKER_00: That tree did not even vibrate.
SPEAKER_00: There was not a millimeter of movement for two trucks pulling it as hard as they can.
SPEAKER_00: And again, it's not like it was buried, it was out, it was dug out.
SPEAKER_00: And I learned a lesson that day in physics, right?
SPEAKER_00: To move an object, you need to apply a gr a force greater than the opposing forces.
SPEAKER_00: The opposing forces of that were about a 50,000-pound tree root was greater than what those two trucks could pull.
SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't move.
SPEAKER_00: And no matter how much of our effort would move it.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you feel like right now you have circumstances in life that seem unmovable.
SPEAKER_00: You can't overcome them.
SPEAKER_00: You have tried and tried and tried.
SPEAKER_00: And they don't move, they won't budge.
SPEAKER_00: And if it left right there, that'd be pretty hopeless.
SPEAKER_00: But what Peter is motivating motivating us today is that in our callings, it's not on our own effort.
SPEAKER_00: It's on the power that's been granted to us.
SPEAKER_00: We have a greater power than the forces that are at war with you.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: The God who created and spoke into existence all things.
SPEAKER_00: The God who brought the flood, right?
SPEAKER_00: The God who told the hurricane in the middle of the water to stop, and it stopped.
SPEAKER_00: And a God who has the power to bring the dead back to life.
SPEAKER_00: And what's amazing about that power is that what he says is it is realized through the knowledge of him.
SPEAKER_00: Now, look, knowledge doesn't save you.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about that last week.
SPEAKER_00: But how remarkable is it that you know of the exceeding power of all life circumstances because of what God's word says.
SPEAKER_00: His word testifies to God is capable of granting all of his promises in Christ and to fulfill them.
SPEAKER_00: Right, Ezekiel 37 might give us the greatest example, the knowledge of what the divine power that has been granted to us.
SPEAKER_00: Remember Ezekiel, he's staying there in this valley, it's just full of bones.
SPEAKER_00: And God tells him, I want you to speak my word over them.
SPEAKER_00: And so he starts speaking to them what God tells him to speak, and then they start coming together.
SPEAKER_00: They start growing together.
SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden, you had a valley of bones, is now an army of people.
SPEAKER_00: His power to take sinners dead and make them into saints.
SPEAKER_00: His power to grant you all things.
SPEAKER_00: All things, not the important things, not most of the things, but all things for life and godliness.
SPEAKER_00: He's given that to you.
SPEAKER_00: He's empowered your calling in that.
SPEAKER_00: And so, how motivated are you knowing that it's God's power in Christ through the Holy Spirit in you, having you to live for Him?
SPEAKER_00: He goes in and tells us we should be motivated, right, by the gratitude and the value of God's precious and great promises in verse 4, by which he has granted to us his, okay, his precious, that's important, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desires.
SPEAKER_00: What's your most prized possession?
SPEAKER_00: Kids, what's your most cherished possession?
SPEAKER_00: It's probably not, for all of us in this room, the most expensive thing.
SPEAKER_00: It's probably not the thing that you spent the most money on.
SPEAKER_00: A few weeks ago, our kids were watching the classic Richie Rich from '94, the Macaulay-Culkin version.
SPEAKER_00: Uh if you need a refresher on it, right?
SPEAKER_00: They're a very wealthy family.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, one of the executives uh for their company wants to steal uh their money from them.
SPEAKER_00: So uh Richie's family has a basically a monument of them, a big uh mountain.
SPEAKER_00: And inside that mountain is the vault.
SPEAKER_00: And so the executive finds out about that.
SPEAKER_00: It's like, I can't believe you have a whole mountain.
SPEAKER_00: It's like the Mount Rushmore, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's like I can't believe you have a whole mountain that has to hold all of your money and your jewels.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and so he he goes in there, he makes them walk in there, and all it is is fairly air heirlooms, right?
SPEAKER_00: And he gets upset and he's like, there's just junk in here.
SPEAKER_00: And they were like, well, that it's not junk to us.
SPEAKER_00: It's our most valuable possessions because it has the most meaning.
SPEAKER_00: Like, so when you're asking yourself about what is something that's precious to you, that is valuable, it's how much meaning is behind it?
SPEAKER_00: Precious sometimes in the Greek can mean costly.
SPEAKER_00: Now you ask yourself, if these are his precious promises, how can someone, or God, who owns all things, right?
SPEAKER_00: How can he give precious promises?
SPEAKER_00: If you have all things, whatever you give to someone isn't that costly, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because they have all things.
SPEAKER_00: But what did he do?
SPEAKER_00: The one thing that was costly, he gave himself.
SPEAKER_00: What could an all-powerful God give?
SPEAKER_00: That's costly, and give you his son.
SPEAKER_00: That's why it's precious.
SPEAKER_00: Think about this.
SPEAKER_00: Every time, and I've said this before, every time Jesus in Scripture tells someone that their sins are forgiven, right?
SPEAKER_00: And since that's a promise.
SPEAKER_00: I promise your sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: We hear that, it's like, that's great.
SPEAKER_00: What Jesus is saying, though, is I promise to give my life for the fulfillment of what I've just told you.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: He's talking in real time to people, your sins are forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: When he knows in the future, very shortly, it's gonna cost him his life.
SPEAKER_00: Think about the preciousness of when you feel forgiven.
SPEAKER_00: The weight that's behind that.
SPEAKER_00: Right, and the motivation of gratitude that comes from me, like you gave up your life.
SPEAKER_00: And all the promises, right?
SPEAKER_00: We could sit here all day with a whiteboard and write down all the promises the scripture talks about, and how all of them are precious because they are fulfilled by Christ's death and his resurrection.
SPEAKER_00: The promise to never leave you, to forsake you, to justify you, to glorify you.
SPEAKER_00: All of them are precious because it cost him his life for you to have them.
SPEAKER_00: I read not too long ago, Kevin Dibley's quote: God isn't calling you to make great promises to him.
SPEAKER_00: He's calling you to trust his great promises to you.
SPEAKER_00: That's really important.
SPEAKER_00: Because we all fight that.
SPEAKER_00: How can I make promises to you, Lord?
SPEAKER_00: What can I do to promise you something?
SPEAKER_00: He's like, that's that's not what I've called you to.
SPEAKER_00: I haven't called you to make promises to me.
SPEAKER_00: I've called you to trust in my promises to you.
SPEAKER_00: And here he goes on to say, I promise to make you for you to become partakers of the divine nature.
SPEAKER_00: I've promised you to give you my spirit that now dwells in you.
SPEAKER_00: I've promised to give you the righteousness of my divine nature, my glory, my joy.
SPEAKER_00: Right in John 15, he's like, that my joy will be in you.
SPEAKER_00: He has shared with you his divine nature, and that's really important because then he says, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desires.
SPEAKER_00: What happens, kids, yeah, when you leave toys outside?
SPEAKER_00: Or if you leave a tool outside, what happens?
SPEAKER_00: It gets dirty, it might start to break down or break or corrode.
SPEAKER_00: When you leave things out in the world, corruption happens.
SPEAKER_00: But here's this promise because of the divine nature that's been given to us, the world no longer destroys us.
SPEAKER_00: We're no longer corrupted by the sinful desires.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing: Jesus was tempted in every way as we were, right?
SPEAKER_00: But his temptations came externally.
SPEAKER_00: Our temptations come externally, but also from an internal.
SPEAKER_00: See, Jesus was never tempted internally inside him because his joy in the Father was far superior than any temptation of pleasure that the world could offer.
SPEAKER_00: So it just was never a fair fight in Satan or the world to offer him, right?
SPEAKER_00: It was the kingdoms.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, I'll give you everything.
SPEAKER_00: That still did not compare to him.
SPEAKER_00: That was not as valuable to him as his relationship in love with the Father.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's saying is I've promised you now, that you too can have an experience in a relationship and know me, going back to that knowledge, that you find God the Father, that you find Christ more beautiful, more pleasure than the other than the things of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And how we've been able to escape the corruption of the lies that the world keeps telling you that you need this, this is what you need for happiness, this is what you need for value, this is what you need for people's approval.
SPEAKER_00: We get to say that's not true.
SPEAKER_00: I have approval, I have prep, I have value, I have purpose.
SPEAKER_00: And it's all been found in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: All right, now that's important.
SPEAKER_00: Those promises are important because when you read this next section, now it starts to seem like we're getting into works-based.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: For this very reason, make every effort.
SPEAKER_00: That's a it starts getting scary when you read that word, right?
SPEAKER_00: For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue.
SPEAKER_00: Now look, he's not saying this is for this very reason, now make every effort as in its faith plus works, is for salvation.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying for this reason, for these reasons we just talked about, for all of these promises, for all the excitement and gratitude that you now feel from hearing these promises, for this very reason, supplement your faith as in a sense of a diligence to abide in Christ, to grow in his likeness.
SPEAKER_00: If what brings you the most pleasure is Christ, then you will naturally abide in him, because it is the motivation that you have for pleasure and joy and satisfaction.
SPEAKER_00: And so that's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_00: For this reason, for these motivations, supplement your faith in a sense of diligence of abiding in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: I've read this quote before by Paul Tripp.
SPEAKER_00: There's a direct connection between what kind of awe has captured your heart and the amount of ministry that occupies your life.
SPEAKER_00: That's what he's getting into here now.
SPEAKER_00: The awe.
SPEAKER_00: Can you look at yourself in the mirror and say, do I have awe in Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Am I motivated by Christ so that serving him, living for him, occupies my life?
SPEAKER_00: So we'll quickly kind of go through some of these.
SPEAKER_00: That virtue, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of that same word as excellence that he had up there in verse 3.
SPEAKER_00: And in one sense, it means just worthy of public recognition.
SPEAKER_00: So that's why this starts to get a little scary, because you're like, okay, so for every effort, you want me to live a life worthy of public recognition?
SPEAKER_00: That seems more me-based, not Christ-based.
SPEAKER_00: Well, if you kind of start looking at that, all right, well, what would be worthy of public recognition?
SPEAKER_00: What was Christ's life worthy of public recognition?
SPEAKER_00: It was service.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: He came to serve, not be served.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Romans 12 1 says, I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: Holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.
SPEAKER_00: Now, Hebrews goes on to break that down more.
SPEAKER_00: That means it's praising God with your lips.
SPEAKER_00: And then it goes on to say it's doing good to others.
SPEAKER_00: And then it goes on to say it's sharing with others.
SPEAKER_00: What do you have to share?
SPEAKER_00: What have you experienced in Christ that's worth you praising people for?
SPEAKER_00: That's motivating you to do good for people?
SPEAKER_00: And what you've experienced for him that you're able to share with others.
SPEAKER_00: That's virtue.
SPEAKER_00: Knowledge.
SPEAKER_00: John Piper said, ignorance of God, ignorance of God's word leads to ungodliness.
SPEAKER_00: For being ignorant of the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the thing with you having an ignorance about what God's word says.
SPEAKER_00: You'll try to add to it.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't know it, if you don't know what Christ has done for you, now you're going to try to add to it.
SPEAKER_00: They were ignorant of the righteousness of God.
SPEAKER_00: And so what did they do?
SPEAKER_00: They tried very hard to supplement that righteousness, to fill in the gaps.
SPEAKER_00: That gets real dangerous.
SPEAKER_00: It leads you to trying to do the things that Jesus has already done.
SPEAKER_00: So he's absolutely encouraging you to be like, you should be motivated.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's through that knowledge that you understood the divine power that has granted you all things, that you don't have to go out and keep trying to earn it and work harder and be better, which is what this list starts to look like.
SPEAKER_00: One way you know you're growing in knowledge is what are you thinking about when you have a moment?
SPEAKER_00: What's occupying your thoughts?
SPEAKER_00: Because what knowledge of what Christ has done for you, it would start to occupy your thoughts of prayers of praise.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: That was really convicting for me.
SPEAKER_00: Are my thoughts, when I have the private time and the moments, is it occupied with prayers of praise or is it occupied with things that I want?
SPEAKER_00: A vacation, a new toy, new putter.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what made it convicting.
SPEAKER_00: Because I was realizing I'm not really pursuing with all due diligence my knowledge in the Lord because most of the time I'm occupied with things that I want.
SPEAKER_00: It's not praise and prayer and adoration.
SPEAKER_00: And that's missing out.
SPEAKER_00: He goes on with self-control, right?
SPEAKER_00: Consider that moderation.
SPEAKER_00: But what's kind of the key behind moderation?
SPEAKER_00: One is having clear priorities of the right desire.
SPEAKER_00: That's moderation.
SPEAKER_00: It's what is the utmost of importance.
SPEAKER_00: It's not things that are good, right?
SPEAKER_00: There's lots of things that are good.
SPEAKER_00: There's lots of things you can do that are good.
SPEAKER_00: But what is best?
SPEAKER_00: What is utmost?
SPEAKER_00: I heard Tim Keller also say one time that self-control has nothing to do with the self.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We try this in these New Year's resolutions.
SPEAKER_00: It becomes about the self.
SPEAKER_00: And then on the second Tuesday or the second Friday of the month, apparently, people quit doing this.
SPEAKER_00: Self-control is about serving other people.
SPEAKER_00: If you want self-control, stop thinking about yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Think of other people.
SPEAKER_00: Think of how you can serve other people.
SPEAKER_00: What did Christ do?
SPEAKER_00: He came to serve, not be served.
SPEAKER_00: Steadfastness.
SPEAKER_00: Forging an unshakable faith strengthened through the dependence on Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And the hard part about that one is forging that strength happens through trials.
SPEAKER_00: Which we spend a lot of time and energy and effort on avoiding.
SPEAKER_00: And rightfully so.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying you intentionally cause trials on yourself.
SPEAKER_00: But steadfastness, right?
SPEAKER_00: An unshakable faith that's strengthened.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, think about faith, right?
SPEAKER_00: Faith is like a muscle.
SPEAKER_00: Resistance to it strengthens it.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Trials strengthen it.
SPEAKER_00: Difficult circumstances where you have to trust the Lord of unknowns strengthens it.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what steadfastness is.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, trust in me.
SPEAKER_00: I want to put you in positions where you have to trust me.
SPEAKER_00: Godliness.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Godliness, in a sense, is good worship.
SPEAKER_00: I think that might be the literal good worship, is it?
SPEAKER_00: Again, we're like, we know these things.
SPEAKER_00: I know John.
SPEAKER_00: Woody's listening here, like, I'm trying to do those.
SPEAKER_00: Those were my New Year's resolutions.
SPEAKER_00: And I can't do them.
SPEAKER_00: So why does he keep telling me to be like godly?
SPEAKER_00: I know I need to be godly.
SPEAKER_00: That's the problem.
SPEAKER_00: I can't be godly.
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that the whole point of the gospel?
SPEAKER_00: But it's not being afraid of being told that.
SPEAKER_00: It's being excited about it.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's being motivated by it because it's what brings you joy and pleasure.
SPEAKER_00: You're not doing it to earn that salvation.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: You're not doing that to become godly.
SPEAKER_00: You're doing that because it's a reflection that you are godly, because you're in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He's just helping you realize the reality of who you are and what he's done for you.
SPEAKER_00: Because when you miss these things, then you're not going to have any motivation or gratitude in what he's done for you.
SPEAKER_00: Brotherly affection, treating others like family members.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Being hospitable.
SPEAKER_00: Being intentional.
SPEAKER_00: Sharing resources.
SPEAKER_00: We're good about doing that with the people we like, right?
SPEAKER_00: But what about brotherly affection?
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We don't always like, we don't get a choice, our family members.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we don't only like them.
SPEAKER_00: But you're bonded with them.
SPEAKER_00: And there are still those moments where I can be hospitable to you, I can share with you, I can support you.
SPEAKER_00: Because guess what?
SPEAKER_00: We're not all very lovable people at times.
SPEAKER_00: And Christ loved us, and he shared with us, and he was intentional with us.
SPEAKER_00: So Peter's asking us to do the same.
SPEAKER_00: Love.
SPEAKER_00: Choosing others.
SPEAKER_00: Love is a choice.
SPEAKER_00: Love is serving people with a joyful heart that comes with a choice.
SPEAKER_00: How do you know you love something, you choose it?
SPEAKER_00: That's love.
SPEAKER_00: God chose us.
SPEAKER_00: Because God is love.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, when you just sit on that, why did he choose you?
SPEAKER_00: You don't even choose you.
SPEAKER_00: He chose you.
SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't just choosing you for a pickup basketball game.
SPEAKER_00: The choice required him to go to the cross and die.
SPEAKER_00: The choice was I'm going, I'm the only person walking this earth that knows how bad God's wrath is.
SPEAKER_00: And he chose to walk into that.
SPEAKER_00: We know it's bad.
SPEAKER_00: But he really understood God's wrath and he went to it anyways.
SPEAKER_00: Joyfully, I might add.
SPEAKER_00: Because he chose you out of an act of love.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's saying, these qualities that have been mentioned are yours, right?
SPEAKER_00: Verse 8.
SPEAKER_00: For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: How encouraging is it knowing that your labor is not in vain?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: 1 Corinthians 15, 58.
SPEAKER_00: Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.
SPEAKER_00: What is fruitfulness?
SPEAKER_00: What is that?
SPEAKER_00: It's eternal significance.
SPEAKER_00: Bearing fruit is acts of eternal significance.
SPEAKER_00: In John 15, 16, he says, You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, that in your fruit you should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give to you.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's important about that, and important when you start thinking about bearing fruit, and like, look, man, if you're putting this all on me again, I'm falling short.
SPEAKER_00: In John 15, 16, he says, You do not choose me, but I chose you.
SPEAKER_00: How that said is, I'm taking responsibility for you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm taking responsibility for your life.
SPEAKER_00: And you know that because you went to the cross for it.
SPEAKER_00: So he's not set us up and asked us to do things, to labor in vain or to be ineffective.
SPEAKER_00: Rather, the opposite.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, I chose you.
SPEAKER_00: And now if you go back up from 1516 to verse 5, I am the vine, you are the branches.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever abides in me and I in him, he is that bears much fruit.
SPEAKER_00: For apart from me you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: How encouraging, how motivating to know that because you abide in Christ, in him in you, that you bear much fruit.
SPEAKER_00: That what you do has eternal significance and impact.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't pay our debt with his life and give us his spirit for us to be ineffective and to not have significance.
SPEAKER_00: And Peter is telling us, he's telling Claude, he's telling us today not to grow weary of doing good.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Because in due season we will reap if we do not give up.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, again, thank you that we can have a service of installation.
SPEAKER_00: And that it's not just really for one individual.
SPEAKER_00: All of us have been called to abide in you and to live for you and to serve you and to bear fruit for you.
SPEAKER_00: And we thank you that just like Claude's ministry to Kaaba Park is not based on his own efforts, it's based on you.
SPEAKER_00: That we are all called, whether it's to be a lawyer or a stay-at-home mom or in business or in the medical field.
SPEAKER_00: We're all called to specific, unique areas and places.
SPEAKER_00: But our motivation is the same.
SPEAKER_00: It's an awe.
SPEAKER_00: It's a genuine pleasure in the beauty of the knowledge of you.
SPEAKER_00: And it's in your name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.