Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 1 of 7 Lies We Love I m Only Human 2 Peter 1:3-7 INTRODUCTION TO THE SERIES Today we continue our sermon series Lies We Love. For four weeks we re looking at four common phrases that we ve all heard and probably used ourselves but that don t quite convey the distinctively Christian truth we find in Scripture. Last week we looked at the phrase, Everything happens for a reason, and compared it to the story of Joseph. We saw how God was at work in every moment of Joseph s life, but that didn t mean that God was the cause of his suffering. Rather, God was at work in his life to restore and redeem. I suggested, that instead of saying everything happens for a reason, a more distinctively Christian thing to say is that everything is redeemable by God. Now, it s been funny this past week how many of you have repeated that phrase to me, and a couple of you have mentioned that it got you thinking a lot more carefully about what you re saying and what phrases you re using. And I ve got to say, I m not sorry about that. And that might be partly selfish. I grew up with an editor for a father and a speech teacher for a mother, so I ve had to live my life with a constant paranoia over whether I m using precisely the right words at the right times. This sermon series might just be my own perverse plan to pass that paranoia on to you. Truth is, though, my hope with this series is to help us as Pastor Jan put it in her E-alert think before we speak, and to encourage us to bear witness to the truth of the gospel even in the everyday words and phrases we use. This morning we re taking another common phrase, one that at first glance even appears to be a thoroughly Christian thing to say. Today we re exploring the phrase, I m only human. Now that sure seems like a good humble phrase to use. In fact, I once heard another preacher say that the point most of the Bible is trying to get across is that God is God, and we are not. So, to say, I m only human seems merely to acknowledge that God is God, and we are not. While it is certainly true that God is God, and we are not, I think Scripture gives us a little more complex of a picture than that. Listen with me to our Scripture passage for today, which comes from the little book in the back of the Bible called 2 Peter: 2 Peter 1:3-7 3 His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust and may become participants of the divine nature. 5 For this very reason, you must make every effort to
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 2 of 7 support your faith with goodness, and goodness with knowledge, 6 and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with endurance, and endurance with godliness, 7 and godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love. I think that line in verse four is one of the most fascinating phrases in all of Scripture: so that you may become participants of the divine nature. Part of the gift that God gives to His children is that we become more than human. We re no longer stuck in our fallen human nature; we may now participate in God s nature. We now have the power of God in us, enabling and empowering us through everything we face in this life. I think Paul puts it powerfully in Galatians when he says: Galatians 2:20 It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Christ has given Himself for us and to us. To live for Christ is also to live with Christ. When we put our faith in Him, God so empowers our lives that we no longer live by our own strength and by our nature alone, but we get to share in God s nature. It seems to me, then, that saying I m only human isn t quite as humble or as Christian as it might first sound. As far as I can tell there are three occasions in which we tend to use that phrase, I m only human : 1) We re trying to justify a mistake humans make mistakes. 2) We re trying to excuse our sins well yes, what I did was wrong, but humans are sinful creatures! 3) We re trying to relieve our sense of responsibility I would love to help out, but what can I do? I m only human! Now, all of these reasons could be acts of humility, simply recognizing that we re not perfect and we don t claim to be. But for the Christian, it flies in the face of the promises we have from God that we re not in this life alone, that we have not just been left to our own devices, that His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness. So, when we say I m only human, we re not just lowering the expectations of ourselves; we re lowering our expectation of God. For a Christian to use the excuse, I m only human, is to say God is not with me; Christ does not live in me; God has not given me all that I need for life and godliness. You know, I ve noticed that there are two different trends going on simultaneously in our culture right now. On the one hand, there is a real craze around self-improvement. Almost every day I come across an article online or an ad in a store offering some plan or product to better your life. I love to listen to podcasts when I m in the car, and some of the most popular podcasts are entirely devoted to how you can make yourself better improve your health, increase your productivity, reach your goals quickly. And there s a
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 3 of 7 lot of pressure put on people to make sure that every aspect of their life is as good as it can be. It takes the opposite extreme of today s phrase. It makes us believe that we should be gods, able to make ourselves perfect in every way. On the other hand, there s also a trend of self-acceptance. Partly in reaction to this self-improvement trend, people are learning to embrace their flaws and even boast about their imperfections. On social media you ll see people post unflattering photos of themselves with the hashtag, nofilter or nomakeup, meaning they haven t done anything to make themselves look good. It always makes me laugh when celebrities try to get in on this trend as if a photo of someone who looks beautiful no matter what they re wearing is really going to make anyone else feel good about themselves! The good thing about this trend is that it relieves some of that pressure to pursue perfection. At the same time, though, it also produces its own kind of despair. It says you are who you are, and that s never going to change, so don t even bother trying to improve anything about yourself. After all, you re only human. I find this passage from 2 Peter powerful because it offers an alternative to these two trends. It acknowledges that God is God, and we are not that it s only by God s grace and in God s power that we have what we need for life and godliness. Yet it doesn t leave us in despair, with no hope for real change and real improvement in our lives. After all, God s own divine power has given us everything we need. We re participants of the divine nature, not just the human nature. Peter presents to us a third way, which gives us peace about our imperfections as well as provides hope for real progress in our lives. You might as well blame the Methodist church for this self-improvement trend, you know. One of the most controversial beliefs of the early Methodists was an idea called Christian Perfection. John Wesley, founder of the Methodist movement, taught that Christians could in fact attain perfection in this life, and that we should all be striving for it. He got a lot of pushback from the other pastors and theologians at the time who said, Wait a minute! Only God is perfect, we re only human; humans are sinful. To say that we can be perfect is to say that we re God! Wesley, to his credit, simply responded, Hey, I m just trying to take Jesus at His word. After all, he did say, Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. What Wesley meant by perfection, though, wasn t that we would no longer make mistakes or even that we would no longer sin; after all, we do still live in a fallen world. Rather, he thought that we could reach a point at which we no longer willfully sinned because our hearts had been so thoroughly filled with the love of God. Now I don t know about you, but even that seems like an awfully high bar. And, as you might imagine, this idea of Christian Perfection has fallen out of favor with us Methodists. There s just so much evidence against it and so little evidence for it. The one place we still see it taught, though, is in the ordination service for United Methodist ministers. In that service, the
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 4 of 7 bishop asks candidates for ordination the very same questions that John Wesley had asked back in his day. Here are a few of them: Are you going on to perfection? Do you expect to be made perfect in love in this life? Are you earnestly striving after it? Almost every time those questions are asked, you can hear some snickering from the congregation. Who can confidently answer yes to these questions? Yet here s how Wesley answered that objection: If Jesus is perfect, and you re not striving for perfection, then you re not following Jesus. If you re not going on to perfection, then what are you headed for and why would you aim for anything less? And as far as the question, Do you expect to be made perfect in love in this life? To most of us it would sound arrogant to answer yes, but notice it says be made perfect, not achieve perfection. For Wesley, perfection wasn t something we could attain by ourselves but it was a gift of God. Every little bit of progress we make in our lives is a gift from God. So, if you can t say that you expect to be made perfect in this life, Wesley would say that you re not expecting too little of yourself, but of God. If you don t expect God to bring you to perfection, then you ve underestimated the power of God. Now, Wesley was quick to note that he himself hadn t attained Christian perfection. In fact, he thought that he had only known one or two persons who had actually attained it, though of course, how would he know? And he said that if you did reach Christian Perfection in this life, the last thing you d want to do is celebrate it because then you d lose your humility and no longer be perfect. The point of the teaching wasn t really to tell us much about ourselves. If we were constantly trying to evaluate how close we were to perfection, then we d be in constant despair. I mean, that s why I ve never bought a Fitbit or Apple Watch like I really want a device right there on my wrist reminding me that I ve fallen short of my goals yet again. The point of Christian Perfection is rather what it says about God: that we serve a God whose divine power has given us everything we need to live the life that He s called us to; that the God who calls us to spread His love throughout the world has not left us alone to the task but has given us His full grace, empowering us for a life of goodness and godliness. When we say, I m only human, we re not really humbling ourselves but undercutting God s power and neglecting God s grace. Listen again to how Peter described it: His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness There s no condition on it. He doesn t say, If you do this, God will grant you His divine power If He finds you worthy, God will give you everything you need... No, Peter simply declares, His divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness. And we receive this, he says, through the
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 5 of 7 knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness. In other words, Jesus didn t choose to grant us His power because of our own glory or goodness because of what we brought to the table or how we impressed Him. Jesus chose us because of His own glory and goodness i.e., because it is simply the kind of God He is to show grace when we least deserve it. You know, I m always a little worried when I preach on passages like this that affirm God s power and God s presence in us because I realize easily that it can sound like just another version of the power of positivity. I m always worried that I ll just sound like yet another motivational speaker telling you that you have more power than you can imagine, that you hold the keys to your own success, that you need to get out of your own way and start living to your full potential! Honestly, that kind of sounds like what Peter is saying here, talking about power and great promises. The difference, though, is that Peter is talking about God, not us. See, 2 Peter like all of Scripture, really says more about God than it does about us. It s not our power that should motivate us, but God s. It s not our glory that should impress us, but God s. Peter reminds us that, left to our own devices, we will always fall short, but that the God we worship refuses to let us settle for less than He has chosen us for and called us to. This God says you are no longer only human; you are filled with a divine power that is not up for sale, and you have been made to become participants of the divine nature that is not your own. All of this is God s gift, offered to us without price. But what about the last half of this passage? We haven t said anything about that part yet. For this very reason, you must make every effort to support your faith with goodness, and goodness with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and selfcontrol with endurance, and endurance with godliness, and godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love. I thought it wasn t about our effort. I thought it wasn t ours to achieve, that it was all a gift. Well, that s exactly why this part comes after the promise that his divine power has given us everything needed for life and godliness. In everywhere else in the world, that order is reversed. Any promise of self-improvement is always presented as a reward for what you put in. With just one small investment, you can become your own boss! For 30 minutes a day, 3 days a week, you can achieve six pack abs! For three easy payments of just $19.95, you can receive our premium beauty package! Peter flips this logic on its head and says, God has already given you His power and His promises, and therefore you may now make every effort to support your faith See the difference? With God, our efforts don t earn us His grace; His grace enables us to work effectively for good in our lives and in this world. We re saved from the pressure of the selfimprovement trend, but we re also given more hope than the self-acceptance trend. There is good work for us to do that will produce real change in our lives.
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 6 of 7 One theologian, Randy Maddox, calls this responsible grace. It s grace because it s freely given with no precondition, nothing required from us. But it s responsible grace because it enables us and empowers us to respond to the gift. I ll give you an example: I know a grandmother who once gave her grandkids a letter writing kit. She put together some stationary and pens, and she included an envelope already stamped and addressed to her. She thought it d be a neat gift because it would give them a way of connecting to her even when they were apart. It was a free gift, but it offered them a way to respond to that gift by writing her a letter. God s grace works the same way. It s freely given, with nothing you have to do to earn it. But it gives you a way to respond to be a good gift receiver. If that grandmother never receives a letter, how do you think she ll feel? It s almost as bad as outright rejecting the gift. It says they didn t really want the gift. Peter presents God s gift in the same way. He has given us everything we need for life and godliness, for living the life God has called us to. If we do nothing in response, if we don t make the effort to live out that calling, we might as well be rejecting God s grace, because we re not using His power. When he says, For this reason, you must make every effort to support your faith with goodness, and so on, he s saying, Be a good gift-receiver. Use the gift, respond to God by embracing His power. You are no longer only human; you are a participant of the divine nature; now act like it! The churches that Peter was writing to in 2 Peter needed that reminder. They needed to be reminded that God has called them to a life greater than the life they were settling for and that God was empowering them to live that life to the fullest. See, the first generation of Christians came under the impression that Jesus was going to return to earth within their lifetime. Jesus had said some things that seemed to hint toward this: There are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God. By the time that Peter writes this letter, though, they were coming to the end of that generation. Peter himself lets on that he is close to death. These churches were starting to lose some of the urgency they had when they first became Christians. You know how it is when you first sign on to a life-change, don t you? When you begin that diet, when you first sign up for that gym membership, etc., you re excited, you re motivated, you can barely contain your zeal for this new way of life, so you tell everybody about it. Oh, I can t eat that, I m on this new diet Sorry, I can t go, I ve got to hit the gym, I m trying this new workout Reminds me of the joke: How do you know if someone is a vegan or does Crossfit? They ll tell you. But that was the early Christians. It was exciting. It was urgent. They were willing to change their whole lives, give up everything to become a Christian because Jesus was going to return soon and the Kingdom of God would be established on earth as it is in heaven. Then the years dragged on and Jesus hadn t come. What at first seemed of utmost urgency became a little less
Lies We Love I m Only Human Page 7 of 7 important. They began to lose some of their zeal, and they began to settle back into their old lives from before they had known Christ. CONCLUSION I wonder if this describes us some times. Do you ever feel like you ve lost some of your hope and zeal for life? You once had such high hopes for what life might hold and who you might become, but now you re stuck unmotivated and uninspired. Then hear this good news: His divine power has given you everything needed for life and godliness. He has given you His precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become participants of the divine nature. Now, that sounds like an adventure worth waking up for. That sounds like a new lease on life. That sounds like real hope, because you are no longer only human. In fact, it is no longer you who lives, but Christ who lives in you. Life Application Questions: 1. Do you ever use the excuse, I m only human? 2. What does it mean to you to become participants of the divine nature? 3. What is God calling you to that will require his power to accomplish? 4. Are you going on to perfection?