2 Peter 1:3-4 “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 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 desire.” Today's episode reassures us that God has given us all we need to do all we need to do through His divine power. It states everything we need for life and godliness. That covers it all. We have this power, we just need to access it and accept it. It also talks about how we can grow closer to God by reading scripture. Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
His Divine Power Granted to Us
2 Peter 1:3-4 “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 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 desire.”
I really liked this verse when I read it and then the more I looked at it, the less convinced I was that I could explain it well. I looked it up online to see what others said about it and it turns out that a lot of people have talked about it and they don’t all agree. There is one article that I read titled “Created to Grow” By Daryl Dash. (CLICK HERE) The article seemed to explain this verse in a way I could really understand.
I think what drew me to this verse were two different parts. First, “His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness.” I like that He has granted us all things we need for life and godliness. Our call, each and every one of us, is to become a saint. We all have a call for holiness and to hear that Jesus’ divine power has granted us all we need for this is amazing. The second part that drew me to this verse is when it says, “So that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature.” We talked about this in my Encounter Ministries class and it just blows me away. I am blown away with the idea that we may partake of the divine nature. Can you imagine how much God must love us for Him to want this for us, for Him to share this with us?
Let’s take the first part of this verse. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. This is not talking about the type of power we have on our own. This isn’t talking about the power we have through our humanity. This is divine power that we are talking about. We are talking about the power that Jesus had. God is giving us this same power. It is a power that never runs out and that is sufficient for all that we need. This is something that can be hard to believe. We often don’t feel like the power we have is sufficient for all that we are going through. I mean we are going through so really hard times right now. Our power seems pretty insufficient a lot of the time. This is because we are trying to do it all ourselves. We are forgetting to invite God into our problems. Also, we invite Him in and we turn our problems over to Him, and then we take them right back. God has given us His divine power and yet we don’t use it. We rely on our own power. Why do we do this? Why can’t we invite God in and let Him help us?
The next part of the verse after it talks about the kind of power we are given, it says how we received it. It says it was granted to us. Do you know what that means? We don’t have to earn it. The article I read compared this to when a student fills out an application for a grant to go to college. If they qualify, they get the grant. They didn’t do anything to earn it and they never have to pay it back. It is just given to them free of charge. This is exactly how we get our power by God. You are a child of God, so you qualify. Therefore, His divine power is freely given to you. We don’t deserve it, we don’t earn, God simply gives it to us because we need it. Just like the student requesting the grant, need is the only qualification.
Next it says what this power covers, “all things.” That is pretty amazing. God’s power isn’t like an insurance policy where they will cover this and that, but not that other thing. God doesn’t say that His power will cover most of what we need, but then we need to come up with the rest. The verse says that His power will cover all things that pertain to life and godliness. There is nothing that is not covered by this power. He give us all we need to live our lives day to day and He also gives us all we need to grown in holiness or godliness. He doesn’t just give us what we need to grow closer to Him, He gives us all we need to grow in all aspects of our life.
Once we can learn this, I mean really learn this and understand it the depths of our heart, life will get easier. It won’t seem so hard. Life may never be easy, and yet when you know with your whole being that you don’t need to be strong enough on your own because God has given you enough of His power for all you need, it feels a bit easier, or maybe not easier, but a bit lighter. Once you fully accept that you are not alone and that you don’t have to do it alone, you can suddenly breathe a little easier. God’s power is enough for whatever it is you are going through. I know you feel like you will be crushed with the weight of your problems some days and yet, God has given you enough power to stand tall under all that weight. I know you have days when you want to give up, don’t, God’s power is right there, just ask for it, just accept it!
The next part of this verse says, “through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises.” When we are trying to grow closer to God the best way to do this is to get to know God. Think about how you grow closer to your friends or your family. Normally you spend time with them, you talk with them and you learn all you can about them. It’s the same with God. You can get to know Him by spending time with Him in prayer. You can spend time with Him talking and then taking time to listen to what He has to say. You can also get to know God by reading scriptures. The more you read the Bible the more you learn about who God really is. God is the same yesterday, today and forever. That means the God of the Old Testament is also the same God as the New Testament, who is also the same God we have today.
If we want to know how God will react in a certain circumstance we can see how He has acted in the past. If you want to know if God will be there for you when things get tough look back at all the ways He has been there for His people in the past. If you want to know what God will do when you do’t have enough money to feed your family look back to how He miraculously provided Mana every single day when His people were in the desert. If you want to know what He will do when you have you back against the wall, your enemy is gaining on you, and you can’t see a way out, read about what God did for the Israelites when the reached the Red Sea and there was no where to cross and the Egyptian army was right behind them. He parted the Red Sea and made a way where there wasn’t one. Then he let that Sea come roaring back to destroy their enemy. Everything you need to know about God can be found in the Bible.
This verse also says “by which he has granted to us His precious and very great promises.” If you want to know what these promises are, you can also find that in the Bible. God has made many promises to His people and He has always kept them. God is not like us. He does not make promises and then break them. I am guessing this is another after effect of the fall, I don’t know, but God does not do that. When He says something He means it and He always keeps His promises. When you read through the Bible and you read something that Jesus has said to the apostles, just know He is saying that to you as well. You can read the Bible as if God is talking directly to you. Sometimes people even insert their name when they are reading the Bible. Especially anywhere where it says God’s people, or where it says the Israelites. The words in the Bible are just as much for you as they are for anyone else.
The very last line of this verse says, “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 desire.” We are meant to partake in the divine nature. Jesus died on the cross for our sins and when He did that he overcame evil. That doesn’t mean that we will never give in to sin again, but it does mean that we are not slaves to sin. We have a choice. We get to choose if we want to spend eternity with our heavenly Father or not. That wasn’t a choice before and now it is. We escaped from the corruption that is in world when Jesus died for our sins. Jesus has given us a divine power to choose God. We have this divine power that makes us capable of all we need, we just have to access it. We have to believe we have it and exercise it with authority. The good news is we don’t have to do this all by ourselves. We can turn to God, get to know God and the rely on His power instead of our own.
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to this episode today. Lord, help us to rely on your power and not our own as we have no power without you. We can do nothing without you and yet we can do all things through you. We are so grateful for the divine power you are granting us. Lord we ask that you put a deep desire in our heart to get to know you more. Lord, we ask that you put a hunger in our heart to read the scriptures and to learn your word. We love you Lord and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’ holy name, Amen!
Thank you for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow. Remember, Jesus loves you and so do I! Have a blessed day!
Article: Created To Grow by Daryl Dash