e calling is not of
us, we should not exalt ourselves as though we had done it, but
render to Him praise and thanksgiving, because He has given us the
Gospel, and thereby granted us power and might against the devil,
death, and all evil.

V. 4. _Whereby are given unto us exceeding precious and great
promises._ St. Peter adjoins this, that he may explain the nature and
method of faith. If we know Him as God, then do we have through faith
that eternal life and divine power wherewith we subdue death and the
devil. Though we see and grasp it not, yet is it promised to us. We
really have it all, though it does not yet appear, but at the last
day we shall see it present before us. Here it begins in faith;
though we have it not in its fullness, we have yet the assurance that
we live here in the power of God, and shall afterward be saved
forever.

Whoever has this faith has the promise; whoever does not believe
possesses it not, and must be lost forever. How great and precious a
thing this is, Peter explains further, and says:

_So that ye by the same might become partakers of the divine nature,
while ye flee from the corrupting lusts of the world._ This we have,
he says, through the power of faith, that we should be partakers and
have association or communion with the divine nature. This is such a
passage that the like of it does not stand in the New or Old
Testament, although it is a small matter with the unbelieving that we
should have communion with the divine nature itself. But what is the
divine nature? It is eternal truth, righteousness, wisdom; eternal
life, peace, joy, happiness, and whatever good one can name. Whoever
then becomes partaker of the divine nature, attains all this,--that
he is to live forever, and have eternal peace, delight and joy, and
is to be perfectly pure, just, and triumphant over the devil, sin and
death. Therefore St. Peter would say this much: As little as any one
can take away from God, that He should not be eternal life and
eternal truth, just as little shall any one take it away from you.
Whatever one does to you he must do to Him, for whoever would crush a
Christian must crush God.

All this, that word, the divine nature, implies, and he also used it
to this end, that he might include it all; and it is truly a great
thing where it is believed. But, as I said above, this is merely
instruction, in which he does not lay down a ground of faith, but
sets forth what great, rich blessing