Self-control and patient endurance

By His divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know Him, the One who called us to Himself by means of His marvelous glory and excellence. And because of His glory and excellence, He has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share His divine nature and escape the world's corruption caused by human desires. In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God's promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with patient endurance, and patient endurance with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love for everyone. The more you grow like this, the more productive and useful you will be in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But those who fail to develop in this way are shortsighted or blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their old sins.
(2Pe 1:3-9 NLT)

Peter tells us we must supplement our faith with moral excellence, knowledge, self-control, patient endurance, godliness, and with brotherly love for everyone. This was not just a laundry list of good things to do but each item was selected by God and led by His Holy Spirit as Peter went through them. You see what the carnal Christian forgets is that true faith leads us to action, it is not enough to simply believe and go back to living the way you used to. Because we have been changed we no longer choose to live for ourselves, the immoral lifestyle no longer binds us because of the knowledge we are given through God’s Word, which leads us to self-control and patient endurance. It is because of these things we reflect God’s character and as we begin to understand all that we’ve been given we are able to freely give it away and love as we are loved. These are inseparable you cannot be moral without godliness and you cannot be patient without self-control and all of these are required in order to show God’s love to your neighbor.

The things Peter mentions here takes a lifetime to get right, that’s why we are told not to grow weary of doing good (2 Thessalonians 3:13) and it does not matter how well we did them yesterday if today we decide to take a break and please ourselves. A race is not won by starting well but by the way we finish. We have all seen those who pull out of the pack at the beginning and are praised by people saying “What marvelous things he is doing, surely he will do mighty works for the Lord.” Only to watch the same person fall behind partway through the race and it matters not who you are, pastor, evangelist, or teacher. When we let go of the hand of Jesus and decide to “I’ve got this” through pride we fall and though we can get back up it is only through full surrender to the Holy Spirit of God that we can be fully restored, for there is a proving that takes place in our hearts and minds that must happen if we are to once again lead others.