In the past few years progressive sanctification or, in other words, growth in grace has been back in the headlines because of the controversy that blew up in the movement that is generally known as the New Calvinism. Generally speaking, this controversy had to do with the relative places of faith and work in the work of ongoing sanctification. One way or the other the issue raised was whether we are sanctified by faith alone.
It is great when such discussions can be addressed directly from the statements of Scripture. 2 Peter has for one of its central themes the matter of growth in grace (2 Peter 3:17-18). It contains what I believe deserves to be called the Bible’s Most Systematic and Detailed Exhortation to Growth in Grace in its very first chapter. That call is found in 2 Peter 1:5-7. Here is how it reads in the NASB:
2 Peter 1:5 For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with goodness, goodness with knowledge, 6 knowledge with self-control, self-control with endurance, endurance with godliness, 7 godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.
Remember Biology in high school? Remember when the teacher put you in front of that microscope and you first looked through a microscope at things, say in a drop of water, that are invisible to the naked eye? Perhaps you had a uncomfortable feeling as you looked at those squirmy little, microscopic beings that inhabit the water we drink. In this and the following blogs it is my intention to put 2 Peter 1:5-7 under the exegetical microscope.
One of the most striking and interesting things about the verses just read in your hearing is the careful and systematic order in which Peter exhorts Christians to add one grace after another to their growing grace. It is tempting, however, to ignore or downplay this order and regard it as meaningless for all practical purposes. This temptation comes from the fact that this order seems to imply an artificial view of growing in grace if we take it seriously. In other words the passage seems to teach, if we take this order seriously, a building or Lego block view of growing in grace.
You know what I mean. Instead of growing in grace being an internal, organic growth in many different graces gradually, this passage seems to imply that we just stack one grace on top of the other. We have faith. We stack on top of that moral excellence. We stack on top of that knowledge, etc. But we all know that this is not what growth in grace is like. It is not a neatly arranged building block or Lego kind of construction. We do not finish self-control before we start working on perseverance. We do not complete perseverance before we turn to the subject of godliness. Because this is obvious to most Christians and most Bible students, it is tempting to conclude that the order of the graces mentioned here is not really important, that it is arbitrary, and that Peter really meant us to learn nothing by it.
Now, of course, I do not believe in the building or Lego block view of growth in grace. Still, I am convinced that it is impossible to ignore the order of the graces Peter mentions here. There is a reason for this order. One of my goals is to explain that rationale as we go further in this passage. Here I merely want to affirm that I think that there is a reason why moral excellence is supplied in faith and knowledge in moral excellence. Even more clearly, I think, there is and must be a reason why the list begins with faith and ends with love. This cannot be a coincidence. It is necessary, as we shall see, that it should begin with faith and necessary that it should end with love.
My emphasis in this blog is that there is a crucial and necessary reason why the list must begin with faith. Let me tell you what it is. The list begins with faith because faith is absolutely foundational to growth in grace. In other words faith is presupposed in the process of growth in grace. What the foundation is to a house, faith is to growth in grace. What the key is to the locked door that faith is to growth in grace. What one is to the sequence of numbers that faith is to growth in grace. What the letter A is to the alphabet that faith is to growing grace. It is foundational.
Three things in this passage make it very clear that faith is foundational.
First, and most obviously, faith stands first in the list. We might regard this as simply an accident or as arbitrary. The problem with this is just one thing—the rest of the New Testament. No one can read the rest of the New Testament and see the prominence it gives to faith and think that in this list faith’s coming first is incidental. No it cannot be, faith comes first because as the rest of the New Testament teaches it is by grace we are saved through faith. The single word faith or its verb form believe and its various relatives occurs well over 600 times in the New Testament. No other Christian grace (and not even love) even approaches this statistic.
Second, faith is not supplied into anything else. All the other graces are supplied into or added unto something else. But what is faith supplied into? Nothing! It stands first, because no grace precedes or can precede it into which it may be supplied. Before a man has faith he has nothing spiritually. Without faith it is impossible to please God. Before a man has faith he is under the wrath of God. Only by faith are men justified in the sight of God. Thus, faith stands first and is supplied into nothing else because there is no other saving grace that can precede it. It is the first of the saving graces. It is the engine in the train of saving grace.
If you would be saved the first thing you must do—the crucial thing you must do—is to entrust your soul by faith to be saved by Jesus Christ. Nothing you do matters—nothing you do will help—until you simply believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
In our day there is renewed interest in the Puritans. That is all to the good, but with that renewed interest in the Puritans there is a renewed interest in Puritan evangelism. Some today are discussing again, therefore, the whole issue of whether the Puritans believed that men should do anything to prepare themselves for saving grace. Should we tell men to read their Bibles, listen to good preaching, go to church in order to prepare for salvation. Now there is much about that learned discussion into which I do not presume to enter. I know one thing, however, faith must always be first in the train. The first thing a man must do to be saved is believe. Until a man does this, he cannot please God. No one should ever be exhorted to do anything instead of or as an alternative to believing in Christ. Whatever else we tell men to do, these things must never be viewed as a substitute for faith. Until you have faith you have no saving grace and do not and cannot please God.
But there is a third thing in these verses that make it clear that faith is foundational to growth in grace…
Third, faith is the provision for growth in grace described in the previous four verses. Notice again how this exhortation to growth in grace begins. Verse 5 begins with the words, Now for this very reason also. The motivation for growing in grace—the possibility of growing in grace—the power for growing in grace is explained in the previous verses. These verses are the backdrop and reason why and explanation for faith standing unexplained at the beginning of the list of graces. Faith stands first because it is the single word summary of all that Peter speaks of in the first four verses. Draw a circle around those verses if you like in your Bible and label that circle faith. Faith sums up the motivation, possibility, and power for growing in grace. Notice how Peter begins and what he assumes about his readers. 2 Peter 1:1 reads: “Simon Peter, a bond-servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours …”
Here is why you can hope to grow in grace! It is because of what God has done for you in giving you faith. It is this God-given faith that is your hope of growing in grace. Everything depends on your believing that through the promises of the gospel embraced by faith you can overcome sin in your life! Everything depends on your believing that through the power of the gospel you can walk pleasing to God. You don’t have to believe that it will be easy. You don’t have to believe that it will happen overnight. But you do have to believe that in faith a power has been unleashed in your soul that will gradually—bit by bit—but irresistibly destroy the power of sin in your life. The first step in being progressively sanctified and being freed from sin practically is believing that. The first step is believing in the power of the gospel to save you from your sins!
Dr. Sam Waldron is the Academic Dean of CBTS and professor of Systematic Theology. He is also one of the pastors of Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Owensboro, KY. Dr. Waldron received a B.A. from Cornerstone University, an M.Div. from Trinity Ministerial Academy, a Th.M. from Grand Rapids Theological Seminary, and a Ph.D. from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. From 1977 to 2001 he was a pastor of the Reformed Baptist Church of Grand Rapids, MI. Dr. Waldron is the author of numerous books including A Modern Exposition of the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, The End Times Made Simple, Baptist Roots in America, To Be Continued?, and MacArthur’s Millennial Manifesto: A Friendly Response.
