Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge, and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love. 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. For he who lacks these qualities is blind or short-sighted, having forgotten his purification from his former sins. 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; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you.

2 Peter 1:5-11

We are told by Peter how to be be sure we remain productive, or fruitful, in Christ.  Whereas one aspect of Sermon on the Mount could be loosely termed ‘how to keep from falling in ministry’ (Matthew 7:26-27), this passage could be likewise be termed ‘how to remain productive in the Kingdom’.  Peter goes on to say that by practicing these things, we will never stumble.  This is a great promise!  What great freedom is ours in Christ, to never again stumble after the flesh, but to be pleasing to Lord, body, soul, and Spirit, so long as we live.  What a great gift and availability before us, if we choose to walk after His Spirit.

Jesus said that the good soil produced a harvest, some thirty, some sixty, and some one hundred fold.  Faithfulness, the good heart, produces something, where the others, even if the plant grows, produces nothing.  In this way, the true heart after His produces fruit in keeping with His.  As faith without works is dead, so a heart living out of His heart must produce the fruits of repentance, of righteousness, and of the Kingdom.

The Spirit of Truth is our standard.  As He comes, in the depth of His measure, He  reveals and unveils what is within us.  As our innermost being is revealed, He is able to flow through us in increasing capacity, and in doing so, bring forth the Kingdom through us more abundantly.

Just as the seed in good soil, or the honest and sincere heart was the only one that produced fruit, it is only in the simple, trusting heart that God bring forth His holiness, and the purity of His work.

Peter was right to use the word diligence.  It is no coincidence that many of the things listed by Peter are listed as fruits of the Spirit by Paul in Galatians 5:22-23.  But, Peter instructs us to add them to ourselves.

Obviously, they are produced by the Spirit, and they must come from Him, but we are told that as we seek, we would find, and as we asked, we would receive.  But, without the seeking, there is no production of righteousness, effectively, for, as we sow, we shall reap.  We must not be negligent, lest, at best, we progress based upon the labors of others on our behalf, at worst, we sow to the flesh instead, and reap its fruit.

Peter would not have instructed us, in the New Covenant, to add to ourselves these things if there was no choice required.  This is a command form.  If the only instruction was simply to believe, that would have been the only instruction in the New Testament.  But, there is no separation in God, if we are truly living by His Spirit, between the thinking and the doing.  As a man thinks in his heart, so is he.  Rather, it is from the place of belief, and the life of the Spirit, that our actions flow.  The unsaved cannot do the works of God, for they neither recognize nor acknowledge Him.  But, true belief in Christ is always hand-in-hand with true works that come from the Father.  It is this regard that one excels another, and that we have distinctions in the body of Christ so that it may be clearly seen who God favors (1 Corinthians 11:19).

But, just as the good seed produces increase in good soil, so the believing heart will, after a season, produce and demonstrate righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost if properly tended!  We don’t always know how it grows, but it does, and proves both the seed and the soil.

A heart that receives the true word, that, after a while, does not produce holiness, is suspect.  Is it not removed from the world?  Is it still with rocks within it the soil allowing no root?  Is it cluttered with the concerns of this world?

Jesus couldn’t be more clear.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a dragnet cast into the sea, and gathering fish of every kind; and when it was filled, they drew it up on the beach; and they sat down and gathered the good fish into containers, but the bad they threw away

Matthew 13:47-48

The Father desires that we produce fruit.  While He is the Father and the Good Shepherd, He is also the Lord of Stewardship.  As the man who buried his talent was reprimanded, and his talent was taken away, so we must use what we have, and produce after our kind.  For some, that will be crusades and mass evangelism, and for some, for many, it is merely showing up to the prayer meeting, and letting all the strength they have go up in a prayer of thanksgiving and intercession to the Lord of Glory.

To whom much has been given, much will be required, and in the same measure we use, it will be measured unto us.  Just as the woman with only two mites who gave all was regarded as the greater giver than those who put in larger monetary amounts, it is not in our quantity in God’s eyes to build that matters, but in the totality of our giving.

Ultimately, God can build more out of the a woman’s 2 mites than he can out of giving of abundance of the rest.  That is, what He builds, eternally, will be bigger, broader, more secure, and more lasting than anything we could construct in this life.  Even to the point of buildings, so much as God desires them.  He is able to do more with faithfulness and to protect it from the devourer, than if people give thousands upon thousands out of excess.  That which is flesh is flesh, and that which is Spirit is Spirit.

While salvation is not of works, and neither is productivity in the Kingdom, it is faith that leads to works of obedience that God is after.  Just as holiness is still necessary, but springs from a heart of love, gratitude, and His Spirit, true, Spirit-led productivity sprints from the same heart.

When the heart is moved with God’s heart, we are moved to fulfill His desires, and, as He gave His only begotten son, why shouldn’t we?  If we really want to be His children, we will be like Him in all regards.