Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 61 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; diligence

Title: Joshua and Judges: The doctrine of leadership part 61 - Essential qualities of leadership: The filling of the Spirit; diligence

 

Announcements / opening prayer:  

 

 

Principle: The believer is not a puppet in the hands of the Spirit but a willing participant with the Spirit. The believer is to be diligent in producing fruit while depending upon the influence of the Spirit.

 

2PE 1:5 Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge;

 

2PE 1:6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness;

 

2PE 1:7 and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.

 

2PE 1:8 For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

2PE 1:9 For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins.

 

2PE 1:10 Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble

 

"diligent" - spouda,zw [spoudazo] = to hasten to do a thing, to exert oneself, endeavor, give diligence.

 

The command is to become more firm in your faith in who you are in Christ by striving for the Christian virtues. Only a born again believer can produce such fruit, and by doing so, the believer becomes more steadfast in who he is in Christ.

 

2PE 3:11 Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,

 

2PE 3:12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, on account of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat!

 

2PE 3:13 But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells

 

2PE 3:14 Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent [aorist active imperative] to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless

 

2TI 2:15

Be diligent [aorist active imperative] to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, handling accurately the word of truth.

 

EPH 4:1 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, entreat you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called,

 

EPH 4:2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing forbearance to one another in love,

 

EPH 4:3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

 

HEB 4:11

Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall through following the same example of disobedience.

 

The Christian is not facing the problem of showing the ideals of the world. The ideals that are true morality which was given to man by God in the OT, simplified in the Decalogue, are even far short of his goal. The world has modified true morality to fit its own desire countless times throughout the history of kingdoms and peoples, and these are shorter of the goal even still.

 

The Christian is faced with the very real, sobering problem of showing forth the praises or virtues of Him - of God.

 

1PE 2:9 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies [arete = virtue] of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;

 

1PE 2:10 for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

 

1PE 2:11 Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts, which wage war against the soul.

 

1PE 2:12 Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may on account of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.