“In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone. The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.”
2 Peter 1:5-9 NLT
Many Christians have a deeply engrained reactionary methodology in the way they handle life’s difficulties. As part of the blame shifting done in Eden, it is easy for them to focus on every part of the problem but themselves. As Peter outlines our proper relationship to problems, he places the emphasis of a persons growth heavily upon the backs of the believers. There is a proper way to respond to difficulties and it is not to blame shift. In fact, it is to love more. He outlines a tangential systems that branches down from the simple act of responding properly to God’s promises. When we do this, we naturally respond properly to him, each other and ourselves. This creates a fertile ground for emotional maturity and self control in our day to day conflicts and best demonstrates the power of God to the watching world. So many people never achieve this type of maturity because they refuse to engage with God’s promises for them on any sort of meaningful level.
JOSH McGARY. COM 