John Wesley on 2 Peter 1:3-11

I wanted to post John Wesley’s notes on this passage as I’m studying it and presenting some devotional talks on it for the Running Toward the Goal podcast (first one here). I was started down the path of studying this passage by Laura Curtis’s post on Pursuing Holiness which is well worth reading.

John Wesley’s notes are interpolated in the KJV of the passage, to fit the language style. I took both the KJV text and Wesley’s notes from e-Sword, a wonderful, completely free Bible software package, though I added formatting.

³According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:

As his divine power has given us all things – There is a wonderful cheerfulness in this exordium, which begins with the exhortation itself. That pertain to life and godliness – To the present, natural life, and to the continuance and increase of spiritual life. Through that divine knowledge of him – Of Christ. Who hath called us by – His own glorious power, to eternal glory, as the end; by Christian virtue or fortitude, as the means.

⁴Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Through which – Glory and fortitude. He hath given us exceeding great, and inconceivably precious promises – Both the promises and the things promised, which follow in their due season, that, sustained and encouraged by the promises, we may obtain all that he has promised. That, having escaped the manifold corruption which is in the world – From that fruitful fountain, evil desire. Ye may become partakers of the divine nature – Being renewed in the image of God, and having communion with them, so as to dwell in God and God in you.

⁵And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;

For this very reason – Because God hath given you so great blessings. Giving all diligence – It is a very uncommon word which we render giving. It literally signifies, bringing in by the by, or over and above: implying, that good works the work; yet not unless we are diligent. Our diligence is to follow the gift of God, and is followed by an increase of all his gifts. Add to – And in all the other gifts of God. Superadd the latter, without losing the former. The Greek word properly means lead up, as in dance, one of these after the other, in a beautiful order. Your faith, that “evidence of things not seen,” termed before “the knowledge of God and of Christ,” the root of all Christian graces. Courage – Whereby ye may conquer all enemies and difficulties, and execute whatever faith dictates. In this most beautiful connexion, each preceding grace leads to the following; each following, tempers and perfects the preceding. They are set down in the order of nature, rather than the order of time. For though every grace bears a relation to every other, yet here they are so nicely ranged, that those which have the closest dependence on each other are placed together. And to your courage knowledge – Wisdom, teaching how to exercise it on all occasions.

⁶And to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;

And to your knowledge temperance; and to your temperance patience – Bear and forbear; sustain and abstain; deny yourself and take up your cross daily. The more knowledge you have, the more renounce your own will; indulge yourself the less. “Knowledge puffeth up,” and the great boasters of knowledge (the Gnostics) were those that “turned the grace of God into wantonness.” But see that your knowledge be attended with temperance. Christian temperance implies the voluntary abstaining from all pleasure which does not lead to God. It extends to all things inward and outward: the due government of every thought, as well as affection. “It is using the world,” so to use all outward, and so to restrain all inward things, that they may become a means of what is spiritual; a scaling ladder to ascend to what is above. Intemperance is to abuse the world. He that uses anything below, looking no higher, and getting no farther, is intemperate. He that uses the creature only so as to attain to more of the Creator, is alone temperate, and walks as Christ himself walked. And to patience godliness – Its proper support: a continual sense of God’s presence and providence, and a filial fear of, and confidence in, him; otherwise your patience may be pride, surliness, stoicism; but not Christianity.

⁷And to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.

And to godliness brotherly kindness – No sullenness, sternness, moroseness: “sour godliness,” so called, is of the devil. Of Christian godliness it may always be said, “Mild, sweet, serene, and tender is her mood, Nor grave with sternness, nor with lightness free: Against example resolutely good, Fervent in zeal, and warm in charity.” And to brotherly kindness love – The pure and perfect love of God and of all mankind. The apostle here makes an advance upon the preceding article, brotherly kindness, which seems only to relate to the love of Christians toward one another.

⁸For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

For these being really in you – Added to your faith. And abounding – Increasing more and more, otherwise we fall short. Make you neither slothful nor unfruitful – Do not suffer you to be faint in your mind, or without fruit in your lives. If there is less faithfulness, less care and watchfulness, since we were pardoned, than there was before, and less diligence, less outward obedience, than when we were seeking remission of sin, we are both slothful and unfruitful in the knowledge of Christ, that is, in the faith, which then cannot work by love.

⁹But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.

But he that wanteth these – That does not add them to his faith. Is blind – The eyes of his understanding are again closed. He cannot see God, or his pardoning love. He has lost the evidence of things not seen. Not able to see afar off – Literally, purblind. He has lost sight of the precious promises: perfect love and heaven are equally out of his sight. Nay, he cannot now see what himself once enjoyed. Having, as it were, forgot the purification from his former sins – Scarce knowing what he himself then felt, when his sins were forgiven.

¹⁰Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall:

Wherefore – Considering the miserable state of these apostates. Brethren – St. Peter nowhere uses this appellation in either of his epistles, but in this important exhortation. Be the more diligent – By courage, knowledge, temperance, &c. To make your calling and election firm – God hath called you by his word and his Spirit; he hath elected you, separated you from the world, through sanctification of the Spirit. O cast not away these inestimable benefits! If ye are thus diligent to make your election firm, ye shall never finally fall.

¹¹For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

For if ye do so, an entrance shall be ministered to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom – Ye shall go in full triumph to glory.