Light Shining in a Dark Place

In one paragraph

This message came from 2 Peter 1 and 2, and the pastor walked the congregation through what he called the "carrot and the stick" of the letter: the rich promises and qualities believers are called to grow in, followed by Peter's sharp warning about false teachers and the certainty of God's judgment on them. He was honest that this text was one he had wrestled with for a month, and that preaching...

Read together

1. 2 Peter 1:3 His divine power has given you all you need for life and godliness
2. 2 Peter 1:5-7 add to your faith goodness, knowledge, self control, perseverance, godliness, mutual affection, and love
3. 2 Peter 1:8-9 possessing these qualities keeps you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ
4. 2 Peter 1:10-11 make every effort to confirm your calling and receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom
5. 2 Peter 1:13-15 Peter living in the tent of this body and making every effort to leave a reminder after his departure
6. 2 Peter 1:16-18 eyewitnesses of Christ's majesty at the transfiguration, hearing the voice from heaven on the holy mountain
7. 2 Peter 1:19 the prophetic message as completely reliable, like light shining in a dark place
8. 2 Peter 1:20-21 no prophecy of scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation but prophets spoke from God carried along by the Holy Spirit
9. 2 Peter 2:1 there were false prophets among the people and false teachers who secretly introduce destructive heresies
10. 2 Peter 2:2-3 many will follow their depraved conduct and teachers will exploit with fabricated stories in their greed
11. 2 Peter 2:4-10 if God did not spare angels, the ancient world, or Sodom and Gomorrah but rescued Noah and Lot, then He knows how to rescue the godly from trials
12. Amos 7:14-15 Amos says he was neither a prophet nor son of a prophet but the word of the Lord came to him while tending sycamore figs and sheep
13. Matthew 18:6 Christ said if someone causes one of these little ones to go astray it would be better to have a millstone tied around his neck
14. 2 Corinthians 12:7-9 Paul's thorn in the flesh and God's response that His grace is sufficient and power is made perfect in weakness

Talk about it

1. Pastor Nathan walked through the list in 2 Peter 1 of qualities to add to your faith, from goodness all the way to agape love. Which of those qualities feels most out of reach for you right now, and why?
2. Pastor Nathan said it is possible to be a Christian, to have your sins forgiven, and still be ineffective and unproductive. Does that sit uncomfortably with you? What do you think that actually looks like in a person's life?
3. The sermon offered two valid readings of 2 Peter 1:20, one focusing on the prophet's own interpretation and one on the reader's own interpretation. Either way, the point was the same: let the word bend you rather than you bending it. Where is that hardest for you personally?
4. Pastor Nathan named two heresies he sees at work today: that it does not matter what you believe as long as you are sincere, and that believing something too firmly is itself the problem. Have you run into either of those in your own conversations? How did you respond?
5. The sermon described Lot as a righteous man who was tormented day after day by the lawless things he saw and heard around him. Pastor Nathan asked how many of us feel like Lot sometimes. What does a healthy response to that kind of torment look like, and what does an unhealthy one look like?