Good evening. I feel like I haven't
done this in forever, and I was just thinking it's an awesome
privilege. I'm excited to do this, but at the same time, it's
such a fearful responsibility, and that fear is running over
me at the moment, so please pray for me. If you will turn back
with me to 2 Peter chapter 3. 2 Peter chapter 3. Look at verse 17 with me. Peter writes, Ye therefore, beloved,
seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led
away with the air of the wicked, fall from your own steadfastness,
but grow in grace, And in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior,
Jesus Christ, to him be glory both now and forever. Amen. These are the final words that
Peter, by God's grace and inspiration, has recorded for us. I titled
this message, Peter's Final Exhortation. Both of his epistles, all eight
chapters, they're exhortations to us. Now, you may have noticed
in verse 17, he told us he's writing to the Beloved. He mentions
that four times in this chapter, and I want to start this message
by showing us all four of them. Look up at verse one. He said, This second epistle,
Beloved, I now write unto you, in both which I stir up your
pure minds by way of remembrance, that ye may be mindful of the
words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of
the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Savior. First
thing he says is, beloved, be mindful. I want you to be mindful
of something. Look down at verse eight. He
said, but beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day
is with the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years as
one day. The second thing is, beloved, it's slipped my mind. Be not
ignorant, be mindful, and be not ignorant. Look down at verse
14. He said, wherefore, beloved,
seeing that you look for such things, be diligent, that you
may be found of him in peace without spot and blameless, be
diligent. And then lastly, in our text,
verse 17, ye therefore, beloved, seeing you know these things
before, beware lest ye also be led away with the air of the
wicked. fall from your own steadfastness." Now, what are these things that
he said that we know before? We just read in verse 2 that
the words spoken before by the holy prophets and the commandment
of the Lord our Savior, all the words spoken by the prophets
are concerning the Lord our Savior, Jesus Christ. From verse 3 to
verse 7, we know and we read that he's promised to come back. It's about the promise of His
coming, though there are currently, right now, mockers, scoffers,
who deny the promise of His coming. They don't believe it. And He
gives us an example of Noah's day. Everybody mocked and laughed. Nobody would believe. And yet,
just like in Noah's day, the day of the Lord shall come. That
rain fell down, and it didn't stop falling down until God said,
all flesh died. The only ones who lived were
in the ark, in Christ, and they died in Him. We know as verse
9 says that the Lord is not slack concerning his promise. As some
men count slackness, but is long suffering to usward, the beloved,
not willing that any of the beloved should perish, but that all should
come to repentance. And we know as verse 15 tells
us that that long-suffering of our Lord is our salvation. As verse 10 says we know that
when Christ returns all of this, everything here, the earth and
the works therein, shall be burned up. And yet we know as verse
13 says that we, according to His promise, Look for a new heaven
and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness." And I love how
that says, according to his promise, I don't have this hope because
some man told it to me or because I decided to think that or believe
that. God, according to his promise,
has convinced me of this. And I'm hanging my soul on every
word he's written for me. And lastly, in verse 14, we know
that we are right now at peace with God, without spot, and blameless
in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We know these things. As God's beloved chosen people,
we know these things. And yet Peter, in verse 17, warns
us to beware. Beware. Beware of what? He said
to beware of the error of the wicked. So many people twist
or pervert the Scriptures. Look at verse 16. I don't want
to read all of it, but he said, of these things, in which are
some things hard to be understood, he's talking about the Word of
God, which they that are unlearned and unstable rest or twist, pervert,
as they do also the other Scriptures unto their own destruction. When I read that, that puts fear
over me. I don't want to be one who is
corrupt in this book. Paul wrote about handling the
Word of God deceitfully, but he said, but as of God, in the
sight of God, we speak in Christ. We're declaring the truth of
God in Christ. We read in Matthew 7 about a broad way, the wide
gate, the popular way, the commonly accepted way, the way which is
fine with everybody, the things that are most commonly believed,
which are contrary to the Word of God, that's the broad way,
that's the wide gate that God said leads to destruction. And
what scares me to death is He said, many there be which go
in there at. But then he talked about a straight gate, a narrow
way, and that way is Christ. And Peter tells us, I believe
in 2 Peter 1, he says, there's no private interpretation of
this book. He said there's one interpretation of it. And our
brother Paul put it well. You know what that interpretation
is? Jesus Christ and Him crucified. He's the straight and narrow
way which leads unto life. And our Lord said, few there
be that find it. I pray that you and I might be
some of the few that by God's grace find it, find the way of
Christ. Peter said, beware, look at it,
lest ye also being led away with the air of the wicked fall from
your own steadfastness. I don't know about you, but I
take this very seriously. You know, many people play church.
Many people play religion. It's not a game. I hope we understand
that. This is life eternal. This is
life and death. Heaven and earth shall fade away,
but the word of the Lord shall endure forever. I don't want to fall away. I
don't want to be lost. When the day of the Lord comes,
I pray that I'm found of Him without spot and blameless. Now, I find it interesting how
Peter worded this. He said, your own steadfastness. When I read that and when I've
read it in the past, the first thing I always think is, my own
steadfastness? Peter, do you mean to tell me
that I'm keeping myself? You know, if that was the case,
this book just makes no sense because Peter, he proved as well
as anybody that we just can't keep ourselves. I'm not going
to look at all the accounts. We may look at a little bit of
it. But the word steadfastness here, it means stability. Peter
wasn't, and I'm not, my own stability. It also means firm condition.
Do you know what our firm condition is? We have a firm foundation,
don't we? And it's not got anything to
do with ourselves. Our foundation is a rock that God has laid in
Zion, a tried, tempted, precious rock, stone, cornerstone. Christ
is my rock. He alone is the firm foundation
upon which I'm hanging my eternal soul. The Church of God, the
whole Church of God is standing on Him. God has put us on Him
and in Him. Remember, He told Moses, I'll
put you in the cleft of a rock. It's Christ, put us in Christ. Peter
knew that Christ was the rock upon which God would build his
church. You remember when he said, whom do men say I am? Some
say you're Elijah, Jeremiah, one of the prophets. He said,
but Peter, who do you say I am? He said, you're the Christ, the
son of the living God. He said, upon this rock, I will
build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against
it. You see, people take that, some people take that, the Catholics
take that and think Peter's the rock. I'm telling you, and I
will show you this here in a minute, The gates of hell could have
prevailed against Peter. The gates of hell could prevail
against me, but not against our rock, not against Christ. I know that if left to myself,
I would fall. I wouldn't be standing here right
now. I would have fallen long before now. Mention Peter. You remember when our Lord took
him, James, and John, I believe the first disciples that the
Lord called, except Peter's brother Andrew. He took them into the
garden of Gethsemane when our Lord was going to pray. And he
said, you sit here, and you watch, and you pray that you enter not
into temptation. You remember what happened? I
would love to have known how long it took. I suspect not very
long. And they just doze off. And our
Lord come back, and he said, what, can you not stay awake
for an hour? Nope. He went back to pray again. Back
to sleep they went. But I love that the third time
when our Lord came back, do you know what he said? He saw them
sleeping again. He said, sleep on now. Take your
rest. What he's saying is, I'm your
rock. I'm your stability. I'm your steadfastness. I'm your
hope. You can rest. Don't you love to hear that,
that we can rest in him? But I say all that to say, if it
was up to Peter, he would have fallen. I'll give you another
example. When Satan desired to have him, that he might sift
him like wheat. Do you remember what Peter's
hope was? Anybody remember? Well, Peter, he resisted the
devil, and the devil fled from him. Nope, people think that.
twisting the scriptures to their own destruction. No, here's what
Peter's hope was. Right after the Lord told him
that, he said, but I've prayed for you. Man, what a hope. I've
prayed for you, Peter. Yep, if it was up to you, Satan
would've had you by now. But I've prayed for you that
your faith fail not. What a hope. Oh, what a hope. Last one I wanna mention was
when our Lord told Peter, he told him that you're gonna deny
me. You're gonna deny me three times, not once, not twice, three
times, Peter, you're gonna deny me. And Peter denied that he
was gonna deny him. Lord, I'm not gonna deny you,
I'm not gonna forsake you, I'll never do that. And know this,
likewise said all the disciples, they all just joined right in
with Peter. He was determined not to. He was. Peter was determined not to deny
his Lord. His spirit was willing. That's
what the Lord told him. The spirit's willing, but the
flesh is weak. His flesh was so weak, just like mine and just
like yours. We don't keep ourselves. We don't save ourselves. I love
a quote from Jonathan that was the only part we play in our
salvation is the sin that made it necessary. That's good. That's
a good quote, and it's true. It's no wonder Peter wrote in
1 Peter 1 that we're kept by the power of God. through salvation,
ready to be revealed at the last time. We don't keep ourselves.
We need him to save us. We need him to keep us to the
very end. Look back in our text here. Verse 17 again. Ye therefore, beloved, seeing
ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being led
away with the air of the wicked, fall from your own steadfastness.
Look at this. But grow in grace. Peter, he knew a thing or two
about grace. You see, he was saved by grace. And as I was looking at this,
I kept changing what I wanted to say here. But one thing kept
coming back to my mind, and that was the day, the moment, when
our Lord came to Peter. You may recall, Peter, he was
out fishing. He was a fisherman. He was out
fishing with his brother, Andrew. I believe James and John and
Zebedee and some others were with them, or very close nearby,
because our Lord called the two sets of brothers. He's just out
there living his life, and I thought about myself. I'm just out here
living my sinful life, not a care in the world, no care of God,
no acknowledgment that God's on his throne. He's having his
way. He's saving his people. And all I'm doing is cursing
him with every breath that comes out of my mouth, with every thought
that runs through my heart, with everything I do. And yet Christ
came to him. He didn't come to Christ until
Christ came to him. And I love this. You can read
it for yourself. I'm not going to because we don't have time.
But literally, he's fishing. Christ comes to him. We have
every reason to assume Peter had no idea who he was. And yet
he comes to him. He says two powerful words, and
they're powerful because he spoke them. Where the word of the king
is, there's power. He said, follow me. And do you know what happened
immediately? and his brother Andrew, and then
James and John. They forsook their nets. James
and John forsook their father, and the ship lord didn't call
him. They forsook everything, and they followed him immediately. That sounds like irresistible
grace, doesn't it? Peter was saved by grace. Saved by grace. And I love this. Grace came to
him in the form of a person Christ came to him, and once Christ
came to him, from that moment on, Peter came to him. He couldn't help it. He couldn't
not come to him. I want to show you this. I'm
sure you know it, but turn to John chapter 6. Very familiar passage.
John chapter 6, verse 66. There's one place God's people
go. You say, well, we go to church.
Yeah. Yeah, we do. but we're going
to a person. We go to Christ. By God's grace,
we come to Him. We don't need to come to the
altar. We need to come to Christ. Now look here, Peter did after
Christ came to him. John 6, verse 66 says, from that
time many of his disciples, these were men that were following
him for earthly reasons, from that time many of his disciples
went back and walked no more with him. Then said Jesus unto
the 12, will ye also go away? Then Simon Peter answered him,
Lord, to whom shall we go? Where are we gonna go? Thou hast
the words of eternal life. Look at verse 69. And we believe
and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living
God. Lord, where are we gonna go?
You're our all in all. There's nowhere else. There's
nothing else. You're all we have. Exactly.
Oh, may God make Christ all we have. We won't look at it, but
in 1 Peter 2, he says, To whom coming? As unto a living stone. This allowed indeed of men. We
didn't want him. He came unto his own. His own
received him not. The world didn't know him. The
world didn't want him, even though he made the world. And yet he's
chosen of God. God's elect. Precious. Peter went on to say, until you
therefore which believe, he's precious. Oh, I pray he might
be precious to us. The Lord told Peter that because he knew that
he was the Christ, he said, Peter, because you know that, you're
a blessed man. Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah.
Flesh and blood didn't reveal it to you, but my Father which
is in heaven. You see, The wonderful, marvelous
grace of God revealed Christ to Peter. You see how salvation
starts with the Lord? And we're going to see how it
continues and how it concludes with the Lord. It's of the Lord
from start to finish. I love what Paul said concerning
his conversion in Galatians 1. He said, he was talking about
how he was out persecuting the church and wasting it and wanting
nothing to do with God, his people. He said, but when it pleased
God, who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by
His grace to reveal His Son, Christ, in me, he said, immediately
I conferred not with flesh and blood. You see, they had the
same experience. Now, Peter was out fishing. Paul was riding
on a horse to go persecute or arrest God's people. No difference.
All have sinned. All understand. But when the
time of love comes, when grace comes, when Christ comes to a
person, we can't resist it. You know, it's kind of like,
I hope this is a good example. I just thought of it. Meeting
your bride. She's irresistible. You gotta
have her. Can't live without her. And then you put a ring
on her and you won't let her go. Hope that's a decent example. Oh, but how much more so is it
with our Lord and his bride? Our makers, our husband, we saw
it this morning. He shall have his bride. He ain't gonna lose
her. There's no divorce there. Perfect love, perfect peace and
rest, perfect union. We're one. He told us that. He
said we're one. One with God. Now, being saved
by grace, Peter's exhortation to us is to grow in that grace. You guys know just a little over
five weeks ago, Rachel and I experienced a birth, a quite miraculous birth
of our baby boy. And I just said five weeks, five
weeks, and I guess today makes three days. They're just flying
by. And it's bittersweet. I'm sad to see him grow so fast. I have a daughter. She just turned
two last month. It breaks my heart to see how
fast the time's going by. It's like she's just running
right by me. But yet at the same time, it
melts my heart and causes me to rejoice to see her grow, to
watch her learn. If our babies don't grow, something
is wrong. Something's wrong. Though it
breaks our heart to see them grow so fast, we delight to see
them grow, don't we? We wouldn't have it any other
way, would we? Growth is an evidence of life. Where life is, there's
growth. For 41 weeks and one day, that
baby boy grew inside her. Amazing. We live and move and
have our being in the Lord Jesus Christ. And by God's grace, as
we live this life and walk this earth, we will grow in grace. Turn to Peter with me, 1 Peter
chapter 2. 1 Peter chapter 2. Verse 1. 1 Peter 2, verse 1. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout
Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect, according
to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification
of the Spirit unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of
Jesus Christ, grace unto you, and peace be multiplied. I read
the wrong verse, didn't I? Look at chapter two. I'll look
at chapter two. Wherefore, laying aside all malice and all guile
and hypocrisies and envies and all evil speakings, here we go,
as newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word that
you may grow thereby. It's what I was just talking
about. With our babies, we want to see them grow. As newborn
babes in Christ, you know, He hid these things. He hid the
spiritual treasures, the truth of God and the knowledge of Christ.
He hid these things from the wise and prudent, but He revealed
them unto babes because it was good in His sight to do so. And
as newborn babes, don't we want that? Don't we long to grow,
desire that sincere milk of the Word that we may grow thereby?
Look at verse 3. If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is
gracious. You who've experienced God's
grace, I know you want to grow in it. I do too. Now, what does
it mean for us to grow in grace? I feel like we could easily err
on this subject, and I pray God won't let us. Does it mean to
become more saved, more holy, more righteous, more good, better? No. No, growing in grace has absolutely
nothing to do with improving our standing before God. I mentioned
earlier what Peter's telling us in our text was that right
now we are at peace with God. Right now in Christ we are blameless.
We are without spot in him. I'll quote a few partial scriptures
to you. He hath perfected us forever. It's done and it's forever. He has made us to be the righteousness
of God in him, in himself. We looked at this a week or two
ago, how that our name is the Lord, our righteousness in him. We are complete in him. As he is, so are we in this world
right now. We can't get any better. It's
done, it's finished. So what does it mean to grow
in grace? Everything I've listened to about this and everything
I read about it and reading the scriptures, comparing scripture
to scripture, the best way I can explain it is spiritual maturity. Peter undoubtedly grew or matured
in grace by all that he experienced. Again, we've mentioned a few
things, but there's a lot. I've been trying to study the
life of Peter. And it blesses my heart. I love being able to
relate to him, to enter into what he went through and how
he grew and pray that I might likewise grow. Our Lord rebuked
him. You know, in our life, when someone
rebukes us, we don't like it. We don't like to be told we're
wrong. We said something wrong. We did something wrong. We hate
it. I mean, I hope I'm not the only one. But our Lord rebuked
Peter several times. He even said on one occasion,
get thee behind me, Satan. Looked him right in the face
and said that. Remember when the Lord was washing his disciples'
feet? Peter wanted no part in it at first. He was thinking, Lord, I need
to wash your feet. Can't you enter into that? I understand.
That makes sense. And yet the Lord rebuked him,
and he said, Peter, if I don't wash you, you can have no part
with me. You're not gonna enter in if I don't wash you. He said,
Lord, wash me from my hands to my head. Wash me from my feet.
Wash all of me. Wash me thoroughly. Cleanse me
from my iniquity. When our Lord rebuked him, First
of all, he took it. We should learn from that. But
second of all, every time our Lord rebuked him was working
together for his good, for his learning, for his growth, for
his maturity. But none of it improved his standing
before God. You understand that? He was already
holy and perfect and righteous in Christ. Nothing could change
that. Growth in grace is a continual, lifelong experience of grace. That's what it is. I look at
myself, I look at my life, and I can honestly say where sin
abounded, grace did much more abound. It continues to. It's been proven to me, it is
proven to me daily, that he giveth more grace Give me too much grace. No such thing. Give me too much.
Give me all. Let me have all the grace there
is to have. We could run that ocean dry,
couldn't we? We can't run the wells of heaven dry. God has
enough grace to last us forever. Oh, I'm so thankful that it's
so. I'm persuaded with every fiber of my being, and I mean
this, No matter what happens in my life, I know I can just
acknowledge the fact I can't see the future, but I can tell
you this with certainty. Trials await. Hard trials await me and
us and you. But know this, brethren. His
grace is sufficient for us. You believe that? Paul, he was
burdened by that thorn in the flesh. Grieved him. He prayed
three times, Lord, please take it away. But he needed it. Whatever God sends our way, we
may not like it. It may be difficult, and it will
be, but we need it. And we have something far superior,
and that's His grace. Turn over to 1 Peter chapter
5 with me. Again, when I initially think
growing grace, I think, well, it's something I need to do. Growth in grace is an increased
dependence on grace. It's growing more needy, more
helpless. It's growing weaker, more dependent
on God and His grace and the Lord Jesus Christ. Here in 1
Peter 5, look at verse 10. He said, I love that. The God
of all grace who hath called us unto His eternal glory By Christ Jesus, after that ye
have suffered a while, make you perfect, establish, strengthen,
settle you. To him be glory and dominion
forever and ever. Amen. By Sylvanus, a faithful
brother unto you, as I suppose I have written briefly, exhorting
and testifying. Now look at this. that this is
the true grace of God wherein ye stand. I'm standing in His
grace. I want to be covered in it. I
don't want it to leave me for one moment. I need His grace
every moment, every hour. We're saved by grace. God's given
us a good hope through grace. We're hoping in grace. As Peter
just told us here, we're established, strengthened, settled in the
grace, the free, sovereign, saving, amazing grace of God Almighty. Now look back at our text, 2
Peter 3. Verse 18 says, but grow in grace and in the
knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. You see, grace
and Christ are inseparable. I mentioned, when Christ came
to Peter, grace came to Peter. When grace came to Peter, Christ
came to Peter. They're one. You can't have one
without the other. Look back just a page at 2 Peter
chapter 1, verse 1. See if I can get it right this
time. Yeah, that's it. 2 Peter 1 verse
1. Simon Peter, a servant and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to
them that have obtained like precious faith with us through
the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ, verse
2, grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge
of God and of Jesus our Lord. Grace, peace, faith are all in,
of, through, and by the Lord Jesus Christ. They're all in
Him. Think about where a couple of
our brethren, it tells us found grace. Remember where Noah found
grace? In the eyes of the Lord. It says the same thing about
Moses. You remember what John said in John chapter 1? He said
the law came by Moses. But grace and truth, they came
by Jesus Christ. He went on to say, he's full
of grace and truth. He's full of it, full of it.
Turn back a few books to Acts chapter 15. If you want to read about Peter's
spiritual maturity, read the book of Acts. I need to do this.
The Lord used him so mightily, so greatly, saved so many through
the preaching of the gospel through his apostle Peter. And right
here in Acts chapter 15, look with me at verse 11. This is Peter speaking, tells
us in verse seven. Acts 15, 11 says, but we believe
that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, we shall be
saved, even as they, the grace of Christ. If we have grace,
then we have Christ. And if we have Christ, then we
have all, Christ is all, all in all. Now, how do we grow in grace? How do we grow in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ? That's what I kept thinking
about as I studied this, and this afternoon I kept struggling
to find something to say here, but this is it. First, we must be born. Gotta
be born before you grow. We must be born again. That's
what our Lord said. We read that we're spiritually dead and trespassing
sins. Our Lord told Nicodemus, he said,
you must be born again. If you're gonna enter in, if
you're gonna be saved, you must be born again. Born of the spirit
washed in his blood. Like I mentioned with Paul, God
in His grace must come to us. He comes to us and reveals Christ
to us and in us. He does it all. Summed up well
in two verses we quote often from Ephesians 2, For by grace
are you saved through faith, that not of yourselves. It's
the gift of God. Grace is a gift. A gift of God,
not of works, lest any man should boast. And then we grow. How do we grow? We grow as God
enables us. I thought of, I think Paul wrote
it, he said, I've watered, or I've planted a Paulist watered,
but who gives the increase? God does. Same way with growing
in grace. God must give the increase. Pastor
just mentioned in his prayer about the measure of the gift
of Christ, I believe. It's one of the verses I had
written down. Ephesians 4, 7, unto every one of us is given grace
according to the measure of the gift of Christ. And one day there's
going to be no measure. You know, he gives the Spirit
without measure unto Christ. One day we're going to know even
as we've been known. Grace must be experienced. I
can tell you about it all day. from the scriptures, but until
we experience it ourselves, we must experience it ourselves
to truly know anything about it. I mentioned Peter grew through
his experiences. You think about after our Lord
was resurrected, and you remember how depressed Peter was. He said, I go fishing. thought
about that and how he's just back. That's where he started,
right? He was out fishing. There he is. Wonderful, wonderful,
I don't know how many years it was that he walked with the,
I guess about three and a half. Best years of his life, I'm sure.
But then he just didn't understand. Lord, if it be so, why am I thus?
I'm sure he felt that way. And he's out there fishing, ain't
catching a thing, again, just like before. And then the Lord
appears. He sat there for a little bit.
Peter didn't know he was there. He didn't know who it was. And
then when he realized who it was, you remember what he did?
He jumped in that water and he swam as fast as he could to get
to the feet of his Savior. And once he did, the Lord had
a conversation with him that blesses my heart to think about,
and I'll leave you with this. He asked him three times, Peter,
do you love me? You think about how he must have
felt being asked this. Peter, do you love me? Peter, do you
love me? I can only imagine how grieved
he must have been, knowing he forsook him, scared
of a little girl, forsook him, denied him three times, stood
there and watched as he bore his sin in his body on that tree. And then the Lord comes to him
and asks him that three times, gets straight to his heart. And
the third time, you know what Peter said? He said, Lord, you
know all things. You know that I love you. And our Lord told him, feed my
sheep. You feed my sheep. Do you realize? That's what the epistles are.
He's feeding his sheep. Peter is feeding Christ's sheep. Look at verse 18 one more time
in our text, 2 Peter 3, 18. But grow in grace and in the
knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And here's the
last words Peter wrote. To him be glory, both now and
forever. Amen. As we grow in grace, this
will be our cry. He must increase, but I must
decrease. I love the story you tell of,
I'm a poor sinner and nothing at all, but Jesus Christ is my
all in all. If God has saved us, if he has
called us by his grace, as we press toward the mark, as we
live out our days, We're going to become smaller and smaller,
and he's going to become bigger and bigger. more glorious. I don't even know how that's
possible, but it's so. It's so. And my prayer for you
and me is first that God might save us by his grace, that he
might reveal Christ to us and in us, and then that every moment
from now till we leave here and enter into that new heaven and
new earth wherein dwells righteousness and see him as he is, I pray
that God might cause us to grow in grace and in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, may he get all the glory
forever and ever. Amen.