Everything You Need, Week 2, Moral Excellence

Have you ever bought a defective item? Maybe it didn’t work when you got home or it didn’t work long? Or you order something and when you put it together you realize all the parts aren’t there? We have this term “quality control.” Companies are supposed to have this, so they maintain a level of satisfaction. (eating with Clint Rivers- Pilgrim’s Pride chicken, found a bone in his chicken, took the box info.)

There is a word in this section of scripture that we’ve been looking at, that is similar to quality control for a Christian. That is the word “virtue.”

Quality control is really, really important. I mean, if we're gonna be strong and effective people who can withstand our culture, we have to be people of quality, people of virtue.

2 Peter 1:3 (NKJV)

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,

2 Peter 1:5 (NKJV)

But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge,

What is virtue?

Virtue is moral excellence or the quality of our character.

A person of virtue is a quality person, a person who's good and generous and gracious, someone who is genuinely trying to be above reproach. That used to be something that was very common in our culture, in many ways not just for Christians. "No, no, he's a good guy. He's a good person," and what we meant by that was he's somebody you can trust, somebody who's not gonna try to cheat you, True virtue, though, for all of us as Christians, comes from our faith. "For this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue". When you become a Christian, virtue is part of the package. Virtue has its beginning when you trust God and placing your full weight on his worthiness.

Fait is what sustains virtue. Now let's talk about how that works.

I. The Moral Quality of Christ

First of all, if there ever was anyone who walked on this Earth who was completely virtuous, it was only the Lord Jesus Christ, and we learned earlier that if you wanna know about God you gotta know about Jesus, 'cause Jesus is God's picture to the world, so if you wanna know what virtue is you look at Jesus.

And how did Jesus express his virtue?

A. He Aimed To Please God

He expressed his virtue by pleasing his Father. You know, there is a part of every one of us that wants to please somebody. For instance, Disneyland and Disney World are built on quality control and that principle began with Walt Disney himself, who inspired deep loyalty in his employees. One of the associates of Disney was a person named Stormy Palmer, said, "Walt's inspiration and enthusiasm made overachievers out of all of us at the studio, because you wanted to please him. He was more than a boss. He was like a father". People work diligently to produce quality work because they wanna please somebody above them. Have you ever done that? Have you ever had anybody in your life that you so respected? Maybe you worked for them or you were associated with them, and you just wanted to please them so much.

There is something within us that drives us forward to please people that we respect and that we love. Well, in John 8 our Lord was having a discussion with his critics, the Pharisees, who resented the quality of his life. They didn't like Jesus because his moral excellence was way superior to theirs. And how many of you know when you live a godly life and you're around people that aren't so godly, you make them real nervous and sometimes you make 'em real mad?

And, you know, these people didn't like Jesus because of who he was and how he lived, and Jesus said to them in John 8:28 and 29,

John 8:28–29 NKJV

Then Jesus said to them, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and that I do nothing of Myself; but as My Father taught Me, I speak these things. And He who sent Me is with Me. The Father has not left Me alone, for I always do those things that please Him.”

Do you wanna know how to live a life of virtue? Make it your goal to always do those things that please the Lord Jesus Christ, that please the Father. The secret to Jesus's virtue was his focus on pleasing his Father. It's not just a one-way street. When you please someone, they end up being pleased with you. You end up being pleased with them. It's a two-way street and on two different occasions, at two different phases of his earthly life, God the Father spoke out of heaven concerning his Son to say to everybody who would listen, "I'm pleased with you". It happened twice.

B. God was pleased with Jesus- at His baptism.

This is recorded for us in Matthew chapter 3, and Jesus was being baptized,

Matthew 3:17 NKJV

And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

I always love this passage of Scripture because it's a tremendous illustration of the Trinity. God the Son is in the water of the baptismal. God the Spirit comes down in the form of a dove. Where is God the Father? He's in heaven, and he's saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased". God the Father in heaven, God the Holy Spirit coming down as a dove, and Jesus Christ being baptized. Now, not only did he say this to his Son at the beginning of his ministry, but at the middle of his ministry he did it again.

C. God was pleased with Jesus- at His transfiguration.

Matthew 17:5 NKJV

While he was still speaking, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them; and suddenly a voice came out of the cloud, saying, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Hear Him!”

Peter never forgot that moment and neither would you. Peter was there when this happened. He saw it all and in 2 Peter 1:17 he mentions it.

2 Peter 1:17 NKJV

For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory: “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”

Peter mentions it in 2 Peter 'cause it was such an impressive thing. So, the moral quality of Christ is this, this is how he was virtuous: he always aimed to please God, and God was pleased with him.

All right, now let's take the second step. The moral quality of Christ was that he aimed to please God and our moral quality comes when we aim to please God, as well.

II. The Moral Quality of Christ-Followers

Let me take this a step further. Just as Christ was pleasing to God, the Bible teaches Christ followers we are to make it our goal to please God, as well. And how do we please God? By living a virtuous life, a life of moral quality. Kevin DeYoung gives us a good word. He said, "When we hear the language of 'pleasing God,' some of us panic because we only relate to God as a judge. But God is also our Father, and if you think, 'I have to please God with my obedience because he's my judge,' you will undermine the good news of justification by faith alone. But you ought to reason this way: 'I've been acquitted. The Lord is my righteousness. I'm justified fully. I'm adopted into his family. I am so excited to please my Father and live for him.'"

A. We Aim To Please God

When we know God is loving and forgiving, the quest for being virtuous becomes a joy, an adventure. The harder we work, we want to develop virtue in our lives so that when God looks at us, he can say to us, "There is my son. There is my daughter. I'm well pleased with them". Just like last week, we work with diligence to please the Father, not to gain his love and acceptance, but because he already loves us and accepts us. The Bible gives us really careful instructions, and I wanna take you now to a passage, just for a few moments, that kinda details some of the things that call to us to be virtuous.

It's 1 Thessalonians chapter 4:1 and 2

1 Thessalonians 4:1–2 (NKJV)

Finally then, brethren, we urge and exhort in the Lord Jesus that you should abound more and more, just as you received from us how you ought to walk and to please God; for you know what commandments we gave you through the Lord Jesus.

Now, Paul wrote these words to the Thessalonian believers, and he is saying to them, "You heard what we talked to you about and how you ought to walk and please God". And then, the next verse tells us some of the ways we can do that,

1 Thessalonians 4:3–4 (NKJV)

For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you should abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you should know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor,

Ladies and gentlemen, you can't talk about the biblical quality of virtue without dealing with moral purity. When you diligently add to your faith virtue, that includes incorporating God's model for your conduct. So our aim is to…

B. We Aim To Live Above the Fray.

How do we do that?

* By filling your heart with Jesus

Number one, fill your hearts with Jesus. Make it the greatest ambition of your life to please God. If you're inflamed with that motivation, it's much harder to fall into sin. To overcome sin and temptation, live above the mess/fray, fill your heart with Jesus. God made you. He loves you. He sent Christ to die for you. He wants a daily relationship with you. He wants to bless you. He has a purpose for your life, which is greater than anything you could imagine. He's built a home for you in heaven. Why would you not wanna please him more than anything else in the world? Believe me, that motivation is your greatest path to holiness. Fall in love with Jesus so much that you'd never wanna do anything to hurt him. It's not about the do's and the don'ts, and this is not right, and that's not right. What it is, it's about your love for God. It's about your desire to do that which pleases God and brings joy to his heart so that he can look down at you and say, "This is my beloved son, and I'm well pleased in him". That doesn't mean you won't have temptation. It doesn't mean you won't have struggles, but if you fall in love with Jesus and you make him your great love, that will overcome so much of what goes on in the world today.

*By filling your mind with scripture

Number two, fill your mind with Scripture. When you take the Bible and you submerge it into your brain, it has a way of displacing other thoughts, and this pleases God.

no two objects can occupy the same space. So, you know, I hear people say, "Well, I'm gonna get up tomorrow, and I'm gonna start in the... I'm not gonna think these thoughts. I'm not gonna think these thoughts, I'm". You know what happens when you do that? You think 'em way more than you ever thought you would, more than you did the day before. You don't replace evil thoughts by determining not to think evil thoughts. You replace evil thoughts by filling your mind with the Scripture and as you begin to do that it pushes the evil thoughts out, and it works, but you gotta work at it.

*By filling your routines with rules

Here is the third thing, and this is really interesting: fill your routines with rules. People don't like rules anymore. Did you know that? But, you know, the Bible is filled with rules. Not all of them are easy to follow, but, as I said before, they're all for our good and for God's glory. Somebody will say, "Well, I don't want rules. That will make me a legalist". can you imagine the chaos? If everything and everyone else in the world needs some rules, don't you think we might need some, too? Early in his ministry, after seeing a number of prominent evangelists fall into sexual sin, Billy Graham decided he would never be left alone with a woman who was not his wife. The decision became known as the Billy Graham Rule. It's true. He was not only protecting himself against temptation. He was protecting himself against the possibility of untrue statements or slanderous accusations.

If we're going to be godly people, we're gonna have to put some fences around our lives.

*By filling your friendships with accountability

thing about small groups, however, is they can hold you accountable. You can talk to each other. You can share the challenges you have. You can ask for prayer, you can ask for help, and so if you have a close friend you trust make a pact with that friend. Hold each other accountable to live your life in a holy way. Fill your heart with Jesus, fill your mind with Scripture, fill your routines with rules, fill your friendships with accountability,

*By filling your soul with resolve

Let me leave you with this general suggestion. Do whatever it takes. If you think Paul and Peter and these other people are tough on sin, you wanna hear what Jesus's take on this is? Here you go. "If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you". Take whatever action you have to take, but be resolved by the grace of God, "I am not gonna be a victim. I am a victor in Jesus Christ, and I'm gonna live that way".

C. We Aim To Live A Quiet Life

Paul wasn’t finished with his discussion of the virtue of pleasing God. He had a final point to make.

1 Thessalonians 4:11–12 NKJV

that you also aspire to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, that you may walk properly toward those who are outside, and that you may lack nothing.

The word quiet life here means “restful.” Not silent or lazy, but it was the picture of serenity. Instead of over-reacting to every situation in life, every problem, we learn to trust Him, with a quiet confidence.

It is a great witness right now. When the world seems to be going crazy, are we? When the world is hateful and stressed out, are we?

Remember, the world is watching! Many times watching for selfish reasons, or to make themselves feel better about their faults, but regardless they are watching. But many times they are looking for an honest person, a person with virtue. Someone who’s actions equal their words. And guess what, that’s what the Lord is looking for too.