Those who know me the most know the best how clumsy I am.

A good friend refuses to get near my coffee cup because I’m so likely to spill it!

In keeping with my reputation for clumsiness, I ruined two pairs of my eyeglasses in the past week.

I sat down on my newest pair of glasses. Then I stepped on an old pair of backup glasses!

Fortunately, I can read without my glasses.

Not surprisingly, this verse in 2 Peter jumped off the page at me this morning:

“whoever does not have them is near-sighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.” (2 Peter 1:9).

What is the “them” that the Apostle Peter is talking about?

He lists “them” in 2 Peter 1:5-6:

“add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.”

The linkage between these virtues and forgetting that we have been cleansed from our past sins is not explained.

There are a number of wise ways to understand the linkage. Therefore, it’s an excellent topic to discuss with friends or in a small group.

My thought is that the linkage involves grasping these truths written by the Apostle Paul in Ephesians: “it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9).

As soon as we think our cleansing must be accomplished by our virtues, we no longer have faith—the very first virtue Peter listed.

Eventually, all the other virtues unravel, too. (Genesis 2:15-3:24).

In our compulsion to cleanse ourselves, we choose ways that are not wise.

Our knowledge of wise ways to cleanse ourselves decreases.

Our desperation to cleanse ourselves makes self-control impossible.

Our depression over our failure to cleanse ourselves undermines our perseverance.

Our futile reliance on our ungodly efforts to cleanse ourselves replaces godliness.

Our selfish effort to cleanse ourselves undermines our mutual affection with others.

Our futile reliance on ourselves reduces our reliance on the love of God and on the love of people.

How do we overcome our nearsightedness and blindness?

In the case of my glasses, the solution is obvious. Get my glasses fixed.

But in the case of spiritual nearsightedness and blindness, the solution is not so obvious—nor so easy.

Peter tells us to “make every effort to confirm [our] calling and election” (2 Peter 1:10).

But how do we do this?

Here is another time it is wise to discuss our ideas with friends and in a small group, sharing each person’s wisdom.

After all, we are each different people with different experiences and different insights.

Therefore, each of us can share different, wise ways to confirm our calling and our election.

Each of us can share different, wise ways that we “add to [our] faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.”

It is also helpful to read about the many wise ways that other people have overcome these challenges.

St. Augustine, Martin Luther, and John & Charles Wesley are people whose wisdom, experiences and insights immediately come to my mind.

They all grappled with the futility of their efforts to cleanse themselves, until they grasped these truths written by the Apostle Paul to the churches in Rome:

“Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.” (Romans 13:13-14 (emphasis added)).

“in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed—a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith.’” (Romans 1:17 (emphasis added)).

By living righteously, we’ll express our faith through love, with goodness, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, and mutual affection, as Paul prayed in Ephesians 3:17-19:

“that Christ may dwell in [our] hearts through faith, [so that] being rooted and established in love, [we] may have power, together with all the [LORD’s] holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”

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To learn more about grasping how wide and long and high and deep the love of Christ is, please read my blog “Grace and Peace—Ephesians”.

To learn more about St. Augustine, Martin Luther, and John & Charles Wesley, please read the sections “St. Augustine”, “Disaster Strikes the Church”, “Martin Luther”, “John Wesley”, and “Charles Wesley” in my book Visions of the Church (published together with Visions of America), at pages 170-173, 176-177, and 193-199.