“Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, According 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” (2 Peter 1:2,3)
To be in Christ is to be given a great opportunity to change at the deepest level of our being. What God has been after in our life has the potential of happening. But getting saved does not guarantee that such radical transformation will take place; it makes it possible. He has called us to glory and virtue; He has given us all we need to be godly and virtuous; but we must want what He is ultimately after. “Giving all diligence,” we must “add to (our) faith virtue …” etc. (2 Pet. 1:5). This one thing we must do: greatly desire to “apprehend” all He has apprehended us for (Php. 3:12).
How great the potential of those who are in the true faith and in the true Vine! They, and they alone, can bring forth fruit unto God. They, and they alone, are free from the sin that one ruled their lives. They, and they alone, can now yield themselves unto righteousness, even as they once yielded themselves unto sin. To be outside of Christ is to be incapable of pleasing God. To be in Christ is to be fully equipped to walk even as Christ walked, living a life that is always pleasing to the Father.
Do we know what is the “hope of His calling”? Do we know what is the “riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints”? Do we know what is the “exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe”? (Eph. 1:18,19) Such knowledge is the first step toward taking advantage of the tremendous privilege and exclusive opportunity we have as New Testament saints who have been given “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” (2 Pet. 1:4)
Once we have been established in the knowledge of what His divine power has given us we can turn this potentiality into actuality. Then we can move forward in becoming in deed and in truth the very people God has saved us to become.