Well, this afternoon, we're gonna be looking at the second epistle of Peter, so please turn there in your Bibles. We'll be looking at chapter one, a beautiful and glorious opening to this epistle. We'll be connecting that with the catechism. This afternoon, we're looking at good works, what they are, and why they're so important in the Christian walk of life. So, second Peter, chapter one. I'll start in verse one, and we'll read down to verse 11. This is God's word of grace to us. Simon Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained like precious faith with us by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ, grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. as his divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. but also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is short-sighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never stumble. For so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Well, the title of the sermon today is Striving for Excellence. And in the pursuit of excellence, I believe it is paramount to have a clear goal in which all other activities and disciplines are aligned. Okay, I give you an example. Think of athletes, how they do this. Think of those Olympic sprinters. What is their clear defining goal? They want to run as fast as possible for that 100 meter track. For those 10 seconds, they want to get to the fastest speeds they can get to. And with that goal in mind, all of their life revolves around that goal, right? It's not just, you know, they wake up and they go running down the track. Their whole life is geared and disciplined toward that ultimate achievement. And so they're going to track, you know, the food that they are eating. They're going to make sure that they're getting the proper amount of water. They're going to make sure that they're getting enough sleep. They're going to make sure that they're spending enough time in recovery. They're going to make sure that they got good routines and practices and workouts to help discipline their body. And they're gonna invite all the help they can get to do that, won't they? They'll get coaches and they'll get trainers and they'll get people that will design their meal prep in order to make sure that they are giving 100% to this ultimate goal of running as fast as they can. The Christian has a goal that is far higher and far more spectacular. We are called to be transformed into the image of God's Son. In other words, to look like Jesus as much as possible. And the beautiful thing is, God himself is the one who says, I will provide all that you stand in need of to accomplish this goal. I'll give you all the training. I'll tell you exactly the routines that you have to keep to. I will make sure that you are equipped to this goal. but yet it falls on us, there's a responsibility on our part to then make every effort to strive towards this goal. I think if we compare ourselves even to these athletic sprinters, you know, we can see we got work to do. Think of how disciplined they are after this one goal to run as fast as they can for 10 seconds. Isn't our goal so much better, so much higher? How much work are you putting into this goal? If we're honest, we as Christians can easily lose sight of this goal, can't we? We can easily become lax in our Christian walk, be existing on a minimal effort towards this goal. And so this passage is gonna challenge us. It's going to require that we make every use of every effort to pursue the goal of striving to share in the excellency of our Savior. And so this is the calling of this text. We'll see the provision we are given, the training routine we got to apply ourselves to, and finally we'll see the results of this end goal. So the first thing we need to understand is that God gives us everything we need to make the end goal possible. Verse 3 tells us God has given His divine power So that we have all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us by glory and virtue. What Peter is telling these believers is that they have everything they need, all the hardware they need to make this goal happen. So all you need, Christian, to live a godly life is provided for you in Christ. I say that we're given all the hardware we need to make an illustration. If you were to buy a phone, if you were to buy a computer, it's going to come with a certain amount of hardware. And that's going to give you a capability of doing something, right? With the capabilities of a computer, people have, you know, made calculations to land people on the moon. They've designed bridges, they've designed buildings, they've done amazing things with the power of a computer. And yet, it wasn't just the hardware that got them there. They needed to use programs. They needed to use what is called software. Now, for those of you, I might be losing a little bit. Let me help to try to explain the difference between hardware and software here for a second. If you were to buy a phone, there's going to be a certain amount of hardware that is given to you on a phone, right? It's going to have a certain amount of storage space. It's going to have a certain system that it is running. That is the capability that the phone is giving you. But if you wanna do something with that phone, you're gonna need to download apps. You're gonna need to download a camera app, an email app, a messaging app, and these apps are then what give you the capability, or you're putting it to use to actually make use of your phone. And so I wanna use these illustrations to say God has given us all the hardware. He says, I have given you my divine power. That's some pretty good hardware, okay? That's something that this world doesn't have access to. That's a power that threw up the heavens and earth around us. That's a power that resurrected Jesus out of the grave. God says, I have given my divine power to my people. And yet, he says that we have to access this divine power by downloading software. He says this divine power is given to us as we come to know him. Who's him? That's Jesus, isn't it? And the more that we know Jesus, the more we have a relationship with Jesus, the more this divine power shows up in our lives. And so that's what we need to continually give ourselves to, and that makes sense, doesn't it? You think about how you were saved. What does Paul say in Romans 1? He says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for I know it is the power of God to salvation. Well, Paul, how do we have access to that power then? He says, well, faith comes through hearing, and hearing through the word of God, that as you hear of Christ, and as you hear of what he has done, and power goes to work in your life. If that's how salvation starts, Paul says, the more that we know Christ, the more that divine power begins to operate within us. So really, there is no excuses that believers can give to not pursuing this, because we've been given all that we need. You can't say, for instance, you know, I would be a more godly Christian, I would be a more holy Christian if I had the right education. But I didn't get good training, I didn't go to a Christian school, I didn't go to a Christian university, and so that's why I got the problems that I got right now. You can't say, you know, I would be a better Christian, but if you saw my childhood, if you saw the difficulties that I grew up with, you know, in a home like that, what's my chances? That's why I have the vices that I have. That's why I got the problems that I have right now. You can't say, you know, it's just my genes. Some people, they wake up and they go for a run and, you know, that's just their genes. I don't got that. My self-control isn't to that level. You can't blame it on your genes. You can't blame it on your schooling. You can't blame it on these things. You wanna know why? Because it has nothing to do with you and everything to do with what God has given to you. If you're a believer, God says I've given you everything that has to deal with life and with godliness. And so every believer ought to say I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. Not every athlete can do that, you know. Sometimes an athlete just can't get the training that he needs. Sometimes he can't qualify because he's got an injury or something. There's obstacles that can get in the way. But for the believer, nothing can stand in your way. No obstacles, no trials, no past traumas, whatever you might make up as an excuse can get in the way of you being transformed into the image of Jesus, for God has given you absolutely everything you need. So with Paul, let every believer say, in Christ, I can do all things. Now Peter is going to further show us how to unlock this power by explaining in particular how the promises of God can set us free from the corruption that is in this world. He says in verse 4, We have been given these promises, exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. Now, I love Charles Spurgeon on this. He has an awesome illustration, as he often does. He says, you know, sometimes you can look in this world and you can see things of great size. Take a rock, right? You might come to a rock face and you see this giant rock and you're blown away just by how great the magnitude and size of it. But he says, it's not much value, is it? You know? A rock. You find them everywhere. On the other hand, you can find things that are so exceedingly precious, the diamonds and jewels of this world. But what's their size? They're often so small. He says, look at the promises of God. The promises of God have both this magnitude and they are exceedingly precious. And that's what we have been given as believers. Now, I believe Peter is thinking here of the future promises of God. Every believer in this room has already received many promises in Christ or in him. All the promises are yes and amen. So, for instance, the promise of the Holy Spirit. If you're a believer, you have the Holy Spirit. That's been given to you. And yet, as believers, we got a lot to look forward to, don't we? There's a lot coming down the road. And I believe Peter is focusing on those eschatological promises, those promises that are down the road for us as Christians. Because one example that he gives is a few chapters later in chapter 3. He speaks of how many in this world ignore the promise of the return of the Lord. Jesus said, I am coming back, and I am coming back soon. Peter says the world scoffs at that. The world doesn't see this as great or precious. They don't even believe it. But for we as Christians, this is an amazing promise. Jesus is coming back. I'm going to make all things right. I'm going to restore this world. This is our hope. This is what we live for. This is what we say, ah. This is what makes life good. Jesus is coming back soon, and Peter is showing us here that there's a power that comes to us through these promises. I thought of the marshmallow experiment. If you remember this, a number of years ago, a study was done with little children, and they were testing their self-control. So what do they do? They put these children, they put them at a desk and they put a marshmallow on the desk and they said to these children, you know, if you eat this marshmallow now, that's it. That's the only marshmallow that you're getting. But if you wait a little bit, we'll come back around and we'll give you another marshmallow. And they're tempting these children and seeing how many had the self-control to actually wait to get two marshmallows. And the study was all about self-control. They wanted to see how this might correlate later in life, and lo and behold, if you had more self-control when you were young, it also helped you in the future. Self-control is a virtue, as we will see in this list. But I want you to imagine, what if they changed the experiment a little bit? What if they said to the children, hey, you can have one marshmallow now, but if you wait a little bit, we'll give you a whole bag? What if they said, hey, if you wait a little bit, we'll give you a marshmallow every day for the rest of your life? Do you think, you know, a lot of these children wouldn't be able to resist a little bit longer to say, oh yeah, that's a lot better. I'm trying to show you guys the greatness and the magnitude of the promises of God are so astounding, so wonderful, that they ought to make us say, hey, I can resist some of the corruption of this world right now. Because that's what Peter is driving at. He says when we capture these magnificent promises, it can free us from the corruption in the world and in our own hearts, the lusts that are in our hearts to say, yeah, I don't need to have that right now because I know God has so much better for me down the road. So whatever struggle you are going for, God has a promise for you to help you escape the corruption of that struggle. If you struggle with greed, if you're struggling with contentment, you gotta look at the promises of God, of God who says, I go to prepare a place for you. I go to prepare an inheritance as undefiled, it's incorruptible, it's reserved in heaven for you. This is a glorious inheritance, so much better than any plot or ground you can get on your puny little planet Earth. I have so much more in store for you, and I can help you to find contentment where you're at right now. Maybe you struggle with lust. What does the Bible say? Blessed are the pure in heart. Why? For they shall see God. I can resist. I can turn away. I don't have to look because I have something so much better in store. I'm going to see the glory and the beauty of the Lord. What could compare to that? Wasn't that the desire of Moses, Lord, would you show me your glory? And because that was his driving desire, that's all he needed in his heart. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. Maybe you're tempted of living a life for yourself, living a life for the pleasures of this world, for food, for drink, for entertainment. Does not Psalm 16 tell us at the right hand of God are pleasures forevermore? There's so much more in store for us. Are you tempted to live in despair? Are you tempted to live in depression? Have you not read Revelations? Where God says to us, there's gonna be no more tears and no more pain and no more sin. I'm gonna create a new heaven and new earth. I will be your God, you will be my people. So don't get so down. Hope in God. Don't you realize You're not somebody to be pitied. God has given you every single blessing in his son. You have a glorious future ahead of you. Isn't that enough to put our chins up a little? Peter says that as we do this, we'll become partakers of the divine nature. Might seem strange language, right? You don't normally go up to somebody and say, you know, how are you doing in partaking in God's divine nature? Somebody asks you that, you'd be like, you know, what kind of new age mysticism are you on? What Peter is saying is not that you're going to be God, right? You're not gonna share in his essence. You're not gonna be able to speak and create worlds, but you will become more and more like God. You'll share in his nature of compassion and mercy and love. More and more people will see you and will remind you of God and his character and his likeness. So Peter says these promises are helping us to resist the corruption of this world and to become like that ultimate goal, to become like Jesus. So now we have seen the provisions of power and promise, and Peter will then call us to put this into practice. If I could go back to the athletic metaphor, he has just shown us how God can provide all the tools and the coaching needed, but now he is saying, here's a training regimen that you guys need to put into practice. So look at verse five, he says, but also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. Now Peter starts off this list by saying, you know, you're gonna have to give all diligence to this. In other words, if your idea of sanctification is that we just kind of coast and float, and then all of a sudden, hey, lo and behold, I'm more like Jesus, you probably got a wrong view, right? I guarantee you that every professional athlete didn't just wake up and say, oh, all of a sudden, hey, I'm good enough to be in the NHL. Every single one had thousands of hours of practice and games that they had to put into it to get to the level that they are at. Peter says, in order to become like Jesus, it's hard work. In order to change our characters, it's going to require a lot of effort. He says, give all diligence. Like, make this your number one priority. Like the runner saying, all I want to do is run as fast as possible down the track. We ought to be that consumed with this goal to say, I want to be like Jesus. This is my goal. This is my heart. So Peter is going to give us a list here, a training regimen. It's a virtue list that he has in order. He uses a very interesting word at the start of this list. He says, I want you to add to your faith. Now what does that mean? Because I think this will help explain this section. The word add in the Greek has the idea of being a supplement, okay? A commentator is helpful here. He says, the normal translation, add to, means to provide at one's own expense, supply, or furnish that which is needed for the well-being of another. In the Roman world, it would often reflect a patron or a benefactor supplying the needs of a client. So, think of the Roman world, they often had these patron-client relationships, where a man would say, hey, I wanna sponsor somebody. I wanna sponsor this man or this woman to go to this school, to participate in these athletic events, so I'm gonna give them everything they need. I'm gonna give them the money they need, I'm gonna send them to the school they need to go to, I'm gonna pay for their boarding, so that they can be, do this. And the only thing that was asked and returned is that the client would then speak well of his patron. He would represent him wherever he went. So that was a relationship they had going on. And Peter says, that's what God has done for us. He's our patron. He is supplying everything we need. He's supplying all the classes, all the schooling, all the work, all the cost. He's taking it on himself so that we can indeed be sanctified. And that's where this list comes in. It's very interesting as you look at this list, he also makes a connection here. He says, you know, add to your faith virtue. He's linking these different virtues together. or items in the list, I guess. He's showing how one helps to provide for the next one down the list. So it's a bit of a unique list, but I don't have time to uncover this list in great detail, so I'm just gonna show how each one helps provide for the next one down the list. He begins with faith, and after faith, he says, add to this virtue. You see in the Bible that there's a connection between believing and obedience, right? James is going to say, faith without works is dead. That a real faith, a genuine faith, leads to an obedience. So now we see the connection. He says that as we believe in God, as we believe in His provision, it's going to help us change. It's going to help us live in obedience, and that's going to start to shape our character. It's going to add to our faith virtues. things that are good about us in our character, in our way. He says, add to your virtue, then, knowledge. He's saying here that our characters will help us increase in knowledge. The Bible explains, you know, that just an increase in knowledge is not good, right? Because it can lead to hypocrisy. So we need to put that knowledge into practice. The more that we know God, the more that we understand who he is, the more we'll understand the Bible. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. The more that we start living as God would have us live, the more we understand the revelation of God, the character of God, and the ways that he works. So he's saying living a life of obedience is going to help us increase in the knowledge of our Savior. From there, he goes on to self-control. We already spoke of that a little bit, about how knowing the promises can help us say no at the moment. I don't want the marshmallow, I'll take the bag, right? He's saying the more that we know the promises that are in our Savior, how great and exceedingly precious they are, the more we'll be able to restrain ourselves and say, no, I got better coming, it's okay. I don't need to act like the world is acting. So knowledge is going to help us in self-control. Self-control is going to help us in perseverance. The more that we put this muscle to use, the more it will develop. The more we'll become stronger in it so that it's a long-term game now. We are persevering under intense trials and intense persecution or intense temptation. We begin to persevere as we put this self-control to use. From perseverance, we go to godliness. and you don't normally call someone godly until you've seen that faithfulness in their character over a long time, right? It's not normally the short-term Christian that you would name godly. Because there's normally a godliness that needs to be seen over a general period of time. That's why Timothy says, you know, don't, don't, oh, it's not Timothy, it's Paul. Paul says, don't hire a young man who's just converted to the faith because we don't see yet whether they are godly yet or not. It needs to be demonstrated in a certain period of time, not forever, but a certain length of time. And as we see that character, that perseverance, we begin to say, those people are like Jesus. I've seen it again and again. They're faithful to their Savior. They'll stand up for what is right. We've seen it in their history. We've seen it in their past. They're godly, godly individuals. So perseverance helps in godliness, godliness in brotherly kindness. It's a godly man that realizes I am my brother's keeper. It's a godly person that is able to help their brother out when they're in a ditch, like the Good Samaritan, going down and showing the kindness, giving them the help that is needed. And brotherly kindness finally leads to love. That is speaking here of agape love, the self-sacrificial love, the love that denies ourselves, takes up our cross, follows Jesus. You see there's this order of how each is kind of supplying the next one down the list, and all of it is leading to that excellent character that is like our Savior Himself. Now you say, why would I make it my end goal, my life goal, my main pursuit to chase after this? It sounds like a lot of work to get there, and it is. That's why I'm gonna bring in the catechism, which we never read, but anyways, we'll bring it in anyways, because it's in my notes, and that's what this whole sermon was about. So, Lord's Day 32, one of the questions asked is, since we have been delivered from our misery by grace alone through Christ, without any merit of our own, why must we do good works? And this is the answer. Because Christ, having redeemed us by his blood, also renews us by his Holy Spirit to be in his image. so that with our whole life we may show ourselves thankful to God for his benefits, and he may be praised by us further, that we ourselves may be assured of our faith by the fruits, and that by our godly walk of life, we may win our neighbors for Christ. Do you see the motivation? The motivation is something of what we spoke of this morning. Christ gave his precious blood to redeem the church. You understand, it's not cheap for God to be our patron. He had to give his son to die in order that he might sanctify you and present you blameless. And so he's given his life to this end, and that ought to motivate us to say, I want to live my life for the one who has done so much for me. Imagine somebody sponsors you to go to school. You have trouble getting the monies together, and they say, I got it. I'll cover you. And you know it's a great cost to them. And then you go to school, and imagine you just don't try at anything. You don't try at your schoolwork. You don't try at the test. You totally flunk out. What an injustice. What a mockery to the person who has done so much to help you out, right? If someone was sponsoring you to that end, you'd say, hey, I want to do them well. I want to use this opportunity that has been given me to excel in my schooling. And that's the attitude a Christian should have. Christ redeemed me with his life. So I wanna excel in this. I wanna pursue it with all that I am. I'm gonna give every effort to this cause so that I might praise and glorify Him. So let's finally consider some of the results of a life that pursues these things. This is a life that will look more like Jesus. The gospel promises that your life will be both exceedingly fruitful and effective. It says in verse 8, I don't want us to get us the idea, you know, you gotta focus on faith first, and then from faith you can go to virtue, and you keep going down the list. Peter says, if these things are yours and abound, he's saying we need all seven of these categories, or eight of these categories. We need every single one of them to be increasingly more like Jesus. This is the plan that God has for us. If an athlete, you know, doesn't focus on his diet, he says, I'm all in on my training, all in on my workouts, and he forgets sleep, he forgets, you know, other things, it's gonna hurt him. So we need to focus on all of these different categories. But Peter says, if these things are yours, and you're abounding in them, you will have an extremely fruitful and effective life. And isn't that what we as Christians all want? To be a force for God? Speaking with a member in our church this week, we were speaking of the life of George Whitefield, and I love talking about George Whitefield because he had such an effective life for God wherever he went. He was just a force for the kingdom. Charles Spurgeon says this, he says, Induced subordination to my Lord is George Whitfield, but with unequal footsteps must I follow in his glorious track This is a man who is a part of the first great awakening He lit the colonies of fire throughout America for the gospel of Jesus Christ and sometimes you're like How did that man become so effective so fruitful? Peter tells us here, you want a life as effective and fruitful, you pursue being like Jesus. And as your character becomes more and more like Him, you will abound in fruit for the glory of His name. So the second result of a life as pursuing these things is the assurance of faith. It says in verse nine, he who lacks these things is short-sighted even to blindness and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins. Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never stumble. Peter tells us that we as believers have a way that we can make our calling and election sure. It says by pursuing, being like Christ. I think every believer can attest to this. As they're walking in the way of obedience, there is a further assurance, a deeper peace, where you're like, oh yeah, God is working my life. I am changing. I am seeing through. I know that can't be me, that must be him. That means I'm a child of God. God is working in my life. That's one of the beautiful things that happens, that as we are pursuing this, we become more like Jesus and we realize, I am one of his children. I know it, I'm assured of it. This is not just necessary for assurance, it's actually necessary for salvation. As I said, faith without works is dead. We need good works because it is a proof that God is indeed working in our hearts and our lives. I'll bring in the catechism here again, because the second question in the catechism says, can those be saved who do not turn to God from their ungrateful and impenitent walk of life? And the answer is, by no means. Scripture says that no unchaste person, idolater, adulterer, thief, greedy person, drunkard, slanderer, robber, or the like shall inherit the kingdom of God. It's pulling that right out of 1 Corinthians 6. How critical is this pursuit? It's really a matter of life and death. Becoming like Christ is what removes those old labels from us, so that as we become more like Him, that's what people identify as. What were the early Christians identified as? Christians, because they look like Christ. Peter says, if you follow after this pursuit, you will never stumble. What he's saying here is not that you will never sin, for Peter himself denied his Lord three times. He knows what it is like to fall into sin in our lives. But he's saying that as we are pursuing these things, as there's this assurance in our heart, as we're seeing the fruit, There will be something in us that shows us God is holding us fast. That we will never have to fear stumbling. What he means is you'll never have to feel walking out of the church, becoming another statistic of another person that no longer believes in God. You won't have to fear that if you make this your pursuit. You will have an assurance that God can present you before his throne. For he has called you and he will hold me fast. So there's a lot that's given to us here. The final result of such a pursuit in lifestyle, Peter says, is gonna be eternal glory. Final verse, verse 11, for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He returns that word, that word supplied is the same word add to your faith. He returns to this idea of God being our patron. He says on that final day when He opens up glory to you, you're gonna see just how abundantly He has supplied for you, not only in this life, but in the life to come, where every single promise will be fulfilled, where we will receive a new heavens and a new earth. That's where we believe Frank is gone. that he has now come to the end of his race, that he is now receiving this glory. That's where we believe our brother Jason's father has gone, and our brother Neil Bierstaker's father has gone. They have gone to glory. They have gone to see God. And they've seen now how he has abundantly supplied for them, not only in this life, but now for an eternity to come. That's what we look forward to in this pursuit. to seeing all the ways God's grace has been poured on us, how abundantly we have been provided for in His Son. So friends, let me leave you with one last call to pursue the glory and excellence of Christ-like character. You know, if you were to ask athletes, was it worth it? All those practices and training routines, all that self-control that was needed in order to compete for the prize. If you were to ask them on that day that they won the championship, you know, was it worth it? They'd say, oh yeah, it was. Every single part of the journey was what made this moment so special. I think musicians would have the same thing. You know, if you ask them, was all those times that you were spending your youth playing that instrument, trying to master the craft, all those years that you spent to be as skilled as you are, do you regret that? Say, no, that's just part of the journey. That's part of learning the instrument. That's part of what makes the gift so special now. That's part of what makes me cherish it so much. If you were to ask a mountain climber, You know, if you could just take a helicopter to the top of the mountain, would that be the same thing? I'm sure they would tell you no. For it's going through the obstacles, it's going up the mountain, it's through the climb, the exhaustion of the climb, when you finally get over the peak and you see the glory of the summit, that you're like, man, that was worthwhile. That's what makes this moment so glorious. And if that's true of all these minor earthly pursuits, how much more in pursuing Christ If we've made this our lifelong pursuit, that when we come to glory, we'll say it was all worth it to be like Him. And on that day, we're given the ultimate promise. The day that you see Him, you shall be totally like Him. You'll be transformed completely into His image. But every single hour and every single moment of this life that you have spent towards that goal, you will say it was worth it. The journey was worth it. So let me encourage you. Believers, those that Christ died for, gave his life for, to continue pursuing this cause. Let's give every effort, every sinew of our body, every fiber of our being, every breath in our lungs, to strive towards the excellency of being transformed into the image of God's divine Son. out of praise and sheer gratitude and thankfulness for what he has done for us. Let's pray together. Lord, our Lord, how excellent is your name in your Son. Amazed to see the excellent work you have done through him at the cross to save us. You do all things well. You do all things to perfection. We pray, Father, that you would help us then to pursue being conformed into the image of your Son, for how could we not want to be like Him? He's done so much for us. He's been so kind to us, so loving to us. He's totally changed us. So we pray, Lord, that you give a heart, a desire today to help us in this walk of faith, to help us to run the race and to Run it well for those of us who might be weary, for those of us who might be tired, for those of us who might have lost the goal entirely. Would you again present it before us and would you stir us up, Lord, that we would indeed want to pursue you. And then add all your grace and all your power for you have promised to provide to make that happen. Lord, would we show this world the beauty of Christ? Would we live for Him, He who is more precious than all the jewels and diamonds of planet Earth, and indeed far greater than 10,000 worlds? We pray this in His name, amen.