Daily Bread 8/25/2023

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    Daily Bread – August 25, 2023 (The Sixth Day – Genesis 1:24-31) 2 Peter 1:8 – For these things being in you and abounding, you shall not be barren or unfruitful in the complete knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, there seems to be little focus both in sermons and individual application to our responsibility to give ourselves to the practice of humility, virtue, temperance, and godliness to name a few. Each of us need to become familiar with practical applications in our life to the conduct God demands. After all, we have been given the nature of God, the divine nature, and thus these are not virtues that we must acquire; rather, they are virtues we need only walk in. There is no question Peter demanded such application, and furthermore, made it essential in order to ensure our calling and election in Christ Jesus (2 Peter 1:10). In fact, Peter says if we lack these things, we are blind and cannot see and have forgotten that we were purged from a sinful nature (2 Peter 1:9). We have been given the divine nature and the help of the Holy Spirit so we may walk in the highest level of expression of these virtues. If we give ourselves diligently to walking in the ways of God and conducting ourselves properly in the divine nature, then we are promised that we will not stumble (2 Peter 1:10; Jude 1:24; 1 Peter 1:5; 1 John 5:18). The Spirit of God will uphold us and strengthen us to live in the way that pleases God. The light of His nature and the beauty of His ways will be seen in the midst of our lives, and we will not be barren or unfruitful in the knowledge of God. There is most certainly a realm of relationship in God into which we enter into as we mature in God. This maturity is a result of our willingness to be obedient to His will and to His ways (1 John 2:14; 1 Corinthians 3:1; Hebrews 5:14; 2 Peter 1:11; Ephesians 3:18-19, 4:12; and John 14:21-23, 15:16). Blessings, Pastor Mark Spitsbergen