7  Habits for successful Christian living!
I have recently spent some time  meditating on some scripture which was written, according to the author in order to prevent followers of Jesus becoming unproductive and unsuccessful in their lives of faith. Which i have taken to mean that the advice given must be intended to promote lives which are successful, fruitful and productive.

Most of us want to make our lives count for something significant and there is a cry within all of us to live lives of meaning and purpose , lives which have a positive impact or make a real difference to our communities or the world at large. Jesus himself said that it was Gods will for us to bear much fruit..which implies being productive, to prosper, to live successfully.

2 Peter 1 v 3-9 lists 7 things which are habits to be developed in order for us to make the most of our relationship with God and to be people who make an impact for Him on a consistent basis.
The fact that there are seven habits obviously reminds me of the Steven Covey classic and as a result I have drawn some comparisons and some contrasts. 

This meditation is a work in progress as there is much to consider but here are a few thoughts for starters....lets call it "7  Habits for successful Christian living"!

Habit #1: Add to your faith goodness/moral excellence.

If you want to be successful as a Christian practice doing the right things right! 

Habit #2 : Add to your goodness Knowledge.

If you want to be successful as a Christian learn to know how to do the right things right but also be prepared to find out a whole bunch of other ways of working that you never thought were possible. Knowledge means learning to change and adapt, to develop and progress to deeper levels of excellence or to put it another way from one degree of glory to another.. Knowing Gods ways as well as His works is the key to real growth.

Habit #3: Add to your knowledge self control.

If you want to be successful as a Christian practice doing the right things right on a consistent basis in order to develop a lifestyle of discipline where you take responsibility for being pro-actively righteous and being a proactive learner (which is another word for disciple).

Habit #4 add to your self control perseverance:

when self control doesn't work and you give in or give up or  you fall flat on your face... you gotta get up and keep going. Following Jesus is a long term commitment not a short term fashion. Keep on keeping on, get back up, keep walking , keep running, persist, commit, choose to go forward, press on to the higher calling of the Lord. These habits are long term commitments to faith and following.

OK so up to this point this stuff is all very familiar to those who read self improvement books and watch personal development gurus giving their motivational speeches and all of this is good stuff but there is something else that we need to mark us out from the self help movement and that is the next habit....

Habit #5: Add to your perseverance Godliness

Central to all the stuff about taking responsibility and being proactive and persistent and setting goals and driving things forward is this timely reminder that all this encouragement to be diligent and make an effort is founded on the central purpose of becoming like Jesus, of aspiring to be like God himself ..."be perfect as I am perfect". we must not forget that following principles alone will never make us like Jesus because it is the life of Christ in us that is ultimately our hope of glory (success). His life, his grace, his power has given us all e need for life and godliness so we must never lose sight of the habit of being God focused, Godly minded, God fearing, God Loving, God praising, God knowing and all the other things it takes to be Godly. Every other habit that has gone before is meant to be centred on our aspiration to know God and to make Him known which leads us onto 

Habit #6: Add to your Godliness brotherly kindness/ compassion.

all this personal and spiritual development is not just for us it is for those around us. the inward working of all these habits must eventually find an expression in acts of mercy, kindness and compassion in the part of the world where we have influence, starting with family and friend and working out to communities, regions and nations. this is where we have impact , this is where we start to change the world, this is where the fruit begins to be produced. 

Habit #7: to brotherly kindness add Love; 

We can only keep all this effort up if we have revelation and an experience of Gods Love in our hearts. the love of God compels us, energises us and motivates us to acts of service.Gods love over flows to us so that we in turn can be generous on every occasion.

Without Love we are nothing.

So make every effort to add to your faith and express it all in acts of Love.