Ignorant Christians?

2 Peter 1:5–9 (NKJV)

5 But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, 6 to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, 7 to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. 8 For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins.

Last week we learned that our call as Christians is to add to our faith virtue. Holiness is not optional but a natural outgrowth of God’s work in our lives. He who has been born of God will become like God.

Today Peter exhorts us to add to virtue knowledge. Webster defines knowledge as “acts, information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject.” So let us explore two implications of Peter’s words:

First, Peter tells us that we are to acquire knowledge, to gain a greater understanding of the Christian faith through experience and education. Remember that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with, among other things, all our minds. God has given us minds to understand the Word of God, to apply it in our lives, and to grow in knowledge. So Paul commands us, Brethren, do not be children in [your thinking]; however, in malice be babes, but in [your thinking] be mature (1 Cor 14:20). Being an ignorant Christian is simply not a godly option.

What this means, therefore, is that each of us is commanded by Peter to grow in knowledge. We are to use the abilities and opportunities that God gives us to expand our minds. And we are, remember, to devote ourselves to this task with all diligence. Read your Bibles; read sound Christian literature; listen carefully to the sermons; review and discuss them through the week. Add to your virtue knowledge.

Second, the order in which Peter places virtue and knowledge is important. We are to add knowledge on top of virtue. Knowledge in itself is not the object; rather, it is knowledge in the service of faith and virtue. Paul warns us that knowledge puffs up but love edifies. In other words, it is possible to abuse knowledge. As J.I. Packer writes in Knowing God:

“if we pursue theological knowledge for its own sake, it is bound to go bad on us. It will make us proud and conceited. The very greatness of the subject-matter will intoxicate us, and we shall come to think of ourselves as a cut above other Christians because of our interest in it and grasp of it; and we shall look down on those whose theolgical ideas seem to us crude and inadquate, and dismiss them as very poor specimins… We need to guard our hearts against such an attitude, and pray to be kept from it.”

So this morning Peter would remind us to add to your virtue knowledge. In light of this, we must admit that we are often either lazy and slothful, failing to gain the knowledge that we ought, or proud and arrogant, looking down on those who haven’t learned as much as we. Reminded of our sins in these areas, let us seek the Lord’s forgiveness through Jesus. Let us kneel as we confess our sin.