Incremental
| His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2Peter1:3-8) |
However, when God's power is at work in us, then we begin incremental growth. Interestingly, perseverance is in the list, but it also takes perseverance to grow from faith to goodness. It takes diligence to grow from goodness to knowledge and it takes courage to move to self-control. Then we need to develop our long-distance muscles for perseverance so that we can tackle the challenging road to godliness. It takes special self-awareness, grace and dedication to grow in brotherly kindness and then sheer determination when it comes to showing love to difficult people.
And I have learned that each time I think I've completed this cycle, I find myself on a new level and God has another growth staircase of faith, goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness and love for me to climb.
This is not so that I can be saved, but because I am saved, and the higher I climb, the more of God's love and goodness I can see.
Faithful Perseverance is Incremental. It's lots of little steps in a number of areas so that I can be more like Jesus!
