I could get lost for awhile in the opening introduction of 2 Peter 1. In our society we really don’t understand today much about what a bond servant actually means. I found a helpful study on Shoreshim Ministries podcasts series ‘Returning to our Roots’. To summarize with great simplicity, it is a servant who has been released by his master after a certain number of years and then chooses, willingly, to devote his life to serving his master as a bond servant because he loves and trusts his master. This is a far cry from what we might simply think of as someone who is “trapped” or “forced” to be a servant. He chooses to serve his master with permanent commitment.
There is much more in this chapter of course. We receive faith. We do not accomplish this simply on our own. We seek grace and peace in the knowledge of our Creator. We are encouraged to grow in Christian virtue and to remember that eternity waits for us beyond our fleshly bodies. Reflecting on eternity always stretches me in my natural thoughts to be more long term focused and less focused only on this world. It is too easy to think of 30 years from now as “long term”, but really it is quite short compared to eternity. Let us remember that in guiding how we live our lives.
Growth in Christian Virtue
1Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ,
To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ: 2Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord; 3seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence. 4For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. 5Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, 6and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, 7and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. 8For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. 10Therefore, 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; 11for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you.
12Therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things, even though you already know them, and have been established in the truth which is present with you. 13I consider it right, as long as I am in this earthly dwelling, to stir you up by way of reminder, 14knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent, as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. 15And I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure you will be able to call these things to mind.