For This Reason [Part 3]

2 Pet. 1:5-7

For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with 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.and self-control with steadfastness...

Since self-control is so obviously lacking in many areas of my life and when I read steadfastness, I immediately thought that I was doing well in this quality. I do what I say I will do. I am a faithful person. But I wonder is this all there is to steadfastness. This quality is often mentioned in reference to God. Ps. 145: 8 says,  The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. This verse is based on Ex. 34:5-6 where it says, The Lord descended in a cloud and stood with him [ Moses] there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness , keeping steadfast love for thousands. This quality is part of the name of God, and He abounds in it. That is a game changer for me. There is no way that I could hope to have this quality in my life apart from the grace and power of God, apart from being a partaker of the divine nature. 

I see this divine model in Jesus as well. 2 Thess. 3:1-5 speaks about this quality. The context of this passage is that Paul asked for prayer for himself and his team that they would be delivered from wicked and evil men. In spite of these men and persecution, Paul was confident that the Lord would be with the Thessalonians protecting them from the evil one. He was confident that they would obey all that Paul had taught them. He ends with a benediction that says,  May the Lord direct your hearts to the love of God and to the steadfastness of Christ. To stand faithfully in persecution they needed to know and mediate on the steadfastness of Christ. He will never leave them. Nothing happens to them apart from the sovereign will and plan of God. And the same is true for me. 

But how is this quality seen in me. There are many mentions of this quality in reference to the early church. Phrases like,  your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. ;   steadfastness and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions that you are enduring.;    Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. ;  the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. ;And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Well it is clear that tests, trials, and persecutions result in steadfastness, and that it is linked to our hoping in Jesus. The Christian life is a race that we must run with endurance keeping our eyes on Jesus because He is our hope. This puts a positive spin on trials and persecutions. They grow us in this vital quality of steadfastness and transform us into the image of Christ. And when steadfastness is firmly established and operational in our lives, the end result is maturity. We will attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. He is our maturity and our hope. What we hope in becomes what we are!

Father,

Thank You for Your steadfastness. You are always abounding in love and faithfulness. Grow me in in Your Son to maturity, to the measure of the fullness of Christ. The end result is glorious, but the path to get there is hard. Help me be steadfast. 

In His name,

amen