Monday, January 24, 2011

Multiplication

“May grace and peace be multiplied to you through the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 1:2)

Just as love (the agape kind) is a characteristic of God, so is grace, and so is peace. These express something of who God is. Grace refers to God’s characteristic of demonstrating love, compassion, mercy, and favor toward us even when it is not deserved. Peace refers to a “being” type of characteristic of God, descriptive of God’s wholeness, unity, completeness, and sovereignty regardless of circumstance. God is always gracious. God is always in control.

Peter’s blessing is that we all might have the grace and peace of God. Further, he wants us to have the “multiplied” grace and peace of God. So, how does God’s grace and peace get multiplied in our lives? Simply put, it is through the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ.

Peter is essentially talking about faith here. Faith is believing into a personal relationship with God. It is foundational, and it becomes the medium through which we experience God’s grace and peace. We, in fact, often speak of faith as “knowing the Lord,” and we’re talking about a personal, faith relationship with Him. Thus, it is through the growth, the deepening of our relationship with God that grace and peace get multiplied many times over.

The call of God is thus that we commit ourselves daily to a deepening of our faith, a deepening of our relationship with the Lord Jesus. To the degree we do this, we experience a multiplication of grace and peace.

Lord, Today help us to grow deeper in our faith in You for Your honor and glory, that we may experience an abundance of grace and peace. Amen.

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