thduggie’s blog

16 Responses to “A World of Reminders”

1. Jon Daley Says:
   April 12th, 2010 at 16:51

   I finally got around to listening to the sermon this morning.

   Does the handout you gave out list the bible verses for each of your “he tells us …” points? I’m having a hard time finding which verses you are referring to in some cases. (I thought maybe I was reading the wrong chapter until you came to the “virtues” section.

2. thduggie Says:
   April 12th, 2010 at 20:52

   Well, downloading and listening to a sermon of mine places you in a very exclusive circle of people! Thanks for taking the time.

   The handout lists the seven virtues Peter mentions and provides space for notes during the discussion time. My idea was to get us to think about ways to remind ourselves of those virtues and the mandate to pursue them in the course of daily events. (I realize now that the silly acronym I thought up for those virtues is what stuck best in my mind, so the handout - at least in my case - was only a limited success.)

   Let me look at my notes / transcript - as far as I remember, a lot of the “He tells us…” points I cribbed from Barclay. I purposely tried to not make them exact quotes of the text, so as not to fall into the stereotypical preacher’s trap of expanding without expounding: “What does he mean with ‘Pray without ceasing?’ He means we need to PRAY! And he means we SHOULD NOT STOP!”

   Here are the points I (Barclay) synthesized, with verse reference and where necessary explanation added:
   – Our faith is no less than that of the apostles (v.1 - “a faith as precious as ours”)
   – We as gentiles are included on equal level with the Israelites (v.1 - alternate possibility of understanding “a faith as precious as ours”)
   – We are as wholly God’s as a slave belongs to his master (v.1 - by extension of even the Apostle Peter referring to himself as a slave/servant - “doulos”)
   – Jesus is God (v.1 - “our God and Savior Jesus Christ”)
   – As our relationship with Christ deepens we more fully come to
   understand God’s grace and peace (v.2)
   – Jesus is the Christ of power and victorious love (v.3 - “His divine power” is what makes his love a victorious one and not, like ours, often a frustrated one)
   – Jesus has given us everything we need for practical religion (v.3 - “everything we need for life and godliness”)
   – Jesus is the fulfillment of the Old Testament prophecies (v.4 - implied by saying we “may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires,” which can only be if the prophecies have been fulfilled, and it’s clear from context and the NT witness that they have been fulfilled in Jesus)
   – In Jesus we escape from the world’s corruption (v.4)
   – In Christ we share in the divine nature and have abundant life (v.4)
   – We ought to equip ourselves and our faith lavishly with good qualities (v.5 - the word for “add” is the same in v.11 for “richly gifted,” “epichoregein”)
   – We ought to make sure we increase in moral quality, working at this
   with our every effort and God’s grace in tandem (v.5, 8; these verses mostly set out our duties, but we know from other passages that we can’t do it alone)
   – We ought to keep climbing up the ladder of the virtues Peter sets out (v.8)
   – We ought to make every effort to make the most of God’s grace,
   keeping our sights set on heaven (v.11)
   – We are forgiven and cleansed from our sins (v.9)

   I hope that clarifies the sermon a bit. Thanks for asking and thus reminding me!

3. thduggie Says:
   April 12th, 2010 at 20:54

   Heh. For clarity’s sake and for all those folks who don’t have 30 minutes to spare: All the above verse references are from 2 Peter 1.

4. SursumCorda Says:
   April 12th, 2010 at 21:06

   Inspired by this conversation, I have now downloaded it. Not listened yet, but taken the first step. Which I only mention to let you know that your BCF links are now out of date….

5. thduggie Says:
   April 12th, 2010 at 21:26

   Thanks, I’ve fixed the links. We changed website design and organisation recently, and I didn’t think to ask for old links to be retained, at least in some minimal fashion.

6. SursumCorda Says:
   April 13th, 2010 at 01:29

   The trouble I have with audio presentation is that I can’t easily go back and quote them for response purposes…assuming I remember what I wanted to mention, which I often don’t. On the other hand, I think that listening while walking is the BEST way to hear a sermon! Even a long sermon doesn’t seem long under those conditions (or maybe it was just better than the average long sermon). I seem to both listen better and think better when I’m moving, whereas sitting still (whether in church or in a classroom) is terribly conducive to thinking about something — anything — else. Or falling asleep, which is hard to do while walking.

   Anyway, I do appreciate the way you approach a sermon (all two I’ve heard). It seems to resonate with the way my brain works. Plus, you didn’t confuse me with sports analogies or pop culture references. Okay, there were a couple of the latter, but the meaning was clear from context. And incidentally fit in really well with my recent post.

   I know there was more I meant to say, but see above comment on the problem I have with aural input. Plus I’ve been up since 3:45 a.m….

7. SursumCorda Says:
   April 13th, 2010 at 01:29

   And it’s now 8:30 p.m. Your time stamp makes it look as if I’ve been up even longer than I have.

8. SursumCorda Says:
   April 13th, 2010 at 13:13

   I remembered one thing overnight. I am one of those people who needs to hear most things at least three times before remembering them. (Make that five for people I’m introduced to.) So why, I wondered, do I make fun of Presbyterian pastors and their like, who insist on ruining a good sermon by stretching 15 minutes’ worth of material into 45? They preach a good sermon, then lose me by essentially saying the same thing two more times. That should be the three times I need, right?

   Wrong. It does little good to have the three repetitions close together. Maybe if they preached the second part in two weeks, and the third a month after that, it would work for me.

9. Jon Daley Says:
   April 19th, 2010 at 14:48

   I had figured it was a translation issue, but now that I am looking at your references and the NIV more closely, I guess it is more a sentence parsing issue than translation.

   You said that v1 was one of the two clearest references to Jesus being God. I see the “and” as delineating two different people, rather than joining two different descriptions of the same person. I’ve been recently trying to figure out the doctrine of the trinity some more, and it is interesting how hard that doctrine is to prove by scripture. The only place I can find Jesus being referred to as God is in John 1. I assume that is the other place you were referring to?

   Going on to your other points:
   “our faith is no less than the apostles”: While I agree that our faith *could* be no less than the apostles, it seems to me that verse 1 doesn’t prove that - but that Peter is writing this letter to those who share a like precious faith with him, and so, unless you assume he is writing to all people, there exists persons who don’t share that faith, and so one should consider whether he is in that group or not.

   I guess maybe you are interpreting scripture differently than I do, since I have basically the same argument against your second point - while I agree we should be slaves to God and not slaves to sin, I don’t see how this verse proves anything about that - it is simply talking about Peter, and not us.

   Thoughts?

10. thduggie Says:
    April 19th, 2010 at 21:39

    Jon,

    thanks for the thoughtful comment. I’m in a hotel and without the reference books that I use, so I can’t comment on the meaning of “and” in the original. I’ll also get back to you on the other points when I have a physical Bible handy and not just biblegateway.com - I dislike flipping between programs.

    However, I am almost certain that we interpret Scripture differently. I’d be surprised if we did, or for that matter, if anyone interpreted Scripture completely identically. I’d hope that you and I align on most points and methodologies, but the (unprovable) fact that everyone interprets slightly differently is probably my biggest headache concerning the doctrine of infallibility of Scripture. We hold that as true, but sometimes forget that the infallible word of God was translated and is interpreted by limited and fallible people. It’s when we forget that that we get a new denomination…

    So I’m glad we’re discussing these things in spite of what differences might arise and because we are brothers in the faith.

    Again, the thoughts you were probably looking for will come later.

11. thduggie Says:
    April 21st, 2010 at 21:26

    It’s often good I have time to think on things and not just shoot off my mouth. My first reaction was to say that not even the English translation allows for the first verse to delineate two different people, and that the structure for referring to two persons is the structure in verse 2, but I later realized that this could depend on the English translation. And indeed, if you use KJV, 21st Century KJV, or the American Standard Version, the English does indicate two persons (”of God and our Savior Jesus Christ”), whereas most other versions don’t (”of our God and Savior Jesus Christ”). So, back to the Greek we go, because merely declaring a certain translation more inspired won’t do.

    The best I can do here is suggest looking at 2. Peter 1 in the Greek on www.biblegateway.com, and comparing verse 1 to verse 11.

    Verse 1 ends with “του θεου ημων και σωτηρος ιησου χριστου,” “of God our and Savior Jesus Christ.”
    Verse 11 ends with “του κυριου ημων και σωτηρος ιησου χριστου,” “of Lord our and Savior Jesus Christ.”
    The grammar is identical, and only “Lord” and “God” are different. Most translators have chosen to translate both phrases with an identical structure in English, which makes sense to me. The KJV and the other versions cited above don’t, choosing to translate verse 11 “of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” instead of “of Lord and our Savior Jesus Christ,” as they’d have to if they treated it the same as verse 1.

    2. Peter 3:18 is another passage with the identical grammatical structure and “Lord” instead of “God,” and the same translation results as 1:11.

    I’ll address your point about the slaves first, because I’m not sure I understand your point about “our faith is no less than that of the apostles” correctly (even though you say it’s the same argument). Yes, verse one does not at face value say any more than that Peter is God’s bondservant or slave. However, on the one hand, it serves as a reminder that we, too, should be slaves to God, and on the other, indirectly, we can deduce that we, too, ought to be God’s slave in a similarly inseparable way. For that we can either head to Paul’s writing in Philippians 3:17 and 4:9, telling us to imitate him, after his introduction as servant of Christ. Or we can take the equality of our faith with Peter’s as an indication that we ought also to be equal to him in commitment, which brings us back to the question about the “like precious faith.” But simply put, verse one does not directly state that we are or ought to be slaves to God, and only describes Peter.

    Again, I’m not sure I understood your point about the “like precious faith,” but then, it also sounds like you didn’t understand me, for I didn’t at any point mean to say that everybody everywhere shares in this faith, which is one thing you seem to have understood. If indeed you understood me as saying that, I’d appreciate you showing me why, so I can attempt more clarity in future sermons. I certainly don’t want to spread messages like that!

    The other thing I don’t understand is probably due to the awful English language that we use. Does your use of *could* mean *might* or *can*? It changes things mightily. I’ll try to expand on what I meant and hope to answer your point in something of a scattershot fashion.

    As it seems you’re using KJV I’ll also use KJV wherever practical. The phrase we’re looking at says “…to them that have obtained like precious faith with us…”. The questions we need to answer first is (a) who the “us” is (Gentiles or apostles, giving the two meanings mentioned), and (b) who the “them” is. I find it likely that the greeting is analogous to Pauls “to the saints that are in Ephesus” greetings, which we who believe usually take to apply to us as well (and I was aiming my sermon at a largely Christian congregation). If that is correct, Peter is saying that we who have believed and confessed it (the saints, according to Romans 10:9) have a faith that is not inferior to his, which is a powerful statement indeed that there are no second-class Christians.

    Think of it this way: If there were different classes of faith, and Peter was only addressing the letter to those first-class Christians in his league, why write all those reminders and admonitions afterward? And more practically, how would you and I be able to know that we can legitimately be included among those he addresses, and therefore ought to bother taking his writing to heart?

    One final note: You’ve probably noticed that I referred to Paul more than once. I’ve done that because Peter himself refers to Paul’s writing at the end of the book, so it’s reasonable to assume he was familiar with it.

    I hope these thoughts are along the line of what you were hoping for. Thanks for making me think harder about what I said, and I’m looking forward to your reply!

12. thduggie Says:
    April 21st, 2010 at 21:57

    I forgot to reply to your question about the passage that calls Jesus God. The other one Barclay mentions is John 20:28, Thomas’s exclamation: “My LORD and my God.” I’m not sure why Barclay doesn’t include the passage you mention, John 1:1 (”…the Word was God”) - perhaps because it isn’t as directly naming Jesus.

    So saying “one of two passages” was overstating the case. I should have said “one of very few,” for there might be a fourth I can’t recall…

13. Jon Daley Says:
    April 22nd, 2010 at 04:39

    “and”: Interesting. It sounds like you know more Greek than I do. I had been meaning to do an online New Testament Greek course at one point, and then I discovered that a lot of the differences in the English translations go back to which Greek manuscripts you pick, and so got discouraged, since the arguments different translators use to justify different manuscripts have good points on each side.

    “ought”: yes, I am fine saying that we ought to be slaves to God. I think it is important to not overstate things, at least here in the States, there are statistics of X% of the people say they are Christians and Y% believe that Christ ever walked on the earth and Z% believe that he was crucified and resurrected. The size of X, Y and Z are kind of strange, though maybe that is just because I don’t know what it means to say one is a Christian and not believe that he existed means.

    I think Jesus taught pretty plainly that there are those who would say they are Christians, but who aren’t: “narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.”, and “[they say] We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets. But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.”

    “could”, My sentence means what I meant it to say by replacing it with “might”. “can” sounds kind of funny in its place. One’s faith might be less than the apostles. And yes, I didn’t think you were saying that universally, all people had the same faith or same ultimate judgement before God.

14. thduggie Says:
    April 22nd, 2010 at 20:10

    I don’t know that I’d claim a better knowledge of Greek than you do, because I’ve never taken any class in it and all I did was compare the grammar structure in the two languages and draw on the few Greek words I do recognize - kurios, teos, iesous, christos - and a good bit of googling. In the course of this discussion I did run into mentions of the different Greek versions (for instance at Leadership U), but they don’t seem to differ on this verse. I used Power Bible CD (the free 3.9 version), which has the Textus Receptus, but which also threw me off because the KJV interlinear version it offers rearranges the Greek words according to their appearance in KJV order and prints them in their root form (undeclined and unconjugated).

    The article cited above at Leadership U does a fair job of explaining the pros and cons of different Greek texts, although explaining the “KJV debate” is its stated purpose. I think in light of this studying NT Greek would be extra helpful, because a grasp of the language would help you better understand the arguments for one or the other text. If you have the time and the means, I’d encourage you to go for it!

    It’s true that people will call themselves Christians and not believe in Jesus. Those that I’ve known to do that would say they’re Christians because they’re not Muslims or Atheists or some such thing, or use the word “Christian” as a cultural signifier. You’re right that overstating is dangerous (even outside the States), and perhaps in a summary like mine it would have been wise to cut the points that weren’t immediately clear from the text (and weren’t mentioned by previous preachers, which that one wasn’t). I’ll try to keep that in mind.

    I guess your sentence confused me because with “might” I didn’t understand why you’d say you agree. Janet said it was clear to her what you meant, knowing emphasis and common usage of the English language, to which my ear might not be as closely attuned. So I’m sorry I misunderstood - I get it now. So, to pick up the discussion again: who do you think Peter meant with those “that have obtained like precious faith with us?”

15. Jon Daley Says:
    April 29th, 2010 at 19:24

    I guess it sort of seems like a strange question to me. It is those he was physically writing to, and because it is included in scripture, then is secondarily written to people in later times.

    It can’t be written to everyone, and I’d say he is less concerned than modern folks about discriminating against those people who don’t share his precious faith.

    In his first letter, which may or may not be to the same crowd, he refers to “scattered strangers”, “elect”, “obedient”, “sanctified” in his introduction. Later, he refers to their “trial of their faith… being tried by fire”.
    In the second letter, he writes to those who “have escaped [past tense] “the corruption of the world”.

    I think that we would do well to decide as individuals whether we think those words apply to us, and thereby decide if the letter is written to us or not.

16. thduggie Says:
    Mai 7th, 2010 at 20:51

    I agree that everything included in Scripture is in a sense written to people in later times, either directly or as examples to learn from (see 1. Cor. 10). The usefulness of all Scripture for men of all periods in history is one of our basic tenets, as Paul writes in 2 Tim 3:16 – though of course he was referring to what we call the Old Testament.

    However, we can’t assume that what’s written in a letter is directed at us just because it is Scripture. I’ve always been taught that we first need to find out who the original audience was and what the letter meant to them before trying to apply it to us today. For instance, I doubt it’s legitimate to directly apply Paul’s admonitions to masters and slaves to today’s bosses and employees because the respective relationships are different in a number of significant ways. Even so, I’ve heard that application made more than once. (It’s often worse with Old Testament promises we like, such as 2 Chron 7:14, Jer 29:11, Jer 31:31ff, because we understand the cultural context even less and have become used to songs and poster prints with those verses.)

    Because Peter doesn’t do us the favor of starting with “to the saints at Ephesus” or a similar phrase, it’s not clear who the actual physical addressees were. So we need to ask if he is (a) restricting the intended audience by addressing himself to those “that have obtained like precious faith with [him],” or (b) using that phrase to say something important about the faith of all who believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.

    If (a): How does anyone reading the letter know if he has a “like precious faith?” What made Peter’s faith precious? How can we know the letter wasn’t just intended for those who like Peter had seen Jesus resurrected, or those who like Peter had experienced Pentecost? Is there a clear test of the preciousness of our faith, or does the applicability of this letter depend on a subjective evaluation of my faith?

    If (b): What, then, makes our faith so precious? How should its preciousness impact our lives? Does it impact our lives in such a way? Why does Peter open the letter with this statement?

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