2 Peter 3
Notes
Transcript
2 Peter 3
2 Peter 3
Good morning Church! We are now returning to where we left off on our study of God’s Word. In the past couple weeks we examined the cross of Christ and the Resurrection of Christ. We looked at the foundations of our faith. Today we are continuing on teaching through the Scriptures so that we can be challenged, corrected, and grow in our faith. So as is our practice and our preference here, we will pick up where we left off and that is 2 Peter chapter 3 if you will turn there with me please.
Just a reminder to everyone, this is the last week of the winter session of Growth Groups, so not this Wednesday, but next Wednesday we will have a midweek bible study beginning at 6:30 p.m. and we will be picking up in Jeremiah chapter 6 if you’d like to read ahead and join us for that. We will only have two weeks of that, and then begin our Spring session of Growth Groups beginning the first week of May and that will run for 9 weeks, giving you July and August off from groups and giving us a long stretch in the book of Jeremiah.
School of ministry will begin the last Sunday night of this month, April 28th at 6 p.m. This first class is open to everyone that calls this their church home and is in regular attendance. It will be on the Calvary Chapel Distinctives and Philosophy of Ministry. If you are interested in join us for that please come prepared that night having read the introduction and first three chapters of the Distinctives.
Let’s pray for our study.
1 Beloved, I now write to you this second epistle (in both of which I stir up your pure minds by way of reminder),
2 that you may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Savior,
Remember, back in chapter 1 Peter told us he would not neglect to remind us of these things. Peter knew that repetition was our friend. There are some staples in life that we need to continue to feed upon if we hope to have good health and strength, we can’t always be seeking the new, but rather receive the benefit of our daily bread. In the second chapter he warns of false teachers coming into the church to deceive, and now he reminds and warns again.
Notice in this second verse that Peter puts the words of the Apostles on the same level as the holy prophets. Not just any apostles, or missionaries as we explained in certain contexts that word can also mean a messenger of the Word, a church planter, missionary. But these were distinguished as the Apostles of the Lord and Savior.
Peter knew that what they were writing was Holy Scriptures.
Verse 3
3 knowing this first: that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts,
4 and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation.”
Now we read this today and it is easy for us to do exactly as the scoffers are doing. See Peter gives us some insight here into their logic and flawed reasoning. I say we can do the same as they are by limiting our knowledge to just our perspective. What we can see, and what we have personally experienced. We are faced with scoffers nearly every day and we can assume that it has always been this way.
I want you to consider however the prophetic application of Peter’s letter here. Scoffers will come in the last days, our days I believe. Saying where is the promise of His coming? All things continue as they have always been.
Not so, we are more than 2,000 years since these words were written and we have these scoffers today, but understand that when they were written, evolution was not being taught. Darwin and his flawed theory was not even developed until the late 1830’s and he never published his famous volume, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection until sometime in 1859!
He continues on explaining the thinking of the scoffers and the false teachers...
5 For this they willfully forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water,
6 by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water.
7 But the heavens and the earth which are now preserved by the same word, are reserved for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
In there limited perspective of the way that things are now are the way that they have always been. Life happens, live, maybe evolve, and then die, and repeat, fails to consider the truth. They do what they do and they live and walk according to their own lusts because from their perspective there are no consequences, they see no judgement. But sadly, just because someone believes something to be true doesn’t make it false, and just because they don’t want to believe the bible, doesn’t mean that it is not true.
See a biblical world view of creation, of the fall of man, of the destruction of every living thing on the planet besides those God shut in the ark, impacts if we walk accorded to our lusts, or in accordance with the will of God. In verse 5 it says they willfully forget. They chose not to know the truth, they chose to ignore the truth, and they choose to forget what both creation and the Holy Spirit witnesses to them throughout their lives and they say there is now judgement and things are as they have always been.
It is a completely false premise. There was never rain before the flood. The world was covered by a canopy, that allowed for a perfect climate, of which Maine was apparently not the center of, because none of it stuck…except maybe the fall months. The oceans changed, the landscape certainly changed. The climate changed drastically as we continue to find fossilized animals with undigested food in their stomachs, educating us as to what the climate was in our northern and southern poles.
But they willfully forget the the world that then existed, no longer exists, verse 6 says it perished, flooded by water. But the Heavens and earth that were once created by the spoken word of God are now preserved by that same Word, but there is another major day of judgement coming. In fact the bible tells us that there will be a new Heaven and a new earth after the tribulation period. What we know now will be completely destroyed. This podium, this building, my flesh. He who holds it all together, the unknown “nuclear glue” the hand of God will let go and it will all be destroyed, not by water, but by fire as a part of the judgement of ungodly men.
Our flesh may be destroyed, the flesh of the ungodly will be destroyed, but not our souls, that part of us is eternal. What we do with Jesus determines our eternity. These last day scoffers willfully forget, or choose to believe a lie. The bible tells us...
11 And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son.
12 He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.
Life without Jesus is not life, it is eternal separation from God in Hell. Life does not cease to exist. Those in Hell are not void of consciousness. Peter tells us, just because we haven’t yet seen it, doesn’t mean that it is not happening, in fact in the waiting is salvation. Look at it with me, verse 8
8 But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
4 For a thousand years in Your sight Are like yesterday when it is past, And like a watch in the night.
God exists outside of time, we do not. Again, if we have a limited world view based only upon what we can see, touch, and experience, then two thousand years seems like a really, really long time. But God, who is eternal, views time from that perspective and a thousand years is as a day.
continuing on in verse 9
9 The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up.
I’m tempted to spend the rest of our time talking about this description of the day of the Lord coming as a thief in the night, but for today what we need to understand is that this is going to happen and for the rest of our chapter, Peter stops talking about these scoffers, and those that don’t believe, and he shifts to talking to us, believers. He gives us some practical application here in light of this truth.
In fact, he switches completely and start laying out those imperative commands. This is happening, so here is how you must respond. He begins in verse 11.
11 Therefore, since all these things will be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness,
We are to be this type of persons in holy conduct and godliness. OK, Peter what does this look like. Let me remind you of what he gave us in chapter 1 because he told us there to be diligent about these things and maybe some have already forgotten what they were. He says,
5 But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge,
6 to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness,
So these are the types of persons we should be, and then he continues on with the commands in verse 12 of chapter 3
12 looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat?
13 Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.
We shall be waiting and looking with anticipation…but not just looking for, notice again in verse 12 that we are to hasten the day of God. What? How can we hasten it?
Check this out
25 For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.
What is the fullness of the Gentiles and how can we effect it?
verse 14
14 Therefore, beloved, looking forward to these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless;
15 and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation—as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you,
There it is! We that might complain, or dread every day that the Lord tarries. But it isn’t because He is lazy or lack motivation, it is His love, and every day that He waits is salvation for another. There are several of you in this room that are very thankful that Jesus didn’t come back 20 years ago, or for others just 5 years ago, maybe even 5 months ago. There are others here that need to know that He could come back today.
16 as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which untaught and unstable people twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.
17 You therefore, beloved, since you know this beforehand, beware lest you also fall from your own steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked;
18 but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and forever. Amen.
We are to grow in the perfect Grace of God and Knowledge of God (intellectual and personal). Stagnation doesn’t do it, that is not abiding in Christ we need to be growing. Titus gives us some info on what growing in the grace of God does in our lives.
11 For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men,
12 teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age,
13 looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ,
14 who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.
These things are happening lets just look down through 11-18 again at Peters instructions. You might want to underline them or take note of them as they are his last words to us.
Grace and Peace