Morning & Evening Devotional Reading–

September 16– Morning

 by C. H. Spurgeon, revised and edited by W. C. Neff

“Partakers of the divine nature.” 

—2 Peter 1:4

To be a partaker of the divine nature is not, of course, to become God. That can’t be. The essence of Deity is not to be participated in by the creature. Between the creature and the Creator there will always be a gulf fixed in respect to essence (being). But, as the first man Adam was made in the image of God, so we, by the renewal of the Holy Spirit, are remade into the image of the Most High, and are partakers of the divine nature. We are, by grace, made like God in several ways.

First, God is love, and in Him we become love–“The one who loves is born of God.” God is truth; we become true, and we love that which is true. God is good, and He makes us good by His grace, so that we become the pure in heart who will see God.

Moreover, we become partakers of the divine nature in even a higher sense than this– in fact, in as lofty a sense as can be conceived– and yet short of our being divine. We become members of the body of the divine person of Christ? Yes, the same blood that flows in the head flows in the hand. The same life that enlivens Christ enlivens His people, for the Scripture says, “You are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”

Oh! What a marvelous mystery! We look into it, but who can understand it? To be “one with Jesus”– so one with Him that the branch is not more one with the vine than we are a part of the Lord, our Savior, and our Redeemer!

While we rejoice in this, let us remember that those who are made partakers of the divine nature will demonstrate their high and holy relationship in their interactions with others. O that we might make it evident by our daily actions that we have escaped the corruption that is in the world and that we are partakers of holiness! [M&E]