A word study in 2 Peter 1:5-11
“But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge…..to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness…..to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. for if these things are yours and abound, you will neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. “For he who lacks these things is shortsighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins.” (2 Peter 1:5-9).
Peter, in verses eight and nine, shows the natural consequence of Christians’ adding these seven attributes to their lives.
“Yours” means they must internalize them, that is, they must make them an integral part of their way of thinking and of their behavior.
“Abound” means these attributes must not be surface actions—they must be carried out not just with sincerity but also with intensity. Christians who do so will bear fruit for the Lord and will have a deeper understanding (‘knowledge’) of the Lord.
Without these attributes, Christians are “shortsighted,” that is, they can’t look back and remember their former lives when they were without the Lord. Formerly, like us, they were sinners without spiritual hope; now they have an awareness of the blessing of Jesus and of the forgiveness He provides.