Seven Graces of the Christian Life: Part 2

Seven Graces of the Christian Life and the Difference Between Salvation and Sanctification

To continue this message, last week I spoke on John 3 .16. I think that was appropriate, and I needed to hear that. We took a small break from 2 Peter, but this is part two, the seven graces of the Christian life, the qualities, the seven graces, the seven qualities, and I'd like for us to just take a little bit more of a second glance and a deeper look into what the text and what these verses are actually speaking to us, and I need this personally, and this is why I went to revisit it and also do some things I did not quite finish.

I wanted to go a little bit deeper because of the time. I said that's good about expository preaching. I need to remind myself of that. I could cut it off and pick it back up. So that's what we're doing here.

So please, in saying that, please turn with me to the second epistle of Peter, first chapter, second epistle of Peter. Only three chapters in this wonderful book, but he packs a lot in, doesn't he? But you notice, before I read the text, is if you read these three chapters, he's dealing, as first Peter dealt with issues and problems on the outside, now he's taking it to the inside, which I believe personally is far more worse.

It's like the Trojan horse that comes within, and this is where Satan is working harder. He's already got the folks on the outside. He goes and takes the Trojan horse on the inside to corrupt it and to corrupt the gospel and do everything he can to pull people away from the truth, and he uses false teachers.

He uses hirelings. He deals with that in chapter two, and in chapter three, he closes it out with that wonderful chapter about the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and all that the details and the revelation that's going to take place, but if you read here in chapter one, notice where he starts.

Foundationally, he's giving us what a true believer really looks like. The sanctification, and he presumes upon that that these people that is reading this, they're in the faith, and he's giving this to the church.

This is his heart, and this heart, he received this from Jesus. Everything that the apostles speak of in the New Testament is commentary on what Jesus taught them, so they were passing the torch along, and Jesus had a great concern.

You notice in John 10, you read John 10, he speaks, first of all, I'm the good shepherd, and then he starts talking about the hirelings, and then he starts talking, I'm the only way the sheep have to come in.

No other way. Any other way is a thief and a robber. He goes into details about the shepherd, the sheep, but he also mentions the wolves and the hirelings, the warnings, and isn't it, don't you love that about the word of God, about Jesus's ministry?

Such truth, such warning, such encouragement, but Peter does the same thing here. So in this verse, I'm sorry, in these verses, we're going to look at today these wonderful seven graces again. It's speaking about sanctification, not salvation necessarily, but sanctification out from salvation.

Let me say one more thing before we read the text. As I was studying this, and I was looking into other commentaries and other commentators, speaking of people that has looked into these verses, they have taken this as the way of salvation.

These graces, the Catholics, the Church of Christ. So what they're saying is, you do these things, gets you to heaven. You see, they're in reverse. They got their gears in reverse. Put it in full swing, always regeneration, salvation first, then sanctification, not the other way around.

That's their problem. They got the gears reversed. So in other words, it reverses it. When it reverses it, it's saying, by our works, by doing these things, I earn my way to heaven. No, no, no, no. It's what God has done.

That's why he's, and we're going to see from the text, this is exactly where the course Peter takes us. What God has done through Jesus Christ, and then we received regeneration, obtained it, right? And then through that, the good works follows.

And that's all he's saying, not the other way around. But here, here the Word of God, verse 5 to 11, verse 5 to 11, but also for this very reason, for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge, self-control, to self-control, perseverance, to perseverance, godliness, to godliness, brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness, love.

For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is short-sighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins.

Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never stumble. For so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Let's all bow in prayer, please. Our Father and our God, our Lord and Savior, we thank you for the access that we can come before you, and we pray, Lord, now that you would speak, Lord, and sanctify our hearts through and by the Holy Spirit, and I pray, Lord, that you would change us more and more into the beautiful and lovely image of your dear Son, Lord.

That's our prayer today, that we would see Jesus, and we ask this for your glory and honor in his mighty name. Amen. Now, I briefly touched on this about the views people have taken on this, and I was studying, and I came across a sermon preached by the late expository preacher W .A. Criswell.

He was a great expository preacher, by the way. I don't believe he was reformed, in a sense, as we speak of, but he was a gospel preacher, and he preached the Word. He was expository, not topical. I love expository preaching.

I don't know about you. Once you get a hold of it, you don't want to hear topical preaching anymore. Topical preaching could be good, it could be exhorting, but when you start digging and you hear expository preaching, there's something about it that gives the meat.

It gives you something to chew on and to grow thereby. In my spiritual life, I don't know about you, I've excelled in growth by God's grace through his Word, through men that God has raised up in preaching expository preaching.

That's why I think so much of R .C. Sproul in his expository. He's more of a teacher. He was more of a teacher. John MacArthur, who's still with us, praise God, very faithful in expository preaching, and others.

Lloyd-Jones was one of the great expository preachers of the times, but once you hear it. But W .A. Criswell was very good. This is what he said of this text before us, and I quote him. There are two ways to look at this sentence.

One is as a ladder, firmly fixed on the basic foundation of faith, the ladder rises rung by rung, step by step until finally we come to the glorious climax, the top of the rung of love. That kind of interpretation would look upon the sentence as meaning, beginning with faith, beginning with the Christian life, with our conversion, we perfect virtue, and then go on to perfection of the knowledge, then rise to the perfection of temperance, and then beyond temperance, patience, and perfecting one grace and one virtue and one excellency after another.

We finally rise where we come to the full image of God himself, who is love. Sounds like a pretty good interpretation to me. But Criswell says this, there's another interpretation, though, that is this.

Rather, I would say the sentence means that intertwined with the great faith that brings us full born into the kingdom of God that gives us life, intertwined with faith are the seven other strands, and each one of those is built out of and into the other.

They support each other, and they are related to each other, and they are born in the babe. And as the days come, he develops, and he's talking about maturity there, he develops these separate graces, these separate virtues, these separate divine excellencies.

And I love the way he says this. I humbly, earnestly think that this second interpretation of the text is the thing that Simon Peter had in mind when he wrote it. And the reason I think that lies in the language of the text itself.

And as you will follow me, I believe you will come to see this as one of the most beautiful and most meaningful of all of the descriptive sentences of the Christian life to be found in any literature, including the Bible.

I personally agree with the late W .A. Criswell on that interpretation. Even though that first interpretation sounded quite well, I see what he's talking about on that second interpretation. And as I was looking and reading how many other people take this and use this as salvation, these graces as somehow earning their way to heaven, know what he says, and this is what Criswell is saying, these are the graces given to us in salvation.

Then from a babe, a newborn babe, as the babe desires the truth, like a baby desires milk from its mother, grows thereby in that, and from that seed, that seed is the new birth. And that's what he's saying, that's what Peter is actually saying in the text.

I personally agree with Criswell on that, on his view on this text, because the language, the view that Peter takes by the Holy Spirit, now that's the real interpreter, he's the real interpreter, is he not?

The Holy Spirit of God. So that's where I want us to take us, is by God's help, look at the text. With that in mind, I've noticed, like I said, studying this, and we don't believe in work salvation, do we?

We do not believe in work salvation. Actually, Jesus is the one that worked for our salvation. He earned our salvation. God is our salvation, and Jesus is the one that literally earned it by keeping the law perfectly.

Who in the world could keep the law of God perfectly? Only Jesus. And he did it. And he did it representing his people. But you see here in the text, the second interpretation is of grace, which God supplies, then by the Holy Spirit of God, we grow in the grace and the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, and eventually, what Paul says in Ephesians, into the full stature.

Don't you love that? We start small, we start humbly, and we must stay humble, right? Until we rise and grow into the full stature of in the church. And it doesn't, if you notice, growth and age doesn't take place overnight, does it?

It takes little time, little here, little there. You know, as a child, I see little Ethan back there looking to his daddy, looking up to his daddy, and I'm thinking he's only two years old right now, but one day he's going to be a Lord willing.

He'll be a large, huge man. I told Ben he may be even bigger than Ben. Ben would be looking up to a little two-year-old, would not grow that big overnight, will he? It takes some time, and it's like it all of us in the family of God.

It takes time. God is patient with us. He's a loving heavenly Father. Speaking of Father's Day, He is the great Father that loves us with an infinite love more than our earthly fathers, even the best earthly fathers can ever do.

Well, here we have growing in the grace and knowledge of God and growing up into the full stature of Jesus Christ. Now, in order to set this context for this study this morning, we need to quickly just review verses one through four for the reason to get the context for we see what God has done for us in salvation.

Now, we've already looked at this, but I think it's very important for us to truly see what Peter is saying in this text. We must go back and see and get the context, the verses before previously, so that we can grow in salvation.

And again, it's not the order is always salvation and sanctification. Always that order, not the other way around. You'd be surprised, or would you, that so many people in the churches and pastors and preachers literally teach that somehow, especially our Armenian friends, that it's something that you do, you cooperate with God, you do this, you do that, and it becomes work salvation.

God forbid they use Paul's language. God has done it all, and that's what Peter tells us. And I want you to see this. Look at verse one through four. I'll start with the very beginning. Simon Peter, a bond slave, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained, that means received, like precious faith with us, by the righteousness of God and Savior Jesus Christ.

See, salvation has come by the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ. God the Father brought it to us through Jesus, the righteous one. Now, notice what he says. Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as his divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue, by which we have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Now, I'll stop right there. You see that basically it summarizes all that Peter has said to us in that text and leads up the verse five that God has given to every believer, everything needed to live the Christian life, basically to have victory over sin.

This is what he's saying. Now, we're not talking about complete perfect victory, even though the victory is perfected in Jesus Christ. There's another doctrine that's preached out there on sanctification, that you can get to a point of sanctification.

They called it, the old Methodists called it entire sanctification. Now, our dear friend Brother Ravenhill believed in this because of his Methodist old holiness upbringing. And I've been in the holiness camps enough and I know what they teach on this, these views of sanctification.

And it sounded so great, folks, I'm telling you. I thought, oh, the victorious life in Jesus Christ, that place of a plateau, of getting to entire sanctification. I thought, this is great, this is where I want to go.

But I come to find out in reading Romans 7, the Apostle Paul, even himself, the greatest Christian ever lived, could not attain to that. Now, Paul can't attain to it, I know I cannot. Now, a lot of people twist that around, they interpret that, they say that's Paul's views in Romans 7 prior to his Christian life.

No, he is the Christian there. There's views that's taken to that, but Romans 7 is speaking of the Christian Paul as of now. That's why a lot of people, they bypass that Romans 7. I never heard our entire sanctification, friends, go much to Romans 7.

Well, there's a reason. Let me tell you a little bit about this sanctification experience they believe in. They also believe in the eradication of sin on this life. Now, we want to definitely kill sin.

That's scriptural. We want to put it to death. We want to mortify it. That is scriptural. We must put the deeds of the flesh, we must put it to death, right? But to eradicate it completely in this life, is it going to happen?

It's just not going to happen. People say, now, if these folks was listening to me, and if I had the old Pentecostal holiness folks and old Methodists, the old Methodists, not these liberals today, they would be saying, pastor, you got it all wrong.

You're throwing out victory. No, we're not throwing out victory. There is victory in Jesus Christ. But what I'm saying is, we're not talking about a place that you can live above, where you can live above sin 24 -7.

And I'm going to get to that in a minute, and you'll see what I'm talking about, but we don't get there. But there is victory in Jesus Christ. This is our victory, even our faith. Our faith, not our sanctification.

Our sanctification is not perfect, it's directed, it's flawed, is it not? It is so flawed. I'm flawed in it. I fall short in this. My thought life has to be controlled by the Spirit of God, and I have to battle with this every single day of my life, especially on the road.

That's where self-control is. I'm telling you, you know what I'm talking about. See how sanctified people are on the road. I like to see some of these holiness people on an Atlanta highway, in Atlanta, see how they would handle that.

But anyway, God has already given us the victory. God has done his part through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So that's true. That part is true. So that the Christian can live victorious over sin by his grace.

And again, I like what MacArthur says. It's not the perfection, it's the direction. He's got it right. And that view of sanctification is scriptural. Not being made perfect in sanctification, but going in the right direction.

Now, it doesn't give us an excuse to sin, does it? Because we fall short? No. Scripture says, Jesus says, the flesh is weak, the Spirit's willing. That doesn't mean that gives us an excuse to sin. No, God forbid.

A Christian chooses to do so as we, every day we live. And there is a choice we do make. That's why there is the book of of the wisdom of Solomon, the Proverbs. You notice how many times he mentions about choose life, choose.

There's a choosing. But in our choosing, God helps us. We do the choosing. Now a lot of people say, well hold on in salvation, you did the choosing. Well, yeah, in a sense we chose. But I like what Spurgeon says, before you chose him, he already chose you.

While we were seeking God, God already was seeking you. He was there before you were. You know, you got a lot of these folks saying, I found the Lord, I found the answer. Well, that's true. But before I found the Lord, he already found me.

He's not the one that was lost, I was.

Lost. He's the seeker.

That's glorious. And that's what I love about the grace of God. It comes to us, he does it all. And that's what Peter's saying. Notice that. As his divine power has given to us all things, through these you may be partakers of these, you may be partakers of the divine nature, being given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, us to us.

God's given, God's given, God's given. So, if we're not living victoriously and choosing to live holy, we do forfeit the blessings, don't we? What do we forfeit? We forfeit joy, we forfeit peace. C. H. Spurgeon said this, faith saves us, but assurance satisfies us.

I like that because a lot of times I battle with my assurance. Full assurance, he says, is not essential to salvation, but it is essential to satisfaction. He goes on to say this, no believer should be content with hoping and trusting.

He should ask the Lord to lead him on to full assurance so that the matters of hope may become matters of certainty. I love that. See, if we are battling with it, let's deal, let's ask God to help us even in our repentance to deal with the things that hurts and wounds our assurance.

There should be a certainty. And it makes me think, when I read that quote from C. H. Spurgeon, I said, First John, First John, that you may know, that you may know you have eternal life, that you may know.

If you go through the book of First John, circle how many times that you may know, that you may know, that you may know. That book was really written to encourage the believers of their assurance in Jesus Christ.

So Spurgeon's right. Faith saves us, but assurance satisfies us. Well, so again, Christians who live in defeat do so because we fail to do so on our part in sanctification. Sanctification is hard work.

See, God's done, he's did everything in salvation. Now comes sanctification. That's the battle. That's the battle. And you know, that's the wonderful thing about it is, we know that there's a battle. We're concerned about that battle.

That should give you assurance. Because people out there that are lost and hell-bent, they don't care. They don't care. They're in their sins.

They could care less. We care.

Lord, sanctify me wholly, because we know within us in this body of sin, it's with us, it remains as a remaining sin until we're glorified. No entire sanctification, I'm telling you. The life of faith is active, is it not?

That's sanctification. Faith is always active. It's never passive. Faith is always coupled with obedience to the Word of God. It's lived by stepping out into trusting God's promises, His Word, and obedience.

Not perfect obedience by far, but obedience that's directed. Flawed obedience? Yes. But obedience nevertheless. Never perfect. Jesus is the only one that had perfect obedience. He's the only one that had perfect submission.

I know preachers right now that do not like the saying, blessed assurance, because it mentions perfect submission. That is speaking about Jesus. My goodness, who in their right mind can stand up behind a podium, a pulpit, and say, or any Christian for that matter, say, I have got perfect submission and perfect obedience.

I'd say, sit down, you liar. You see, only Jesus had that, and that's what pleased the Father. That's why the Father in heaven said, this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased. And what's wonderful about it, He lived that perfect obedience as a man full of the Holy Spirit.

Don't you love it? Well, never perfect, but faith does please God. Hebrews 11, 6. And by the way, what I'm talking about here is opposite of let go and let God. I can't remember who said it exactly, but it actually, the right way of saying it is, let's go and let's get going.

Let God, let go, I'm sorry, let go and let and let's get going. Because sanctification is work. So the quest, the question is, what then is our part in living a victorious life over sin? What is our part?

Is that not a loaded question? What is our part with living a victorious life? Peter gives them right here. These seven graces. He gives them here. Notice it. He begins in verse 5 with the phrase, but also for this very reason, which points us back to the previous verses, by the way, which we looked at.

God in His infinite goodness and in His infinite love and grace has already done His part in salvation and granting us everything, I love that word, everything that pertains to life and godliness to live this Christian life, but we also must work out our own salvation with fear and trembling.

Salvation's done, but now you got to work it out. Work it out with the attitude of fear and trembling. We don't see that much today, do we? Fear and trembling? And then he says this, for it is God, this is Paul, who works in you to will and to do for His good pleasure.

Notice what he said? It is God who works in you to will and to do His good pleasure. So we work it out. He's worked it in us. So look at verse 5. This is the transitional point right here. That's the transition from salvation to sanctification.

What God has already done for us, now what we have to do. And this sanctification is the doing, but it's the help of the Holy Spirit. People get confused about this. Yes, we we do it, we repent, but it's the Spirit of God that is working within us.

Without the Spirit of God, and we'll see after a while, we're none of His. There's no one that can even do it, the work of sanctification, unless we are God's children. So what God has done in salvation, what we do in sanctification, that's basically what he's talking about.

The seven qualities, the seven graces to which we are applying all diligence, he said. And I like that, don't you? Applying, giving, all diligence. Or another translation, your translation may say, making every effort.

You make every effort to supply alongside of our faith. Keep this in mind also, these steps are not optional. Let's remember this, these are commands. God is commanding this. God is saying, this is not optional to make, for we are having a part to play in our sanctification, living out the Christian life victoriously.

So, we have to uphold our end by God's help and grace, in obedience to His commands. Actually, the Greek word here is interesting. It brings out the nature of what is happening. The word applying, or giving all diligence, means to bring in beside, to bring in beside.

But also for this very reason, that's what he's saying, giving all diligence, bring in beside. So, the idea is this, that along with our faith that is foundational, each of us, I'm sorry, each of the other qualities of having a Christ-like character, he says, bring this aside, bring it aside.

Giving all diligence, add to your faith, supply. The word supply was used to refer to training. It's a training word, supply, and staging, as we looked at, a grand chorus for some high celebration, which the entire expense was paid for by a rich patron.

That's what he's talking about. Isn't that amazing? It's a training. It's almost like sending us to boot camp for training, but God's already supplied all that. He's paid the way you go. It's paid for.

Now, we're going to have you go through the training and be disciplined and get ready for war. That's actually what he's speaking of. This resulted, see, in this word coming to mean supply, add, furnish, to furnish in a complete lavish sense.

So, the full sense here is to bring alongside your faith, which is a gift from God, determined effort to fully and completely supply and equip to provide that faith with the things, the qualities, the graces in these verses.

Now, that's where he goes to. So, what is it that we're to bring alongside our faith? What is it that adds or equips our faith? I like the word equip, to equip the faith. Now, like I said in part one, we saw these qualities, and once again, we're going to take a second glance, and I'm going to go over them again.

I don't know about you. I need to. I need to hear this again and again. The first thing he mentions is moral excellence, and in the old translation, the old King James, the new King James says virtue.

I like the word virtue, but it means moral excellence. Notice what it says in verse 5. Add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge. Let's look at moral excellence first. Virtue. Add to your faith virtue.

Divine power is given to all things that pertain to life and godliness. That's back in verse 3. Through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue. That's not a small thing. He's called us to glory and virtue.

That is our call to moral excellence. It makes me think of what Paul said in 1st Thessalonians chapter 4. God has called you, notice the language here, not to holiness but in holiness. He's called you.

That is the calling. Didn't Peter say this in 1st Peter? Be holy for I am holy. He's called us in holiness to be holy as he's holy. We're children of God. God's holy. We're to reflect our heavenly Father and to resemble him in that holiness.

Everything about Jesus was perfectly holy in everything that he did. People say, yeah, what about him taking, going into the temple and losing his temper and all this and turning over the table, the money changers and running them out with the whip and I even heard some people say, yeah, he whipped them with the whip.

I said, show me in the Bible where he whipped them. He never whipped them. He ran them out with the whip. There was nothing unholy about that act. That was the zeal of the Lord. That was the zeal of truth himself seeing the temple defiled and the love of money in the temple.

It was a holy anger. It was a holy anger. Holy. Everything about Jesus was holy and this is what Peter is talking about here is holy virtue. The virtue is giving God's glory. This is the glory of God.

That's the purpose and we looked at that purpose. Moral energy, very power that performs the deeds of excellence performs the purpose in life. That's to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. I like the catechism, don't you?

What is the chief end of man? What is the chief end of man? We all know it, don't we? To glorify God, to enjoy him forever, to love. What does that mean? To love God supremely and love one another and we can't love one another unless we love God first and we can't love God first unless he loved us and he's poured his love in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

So I was thinking a little bit about the synonym of excellence. Chaste, honorable, moral. The antonym would be wrongness, immorality, unrighteousness, unholy and impure. It's the direct opposite. It kind of gives you an idea what Peter is talking about that having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

God has marvelously, wonderfully rescued us from that. He saves us from our sin. Well, to live this out daily, we must be morally excellent. It's far better than just being moral, by the way. It means to be morally pure.

It makes me think about what Jesus said on the Sermon on the Mount, Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. Follow peace with all men and holiness without which no man will see the Lord.

Holiness, purity of heart, the purity of life, moral excellence. The second is that from virtue, moral excellency, moral excellence, I'm sorry, knowledge. And we looked at this knowledge. And what does it refer to?

That's a good question. The specific knowledge of what God has revealed about Himself in His written Word and in nature. God has given so much knowledge, hasn't He? And you think about the knowledge that He gives in creation, but look at the knowledge He's given and through these 66 wonderful books, all compiled together, called the Bible.

The knowledge of God. The knowledge of God. Paul tells us that nature itself reveals God's eternal power, His divine nature, and the extent that all men are without excuse and fell into knowledge and worship God.

And if you notice, you don't have to turn there, but you know Romans 1 well. Verse 20 says this, for since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen. You notice that? Clearly seen.

Being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power in Godhead. What's that saying? His divine nature, His deity. That God is God. God created all things, the stars, the universe. We have the account in Genesis, don't we?

We've been going through that as we've been going, R .C. Sproul's been leading us in Genesis on, from dust to glory. So that, and then he says, people are without excuse. And you know, I really do believe, see?

And to the people of our day, just like in Paul's day, to the philosophers that put up the unknown statue of God to an unknown God, they didn't know. And Paul starts at creation. In Acts 17, I said, this is wise.

This is the Holy Spirit upon that man. And that we must do the same thing. Before we take him to the divine revelation, the special revelation, we must first point out, look around you. Look at the sun.

Look at the stars. Look at you. You may not have, these people today may not think they have an identity, but they were made who God made them. And they're trying to change that, of course. And they're deceived by it, and they're blind, having no identity with God and who they are, where they came from, why they're here, and where they're going.

But nature says that, doesn't it? And that's what, isn't that what David said in Psalm 19? The Word of God, he starts at the first half of the chapter about nature speaks. Nature proclaims the glory of God in nature.

And then he takes to the special revelation. His Word that's perfect, that's sure, that's right, that's clean, that endures forever. It's so true that its effect is to restore the soul. Make wise the simple, he says.

Rejoice the heart. Enlighten they eyes. It endures forever, and it's righteous altogether. Don't you love that? Everything God does is pure and powerful, and he restores man back to where he should be.

Sin has corrupted him. Sin has taken him into the mud, as we have known. And that's why Peter says, see, you have escaped that corruption that is in the world through lust. He's rescued us. And there's the knowledge of God.

No wonder he said it's the scriptures are more valuable than gold and sweeter than honey. The knowledge of truth and importance of both the warnings and bringing him God's blessing. This includes what Peter says in verse 4, see, by which we have been given its seemingly great and precious promises.

That's as he's referring to. Correct insight, discernment, applied to our daily life, diligent study in the scriptures. We are to diligently study the scriptures as a brian's were an axe, and to see whether they're so.

The scriptures pursue the truth of the word of God like a deer pursues the brooks of water and a dry and a desolate land. The third grace is self-control. This one hits me all the time. It's temperance.

Knowledge, he says, to knowledge, then there comes self-control. This is the fruit of the spirit. Again, it's an abstinence. It's to abstain, I should say, from lust, from unholy desires of the world.

It's a constant battle, isn't it? Because it's thrown out in front of us. Billboards, magazines, now we have the iPhones to deal with. It's like it bombards us. It pushes its way in. Don't let it press you into its molding.

We have the knowledge of God. We have the knowledge of the truth, and we know the will of God through the word of God. And this literally actually means to holding oneself in. That's what it means. That self-control, holding oneself in, was used of athletes.

It was used of the athletes that were self-controlled and disciplined. They were self-restrained and self-disciplined. We looked at the example of, what's his name, that the birds study. I can't think of it now.

Yes, Audubon. We looked at that, didn't we? He was a disciplined man, but for a bird, take a picture of a bird. How much more should the Christian be disciplined? My goodness. A believer in Jesus Christ is to control the flesh, to control his thought life, and I'm telling you, that's a battle.