How to Grow in Godliness

At the end of every podcast, we like to ask our guests to share what God has been teaching them in this season of life. This week’s guest is Pete Kelly , the CEO of Apartment Life—a growing nationwide ministry helping people see their neighbors as their greatest amenity, while also improving financial return for real estate owners.

2 Peter 1:3-8

His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. For this very reason, make every effort to 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. For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Just a couple days ago I emailed our senior leadership team a passage from 2 Peter 1:3-8 that just really stood out to me as being so essential for what we do. But in that passage, the apostle Peter says God’s divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him, who called us by his own glory and goodness. 

And then he goes on to say, for this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith. And he really lists several attributes that we need to add to our faith. So he says for this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith. Goodness. And the Greek word for goodness, which means excellence. Sometimes it's translated as moral excellence. But in general, it's just excellence. 

And so one of the first attributes of our Apartment Life coordinators is they need to be able to serve with excellence, because if you're not serving the client with excellence, you're not going to be able to keep that mission field open. To assess for this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith, goodness and after goodness, knowledge. 

So, in Peter's context, that idea of knowledge had to do with knowing God, which absolutely our coordinators need to know God and they need to know his word. But in addition to that, they need to know their clients. They need to know what their client's preferences are. They need to know how to run an effective Apartment Life program. So they not only need to grow in faith, they need to grow and goodness or excellence, they need to grow in knowledge and then after knowledge, self-control. 

One of the things we like to tell our teams is it takes a lot of self-discipline and control to be an apartment life coordinator, because managers aren't always grateful. Residents can be quirky. Sometimes you don't want to do a welcome or renewal visit after work. So it takes a lot of self-control. And Peter goes on to say self-control and perseverance. So there's a stick to it type of attitude. 

And then after perseverance, godliness. You need to have a character that reflects who God is to your residents and to godliness, brotherly kindness and a brotherly kindness love. So, first, you need to like people. And then as you like them, you'll grow to love them. And it's hard to love your neighbor with God's unconditional love if you don't even like them to begin with. 

That passage out of 2 Peter is just a great descriptor of what it means to be a great Apartment Life team or coordinator.