“Godliness is to see all of one’s life as worship and confession” Lent 4 Midweek 2025
02. April 2025
Lent 4 Midweek
2 Peter 1:2-11 - Godliness
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. (2 Pe 1:10–11)
This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.
Peter takes pains to speak first of the sufficiency of Christ’s saving gifts for His people. “His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness.” Then, built on that foundation, Peter continues with the virtues that necessarily flow from the gifts of Christ, worked by the Spirit. “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue…” Faith in Christ's power to save and sanctify is the foundation, and the virtues of the Christian’s life follow as His gift.
Tonight, we focus on the virtue of godliness, εὐσέβεια, also translated as piety or reverence. Despite the accusation of our enemies, we believe that God has called us to a particular manner of life. God has much to say about our conduct and manner of life and how it can complement or hamper faith and love. Godliness is a sort of catch-all phrase for having both appropriate beliefs about God and devout practices that confess those beliefs.
At a basic level, godliness, εὐσέβεια, is an expression of respect or worship for God and what He has established. We are called to hold both Him and the orders He establishes in high esteem and avoid sinning against them. We sin against God when we sin against what or whom He has established. This is why we honor parents as God in God’s place. We revere preachers and teachers who deliver God’s Word to us. We respect civil rulers who are called to commend those who do well and discipline those who do wrong.
But we also take pains to deliver God’s gifts with piety, from the table prayers in your home around daily bread to the liturgy of the Sacrament that gives you Christ’s body and blood. What we do, how we act, and how we speak confess what we are given to believe—Christ crucified for the forgiveness of sins. In this way, the call to godliness is to see all of one’s life as worship and confession. Everything is received from God in thanksgiving. Everything is done in Jesus’ name and to God’s glory. Whatever cannot be done in Christ is excluded. Whatever cannot be said in love is rejected. As St Paul said to the Greek philosophers at the Areopagus, “In Him we live and move and have our being” (Ac 17:28).
Like the other virtue, godliness is a term only used in Acts and the epistles of Paul and Peter. In Paul’s pastoral epistles and 2 Peter, it is the call to faith and life grounded in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus revealed in the Gospels. But in Acts, it is used more broadly for reverence or piety for authorities or people of notoriety. The infrequent use makes sense when we account for its roots in Greek philosophy, religion, and practice, not Hebrew faith and piety. Yet, Paul and Peter, like us, adapt to the language and thoughts of our day, bringing even a term like godliness in captivity to Christ.
For example, Paul instructs Timothy: “But reject profane and old wives’ fables, and exercise yourself toward godliness. For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come” (1 Ti 4:7–8). And later in the same book, “If anyone teaches otherwise and does not consent to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which accords with godliness, he is proud, knowing nothing, but is obsessed with disputes and arguments over words, from which come envy, strife, reviling, evil suspicions, useless wranglings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain. From such withdraw yourself. Now godliness with contentment is great gain” (1 Ti 6:3-6).
In other words, to claim godliness but to act against the Word of Christ is not godly at all. What distinguishes New Testament piety from that of the Old Testament is that we are no longer under the law. There is no trace of godliness being a legalistic requirement, but as with all Christian virtue, a fruit of faith worked by the Holy Spirit. Even the pious corporate actions of the Christian congregation are not under the law but under grace. We’re free to add and remove ceremonies to confess Christ as He is given to us in the Word. Where ceremonies fail to teach or confess wrongly, we omit them. Where ceremonies are useful for godliness, we may introduce them with patience and a Spirit of gentleness.
Godliness, also translated as piety or reverence, is echoed in the maxim from Prosper of Aquitaine, “lex credendi, lex orandi.” The rule of faith is the rule of prayer. What we believe informs what we do, but what we do also informs what we believe. Your piety matters because it is often a confession without words. Do not get lumped in with the libertine mainline churches with their “do whatever you want” ethos. Instead, hear our defense of the Augsburg Confession:
“At the outset, we must again make this preliminary statement: we do not abolish the Mass, but religiously keep and defend it. Masses are celebrated among us every Lord’s Day and on the other festivals. The Sacrament is offered to those who wish to use it, after they have been examined and absolved. And the usual public ceremonies are observed, the series of lessons, of prayers, vestments, and other such things […] we keep also the Latin lessons and prayers. However, ceremonies should be celebrated to teach people Scripture, that those admonished by the Word may conceive faith and godly fear, and may also pray” (AC XXIV, 1-3).
Ceremonies are observed and celebrated to teach people the Scripture, that is, to give faith towards God and love for one another. An obvious example is the greeting of peace before the Service of the Sacrament. We extend a handshake, a hug, or even a kiss to demonstrate our reconciliation in Christ. It's a very real, tangible practice that confesses what we believe. For Jesus says:
“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.’ But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment. And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire. Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First, be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.” (Mt 5:21–24).
Finally, we come to Second Peter, where godliness, εὐσέβεια, is used four times. The situation differs from Paul’s letters to Titus and Timothy, in which the Apostle deals with strict and minimal piety. Peter is dealing with false teachers who say that anything goes, much like the liberal, mainline churches today. He encourages us to remain in the life and godliness given to us by God’s divine power and to be diligent in adding godliness to endurance and brotherly love. In contrast with the false teachers who “secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them, and bring on themselves swift destruction” (2 Pe 2:1), Peter points to God’s conduct in days of old as negative examples and Lot as godly.
“For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)—then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly [pious/reverent] out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who walk according to the flesh in the lust of uncleanness and despise authority. They are presumptuous, self-willed. They are not afraid to speak evil of dignitaries, whereas angels, who are greater in power and might, do not bring a reviling accusation against them before the Lord” (2 Pe 2:4–11).
This is all to instruct us to be disciplined in our thoughts, actions, and deeds as the Spirit gives us His life and piety. In this way we are kept in the faith and prepared for the Last Day and the coming judgment.
“But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up. Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pe 3:10–13).
“Therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked; but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen” (2 Pe 3:17–18).
What we do, how we act, and how we speak confess what we are given to believe—Christ crucified for the forgiveness of sins. In this way, the call to godliness is to see all of one’s life as worship and confession. Everything is received from God in thanksgiving. Everything is done in Jesus’ name and to God’s glory.
This is the Word of the Lord that came to me, so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing, you may have life in His + Name. AMEN.
Rev. Christopher R. Gillespie
St. John Ev. Lutheran Church & School - Sherman Center
Random Lake, Wisconsin
