David Bahn – Reflections

2 Peter 1:3-8

By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence.⁴ And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires.

⁵ In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, ⁶ and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, ⁷ and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone.

⁸ The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

God has made an incredible investment in this world and the people of it – you and me. In fact there are Five Capital Investments he has made in us. He has given us Spiritual, Relational Physical, Intellectual, and Financial Capital. His purpose is that we use these for his kingdom’s sake; that through our efforts with his capital investments in us we further the cause of his kingdom.

When it comes to spiritual capital we Lutherans (not to be smug here – more on that later!) have the goods. In the words of Dale Meyer, president of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, “We know precious little about God. But the little we know is precious.” But we Lutherans pride ourselves (in a humble sort of way?) of knowing the precious little we know very well. We have it systematized, catechized, and organized with – and maybe better than – the best of Christian groups and denominations. That is part of our strong German heritage. People look to us in this regard – and rightly so. And while we certainly do not have the corner on the market of theological insight and knowledge, we do have a good stake in this arena.

If this is so, why then are we not more missional and kingdom-minded? A good friend of mine is an Episcopal priest. He says the Episcopal notion of evangelism is to find a stream with lots of fish and build the most beautiful aquarium next to it, hoping the nearby fish will be attracted to it. I’m not sure how we would describe ourselves in regard to evangelistic/kingdom-mindedness. But it might be that we write books about, do deep theological study of, and provide (sometimes necessary) correction to the efforts of those who are on the front lines of evangelistic efforts.

Sometimes that comes of as smug at best and hypercritical at worst. We’ve got the goods and we know it. We will do all we can to protect, define, maintain and uphold the truth. That’s not bad in itself. But if that’s all we do we are forfeiting the purpose for which God has given us – and all Christians – the goods. For God’s purpose is that we be productive with the spiritual capital he has given us. He has given us the goods so that we may produce the fruit of righteousness, so that we may produce the fruit of the kingdom, so that we are part of his work in the world advancing his kingdom.

In the Lord’s prayer we pray, “Thy kingdom come.” Luther says that the kingdom of God comes by itself – even without our prayer. In his explanation of the 2nd article of the Apostle’s Creed he says that Christ has redeemed us so that we may be his own and live under him in his kingdom and serve him. We have no cause to be smug; we have reason to serve Christ, to lay hold of his mission and advance his kingdom in the world.

You may not know it all. No one does. But you do know of God’s call in Christ, the forgiveness of sins through his suffering and death, and the hope of glory of his resurrection. It’s time we all embraced the purposes of God. After all he’s made a great investment in you and me: he has given us everything we need for life and salvation. What a gift! What a calling!