Who Needs Virtue? You Do!

Virtue is hard to come by these days. When we look out upon our country in our day, moral degeneracy is not only promoted, it has run amok. Just this week, a pastor visiting a local bookstore discovered a book titled Be Gay, Do Crime! Indeed, we are in an age where vice is valued over virtue. When we see this, we can give way to fear as we read John Adams who said, “Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people,” and Benjamin Franklin who said that “Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom.” We may wonder where our country is headed as we see societal morals decay.
Because of this, Christians would do well to recover the lost discipleship of Christian virtue. We don’t earn our salvation by our growing in virtue, but virtue does help us become more like God in this life. If our God is one of perfect character and one who calls us to be like himself, the more virtuous we should seek to become.

Sanctification through Seeking Virtue
The prime example of a passage that presents this is 2 Peter 1:1–15. There Peter exhorts us to “supplement our faith with virtue” for a number of reasons. As we do so, we become more fruitful for his kingdom in the world (v. 8); we grow in our knowledge of the Lord, as we act out and imitate his character (this is what Peter means by partaking of the divine nature) (vv. 4, 5, & 8); but most of all, we confirm our calling and election (v. 10). By acting out virtue we are backing up our head knowledge with heart knowledge. We show the authenticity of our Christian faith not just in word but in our character and deeds as well. Virtue can be a great witness to the world.

What is virtue? At the most basic, it is a good habit that forms us and remains as a quality of our being. There can be bad habits too, and these are called vices. But our vices don’t have to remain that way. They can be replaced with virtues. Think of laziness, or, as the Bible calls it, sloth. One can become aware of how lazy they are and seek to become more productive, having great zeal and energy as they work, and with that, gain the virtues of fortitude and temperance. But this productive zeal should not fade, it should remain with an overall abiding consistency. It means acting with virtuous character even when times get tough. Therefore, virtue is a: Disposition to Desire, Discern, and Do the Good, even in Difficulty.^[1]

Though anyone can change in behavior, no amount of changing our behavior through our own works can please God. What matters, is if they have been made new in Christ. For the Christian, our motivation is not ourselves, rather it is to imitate and become like Christ for the glory of God. And thankfully, through faith in Christ and the sanctification of the Spirit working in us, we can repent of our vices and be transformed to more virtuous character, from one degree of glory to another.

The Seven Classical Virtues
When we think of the seven classical virtues there are two main categories. One is the three theological virtues of faith, hope, and love, while the four cardinal virtues are wisdom, temperance, fortitude, and justice. The theological virtues direct us toward God, while the cardinal virtues acted more like umbrella categories for grouping moral decisions that Christians had to make while seeking to love self and neighbor in the world.

Ultimately, we should seek these seven virtues because we should want to imitate Christ, who was the most virtuous man who ever lived. Through his life and death, he perfectly displayed the three theological virtues of faith, hope, and love. He had perfect faith and hope in his Father, and he perfectly displayed love for his fellow man in dying on the Cross.
Jesus embodied the cardinal virtues as well, being wise in every decision, fortuitous in calling out sin, temperate in his desires, and just in all his ways.

We need a recovery of these things in our day. And this is what Peter says, as 2 Peter 1 closes. “Therefore, I intend always to remind you of these qualities . . .” and “I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder. . .”

For the College and Career Ministry, that is exactly what we intend to do this Fall, as we are reminded of virtue, and recall the glory of Jesus Christ, who which our virtuous living strives to imitate. Feel free to join us each Wednesday at 7:30pm or if you’d like to continue this discussion of virtue, contact mwood@obc.org.

For His glory and your joy,
Matt Wood

  ^{[1] This definition is only ever so slightly modified from Dan Doriani’s, in his book The Death of the Deadly Sins (Philipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2025). 5.}