Everything You Need, Week 4, Mental Focus
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(read story from pg. 57, Bob Dwyer 90 yr. old college grad)
As you read through 2 Peter, you just can't miss Peter's emphasis on knowledge.
Peter begins and ends his book with these verses:
2 Peter 1:2 (NKJV)
Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord,
and three chapters later he wraps up his letter with…
2 Peter 3:18 (NKJV)
but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen.
He begins his little letter with knowledge, he ends his little letter with knowledge.
And between those two verses, he says the word "knowledge" 14 times and there's only three chapters in this book.
So, knowledge is really critical to Peter.
He knows that it's important that we know what we NOW know,
because we're living in a time when a lot of people in our churches are saying:
"No, the only way you grow, is to have these wonderful experiences".
Why would God ever tell us not to know more about him?
When Jesus was asked, "What is the greatest commandment"?
And Jesus said, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul," and he said, "and all your mind".
Have you ever thought about how you love God with your mind?
How you use your mind to know more about him and to study and to grow in what you know?
So, the Lord tells you to diligently add knowledge to your virtue.
2 Peter 1:5 (NKJV)
But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge,
And this isn’t about your IQ! (thankfully!)
(stats about geniuses… and IQ’s)
You don’t have to be a genius.
He’s saying enroll in my classroom!
Peter is telling us to follow in his footsteps and be a disciple.
Disciple means “learner.”
And then, that involves three steps, three decisions you have to make.
I. I Will Follow You- A Personal Step
I. I Will Follow You- A Personal Step
In the time when Peter wrote this, a student was noted by the fact that he had a mentor.
He didn't have a classroom, he just followed that mentor everywhere he went.
If you were a teacher, even like Socrates or some of the people in the early days,
they were teachers but they didn't have classrooms.
Their classroom was wherever they went and their disciples just followed after them like a little troop.
The students learned by the interaction that they had and that's the way Jesus taught his disciples.
Jesus didn't ever have a classroom where he brought his disciples together and said,
"Okay, this is gonna be New Testament Theology 103".
No, he just taught them every day in all that he did, and that's what Peter is saying.
If you want to be a learner of Jesus, you have to follow him.
You cannot become a follower of Jesus unless you get in line behind him,
unless you make the decision to put your trust in him.
And you say, as the old chorus goes, "I have decided to follow Jesus".
Now, when this happens, when you decide to follow Christ,
there's a couple of things you need to do.
First of all, you've got to move from the shoreline to where the Savior is.
A. Move from the shoreline to the Savior.
A. Move from the shoreline to the Savior.
We usually think there were only 12 disciples,
but the word “disciple” was a common term for followers of Christ
It’s used 30 times in Acts to describe Christians.
Acts 11:26 says “the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.”
I think that term would be better today, because the term Christian has become so misunderstood.
“Are you a Christian?”, “No I’m a disciple of Jesus Christ.” You see the difference?
(Portugal- Christian nationality)
So these disciples were learners.
Peter left the shoreline of Galilee to follow the Savior.
Jesus walked along the beach. Here's what he said.
"He saw two brothers, Simon Peter and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; and they were fishermen. And he said to them, 'Follow me, and I'll make you fishers of men.' And immediately they left their nets and followed Jesus".
They followed him all right.
They followed him through the streets of Capernaum as he healed the sick and preached the kingdom.
They followed him up the hillsides as he taught the multitudes and fed the crowds.
They followed him into the fishing boats, tossed into the storms,
into the homes packed with sinners.
They followed him into the synagogues that were crammed with the curious listeners.
They watched him turn water into wine, open the eyes of the blind, battle with and cast out demons.
They followed him into the hills of Judea, into the angry streets of Jerusalem.
They saw him raise the dead.
They listened to his sermons and then they asked questions and grew in their knowledge of his teachings.
If you read the New Testament you see that pattern.
Jesus would preach, then he'd have a discussion with the disciples so he could make sure they understood what he was teaching.
And sometimes, he would be discouraged because they didn't get it.
He told lots of stories to help them understand what he was saying.
He never had a sermon didn't have a story in it.
And if we follow him, just as his disciples could interact with Jesus,
we interact with Jesus through this precious book
and we hear his sermons and we read the discussion
and we learn and we become disciples, better disciples.
We become better learners.
Everyone in this room is a disciple.
What kind of learner am I? Am I growing in knowledge?
and then, you move from head knowledge to heart knowledge.
B. Move from head knowledge to heart knowledge.
B. Move from head knowledge to heart knowledge.
When you hear these words about knowing the Lord Jesus, it's not just about you know about him.
Just about everybody in our culture knows who Jesus is and they know about him.
And we celebrate Christmas.
Most people have some idea that that's related to Jesus, or Easter.
But knowing about somebody and knowing somebody is different.
So, the first question is this.
If you're gonna be a disciple, if you're gonna be a learner,
if knowledge is gonna be a part of what you're adding to your faith,
you have to make this decision: I will follow you. - a personal step.
And you begin following Jesus. Here's the second one: I will study you.
II. I Will Study You- A Thoughtful Step
II. I Will Study You- A Thoughtful Step
Knowledge means yearning and saying, "I will follow you," but when Peter speaks of knowledge here, he's also talking about actively learning.
After Peter and Andrew and the others left their fishing boats to follow Christ, he had a lot to teach them.
I mean, they didn't know anything.
They were humble, at one time even referred to as "unlearned men".
So they were starting from zero. They were starting from scratch.
For some of us “studying” is not a nice word! Brings back bad memories!
But remember this isn’t about just information, it’s relationship based.
(my son college- study 3-4 hours for every hour of class, so 15x4=45 to 60!!?)
They listened to his sermons, and they began to accumulate knowledge about who Jesus was.
He preached in the synagogues and the arguments that he would wage in the temple,
these disciples heard it and they would process that information
and little by little they would add knowledge to knowledge and begin to grow.
Unfortunately, most of them never really did comprehend the message of the Resurrection because we realize that they didn't understand that until after it happened,
even though Jesus had talked about it incessantly through all of the days of his ministry.
So, when you become a disciple, when you become a learner,
when you add to your faith, virtue; and to your virtue, knowledge,
God teaches you through his book.
So, let me suggest to you a couple of ways that you can do this study.
A. Study his Word as a textbook.
A. Study his Word as a textbook.
Number one, study the Bible as a textbook.
Don't stop there, but start there. Realize that God's Word, the Bible, is his great textbook of truth.
And today, more than ever before in history, we are blessed with resources to help us do that. We have apps and all kinds of things and, you know,
you've gotta do some homework and find out what you're getting into,
but many of the Bible study tools that are available to us on the Internet today,
we couldn't have possibly dreamed of many years ago.
And now, God has allowed this technology to come.
It's just amazing to me how much there is out there to help us take in the Scripture and learn what it means.
It's just amazing what happens when you study the Lord.
When you study the Lord, that means you're studying the book.
Where does Jesus appear?
The living Word is found in the written Word.
(College textbooks today- online, or you download it, then ipad with e-notes, write on the pad with stylus…)
B. Study his Word as a survival guide.
B. Study his Word as a survival guide.
The Bible isn’t just a textbook like in school, for chemistry or whatever, it’s a living, personal book, a love letter, a guide how to survive.
Beloved, I now write to you this second epistle (in both of which I stir up your pure minds by way of reminder), that you may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Savior,
He says “immerse your minds into the study of these words..”
Add knowledge to your life and grow in knowledge of Christ!
So, all I'm saying to you is, you all are smart people.
Use your smart people stuff to find out what the Bible has to say and get acquainted with it.
After you say, "I will follow you," and "I will study you," don't forget to say, "I will obey you".
C. Study his Word to transform, not just inform.
C. Study his Word to transform, not just inform.
“Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:
Did you know studying the Bible can be dangerous?
In fact, the results of Bible study could be disastrous!
But God intended for us to apply the Bible to our lives—not just read it.
So when you read God’s Word but don’t apply it, the foundation of your life may crumble.
At the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, “Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock” (Matthew 7:24 NIV).
That wise man’s house stayed strong through the storm.
But then Jesus spoke about someone else: “Everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand” (Matthew 7:26 NIV).
You probably know how the story goes: The foolish person’s house collapses during the storm.
God has given you the Bible for transformation, not just information.
When you apply it, you’re building a firm foundation for your life.
Here are three more reasons it’s important that you apply God’s Word to your life:
*Knowledge produces pride if you don’t apply truth to your life.
*Knowledge produces pride if you don’t apply truth to your life.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 8:1, “Knowledge puffs up while love builds up” (NIV).
Christians can be the most cantankerous, evil, mean-spirited, critical, judgmental people the world has known—if we never take the extra step and apply the Bible to our lives.
That’s because knowledge on its own produces pride.
Instead, God wants you to apply that knowledge in love.
*Knowledge requires action.
*Knowledge requires action.
James 1:22 says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says” (NIV).
What a person knows should be reflected in what that person does.
You can’t grow spiritually just by taking notes on a Bible study.
God expects you to follow his commands—they’re not optional!
*Knowledge increases responsibility.
*Knowledge increases responsibility.
The Bible says, “Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it” (James 4:17 NLT).
When you study the Bible, God will show you areas of your life that need to be changed.
And once he shows you those areas, he’ll hold you responsible for what he’s shown you.
A deeper knowledge of Scripture equals a greater responsibility to follow it.
As you study and apply God’s Word,
you’ll be building a strong foundation that will keep you steady during life’s storms.
III. I Will Obey You- A Behavioral Step
III. I Will Obey You- A Behavioral Step
When Peter and Andrew decided to leave their nets, leave their families, leave their life, it wasn’t just about head knowledge. It was personal!
It was because of this new relationship that had changed them.
They had to turn away from all that and walk in a new direction- obedience.
Do what God tells you to do.
When you do what God tells you to do, he'll tell you something else.
But God isn't gonna just load you up for information so you can see how smart you are.
He wants you to grow in your relationship with him and the process of that is the process we know as obedience.
We're not to be just hearers of the Word of God, but what's the rest of it? Doers.
When you become a doer, you grow as a disciple.
So, when that happens, here's what will happen in your life.
A. Be prepared to change your values.
A. Be prepared to change your values.
First of all, your values will start to change.
The more you know about God in his Word, the more your life will be changed.
Our desires change to reflect eternal priorities.
Our behavior habits change.
You cannot be in this book seriously without it changing your values.
So when you study the Word of God and you get into the Scriptures and you begin to grow in Christ, all of a sudden that's what the Bible means when it says:
"When you become a Christian, old things pass away; behold, all things become new".
B. Be prepared to change your vision.
B. Be prepared to change your vision.
And be prepared to change your vision. That's another thing.
When you become a Christian, it changes how you look at everything.
Tony Evans, said, "When you become a Christian and you begin to read the Bible, it shapes how you look at everything and how you view everything. It's the grid through which you evaluate the good, the bad, and the ugly.”
(read story from pg. 72-73, Dawson Trotman, Navigators)
It shows you how, one step at a time, to add knowledge to your virtue,
and this is the essence of discipleship.
I will follow you, I will study you, and I will obey you.
God sent down his written Word, the Bible, and his living Word, Jesus Christ, to provide you with everything you need.
And that's what he says in 2 Peter.
He says: "Through the great and precious promises of God, you have everything you need for life and godliness".
the Bible's already given you everything you need.
Find what he's given you in the Bible and start practicing it.
I can honestly tell you this.
If you will take the Word of God and make it your purpose to lavishly pour yourself into it and learn what it says,
and even when you get discouraged don't give up, keep working at it,
and make the Bible come alive in your life,
you will have everything you need for life and godliness.