THE ABUNDANT ENTRANCE
God
asks of all believers three things: Full-orbed character, full-orbed conduct,
and full-orbed testimony all to be crowned with glory at Christ's
coming; and full-orbed character is the root of all. So the Apostle (2 Peter 1: 5) says: "Yea,
and for this very cause" - namely, because God has endowed us with
such a wrath of possibility, the limitless promises just named - "adding on your part all diligence" - every
kind of holy concentration - "to your faith"
- the sole foundation that saves: the only quality of the seven they were not
to furnish, for it was already there: he has just addressed them as those who
have obtained a like precious faith in the righteousness of Christ - "supply" - add, furnish: for we are not born with
these added graces, nor are we born again with them, except in germ and
principle - "virtue" - courage,
manliness; "and to your virtue, knowledge"
- for knowledge is vital for our shaping our life so as to please God; "and to your knowledge, temperance" -
self-control, self-government; "and to your
temperance, patience" - the dogged persistence of the
long-winded runner; "and to your patience, godliness"
- doing everything, habitually, Godward; "and to
your godliness, brotherly-love" - the family affection for
all the redeemed; "and to your brotherly-love, love"
- love in its widest and most catholic scope. "For if these
things are yours and abound, they make you" - look after
your character, and your work will look after itself - "to be not idle nor unfruitful unto the knowledge"
- the after-knowledge (see Greek) - "of our Lord
Jesus Christ.
Now
the Apostle reveals the peril of our having a saved character without these
graces. "For
he that lacketh these things"
- that is, the six qualities that can be built on the one saving foundation of
faith - "is blind" -
short-sighted; smoke-darkened, fogged: it is the technical term used by medical
men, "myopia," for short-sightedness: apt to shut his eyes, so as not
to see -"seeing [for he is not totally
blind] only what is near" - absorbed in this world, not in that which
is to come - "having forgotten the
cleansing from his old sins" - therefore he is a soul once
purified by the blood of Christ, but now is confirmed a backslider that he has
become oblivious of his purging at conversion, and (it may be) of his
baptismal bath. He now either doubts whether he was ever converted at all; or he denies
it; or he is now so intent on earthly things, so absorbed body and soul in the
world, that he has simply forgotten "the fact
of his ancient, pre-conversion sins having been purged away" (Dean Alford). His old sins are
purged, not his present sins: for God never forgives unabandoned sin; and to cloak a believer's present,
known sin with the Atonement is not only unscriptural, but anti-scriptural. So partial blindness is the consequence of his
obvious neglect: to such a soul all prophecy is taboo: seeing only
things that are near, the coming [millennial] Kingdom has long vanished from his gaze: like
the wealthy Laodicean, he lacks eye-salve: having
forgotten the Cross, he has long ceased to seek the Crown: he is idle
and unfruitful, for he has never cultivated the graces that prevent sloth and
cure barrenness.
Therefore
here the Apostle bases his exhortation. "Wherefore,
brethren" - in a tone of
affectionate appeal - "give the more diligence"
- the passage "reeks" of diligence -
"to make YOUR
calling and election sure." "The
Apostle," as Dr. Warren
well says, "has shown the danger
of such souls as forget their own purging; but there are many who
remember it too much." But a
vital theological problem arises here. What
is THIS "calling" and THIS
"election" which it is IN OUR
POWER to "make sure"? It is manifest that it is not the calling
and election to eternal life: for (1) that choice dates from
"before the foundation of the world" (Ephesians 1: 4); (2) it is wholly sundered from our works, either before or after faith
(Ephesians 2: 9); (3) it is irrevocable,
immutable, irreversible, for "the calling of God is without repentance" (Romans
11: 29); and so any attempt on our part to make it [i.e., eternal life]
sure would be unbelief. *
[*
Either Calvinist or Arminian, if he would bind us to
the election as being the election to eternal
life, involves us and himself in the gravest difficulties: for if so, our eternal security is partly of our own
making, and its final finish is ours; and without the six graces super-added to
faith [eternal] salvation
is insecure, and even impossible. Calvin actually changes the Scripture
thus, - "give diligence to make the witness to your calling
and election sure": which draws down Dean Alford's just if severe rebuke, - "a wrestling of plain words and context." (Panton).]
The
very order of the words betrays the secret. Unlike the election to [eternal] salvation, which
precedes the calling by thousands of years, this election accompanies
the call, and the call precedes: for the "call"
is this, - "Walk worthily of God, who calleth
you" - is calling you: this call is a question of the "walk," and is a call to those already believers –
“INTO HIS OWN KINGDOM AND GLORY" (1 Thessalonians 2: 12, R.V.). It is a call, not to grace, but to glory.
Both the calling and the election seized
Paul on the way to
So
the Apostle now clinches the call. "For if ye
do these things" - not what gain promotes, or lust suggests,
but what God COMMANDS - "ye shall never
stumble"; never come to grief (Lange): more literally, and more
suggestively, "while ye do these things" - while you are building on
the one saving foundation the lovely superstructure of a full-orbed character;
so long as you are thus building, constantly and carefully, grace on grace -
"YE SHALL
NEVER STUMBLE" - shall never so stumble as to lose the Prize.
Thus
the full-orbed character, while purely the product of the grace of God, is
sharply contingent on our own efforts. What light is here shed on sanctification! "These things"
- the exquisite graces - do not come as a matter of course; they do not spring
out of accident; they do not come by the new birth, taken by itself alone; they
do not come by a sudden attainment of sinlessness; they are not such a promise
of God that if we do not have them, He is responsible; they
neither come without effort, nor remain without culture: on the other hand,
they are inherent in the "all things that pertain
unto godliness" just named; and they are gloriously possible and
absolutely certain to consecrated co-operation with the golden promises and
omnipotent grace of God.
So
now the Apostle reveals the election that falls upon the full-orbed character that
responded to the call. "For thus" - thus, and thus only [the word
"thus" means, 'in
this manner; in the following manner or way; to this specified degree,'];
by sanctification added to justification;
addition after addition, growth upon growth - "shall
be RICHLY supplied unto you"
- not meagrely, but a wealth of glory meeting a wealth of grace - "the entrance into the eternal* kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." "The adverb,"
as Dean Alford says, "indicates high degrees and fullness of glory; not the fact
of this entrance taking place, but the fact of its being 'richly supplied.'" But it is more than that. It is not an abundant rank, but an
abundant entrance; and into an everlasting kingdom a rich or
abundant "entrance" can only be a prior
entrance: beyond, the Kingdom is
without a terminus, but at this end
– [the evil age
in which we are now living] - it
has two entrances - the scanty, of
the just saved (1 Corinthians 3: 15); and the abundant, of the full-orbed overcomer.
"Blessed and
holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection"
(Revelation 20: 4). Supply grace, says the Apostle, and God will
supply the glory: the Apostle plays upon one word (in the Greek) - add the six virtues to the one foundation, and
God will add the abundant, or
Millennial, entrance into the Kingdom without end. "The gifts of
God are followed by our diligence: our diligence by the entrance into the
Kingdom" (Lange). In the words of Dr. Alexander Maclaren: "There is a being 'scarcely saved,' and there is 'an entrance
abundantly'; and the principle that lies here is plain - that the degree of our
possession of the perfect Royalty of heaven depends on our faithfulness here on
earth."
[* The
Greek word "aionios" translated "eternal," can also be translated "age-lasting," if the context so indicates, says
Dr. A. L. Chitwood. Here is a classic example! See also Gal. 6:
8; Heb. 5: 9 etc.]
So
the Apostle says, "make haste": all must be done between the cradle and
the grave.
'Our life is long.' Not so, the Angels say
Who watch us waste it, trembling while they weigh
Against eternity one squander'd
day.
'Our life is long.' Christ's word sounds different:
'Night cometh; no more work when day is spent.'
Repent and work to-day, work and repent.
Lord, make us like Thyself: for
thirty-three
Slow years of toil seem'd not too
long for Thee,
That where Thou art, there Thy
Beloved might be.
Lord, make us Thy Host, who day nor night
Rest not from adoration, their delight,
Crying, 'Holy, Holy, Holy!' in the
height.