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2 Peter 1:5-7 – A Most Difficult Virtue
It appears that there is a virtue that is very difficult to obtain and retain while acquiring other equally needed virtues. That is part of the paradox of this spiritual quality. It is needed to attain other qualities, but those other qualities might remove the foundational virtue and thereby remove the added ones also.
Maybe this is why Peter wrote that we need to “add” (2 Peter 1:5-7) virtues, as if each one is a building block and connected to the next. To add means,
“to develop one virtue in the exercise of another: “an increase by growth, not by external junction; each new grace springing out of, attempting, and perfecting the other.” (Vincent Word Studies)
After faith, I start off being a good, moral person, and then add knowledge. After adding knowledge, I cannot truly add self-control without this other virtue. After adding self-control, I need this extra virtue in order to endure others and other things. Patience leads me to a better understanding of godliness which again requires this other virtue. Learning more about acting right and respecting both God and others, I learn to love others who are my friends and even those who are not.
Reading Peter’s list we see a valuable virtue that is possibly not as valuable in God’s eyes as ours. Maybe that is because it is so easy to obtain compared to the others – knowledge. Have you noticed how easy it is after acquiring a deeper understanding of knowledge, to disdain those who have not yet arrived? We can possess zeal for the Lord in truth and purity, and again hold in contempt those who cannot see the truth we are striving to uphold. Maybe that is why after adding knowledge we need to supply a little self-control. Increasingly, we add and add and add, each one building upon the next. The last one listed is love.
I would like to suggest to us all that the most difficult virtue to which I am referring is not listed, but is embedded in many – if not all – of the ones listed. What do you think is this very difficult virtue?
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