“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence”
> 2 Peter 1:3

In a few verses after this, verses five through seven, Peter states essentially that as a result of the work of God to reconcile us to Himself, we are to supplement our faith with virtue, virtue with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, self-control with steadfastness, steadfastness with godliness, godliness with brotherly kindness, and brotherly kindness with love. However, we cannot simply press in to obtain these qualities by our own power and strength. It is not possible. Jesus made this very clear. “Apart from Me, you can do nothing.” We are corrupted in our nature and we must have something externally come in and change us. And not only is it not possible for us to morally reform ourselves and thus make these virtues our own, but if we pursue it in that fashion (as if it were possible), it is extremely dangerous and we stumble, as it were, over the stumbling block, that is Christ. This is what the Pharisees were guilty of. It is called self-righteousness, and it not only does nothing to profit you in your pursuit of holiness, but rather it stifles you. In addition to that, it is offensive to God Himself that anyone would suppose they could stand on their own moral merits, which simply amount to filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6)! For anyone to even suppose that man has even a slight hint of any righteousness within him after the fall is pure arrogance, an idea itself resulting from the fall.

So what must we do to obtain these qualities? “His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us to His own glory and excellence.” God Himself, through the death and resurrection of Christ has granted to us, His children, all things that pertain to life and godliness, including those virtues mentioned in verses five through seven. In Christ they are already ours! Fall empty handed before the Lord, laying out all of your ways, confessing each and every sin you are aware of, casting off your supposed righteousness and moral deeds, being honest with Him about your short-comings, failures, and the sin that so easy entangles you, and cling to His cross where cleansing and forgiveness for your wicked deeds may be found. Coming empty handed before the sovereign Lord, being honest about your estate before the Lord, that you are a desperately wicked sinner, morally bankrupt, look to Christ, the Author and Perfector of your faith, because in Him, you are completed morally because His perfect obedience and righteousness has now been credited to your eternal account.

In emptying yourself of yourself, lay hold of Christ and His perfect work, because in Him are all the delights and joy that nothing in all of creation can deliver. Sex, money, power, these things pail in comparison to the delight, joy, pure satisfaction that can be found in the One that all other earthly joys, delights and satisfaction are dependent upon. How much greater is His satisfaction compared to the satisfaction in His created things? Beloved, we have been granted all things pertaining to life and godliness; they are ours in Christ. Look to Christ alone who is alive right now and cares for you; see His arms stretched out on the cross, pierced as they were by nails, where He experienced the wrath you deserved in Him and look to His work on the cross where He purchased your redemption by His blood and know that in Him and His work, you have nothing else you can possibly offer. What more could we possibly offer to God as a payment for our sins than the sacrifice of His own Son? Again, I repeat, you have nothing else you can ever offer this holy and just God than what Christ has already offered to God on your behalf, namely the sacrifice of Himself. He is our great High Priest who forever lives to intercede for us. So simply fall on your face in wonder at this gift of righteousness, Jesus Christ, and that by His strength, not your own, you can possess these qualities spoken of in verses five through seven. Spend time in communion with this great and glorious God and contemplate this majestic work on your behalf, for those of you who believe in Christ. There is none like Him.

This is an excerpt from Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God by Jonathan Edwards. I think Edwards does an excellent, truthful, poetic, Scriptural job of summing up the destiny of all men apart from the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit to bring us to faith Christ. As difficult as it is to swallow, it is simply the mere sovereign pleasure, power, and mercy of God that holds any wrath-deserving sinner living outside of Christ from falling into eternal condemnation forever.

How patient and merciful is this great God who bears with wicked sinners who spit on His name day after day in their words and actions, who take for granted all that He sovereignly blesses them with? Thank God for Christ, that He underwent this very torment and was indeed cut off from the land of the living on the cross, experiencing the wrath of God Himself for the sake of His people, to rescue them from this awful, terrifying eternal torment. Praise God that whosoever believes in Him should not perish and experience this awful plight forever, but rather that they may have everlasting life to dwell before this great and powerful God forever.

“The use of this awful subject may be for awakening unconverted persons in this congregation. This that you have heard is the case of every one of you that are out of Christ.-That world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone, is extended abroad under you. There is the dreadful pit of the glowing flames of the wrath of God; there is hell’s wide gaping mouth open; and you have nothing to stand upon, nor any thing to take hold of, there is nothing between you and hell but the air; it is only the power and mere pleasure of God that holds you up.

You probably are not sensible of this; you find you are kept out of hell, but do not see the hand of God in it; but look at other things, as the good state of your bodily constitution, your care of your own life, and the means you use for your own preservation. But indeed these things are nothing; if God should withdraw his band, they would avail no more to keep you from falling, than the thin air to hold up a person that is suspended in it.

Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend downwards with great weight and pressure towards hell; and if God should let you go, you would immediately sink and swiftly descend and plunge into the bottomless gulf, and your healthy constitution, and your own care and prudence, and best contrivance, and all your righteousness, would have no more influence to uphold you and keep you out of hell, than a spider’s web would have to stop a falling rock.”

“And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ has thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and crying with a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and pressing into the kingdom of God. Many are daily coming from the east, west, north and south; many that were very lately in the same miserable condition that you are in, are now in a happy state, with their hearts filled with love to him who has loved them, and washed them from their sins in his own blood, and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God. How awful is it to be left behind at such a day! To see so many others feasting, while you are pining and perishing! To see so many rejoicing and singing for joy of heart, while you have cause to mourn for sorrow of heart, and howl for vexation of spirit! How can you rest one moment in such a condition?”

The entire sermon can be found here:
http://www.jonathanedwards.com/sermons/ … inners.htm

“God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.” (p.50, Mere Christianity)

Some people just seem to not understand what this is saying. I hear from people, “I just don’t agree with that statement. You can find happiness in things apart from God.” But it is not saying that there is absolutely no joy that can be found in the world and what it offers, but that there is no ultimate joy or happiness found in anything outside of God. If God gave us these created things and they give us X amount of joy, how much more will the infinitely glorious God give us X times an infinite amount of joy in Himself, the one from whom the joy in those created things came from to begin with? If I find my ultimate happiness in created things, what do we know ultimately happens to all these things? They wind up going away in the end. And the joy and happiness they deliver is nothing, absolutely nothing compared to the joy, peace, and happiness found only in the One from which our whole existence is dependant, who holds the universe together by the power of His word.

Sure, I can find happiness and joy in Courtney, my wife. She is awesome and makes my life so much fun. But if I find my ultimate happiness in her, then I will be disappointed because we’re all sinners, and inevitably, she will fail my expectations. And the reverse is true for her. If she stakes all her joy and happiness in me, (and the Lord knows) she will be utterly disappointed because I’m a sinner and fail her continually. And really if you want to get Biblically technical about it, if either of us stakes all our hope, joy, and happiness in each other, it’s called idolatry. And this is true for anything within all of creation that we stake our ultimate hope and joy in outside of Christ. And so this quote from C.S. Lewis is stating that in comparison to all the things within creation that are so wonderful, that we enjoy on a daily basis, they do not deliver the satisfaction, the joy, the happiness, the peace, the love, the deep soul rest that can only be found in Christ, mainly because they can’t give us any of that. In all honesty, they are not even worth comparing, because He is incomparable with anything within creation. And those things do not deliver because they are not ultimate, only God is ultimate. I think to understand this quote more though, we need to see what C.S. Lewis wrote leading up to that statement:

“God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.” (p.50)

God designed us in such a way that our souls can only be truly satisfied, truly happy, truly joyful, totally satisfied in Christ Himself and no other. The whole of the history of man has been spent trying to find an ultimate happiness in something other than God Himself. You cannot do it. It is not possible. Just look at history to see what man has done to himself by attempting to find an ultimate joy and peace apart from the Creator that they are dependent on for every breath. Men seek power, prestige, money, relationships, anything other than the true God that can give them all these things beyond understanding through Christ. And look at how utterly miserable people are outside of Christ! They run to and fro, from here to there seeking to find the next thing that will give them satisfaction, but as soon as they get what it is they are seeking, it fails to deliver. Why? Because it’s a created thing, just like themselves, and because only the eternal God can give them what they need spiritually. In going along with C.S. Lewis’ thought above, it’s the equivalent of putting sugar water in the gas tank of an engine. It kills the car! So I would qualify the quote to say that there is no true, divine, ultimate happiness, joy, love, peace, satisfaction that can be found in anything outside of Christ. Sure, you can find satisfaction in created things, but it will last only for a season, and then fade away. But the satisfaction Christ gives is beyond comparison to the things of this world. The satisfaction obtained from created things only points to the greater satisfaction found in Christ alone. In speaking about this infinitely deep satisfaction that can only be found in Him, He says to the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4:13-14, “‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty forever. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.'” And what an excellent comparison! Everyone who drinks of the water from the well will thirst again. But everyone who drinks of the water Christ gives will never be thirsty. And this living water He gives is the fullness of Himself. This is true happiness. This is true satisfaction.

There is a type of joy that can be found in created things, but it is not ultimate. We all need water to live. And I do find joy in water after I go on a run or after I workout. But how long does that last? It dissipates very fast. I find joy in Courtney, my work, fellowship with other believers, Chipotle burritos, and many other things. But that joy is temporal and shallow, and it will fade faster than you could even anticipate; whereas the satisfaction God gives in Christ is eternal and infinitely deep. All the things the world offers are fleeting, and if we stake our hope in them, we will be terribly disappointed over and over and over again. Why is it that so many divorces are occurring in this nation? Is it not because people seek ultimate satisfaction in their spouse, and when the spouse fails them, they get out of the situation, hoping once again to find ultimate happiness in something besides the marriage? The story of the history of man is like that of a dog chasing its own tail. But in Christ, we can have that ultimate peace, that deep satisfying soul rest we all so desperately need. It can only be found in Christ, it can be found in nothing else. And if we set anything else up as God (as that ultimate joy), we will be miserable and utterly ruined, because it cannot deliver what God can deliver to you through the cross of Christ.

We see that because of this plight of man, attempting to find ultimate joy in created things rather than the Creator, we exchanged the glory of God for created things. How offensive must that be to God? Here He is, the great Author and Founder of all things, never created, always there, infinitely powerful, infinitely knowledgeable, the One from whom our entire existence is dependent, knowing full well that He is infinitely satisfying and the ultimate value in all the universe; and instead of being in awe of who He is and of all He’s done, we take the things He’s made and worship them instead, setting them up as our gods, and we thus sin in these things. This sin is infinitely offensive because it’s telling God to His face that He is worthless, that His glory is worthless, that everything He does is meaningless. How infinitely, unbelievably offensive is that!? And because God is just, he must indeed punish sin, and that punishment is experiencing His eternal wrath forever, because the offense is infinite. It would be totally fair of God to send every single one of us to hell forever.

But in great mercy, this is not what He has done. He saw man’s plight, that sin had corrupted every faculty of his being, that no one wanted God, that all had turned away, that no one wanted anything to do with Him, and left to themselves, they would all be damned forever. And so He Himself had to become like one of us. On our behalf, He lived the life that we could never live, and died the death that we should die for our wicked betrayal of the almighty God. In order to turn away the wrath of God, He offered Himself up as an eternal sacrifice of atonement on the cross in order to bridge the infinite gap we ourselves have created by exchanging the glory of God for created things. However, this turning away of the wrath of God comes only to those who by faith trust in Christ for their salvation. After He died, and then by the power of God, being that death couldn’t hold Him, He burst forth from the grave and now sits at the right hand of the Father in heaven, where He lives and pleads for those who through faith are redeemed from eternal death. All the joy, happiness, peace, love, mercy, grace, deep soul-satisfaction you are looking for can only be found in the great God who became one of us: Jesus Christ.