This is now, beloved, the second letter that I have written to you; and in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by reminding you,
Parallel Translations
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This is now, beloved, the second letter that I have written to you; and in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by reminding you,
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This is the seconde pistle that I now wryte vnto you beloved wherwith I stere vp and warne youre pure myndes
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This seconde Epistle I nowe write vnto you, beloued, wherewith I stirre vp, and warne your pure mindes,
Cross-references (9)
Passages linked to 2 Peter 3:1 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 2 Timothy 1:6 For this cause, I remind you that you should stir up the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands.
- 2 Peter 1:12-15 Therefore I will not be negligent to remind you of these things, though you know them, and are established in the present truth. I think it right, as long as I am in this tent, to stir you up by reminding you, knowing that the putting off of my tent comes swiftly, even as our Lord Jesus Christ made clear to me. Yes, I will make every effort that you may always be able to remember these things even after my departure.
- Psalms 24:4 He who has clean hands and a pure heart; who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood, and has not sworn deceitfully.
- Psalms 73:1 Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart.
- Matthew 5:8 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
- 1 Timothy 5:22 Lay hands hastily on no one. Don’t be a participant in other people’s sins. Keep yourself pure.
- 1 Peter 1:1-2 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the chosen ones who are living as foreigners in the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, in sanctification of the Spirit, that you may obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with his blood: Grace to you and peace be multiplied.
- 1 Peter 1:22 Seeing you have purified your souls in your obedience to the truth through the Spirit in sincere brotherly affection, love one another from the heart fervently,
- 2 Corinthians 13:2 I have said beforehand, and I do say beforehand, as when I was present the second time, so now, being absent, I write to those who have sinned before now, and to all the rest, that, if I come again, I will not spare;
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (28 sources)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 1. Lest they should be wearied with the Second…
1. Lest they should be wearied with the Second Epistle as though the first was sufficient, he says that it was not written in vain, because they stood in need of being often stirred up. To make this more evident, he shews that they could not be beyond danger, except they were well fortified, because they would have to contend with desperate men, who would not only corrupt the purity of the faith, by false opinions, but do what they could to subvert entirely the whole faith.
By saying, I stir up your pure mind, he means the same as though he had said, “I wish to awaken you to a sincerity of mind.” And the words ought to be thus explained, “I stir up your mind that it may be pure and bright.” For the meaning is, that the minds of the godly become dim, and as it were contract rust, when admonitions cease. But we also hence learn, that men even endued with learning, become, in a manner, drowsy, except they are stirred up by constant warnings.
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It now appears what is the use of admonitions, and how necessary they are; for the sloth of the flesh smothers the truth once received, and renders it inefficient, except the goads of warnings come to its aid. It is not then enough, that men should be taught to know what they ought to be, but there is need of godly teachers, to do this second part, deeply to impress the truth on the memory of their hearers. And as men are, by nature, for the most part, fond of novelty and thus inclined to be fastidious, it is useful for us to bear in mind what Peter says, so that we may not only willingly suffer ourselves to be admonished by others, but that every one may also exercise himself in calling to mind continually the truth, so that our minds may become resplendent with the pure and clear knowledge of it.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain The remedy against those wicked enemies both of true…
The remedy against those wicked enemies both of true doctrine and holiness, is to be sought for by the continual meditation of the writings of the Prophets and Apostles.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 1 This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto…
1 This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance:
Ver. 1. This second epistle] So must ministers with one sermon peg in another, and never cease beating and repeating the same point, saith St Augustine (de Doct. Christian.), till they perceive by the gesture and countenance of the hearers, that they understand it and are affected with it.
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I stir up] Gr. διεγειρω, I rouse you, who perhaps are nodding with the wise virgins, Mat 25:5.
Your pure minds] Gr. Pure as the sun. Chrysostom saith of some in his time that they were ipso caelo puriores, more pure than the visible heavens; and that they were more like angels than mortals. Hom. lv. in Matt.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain This second epistle: this confirms what has been said,…
This second epistle: this confirms what has been said, that this Epistle was written by Peter, as well as the former.
I stir up your pure minds; or, sincere minds: the sense is either:
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1. I stir up your minds, that they may be pure and sincere; and then he doth not so much commend them for what they were, as direct and exhort them to what they should be, that they might receive benefit by what he wrote, there being nothing that contributes more to the fruitful entertaining of the word, than sincerity and honesty of heart, when men lay aside those things which are contrary to it, and might hinder its efficacy, 1Pe 2:1,2. Or:
2. I stir up your minds, though pure and sincere, to continuance and constancy in that pure doctrine ye have received.
By way of remembrance: see 2Pe 1:13.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain Observe here, 1. The design of both St. Peter’s…
Observe here, 1. The design of both St. Peter’s epistles was one and the same, even to put them in remembrance of, and to call to their minds what they had formerly heard and understood, but possibly not retained, nor duly considered. This second epistle I write; in both which I stir up your minds by way of remembrance.
Note, The office of ministers is to be remembrancers, The Lord’s remembrancers, by putting him in mind of the people’s wants; their people’s remembrancers, by putting them frequently in mind of their duty to God. There is then a constant necessity of a conscientious ministry; none are weary of it but such as love not to be remembered of their duty by it.
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Nay, farther, St. Peter tells them, he would stir up their pure minds by ways of remembrance; implying, that the memories of the best Christians stand in need of refreshing, and the affections of the holiest want a fresh exciting. The freest Christians sometimes want a spur: We are slow to learn what we should do, and more slow to do what we have learnt.
Great then is the sin of those who contemn repeated truths. Cursed is that curiosity that despises a wholesome truth, because it is common. If we have such nice stomachs that will not endure to eat twice of the same dish, if wholesome; it is just with God, that want should overtake our wantonness.
Observe, 2. What it is that he would have them remember and be mindful of; it is the word of prophecy in the Old Testament, and the doctrine of the gospel in and under the New, That ye be mindful of the words spoken before by the holy prophets, namely, Enoch and Daniel, who prophesied of the general judgment of the last day, and of the destruction of Jerusalem, then at hand.
Observe, 3. How St. Peter here joins the prophets and apostles together, as concuring harmoniously in their doctrine; what was foretold by the prophets was confirmed by the apostles; hence they are said to have but one mouth, Luk 1:1 As he spake by the mouth of all his prophets, not by the mouths; for, though the prophets and apostles were many, yet had they all but one mouth, speaking all the same things.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain That the apostle might the better reach his end…
That the apostle might the better reach his end in writing this epistle, which is to make them steady and constant in a fiducial and practical remembrance of the doctrine of the gospel, he, 1. Expresses his special affection and tenderness for them, by calling them beloved, hereby evidencing that he added to godliness brotherly-kindness, as he had (Pe2 1:17) exhorted them to do. Ministers must be examples of love and affection, as well as life and conversation. 2. He evinces a sincere love to them, and hearty concern for them, by writing the same thing to them, though in other words. It being safe for them, it shall not be grievous to him to write upon the same subject, and pursue the same design, by those methods which are most likely to succeed. 3. The better to recommend the matter, he tells them that what he would have them to remember are, (1.) The words spoken by the holy prophets, who were divinely inspired, both enlightened and sanctified by the Holy Ghost; and, seeing these persons' minds were purified by the sanctifying operation of the same Spirit, they were the better disposed to receive and retain what came from God by the holy prophets. (2.) The commandments of the apostles of the Lord and Saviour; and therefore the disciples and servants of Christ ought to regard what those who are sent by him have declared unto them to be the will of their Lord. What God has spoken by the prophets of the Old Testament, and Christ has commanded by the apostles of the New, cannot but demand and deserve to be frequently remembered; and those who meditate on these things will feel the quickening virtues thereof. It is by these things the pure minds of Christians are to be stirred up, that they may be active and lively in the work of holiness, and zealous and unwearied in the way to heaven.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you,....…
This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you,.... This is a transition to another part of the epistle; for the apostle having largely described false teachers, the secret enemies of the Christian religion under a profession of it, passes on to take notice of the more open adversaries and profane scoffers of it; and from their ridicule of the doctrine of Christ's second coming, he proceeds to treat of that, and of the destruction of the world, and the future happiness of the saints: he calls this epistle his "second epistle", because he had written another before to the same persons; and that the author of this epistle was an apostle, is evident from Pe2 3:2; and which, compared with Pe2 1:18 shows him to be the Apostle Peter, whose name it bears, and who was an eyewitness to the transfiguration of Christ on the mount, Mat 17:1, he addresses these saints here, as also in Pe2 3:8, under the character of "beloved"; because they were the beloved of God, being chosen by him according to his foreknowledge, and regenerated by him, according to his abundant mercy; and were openly his people, and had obtained mercy from him, and like precious faith with the apostles; and were also the beloved of Christ, being redeemed by him, not with gold and silver, but with his precious blood; for whom he suffered, and who were partakers of his sufferings, and the benefits arising from them, and who had all things given them by him, pertaining to life and godliness, and exceeding great and precious promises; and were likewise beloved by the apostle, though strangers, and not merely as Jews, or because they were his countrymen, but because they were the elect of God, the redeemed of Christ, and who were sanctified by the Spirit, and had the same kind of faith he himself had. The Syriac and Arabic versions read, "my beloved"; and the Ethiopic version, "my brethren": his end in writing both this and the former epistle follows;
in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance; that this was his view both in this and the former epistle, appears from Pe1 1:13; he calls their minds pure; not that they were so naturally, for the minds and consciences of men are universally defiled with sin; nor are the minds of all men pure who seem to be so in their own eyes, or appear so to others; nor can any man, by his own power or works, make himself pure from sin; only the blood of Christ purges and cleanses from it; and a pure mind is a mind sprinkled with that blood, and which receives the truth as it is in Jesus, in the power and purity of it, and that holds the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience. Some versions, as the Vulgate Latin and Arabic, render the word "sincere", as it is in Phi 1:10; and may design the sincerity of their hearts in the worship of God, in the doctrines of Christ, and to one another, and of the grace of the Spirit of God in them; as that their faith was unfeigned, their hope without hypocrisy, and their love without dissimulation, and their repentance real and genuine; but yet they needed to be stirred up by way of remembrance, both of the truth of the Gospel, and the duties of religion; for saints are apt to be forgetful of the word, both of its doctrines and its exhortations; and it is the business of the ministers of the word to put them in mind of them, either by preaching or by writing; and which shows the necessity and usefulness of the standing ministry of the Gospel: the particulars he put them in mind of next follow.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain The apostle shows his design in writing this and…
CHAPTER III.
The apostle shows his design in writing this and the preceding
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epistle, 1, 2.
Describes the nature of the heresies which should take place in
the last times, 3-8.
A thousand years with the Lord are but as a day, 9.
He will come and judge the world as he has promised, and the
heavens and the earth shall be burnt up, 10.
How those should live who expect these things, 11, 12.
Of the new heavens and the new earth, and the necessity of being
prepared for this great change, 13, 14.
Concerning some difficult things in St. Paul 's epistles,
15, 16.
We must watch against the error of the wicked, grow in grace,
and give all glory to God, 17, 18.
NOTES ON CHAP. III.
Verse 1. This second epistle] In order to guard them against the seductions of false teachers, he calls to their remembrance the doctrine of the ancient prophets, and the commands or instructions of the apostles, all founded on the same basis.
He possibly refers to the prophecies of Enoch, as mentioned by Jude, Jude 1:14-15; of David, Ps 1:1, c. and of Daniel, Da 12:2, relative to the coming of our Lord to judgment: and he brings in the instructions of the apostles of Christ, by which they were directed how to prepare to meet their God.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain 2Pe 3:1-2. The doctrines and precepts delivered by the…
2Pe 3:1-2. The doctrines and precepts delivered by the prophets and apostles, being the most effectual means of preserving the Christian converts from being seduced by the false teachers spoken of in the preceding chapter, the apostle begins this with informing the brethren that his design in writing both his epistles was to bring these doctrines and precepts to their remembrance. And as one of the greatest of these men’s errors was their denying the coming of Christ to judge the world, and destroy this mundane system, he first exhorts the brethren to recollect what the holy prophets had anciently spoken on this subject, together with the commandments of the apostles of Christ to their disciples, to expect and prepare for these events. His saying, This second epistle I now write, &c., implies that he had written a former one to the same people, and he here affirms that in them both he had one great end in view, which was to stir up their minds (which he terms pure, or rather sincere, as ειλικρινη more properly signifies) to keep in remembrance and lay to heart what had been already taught them on these important subjects, so as to be properly influenced by it. The holy prophets intended, who had spoken of these things, were chiefly Enoch, mentioned Jdg 1:14-15; David, Psa 50:1-6; Psa 75:8; and Dan 12:2.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you…
This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you - This expression proves that he had written a former epistle, and that it was addressed to the same persons as this. Compare Introduction, Section 3.
In both which I stir up your pure minds ... - That is, the main object of both epistles is the same - to call to your remembrance important truths which you have before heard, but which you are in danger of forgetting, or from which you are in danger of being turned away by prevailing errors. Compare the notes at 2Pe 1:12-15. The word rendered “pure” (εἰλικρινής eilikrinēs) occurs only here and in Phi 1:10, where it is rendered “sincere.” The word properly refers to “that which may be judged of in sunshine;” then it means “clear, manifest;” and then “sincere, pure” - as that in which there is no obscurity. The idea here perhaps is, that their minds were open, frank, candid, sincere, rather than that they were “pure.” The apostle regarded them as “disposed” to see the truth, and yet as liable to be led astray by the plausible errors of others. Such minds need to have truths often brought fresh to their remembrance, though they are truths with which they had before been familiar.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Nelson Darby 1862 · Public Domain 2 Peter Chapter 3
2 Peter Chapter 3
In the last chapter, as we have said, it is materialism: trust in the stability of that which can be seen, in contrast with trust in the word of God which teaches us to look for the coming of Jesus, the return of the Lord. They judge by their senses. There is, say they, no appearance of change. This is not the case. To the eye of man it is indeed true that there is none. But these believers are willfully ignorant of the fact that the world has been already judged once; that the waters, out of which by the mighty word of God the earth came, had for the moment swallowed it up again, all perishing except those whom God preserved in the ark. And by the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. It is not that the Lord is slack concerning the promise of His return, but that He is still exercising grace, not wishing any to perish, but that all should come to repentance. And a thousand years are to Him but as a day, and a day as a thousand years. But the day of the Lord shall come, in which all things will pass away, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat and all that is on the earth will be consumed. Solemn consideration for the children of God, to maintain them in complete separation from evil, and from all that is seen, looking for and hastening the day in which the heavens shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat! Everything on which the hopes of the flesh are founded shall disappear for ever.
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Nevertheless, there shall be new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness shall dwell. It is not here said, “shall reign,” which would be the thousand years of the Lord’s dominion; here it is the eternal state, in which the government, that has brought all things into order, will terminate, and unhindered blessing will flow from God, the kingdom being given up to God the Father.
It is in following out the ways of God in government that the apostle carries them on to the eternal state, in which the promise will be finally accomplished. The millennium itself was the restitution, of which the prophets had spoken; and, morally, the heavens and the earth had been changed by the imprisonment of Satan and the reign of Christ (see Isa 65:17, Isa 18:1-7” 18, Jerusalem having been made a rejoicing); and the heavens indeed entirely cleared by power, never to be defiled by Satan again, the saints on high too in their eternal state, the earth delivered, but not yet finally freed. But, materially, the dissolution of the elements was, necessary for the renewal of all things.
It will be observed, that the Spirit does not speak here of the coming of Christ, except to say that it will be scoffed at in the last days. He speaks of the day of God, in contrast with the trust of unbelievers in the stability of the material things of creation, which depends, as the apostle shews, on the word of God. And in that day everything on which unbelievers rested and will rest shall be dissolved and pass away. This will not be at the commencement of the day, but at its close; and here we are free to reckon this day, according to the apostle’s word, as a thousand years, or whatever length of period the Lord shall see fit.
So solemn a dissolution of all that the flesh rests upon should lead us so to walk as to be found of the Lord, when He comes to introduce that day, in peace and blameless; accounting that the apparent delay is only the Lord’s grace, exercised for the salvation of souls. We may well wait, if God makes use of this time to rescue souls from judgment, by bringing them to the knowledge of Himself, and saving them with an everlasting salvation. This, the apostle says, had been taught by Paul, who wrote to them (the Hebrew believers) of these things, as he did also in his other epistles.
It is interesting to see that Peter, who had been openly rebuked before all by Paul, introduces him here with entire affection. He notices that Paul’s epistles contained an exalted doctrine, which they who were unstable, and not taught of God, perverted. For Peter in fact does not follow Paul in the field on which the latter had entered. This however does not prevent his speaking of Paul’s writings as forming a part of the scriptures; “as also the other scriptures,” he says. This is an important testimony; which moreover gives the same character to the writings of one who is able to bestow this title on the writings of another.
Let Christians then be watchful, and not allow themselves to be seduced by the errors of the wicked but strive to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and for ever. Amen!
John Nelson Darby — Synopsis of the Books of the Bible: the New Testament (c. 1857–1862) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain 2 Peter 3:1–9
2 Peter 3:1–9
Analysis:—Reference to the long-predicted rise of scoffers, and refutation of their unbelief
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1 This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance: 2That ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us1 the apostles of the Lord and Saviour: 3Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days2 scoffers,3 walking after4 their own lusts, 4And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were5 from the beginning of the creation. 5For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of Grod the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:6 6Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished: 7But the heavens and the earth which are now, by the same word7 are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. 8But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with8 the Lord as a thousand 9years, and a thousand years as one day.9 The10 Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward,11 not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
2Pe_3:1. This Epistle now, beloved, the second.—The flow of fiery, prophetical diction beginning with 2Pe_1:16, comes here to a point of rest. Peter takes up 2Pe_1:15.—Ἤδη in the acceptation of already, gives no good sense. [But this is doubtful; we have only to render “this Epistle, already a second” and the idea is plain that this Epistle was written very soon after the former; this is the opinion of Bengel, “priorem paullo ante scripserat;” cf. the same author on 2Pe_1:12, “alteram hanc epistolam scribit brevi intervallo post primam.”—M.] Connect ἥδη with γράφω not with δευτέραν. Now in the near prospect of death and in the presence of scoffers denying the coming of Christ, write I unto you. This passage defines more explicitly the somewhat indefinite statement of 2Pe_1:15; but this does not therefore exclude a reference to the Gospel according to St. Mark.
In both which I rouse, etc.—Ἐν αἷς, the pronoun is in the Plural, because δύο is implied in δευτέραν, Winer, p. 154.—Διεγείρω, it seems, must be taken as a Conjunctive for ἵνα ἐν αὐταῖς. On the sense see 2Pe_1:13.—Ὑμῶν may be connected with ὑπομνήσει or διάνοιαν; the latter seems preferable.—Εἰλικρινῆ, see Php_1:10 from εἵλη (sun-light) and κρίνω, something attentively examined in the light of the sun and found genuine, hence pure, clear, unmixed, [unadulterated.—M.] Διάνοια, 1Pe_1:13, “this pure mind is at once opposed to errors in doctrine and to excuses for the practice of vices. A man of a pure mind believes and loves the truth, and grows holy in the truth.” Roos. Such a mind can only be roused in the case of those, who are not in the truth, cf. Joh_18:37; Joh_3:21; 1Jn_1:6. A principal means thereto is the remembrance of the revelations of God, deposited in the writings of the Prophets and Apostles.
Ver 2. That ye should remember the words, etc.—Here, as in 1Pe_1:10-12 and 2Pe_1:19, great weight is attached to the word of prophecy, which is brought into most intimate connection, with the Apostolical doctrines.—Ἁγίων προφητῶν, see 2Pe_1:21.—Ἐντολῆς, 2Pe_2:21.—Ἡμῶν apposition with ἀποστόλων as in Act_10:41. The author here repeatedly describes himself (as in 2Pe_1:1) as an Apostle, just as he describes himself in 2Pe_3:1 as the Author of the first Epistle.—Μνησθῆναι, further definition of ἐν ὑποφητῶν. The Infinite of intention or of further definition, Winer p. 341.—Τοῦ κυρίου καὶ σωτῆρος; de Wette makes these words to be governed by the Infinitive and gives the ungrammatical rendering “of our Apostles.” But it is more natural to connect τοῦ κυρίου with ἐντολῆς. This has a double Genitive; cf. Winer, pt. 3:30. The one of these Genitives relates to the announcement, the other to the origin of the doctrine.—In the parallel passage, Judges 17, the reference to the Prophets is omitted.—De Wette’s interpretation being manifestly incorrect, we need not stop to refute his inference that the non-apostolical author here betrays himself and acts out of his character.
2Pe_3:3. Knowing this first that in the last of the days scoffers shall come.—2Ti_3:1; cf. 1Ti_4:1. They are to consider it as a principal point of the prophetical and apostolical word that—γινώσκοντες. Here we should expect the Accusative, governed by μνησθῆναι. Such, probably intentional, anacolutha are of frequent occurrence. Conceptions expressed by the casus recti of Participles, are exhibited with greater prominence, Winer, p. 594; cf. Act_15:23; Eph_4:2; Eph_3:17.
Shall come, cf. 2Pe_2:1; Mat_24:5; Mat_24:11; Mat_24:24; Mat_7:15; Mat_7:22; 1Jn_4:1. The parallel passage Judges 18 is almost identical; ὅτι ἐν ἐσχάτῳ χρόνῳ ἔσονται ἐμπαῖκται, κατὰ τὰς ἑαυτῶν ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμενοι, with the addition τῶν ἀσεβερῶν.—Ἐπ’ ἐσχάτου τῶν ἡμερῶν. The Adjective Neuter is often used emphatically instead of the Substantive. Winer, p. 248. At the end of these present days of the world. [But as ἐσχατών is the best supported reading, cf. App. Crit., it is better to translate “in the last of the days”; there is perhaps no difference in meaning, but the Plural seems to extend the expression over a wider space, so Alford; Wordsworth: “From this reference, it appears that St. Jude wrote his Epistle after the present Epistle, and that he owned this Epistle to be the work of an Apostle, and therefore an authentic writing; and if authentic, then it must be also genuine, for it asserts itself to be written by St. Peter, 2Pe_1:1; 2Pe_1:17, where the writer describes himself as present at the transfiguration, at which only three Apostles were present, viz.: Peter, James and John.”—M.]—Ἐμπαῖκται (from ἐμπαίζω to play, sport in or on) scoffers, deceivers; cf. LXX. in Isa_3:4, for תַּעֲלוּלִים, petulantiæ, petulantes, people that jest about things of the greatest importance. Here we encounter another class of adversaries of Christ, different from the false prophets and teachers described in the second chapter. The two classes have this in common, that they are Epicurean and Antinomian. in mind, cf. 2Pe_3:17; 2Pe_2:18-19. The appearance of such men is predicted Act_20:29; 1Ti_4:1; 2Ti_3:2, etc. If the reading ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ is retained, it is necessary to use a mark of distinction after the latter word, rendering: “they shall come in the spirit of scoffing, as scoffers, walking, etc.” [“They will not only be scoffers, but they will come in scoffing, like those of whom the Psalmist says, that their delight is in cursing, and that they clothe themselves with it, as it were, with a raiment (Psa_109:16-17); and the contrast is striking to the Divine words εὐλογῶν εὐλογήσω, Gen_22:17, cf. Eph_1:3, ὁ εὐλογήσας ἡμᾶς ἐν πάσῃ εὐλογίᾳ and Clem. Rom_1:24.” Wordsworth.—M.]
Walking after their own lusts.—They no longer appear in sheep’s clothing, but exhibit their wolf-nature.—Κατὰ τὰς ἰδίας αὑτων. Ἰδίας brings out the self-will and opposition of these men to the law of God.—Ἐπιθυμίας πορευόμεναι. Bengel: “This is the origin of error, the root of libertinism.” Luther: “These are our Epicureans and Sadducees, who believe neither one thing nor the other, who live as they think best and walk after their own lusts, considering permitted whatever suits their pleasure: examples of such are met on every hand.”—Πορευόμενοι, see 1Pe_4:3.
2Pe_3:4. Where is the promise of His coming?—Similar to the daring words of the scoffers in Mal_2:17 : “Where is the God of judgment?” The same form of speech occurs in Luk_8:25; Psa_42:4; Psa_79:10. Where is it? e. g., Where is its fulfilment? It is nowhere to be found.
The promise.—They use the language of believers, to whom the coming of their Lord is the most cherished desire, cf. Luk_21:28.
Of His coming.—παρουσίας. Used here in a more special sense than in 2Pe_1:16, of the visible coming of Christ to the judgment of the wicked and to the consummation of His Kingdom, Mat_24:3; Mat_24:27; Mat_24:37; 1Th_2:19; 1Th_3:13; 2Pe_3:12.—Αὐτοῦ, they do not take His name on their lips, so much do they disdain it. [Polycarp, 100:7: “Whosoever does not confess the suffering of the cross, is of the devil; and whosoever perverts the oracles of the Lord to his own lusts, and says that there is neither resurrection nor a judgment,—he is the first-born of Satan.”—M.]
For since the fathers fell asleep.—Ἀφ’ ἧς γὰρ scil. ἡμέρας. De Wette is wrong in saying: “The author appears to assume these scoffers, as present and that prediction as fulfilled.” No; this appearance springs solely from critical prejudices. Peter puts himself into the time of the fulfilment of that prediction, when the first generation of believers had already fallen asleep; most of them had expected the visible coming of the Lord as immediately connected with the destruction of Jerusalem; but after that catastrophe had taken place without the expected visible coming of the Lord, the scoffers took occasion to deny the coming of the Lord altogether. This Peter foresees in the Spirit. The word fathers denotes therefore not the Patriarchs, the ancestors of the Jewish people, nor (as Dietlein maintains) any preceding generation standing to that immediately succeeding it in the relation of fathers, but the fathers of the second generation of Christians. Otherwise the sentence would be pleonastic, because ἀπ’ ἀδχῆς follows after.—Ἐκοιμήθησαν like ἐπαγγελία, to be understood in a mocking sense, as imitating the language of believers.
All things remain thus from the beginning of the creation.—Διαμένει, they remain without intermission, the whole world remains according to its old constitution, in the consistence which it has once for all, it remains through all mutations. Huther arbitrarily inserts the idea, “since the fathers …. hath come to pass; all things continue thus.…”—Others supply ὡς ἦν, as it was from the beginning of creation, which is equally arbitrary. The construction is pregnant: “All things from the time of our fathers remain in a general way, as they are; yea, from the beginning of creation all things remain essentially the same.” Bengel gives to οὕτω a pregnant force: “All things remain thus as they remain from the beginning of the world.” [Sic permanent, ut permanent.”—M.] Dietlein makes these erring spirits speculative philosophers who advance the proposition that “the history of creation is endless; the destiny of the human race is not one that actually occurs at a given time and terminates the course of the world, but it fulfils itself in an untemporal (unzeitlich) manner (it is immanent, to use the language of modern speculation); and this they infer from the circumstance, that one generation passes away after another, and is dispatched as they suppose, and that therefore it cannot be otherwise with all succeeding generations.” There is no reason to assume such a system in the case of these trifling Epicureans, and ἀπ’ ἀρχῆς is absolutely in conflict with such an assumption.—Luther explains the inference of the false teachers as follows: “The world has stood so long, and has always remained thus; should it now at last become otherwise?” We must however add in the sense of those scoffers: The coming of Christ and the destruction of the world were long since predicted as connected with the destruction of Jerusalem without coming to pass; where then is now the word of the Scripture?
2Pe_3:5. For it is hidden to them, because they thus will it.—Refutation of the assertion that all things remain in the same condition by the fact of the flood.—Τοῦτο belongs to ὅτι, not to θέλοντας, as in 2Pe_3:8, and θέλειν denotes not “to choose a view” (eine Ansicht belieben, as Dietlein maintains), for this meaning cannot be verified. Huther, indeed, cites a passage from Herodotus, but it is isolated and proves nothing for the New Testament. It denotes “a guilty ignorance,” as Luther translates; they are wilfully ignorant of it; they are wilfully blind to the consideration of the flood. Winer, p. 489, note [says: In 2Pe_3:5, λανθάνει τοῦτο θέλοντας I prefer the rendering: latet eos hoc (what follows) volentes, i. e., volentes ignorant, to the other: latet eos (what follows) hoc (what precedes) volentes, i. e., contendentes. The former brings out more clearly the guilt of the mockers. Neither in Col_2:18, is θέλων to be taken as an adverb.—M.]
That the heavens and an earth were from of old, etc.—Οὐρανοί, as usual in the Plural like שָמַיִם, cf. 2Co_12:2.—Ἔκπαλαι, from of old, from the first origin of all things.—Ἦσαν, de Wette, Huther, al., refer it primarily to οὐρανοί, but then also to γῆ συνεστῶσα. This might pass grammatically (Winer, p. 368), but how are we to conceive the heavens to consist out of and through water? De Wette, indeed, observes that the conception that the heavens (the firmament) were made out of water, may be justified by Gen_1:6, but he is conscious of the unsatisfactoriness of this exposition, since he proposes to refer ἐκ to the earth and διά to the heavens (through the water). This is very forced, and in no event applicable to the starry heavens, which are of course included in οὐρανοί. According to the representation of the Bible, the firmament (רָקִּיעַ) consists not out of water, but forms a wall of partition between the waters above and the waters below, Gen_1:7-8.—The earth originated out of water, out of the dark matter in which it was comprehended, and through water, i. e., (as Winer, p. 438, explains it) through the agency of water, which partly descended into the lower parts of the earth, and partly formed the clouds in the sky. The earth, moreover, manifoldly received its diversified form through the water, consists in a great measure in water and this element, as already noticed by Oecumenius, holds it together and cements it.—The Indo-Ægyptian cosmogonies, to which de Wette refers, and which are said to contain an account of a chemical origin of the world out of water, are altogether irrelevant. [Bengel: “Gradatio, aqua terram texerat: ex aquis terra emersit: et aqua inserviit, ut terra consisteret, sicut Creator eam formavit et collocavit. Aqua ceteroqui levior est, et terra inferiores partes petit, usque eo, ut omnis aqua, in linea recta a superficie ad centrum orbis hujus sive rotundi systematis, terram semper sub se habeat: sed in ipsa superficie terra passim supra aquas plus minusve eminet; et vel hunc aqua locum quasi invita, et potentissimo jussu divino coacta, terræ concessit et reliquit. Exo_20:4; Psa_24:2; Psa_104:5-8; Psa_136:6; Job_38:10.”—The assertion that the earth arose out of the water is opposed to the dogma of Simon Magus, that it was engendered from fire. Wordsworth referring to Hippolyt., Refut. haer, p. 165.—M.]
By the word of God may refer both to the heavens and to the earth, cf. Gen_1:6; Gen_1:9. But we may also join these words more intimately with συνεστῶσα, which appears to be preferable, as it gives greater prominence to the thought, that it does not consist a moment longer than God permits. Bengel: “By the word of God is defined the duration of all things, so that it cannot be longer or shorter.” [The reference here is to the creative energy of the Divine Logos. The Jewish readers of Peter’s Epistle were familiar with that doctrine, which was opposed to the error of the Gnostics who held that the universe was made by angels or by the demiurge opposed to the supreme God. Irenæus I., 19, declares, that the world was not made by angels, nor by any powers separated from God, but by His Word, i. e., Christ. Psa_32:6; Joh_1:3. The same author says, II., 2 Peter 2 : “All things which God made, He made by the indefatigable Word, even as John the disciple of the Lord declares concerning Him, Joh_1:3.”—M.]
2Pe_3:6. Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished.—Δι’ ὧν cannot possibly refer to ὕδατος (Huther), more especially because ὕδατι follows after; nor can it signify: quapropter, nor “through which circumstances it also came to pass that. …” (Dietlein), still less “yet” (dennoch—Luther). It evidently belongs to οὐρανοὶ καὶ γῆ. It was just the heavens and the earth which became the instruments of destruction of the then κόσμος, i. e., for the then existing world of human beings and animals. Peter uses κόσμος in precisely the same sense, 2Pe_2:5. The heavens became such an instrument of destruction, when their windows were opened and it rained as never before since the creation of the world, Gen_7:11. The earth which had been founded upon the waters and risen out of the water, Psa_24:2, in obedience to the command of God was compelled to pour forth its treasures of water, Gen_8:2, in order to destroy man and beast. Who would have believed this before the flood came? Who would have supposed that the heavens and earth did contain within them such powers of destruction, seeing that they consisted so long before? Every attempt of taking κόσμος in another sense, understanding it of the whole world, of the universe (Huther, al.), or more particularly of the earth (Calov), fails to bring out the full force of ἀπώλετο which was then to be circumscribed to such an extent as to denote a great mutation, which conflicts with grammatical usage. But here we must take a retrospective view of ἔκπαλαι, 2Pe_3:5, in order to understand the full refutation of the antagonistic proposition. l. Ἔκπαλαι should be joined not only with οὐρανοί, but also with γῆ. The heavens and the earth even in the time of Noah had consisted from of old, upwards of 1600 years; from this circumstance the men of that time might have drawn the inference that all things in the world of man would ever remain, even as they were; but how fallacious was that inference! 2. With this is connected the thought, that considering that the earth came into existence and does consist by the Word of God, the people of that time might surely have been able to understand that it could be destroyed by the self-same Word. 3. The event has shown, that the world of man was destroyed just by the heavens and the earth, which to them had the appearance of an imperishable existence. 4. Now the heavens and the earth, as intimated in 2Pe_3:7, underwent also a change in that catastrophe. That flood which covered the whole earth would be inexplicable without an extraordinary influence exerted by God upon the heavens and the earth, whereby their condition was changed. Gen_9:11; cf. Gen_10:25, where reference is made to an extraordinary terrestrial catastrophe, expressly testify that the earth was destroyed by the flood, and that it presented in many respects an appearance very different from that which it had before that mighty revolution.
2Pe_3:7. But the heavens and the earth which are now, by His word are kept in store.—Οἱ δὲ νῦν οὐρανοί. Νῦν belongs also to γῆ and presupposes a change wrought upon the heavens and the earth by the flood; according to our exposition, it is not in antithesis with ὁ τότε κόσμος.—Τῷ αὐτοῦ λόγῳ. The same Divine omnipotence which commanded the water to destroy men and to lay waste the earth, will hereafter destroy the present world by fire, and not only change the surface of the earth. [Irenæus calls the last conflagration, “diluvium ignis.” Bengel: “Ignis confutabit empæctas.”—M.]
Kept in store.—θήσαυρίζειν, properly, to lay up in store, to treasure up, e. g., grain or a treasure. The meaning is not, that the present world is only a treasure gathered together and saved from the deluge, merely a remnant of the original world-totality. Such an idea belongs not to θησαυρός. But the reference is doubtless partly to the promise (Gen_9:15), and partly to the redemption in Christ. Calov:—“The world, for a certain time, is as yet in store and left unhurt, like treasure stored up in a chest, as yet untouched.” Huther justly rejects Dietlein’s notion that the idea of profit must be held fast, in the sense that the heavens and the earth are the materials stored up for the exercise of punishment, yet so that they shall perish under the punishment.
Reserved unto fire, etc.—Πυρὶ must not be connected with τεθησαυρισμένοι, but with τηρούμενοι. Just as fire is even now an instrument of punishment to the world, so it will be used as an instrument of the destruction of the world in the final judgment, cf. Gen_19:24; Amo_7:4; Isa_66:15; Dan_7:9; 2Th_1:8; Mat_3:12; Mat_25:41; Rev_19:20; Rev_20:10. This is enlarged upon in 2Pe_3:10.—Τηρούμενοι, used several times by Peter, 1Pe_1:4; 2Pe_2:4; 2Pe_2:9; 2Pe_2:17.—Ἀπωλείας.—Calov:—“Not perfect destruction, but perdition and eternal death.”—Τῶν ἀσεβῶν ἀνθρώπων.—Dietlein applies this to the whole human race, because with the exception of the converted, it is ungodly. [But he is here, as so often, inaccurate and unreliable. The reference is simply to the ungodly among men. The following passage from an oration by Melito, Bp. of Sardis, in the second century, published from the Syriac by Cureton, is an interesting relic of ancient exegesis: “There was a flood of water, and all men and living creatures were destroyed by the multitude of waters, and the just were preserved in an ark of wood by the ordinance of God. So also it will be at the last time; there will be a flood of fire, and the earth will be burnt up, together with its mountains, and men will be burnt up with the idols which they have made; and the sea together with the isles will be burnt, and the just shall be delivered from the fury (of the fire), as their fellows in the ark (were saved) from the waters in the deluge”.—M.]
2Pe_3:8. But let this one thing not escape you, etc.—This is not a second refutation of the scoffers, but the removal of an obstacle which believers might find in the protracted delay of Christ’s advent.
That one day is before the Lord.—The shortest space of time before Him, is in His sight long enough for the execution of events, which in our computation would require a thousand years, and the longest space of time before Him passes away as rapidly as does a day to us. In order to occupy the right stand-point with respect to the coming of Christ, we must apply the standard of eternity, and not use human measures of time. The second clause of the proposition is taken from Psa_90:4. Time is not absolutely denied in the case of God, but His relation to time is very different from that sustained by us men, the creatures of a day. Bengel:—“God’s ænologium (time-piece for eternity) differs from the horologium (time-piece for hours) of mortals. But how shall we understand this? If we could understand it, Moses and Peter would not have been under the necessity of adding “with the Lord.”—Stier:—“He who created the heavens and the earth in six days, because He thus willed it, may also suddenly accomplish in one day that which under other circumstances would require a thousand years; in like manner He may ordain thousands of years to be to the world week-and-work-days before His great Sabbath begins to dawn. The longest time is only brief after God’s measure; yet it hastens and rushes irresistibly into eternity, just because it is time.”—Thiersch:—“The internal development of mankind, which must have reached its consummation before the end of the world, is so entirely dependent on the Divine disposal that at one time there may occur a step forward so mighty that we should hardly have expected it to take place in a thousand years, while at another time, the course of development, retarded by God, does not progress in a thousand years any further than at other times in a day.” This is as incorrect as Dietlein’s view, that God will punish in one day the sin of thousands of years, and thus equalize the great disfiguring which by so long a duration had come into eternity; that otherwise the duration of time with God is of great, though not of necessary, importance, because a thousand years are before Him as one day.—The Fathers, as is well known, have drawn from this passage the inference that the world is to last six thousand years, especially as Heb_4:9 speaks of a Sabbath-time of the people of God, but without sufficient reason.
2Pe_3:9. The Lord is not tardy.—Οὐ βραδύνει ὁ κύριος. Bραδύνω, to delay, to postpone [to be late.—M.], usually construed with the Accusative, but here with the Genitive. See Winer, § 30.—De Wette:—βραδύνει is not taken in relation to a definite point of time, according to human expectation, as in 1Ti_3:15, but with reference to the purpose and counsel (of God); for although with reference to the former the author admitted a delay, he denied the title to such an expectation, according to 2Pe_3:8, because God’s views of time (as well as His thoughts and ways, cf. Isa_55:8) are different from men’s. Similarly, Sirach , 35, 22; cf. Hab_2:3.—Calov:—“Although it seems as though He were tardy (Rev_6:10), He is not tardy after the manner of men, from procrastination or neglect, but from long-suffering, for, as Justin observes, He prefers repentance to punishment.”—Κύριος, as in 2Pe_3:8, denotes God the Father.—ὡς τινὲς βραδυτῆτα. The reference here is not to scoffers, who deny the coming of Christ, but to weak believers.
But He is long-suffering towards us, etc.—μακροθυμεῖ. He is long-suffering, putting off His punishment for a long time, Mat_18:26; Mat_18:29; Luk_18:7; 1Th_5:14. Εἰς ἡμᾶς, towards us, the called, then to us all, to men in general. Βούλεσθαι, to will, as the result of conscious deliberation, but not with irresistible coercion. Calov:—“As an earthly king would desire to see all his subjects happy, as far as they are his subjects, not as far as they are malefactors.”—Χωρεῖν εἰς, to go into, to enter, Mat_15:17; cf. Eze_18:23; Eze_33:11; 1Ti_2:4.—The adherents of the Calvinistic doctrine of predestination wrongly restrict this passage to the elect. Calvin himself explains it of the will of God revealed in the Gospel as contrasted with His hidden counsel.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. A sure means of resisting the temptations of the last anti-Christian times and of repelling the assaults of deceivers is keeping the prophetic and apostolic word in an honest and good heart, even as Christ often exhorts us to keep His sayings against the subtle attacks of the enemy.—“In the last days there will be a thorough confluence of all the corruption engendered by former unbelief.”—“He who by his lusts is corrupted in error, will do what he desires, and will not be deterred from it by any fear of God. This necessitates an unbelieving cancelling of all the truth of God, and if good proofs of such pretences are wanting, scoffing and witty humour must become the substitutes of proof.” H. Rieger.
2. Peter in making mention of the last days, draws no distinction between the second and third coming of Jesus, as made prominent in the Revelation of John, and alluded to in 1Co_15:23-24. This circumstance deserves to be noticed in connection with the inquiry relating to the date of this Epistle.
3. “The Word of God composed in writing is the instrument of our conversion and illumination, the store-house of all salutary knowledge and wisdom, and the armory against all sorts of enemies.” Gerhard.
4. Although we must identify the scoffers primarily as those deceivers, who arose at the end of the Apostolic age, the prophecy, nevertheless, is ever undergoing new fulfilments in the course of time, and will have its most fearful fulfilment in the last times. In ancient times, Simon Magus is cited as denying the end of the world (in the Pseudo-Clementine Recogn., 2Pe_3:3); in the middle ages, a heresy sprung up, which maintained the imperishableness of the world. v. Meyer asks whether that portrait of the future does not perfectly apply to the rebellious liberty and wanton licentiousness of the corrupt priesthood and monastic orders of the middle ages and later times? “The Hegelian school of philosophers (at least those of the left side) deride the Church’s faith in a visible advent of Christ, in the judgment and the end of the world, as a pietistic notion. They see in the dominant influence of the idea (Begriff), brought about by the Hegelian philosophy, Christ returned, and regard the end of pietism, of orthodox Christianity as heretofore existing, to be the end of the world.” Richter.
5. “It is an old trick of the devil to oppose the course of nature to the word and promises of God, seeing that God is the Author of nature, and able at His pleasure to change or wholly destroy it.” Gerhard.
6. The traditions of other nations also contain the hypothesis that the world originated out of water. The Chinese and the Egyptians teach that water is the oldest element. The Vedas of the Hindoos declare that this world was originally water; the code of Manu declares that water was the first thing which God created; Ramayana reports that originally all things were water, and that the earth was formed out of it. But this, so far from being a ground of suspicion against the teaching of Scripture, in connection with other reasons, constitutes a proof in its favour.
7. In like manner all nations have their legends of the great deluge, of which the highest mountains, the graves and caverns of the earth bear testimony. The deluge, according to Scripture, was not partial and local, but universal; but natural science, to be sure, is incompetent to account for it by natural causes.
8. The preservation of the world, as well as its beginning, depends altogether on the will, the word and the direction of God. “The word of God is not only the architect of the heavens and the earth, but also the prop and foundation of this edifice, Heb_1:3.” Gerhard.
9. The statements of Peter respecting the world being reserved unto fire, are partly connected with the sayings of Christ, Mar_9:44; Mat_3:10; Mat_3:12; Mat_25:41; Mat_13:40; Mat_13:42; Mat_6:22, and partly, where he goes beyond them, to be regarded as a revelation which he had received. The religions of the pagans and the philosophemes of the Greeks and Romans, frequently describe fire as the end of the world. Zoroaster assumed a dissolution of the mountains by the action of fire. The Orphic cosmogony, Heraclitus and the Stoics, the Epicureans, Pliny, Ovid, the Gallicans and the Scandinavians coincide in this respect. The Mexicans describe the fourth age of the world, as the age of fire. The Hindoos also teach the future burning of the world. “This fact proves nothing against the truth of this doctrine. On the contrary, it can only deepen the overpowering impression of the sacred revelations of the final judgment.” Dietlein.—“As men are melted and purified by the fire (of the law, the love of God and the sufferings of Christ), so it will fare with the earth which goes the course of man. In the time of Tycho de Brahe, according to the opinion of some, another solar system met perhaps a similar fate.” Richter.
10. Although time was created simultaneously with the creature, it is nevertheless to God also a reality, otherwise He would not interfere with time and be conscious of what occurs in time; but He is superior to the river of time and controls it. A thousand years with Him are as one day, similar, (so Bengel puts it), as a thousand flourins are with a rich man as a farthing.
11. Even before Justin and other fathers gave currency to the opinion that the world should last six thousand years, the ancient Etruscans taught from tradition that the world’s duration was fixed at 6000 years, that the sixth millennium would bring the end and the great year.
12. Calov rightly declares 2Pe_3:9 to be an unanswerable proof against the absolute decree of Calvin, and quotes also 1Ti_2:4. God wills to save all men only in Christ and in the order of repentance and faith.
[13. Bp. Conybeare on 2Pe_3:5 : “The truth of the case is, God does not interpose in a miraculous manner upon every instance of sin: as He hath made men free agents, so He doth not interrupt the use of this liberty by breaking in upon the common order of causes and effects. Hence nature goes on for the most part in one uniform course; and exemplary punishments are reserved only for extraordinary occasions. Yet still God hath not left Himself without witness: many predictions of His prophets have been already confirmed by fact; the old world was destroyed by a miracle, and Sodom and Gomorrah are set forth for an example, having suffered the vengeance of eternal fire.” Instances of this kind, it must be confessed, are rare: however, those few which have been afforded us are enough to alarm the sinner. Men should not flatter themselves that their crimes are forgotten, because they are yet unpunished: but rather dread the delays of vengeance. Though mercy spares them for the present, yet this very mercy, if slighted, will increase their future ruin.—M.]
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
The advent of Christ: 1. Its signs and certainty. 2. The particulars attending it. 3. The preparation for it.—As the coming of the Lord draws nearer, the denial and derision of it will grow stronger.—It should be our most anxious care to be ready, whether the Lord come early or late.—Why does God defer the full punishment of the ungodly to the day of judgment? 1. Because the measure of their unrighteousness is not yet wholly filled; 2. Because it is His will to accord to sinners room for repentance; 3. In order to set His long-suffering towards all men, in the clearest light; 4. In order to make more manifest the wickedness of those who will not be converted.—Let us take heed, not to abuse the long-suffering of God, but to know the time of our visitation, Luk_19:44.—What is the longest life in the light of eternity? A span of time of 1½ to 2 hours’ duration.
Starke:—As frail men grow soon tired and are overcome of sleep, so it is with Christians; hence it is necessary that they should be constantly stirred, shaken and roused, Heb_12:1.—The works of our bad Christians show that they believe neither in heaven nor hell, neither in angels nor in the devil, but the truth will come home to them, Zep_1:12.—Only see, how deeply man can fall through the violence of his lusts; deeper than the devil himself, who denies neither God nor His judgment, but trembles at it, Mat_8:29; Jam_2:19.—Ignorance in things human or Divine is never good, but malicious ignorance, which refuses to hear and to know the truth, is worthy of hell-fire, Isa_1:11.—The present world will be more severely visited than the former world, which was laid waste by water; but this world will be burnt up by a consuming fire, which the Lord Himself will kindle, 2Th_1:7-8.—The long-suffering of God is accompanied by tender love, looking to the salvation of men; hence He does not overtake them with His judgment of wrath, but gives them time enough to repent, Eze_33:11; Eze_2:1.
V. Herberger:—1. How Peter answers five questions relating to the last day. 2. How thoroughly he instructs us as to the manner of our preparing for it. Ad 1. a. Whether we are yet to wait confidently for the last day? b. When and at what time it will come? c. Why Jesus has not come for so long a time? d and e. How and in what manner the last day will come? f. What the Lord Jesus will do and perform on the last day? Ad 2. a. In holy conversation and godliness, b To wait and haston unto the coming of the day of the lord, c. To give all dillgence that we may be found of Him without spot and blameless.
J. C. Storr:—The waiting of believers for the coming of the day of God: 1. What they wait for; 2. who are they who wait? 3. How do they wait?
Stier:—The Apostle’s word concerning the expectation of the last day: 1. The certainty of its coming; 2. The manner of its coming; 3. The preparation for it.
Kapff:—The beginning and completion of the Kingdom of God: 1. The beginning in the creation of the world and man; 2. The completion in the renovation of man and of the world.
Lisco:—The completion with which the citizens of the kingdom comfort themselves. The emptiness of the objections against the Bible-dogma of the Lord’s coming to judgment.
Staudt:—The destruction of the world: 1. The reasons why many do not believe it; 2. How does the destruction of the world affect us?
Sharp:—[O what confusion will this be to all unbelievers and impenitent sinners, when they shall see that very Person, of whom they thought so meanly, and whose offers of salvation they often despised, appearing in the clouds of heaven with ten thousand glorious angels about Him, and coming in the most terrible manner that can be imagined, to call them to account for their lives past, and to execute judgment upon all ungodly men! They will not then any longer, with the scoffers, that Peter tells us should be in the last days, say, “where is the promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation;” for they shall be convinced that, however His coming was for good reasons deferred, yet He shall then come to purpose; to the everlasting confusion of their faces, that opposed, or despised, or neglected Him and His religion. Then shall they say, Yonder He is, whom we slighted, whose religion we denied, whose servants and followers we took to be no better than a company of credulous fools! Lo, yonder He is in the clouds, whose tenders of mercy we have refused, whose counsels we have rejected, to whose Spirit we have done despite! Yonder He is: but no longer “a carpenter’s son;” no longer “a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;” no longer a mean, obscure Galilean; no longer a crucified God, as we in derision called Him: but the everlasting Son of the everlasting Father; the Sovereign of angels! the Judge of mankind and of devils; the Lord of all things both in earth and heaven.—M.]
[Cf. Joseph Mede’s Paraphrase and Exposition of St. Peter. 2. Epistle, 2 Peter 3. Works, II. 753.
Additional Sermon-Themes:
2Pe_3:3. Ridicule in matters of religion. Modern infidelity. Some prophecies are daily fulfilling.
2Pe_3:4. Miracles now neither necessary to the conviction of unbelievers, nor the conversion of sinners, (Fiddes). Consistency between the efficacy of prayer and the uniformity of nature. (Chalmers).
2Pe_3:8. God’s eternity in reference to the suspension of his promised purposes, (R. Hall).—M.]
Footnotes:
[1] 2Pe_3:1. [German: “This Epistle, beloved, I now write you as the second in order to rouse in it [as also in the former] your pure mind by way of remembrance”.—M.]
2Pe_3:2. [ Lachmann and Tischendorf read ὑμῶν. According to the testimony of most of the authorities this must be considered the original reading. [ἡμῶν, Rec. Oec; ὑμῶν A. B. C. K. L., Cod. Sin.—M.]
Translate: That ye should remember the words spoken before by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour given by your Apostles. Alford.….and the commandment of the Apostles of their Lord and Saviour. Wordsworth. Fronmüller agrees with Alford in the construction but, retaining ἡμῶν, renders:.… and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour, given to you by us the Apostles.—As the authorities are overwhelmingly against ἡμῶν, Alford’s rendering is the most correct and grammatical.—The construction is difficult, but the sense is clear and ὑμῶν so far from affecting the genuineness of the Epistle, is an evidence for its genuineness. A forger would certainly have used ἡμῶν, but a real Apostle may content himself with modestly saying ὑμῶν.—M.]
[2] 2Pe_3:3. Lachmann and Tischendorf read ἐσχάτων. [ἐσχάτου Rec. K. L. ἐσχάτων. A. B.C*., Cod. Sin., Vulg., Copt., al., Alf., Words.—M.]
[German: “at the end of the days.” Translate: “in the last of the days.”—M.]
[3]2Pe_3:3.[ Omit ἐν ἐμπαιγμονῇ, Rec., K. L., insert A. B. C., Vulg., Copt., Syr., al.—M.] Griesb., Lachm., Tischend., ἐμπαιγμονῇ another ἃπαξ λεγόμ. [Scholz., Alf., Wordsw.—M.]
[4]2Pe_3:3. [ Translate: Scoffers in scoffing, or (mockers in mockery.) Lillie.—M.] [αὐτῶν before ἐπιθνμίας Rec, A., al., Oec.—M.] αὐτῶν after ἐπιθυμίας [B. C. K. L.] Griesbach. [Alford.]
[5]2Pe_3:4. [ German:.…. all things remain thus from the beginning of the creation. Better than “continue as they were from,” etc., in E. V.—M.]
[6] 2Pe_3:5. [ German: For it is hidden to them, because they thus will it, that the heavens and an earth were from of old out of water and by means of water consisting by the word of God.
Translate: For this escapes them of their own will, that the heavens were from of old, and the earth out of water and by means of water consisting by the word of God.—M.]
[7] 2Pe_3:7. Lachmann reads τῷ αὐτῷ, by the same word, as in 2Pe_3:6. But Tischendorf with B. C. K. L. reads τῷ αὐτοῦ.
[Translate with German: “by His word.” With this single, but important variation, the E. V. cannot be improved here.]
[8]2Pe_3:8. [ παρὰ κυρίου. Cod. Sin.—M.]
[9] 2Pe_3:8. [ German: But let not this one thing be hidden to you, beloved, that one day is before the Lord as a thousand years, etc.
Translate: But let this one thing not escape you, (with allusion to 2Pe_3:5), beloved, that one day, etc.—M.]
[10]2Pe_3:9. [ Insert ὁ before κύριος, Rec., K. L., al.; omit A. B. C., Cod. Sin.] Lachm. and Tischendorf.
[11] 2Pe_3:9. Lachmann reads δἰ ὑμᾶς, for your, the believers’, sake; but Tischend., with many anthorities gives εἰς ὑμᾶς. [Cod. Sin. δἰ ὑμᾶς.—M.]
[German: The Lord delayeth not with the promise, ae some consider it a delay, but He hath patience with us, not willing that some should perish, but that all should turn to repentance.
Translate: The Lord is not tardy concerning His promise, as some account tardiness, but He is longsuffering towards us, etc. Alford.—M.]
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain III. ERROR OF EXPECTING A NEAR ADVENT CORRECTED, 2Pe_3:1-18.
III. ERROR OF EXPECTING A NEAR ADVENT CORRECTED, 2Pe_3:1-18.
1. The fatal error of expecting Christ’s immediate coming, from the immediateness of the terms in which it is predicted, 2Pe_3:1-13.
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1. This—Literally, This epistle, already beloved a second, unto you I write. The first chapter is a general, yet direct, introductory address; the second chapter steps aside to portray the corruptionists to come; this resumes and finishes the direct epistle.
Now—Literally, already; it is already a being-completed second epistle.
Pure minds—In contrast with those corrupt minds whose portraiture occupies the last chapter. Those are the ungodly men of 2Pe_3:7, bound to perdition; while you, warned of that day of judgment, will (2Pe_3:17) beware.
Remembrance—The apostle delivers not so much a new prophecy as he recalls, explains, and applies a whole body of old prophecies.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 1. This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto…
1. This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you] A new section of the Epistle opens. The “false teachers” recede from view, and the thoughts of the Apostle turn to the mockers who made merry at the delay of the coming of the Lord, to which Christians had so confidently looked forward as nigh at hand. In the stress laid on this being the “second Epistle” we have a fact which compels us to choose between identity of authorship for both Epistles, or a deliberate imposture as regards the second.
I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance] The word for “pure” is found in Php_1:10, the corresponding noun in 1Co_5:8; 2Co_1:12; 2Co_2:17. Its primary application is to that which will bear the full test of being examined by sunlight, and so it carries with it the sense of a transparent sincerity. Its exact opposite is described in Eph_4:18, “having the understanding” (the same Greek word as that here rendered “mind”) darkened. In the “stirring up by way of remembrance” we have a phrase that had been used before (chap. 2Pe_1:13).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (1) This second epistle, beloved, I now write.—Rather, This…
(1) This second epistle, beloved, I now write.—Rather, This now second epistle I write, beloved; or, This epistle, already a second one—implying that no very long time has elapsed since his first letter, and that this one is addressed to pretty much the same circle of readers. There is no indication that the first two chapters are one letter, and that this is the beginning of another, as has been supposed. With this use of “now,” or “already,” comp. Joh_21:14.
Pure minds.—The word for “pure” means literally “separated”—according to one derivation, by being sifted; according to another, by being held up to the light. Hence it comes to mean “unsullied.” Here it probably means untainted by sensuality or, possibly, deceit. In Php_1:10, the only other place where it occurs in the New Testament, it is translated “sincere.” (Comp. 1Co_5:8; 2Co_1:12; 2Co_2:17.) The word for “mind” means “the faculty of moral reflection and moral understanding,” which St. Peter, in his First Epistle (2Pe_1:13), tells his readers to brace up and keep ready for constant use. These very two words are found together in a beautiful passage in Plato’s Phaedo, 66A.
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By way of remembrance.—We have the same expression in 2Pe_1:13, and the translation in both cases should be the same—stir up in putting you in remembrance.
III.
(1, 2) Just as the two halves of the first main portion of the Epistle are linked together by some personal remarks respecting his reason for writing this Epistle (2Pe_1:12-15), so the two predictions which form the second main portion are connected by personal remarks respecting the purpose of both his Epistles.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain This Second Epistle, beloved, I now write unto you;…
This Second Epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; literally, this Epistle already a second one I write unto you. The hdh ("already") implies that the interval between the two Epistles was not long. The expression "beloved," four times repeated in this chapter, shows the apostle"s affectionate interest in his readers; and the word "second" forces us to make our choice between the Petrine authorship of the Epistle or the hypothesis of a direct forgery. In both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance; literally, in which, i.e., "Epistles;" the word "second" implied an allusion to a First Epistle. St. Peter repeats the words which he had used in chapter 1:13, "I think it meet to stir you up by putting you in remembrance." Mind (dianoia) is the reflective faculty; (see 1Pe_1:13) that faculty should be exercised in holy things. The thoughts that pass through the Christian"s mind should be holy thoughts; his mind should be pure. The word rendered "pure" (eijlikrinhv) occurs in; Php_1:10 (where see note) the corresponding substantive is found in 1Co_5:8; 2Co_1:12 2Co_2:17. It is said of things which can bear to be judged in the sunlight, and so means "pure, clear," or (according to another possible etymology) "unmixed," and so "genuine, sincere.
Vers. 1-10.
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The certainty of the Lord"s coming.
I CONFUTATION OF SCOFFERS.
1. St. Peter"s purpose in writing, He took a deep interest in the spiritual welfare of the Christians of Asia Minor; he felt a great affection for them; he calls them "beloved" four times in this chapter. We do not know whether he had ever seen them face to face. It may be that Silvanus had made known to him their circumstances, their dangers, their temptations. So he writes to them. In the First Epistle he comforts them in the presence of great persecution; in the second he warns them against the seductions of false teachers. He is an example to Christian ministers of diligence, of affectionate care for souls. He writes:
(1) To stir up his readers. Their minds, he says, were pure. They were single-hearted Christians; their religion was genuine, sincere. Nevertheless, it was well to stir them up. We all need to be aroused from time to time. We live on in the same way day after day; the daily prayers, the daily life, are ordered according to rule; there is danger of becoming lukewarm, formal, of acting from habit rather than from the conscious desire of pleasing God. Hence the need of exhortation. We ask God to "stir up the wills of his faithful people." It is he only who, by the power of his Spirit, can really arouse us; but he uses men as his instruments. He used the agency of St. Peter to stir up the minds of the Asiatic Christians.
(2) To remind them of the words of the prophets and apostles. He had urged the study of prophecy in the first chapter of this Epistle; he had dwelt upon the subject of prophetical inspiration in both Epistles; he was constantly referring to the prophets both in his speeches and letters. Christians ought to study the writings of the prophets; they ought to give heed to the Word of prophecy. So also they should be always mindful of the Lord"s commandment given through the apostles. "God who in times past spoke by the prophets, hath in the latter days spoken unto us by his Son." The writings of prophets and apostles come from the same source the inspiration of God; both have a message for us. It becomes us to be mindful of that message; to forget it is to be wanting in reverence and gratitude to him from whom the message comes. The commandment, delivered to us by the apostles, is in truth the commandment of our Lord and Saviour, who, as our Lord, has a right to our obedience, and, as our Saviour, has a claim upon our tenderest feelings of love and gratitude.
2. Scoffers will come. It has always been so; there have always been men who mocked at those who trusted in God. It was so with Lot in Sodom, with Isaac the heir of the promise, with the psalmist, with the Lord Jesus himself. Those of whom St. Peter speaks were men of sensual habits, walking after their own lusts. There is such a thing as honest doubt, like that of St. Thomas; there are men who would give the world to believe, if they could; their temperament, their education, their habits of thought, throw immense difficulties in their way; such men, we hope and trust, will be guided, sooner or later, to the truth. But in all ages a very large proportion of the prevalent skepticism has issued out of an ungodly life. Men have rejected the faith because they were unwilling to believe. The pure morality of the gospel offends the self-indulgent; it is a constant reproach to them; the teaching of Scripture concerning the judgment is repulsive to them; they try to keep such thoughts out of their minds. And, besides this, sin hardens the heart; a sensual life blinds the eye of the soul, and makes men incapable of appreciating spiritual truth. "The natural man the yucikov, in whom the animal soul is predominant receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned". (1Co_2:14) Such men come with their mockery, saying, "Where is the promise of his coming? The fathers have fallen asleep; generation after generation has passed away. Christians have lived in expectation of the Lord"s coming according to his promise; they have waited for him, but he came not; they are in their graves. Are men still to pass their lives in waiting for an advent which seems to be continually receding? All things continue thus, as they are, and as they have been; the laws of nature work on in their changeless uniformity. Where is the promise?" These men took the Epicurean view of the Deity. God might have created the world; he might have called into being the forces which are working in the universe. But now, they thought, he leaves those forces to their mutual action and reaction upon one another; he does not interpose either in the natural world or in the affairs of men; he leaves all to the silent rule of law. The teaching of Holy Scripture is directly opposed to this form of agnosticism. "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," said the Lord Jesus to the Jews. "In him we live, and move, and have our being," said St. Paul to the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers, as well as to the men of Athens generally. God sustains the universe from day to day, from hour to hour, with his continued agency. Without his support the world would fall into ruin; without his providence the order of society would collapse. The laws of nature are but observed uniformities, sequences of cause and effect; they are not forces; they have no life, no power; they are the expression of the Divine will. God changeth not; and those laws which he has impressed upon the material universe exhibit the hand of the Creator, they too are changeless within the sphere of the all-controlling will of God. He can suspend their operation, for he is the Lord God omnipotent; but as a rule his working is uniform, continuous. If it were not so, the world would be a scene of disorder all its rare beauty would be lost, life in its present conditions could not be sustained, society would be impossible. That uniformity which is the result of the wisdom of God must not be made an argument against the providence of God. He works in the uniformities of the laws of nature as certainly as in disturbances of those uniformities. There have been such disturbances; the uniform course of nature has been broken by Divine interpositions on a great scale.
3. The answer to the scoffers. All things have not always continued as they are. For:
(1) Creation itself was the introduction of a vast change; it was a mighty interposition of Divine power. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." We are not concerned here with the scientific interpretation of phenomena. The Bible was not intended to teach us that knowledge which men may by patient labour obtain for themselves, but to reveal to us the relations between man and God, so far as those relations are within our comprehension, and to show us the duties which arise out of those relations. We are not told how many ages, or what processes of evolution, may have their place between the second and the third verses of the first chapter of Genesis. It is the great fact of creation which is forcibly declared in those emphatic words with which the first of the sacred books begins. "By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." This is the great truth: "By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth." It was he who said, "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear." The scoffers willfully forget this; even if they do not formally deny the possibility of creation, they shut their eyes to it, and forget that he who made the world can also destroy it, that the great change of creation may be preparatory for other changes as great in the future.
(2) One such catastrophe was the Deluge. The earth, which God had once pronounced to be "very good," had become corrupt, and was filled with violence. Then God brought in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly. By his Word "were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened." "And all flesh died that moved upon the earth." That awful visitation was a warning of coming judgments. All things did not go on in the same unvarying course as the scoffers said. When all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth, then God interposed in his awful justice, and the earth was, by a baptism of water, restored and purified, prepared for a new beginning.
(3) All things will not always continue as they are. By God"s Word the heavens and the earth were made at the first; by his Word they are now maintained in being. But as the old world contained in itself the element which swept away the ungodly race of men, so the world that now is contains in itself the agent of its own destruction. It is stored with fire; there are stores of fire hidden within it, which are to work the last most awful change, which are to destroy the present order of things, and by their purifying and refining power to work, as by a baptism of fire, the regeneration of the universe into a new life. And it is stored up for fire, reserved unto the day of judgment, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven in flaming fire. That great day is presented to us in Holy Scripture as a day of terror with surroundings most awful and overwhelming. It will be a day of destruction to the ungodly; it will sweep them into utter death that death of the soul which is so much more dreadful than the death of the body, for it is death eternal, a state of separation from the life of God, separation from light and joy and love, felt in all its blank and utter misery. Then all things will not continue as they are; he who made the world at the first, he who interposed when that world had become corrupt, and swept away the wicked with the waters of the Flood, he will come again, but this time "in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." The mockers may mock; but the Word of God abideth; it must be fulfilled he will surely come.
II EXPLANATION OF THE DELAY OF THE JUDGMENT.
1. With the Eternal time is not. We think under the laws of time; time is an essential element in our thought we cannot think without recognizing it. It is not so with God; the thought of God is not subject to the law of time. He is eternal; past, present, and future are all within the sphere of his immediate knowledge. To him one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. To him that inhabiteth eternity the longest time that human thought can conceive is but as a speck. Even we can understand that real life is measured not by mere time, but by action. How much of life was there concentrated in the three years of our Lord"s ministry, those years filled full with works of love and holy teaching! while,
2. on the other hand, the seventy years or more of many men pass by in careless living, in listless idleness, without energy either of thought or action, without any good results either for themselves or for others. It is thought, love, action, that measures life, not the hand of the clock, not the mere lapse of hours and years. "He, being made perfect in a short time, fulfilled a long time". (RAPC Wis 4:13)
3. The Lord is long-suffering. The delay does not mean indifference; it does not mean that the Lord heedeth not the conduct of men. The ungodly say, "Tush, God hath forgotten: he hideth away his face; he will never see it." But it is not so. The delay of the judgment comes from a far different reason. God is not willing that any should perish. Alas! men do perish in their sins; the day of judgment is the day of perdition of ungodly men. But it is not of God; it is of their own willfulness and obstinacy; they bring upon themselves swift perdition. God has bestowed on man the awful gift of power to choose good or evil; without that power there could be no moral action, no responsibility, no obedience, no holiness, no love; life without that power would be the working of a machine, not the energy of a creature made after the likeness of God. Man, alas! has too often abused that great and perilous gift, and has turned that which should have led to holiness into an occasion of sin; and "the wages of sin is death." But God hath "no pleasure in the death of the wicked;" his desire is that "all should come to repentance." Therefore he gives them time. "The goodness of God leadeth them to repentance". (Rom_2:4) We cannot enter into life without repentance, without a deep and real change of heart. "Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand," was the first sermon of John the Baptist, the first sermon of our Lord. "Repent, and be baptized every one of you for the remission of sins," was the exhortation of St. Peter in his first great sermon. And God willeth that all should come to repentance; for "the Lord is loving unto every man;" and Jesus Christ our Lord "tasted death for every man." And "there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth." Therefore he gives us time. The delay comes from the long-suffering love of God. How sad that men should scoff at that which should be the ground of adoring gratitude!
1. But the day of the Lord will come. It must be so, for so it is decreed in the counsels of God. The mockers may mock in their mockery; they may ask in bitter sarcasm, "Where is the promise of his coming?" The Christian knows the answer; it is hidden in the secret purpose of God, in the mystic book sealed with seven seals, which none can open save the Lion of the tribe of Judah. But the day of the Lord will come that we know, though we know not the time.
(1) Its coming is certain, sure as the Word of God; the Bible tells us it will come; our consciences bear witness also; the warning voice of conscience points forward to the coming of the awful day. And it will come suddenly, as the thief cometh when men are not looking for it. Men will be living, as, alas! so many men are living now, heedlessly; eating, drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage, without a thought of God and the solemn future. Then, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, shall the sign of the Son of man be seen in heaven, and the archangel"s trump shall sound. "Therefore take ye heed," saith the Lord, "lest that day come upon you unawares.
(2) And its coming is terrible. St. Peter"s words bring vividly before our thoughts the awful scene the crash of falling worlds, the roar of the destroying flames, the dissolution of the elements into chaos, the conflagration which shall burn up the earth and all that is therein. All the works that are therein, the palaces of kings, the fortifications of cities, the cathedrals and churches built for the worship of God, all shall be involved in that one tremendous ruin. This is the apostle"s answer to the scoffers.
LESSONS.
1. Scoffers will scoff; men of science will point to the unchanging laws ofnature. Neither sarcasms nor the hypotheses of scientific men can shake the Christian from his faith.
2. Therefore we must stir up one another and ourselves; we must keep thesolemn words of Holy Scripture in our memories.
3. God has intervened in his judgments; he will intervene again.
4. God is long-suffering; but there must be a limit even to that long-suffering patience. The day of judgment must come; therefore repent while there is time.
HOMILIES BY U.R. THOMAS Vers. 1-9.
The Divine commandment.
A careful study of this passage is necessary to a clear understanding of the apostle"s meaning, and of the place of this urgent exhortation in his argument. For such a study it may be welt to gather up his teaching here round three points.
I THE "WORD" OR "COMMANDMENT" HERE INTENDED. Concerning such we ask:
1. By whom is it proclaimed?
(1) "Spoken before by the holy prophets;" i.e., perhaps chiefly, though not solely, of the Old Testament. Forth-tellers as well as fore-tellers.
(2) "Your apostles;" i.e., those that brought you the gospel.
(3) "The Lord and Saviour." He is the Source; the prophets and apostles are but the channel.
2. How is it to be received?
(1) "Stir up your mind;" active intelligence.
(2) "Sincere" mind; unprejudiced intelligence.
(3) By way of "remembrance;" intelligence that recalls what has been revealed. Not a novelty, not a discovery.
3. What is it? The theme of both Epistles Christ"s coming.
II THE OBJECTION OF MEN TO THIS "WORD" AND "COMMANDMENT.
1. What are the men who object? "Mockers with mockery." Not the troubled truth-seeker.
2. What is the spirit in which they object? "Walking after their own lusts." Strong unbridled desire is the explanation of their scornful unbelief.
3. What is the argument of this objection? "Where is the promise of his coming?" Not, where written? but, what has come of it? Since the fathers fell asleep it seems to lie like a dead letter.
III THE THREEFOLD ANSWER TO THIS OBJECTION.
1. It arises from willful ignorance of history. There is the "Flood probably one among many, but the chief of which tradition, science, the Bible, have much to say. And that Flood, and all coming destruction, is to be traced, not to a fortuitous concourse of atoms, but to "the Word of God.
2. It arises from fixing time as a condition of God"s ways, as it is of man"S."one day," etc. Look at "the dial of the ages, not the horologe of time.
3. It arises from misreading the apparent tardiness of God. He is slow, butnever late. What seems to us delay is not an interval of Divine neglect, but a period of Divine mercy, granting an opportunity for human "repentance. U.R.T.
HOMILIES BY R. FINLAYSON
Vers. 1-10.
Fact of second coming, especially in its accompaniments.
I AIM OF THE EPISTLE.
1. To stir them up by reminding them. "This is now, beloved, the second Epistle that I write unto you; and in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by putting you in remembrance." There is here the first of four designations of them as beloved in this chapter. It was already a second Epistle that he was writing to the same circle; not much time had elapsed since the writing of the First Epistle, which in all probability is that which has come down to us under that title. The aim of both Epistles was the same. It is expressed in accordance with language used in the first chapter of this Epistle. lie did not profess to be revealing to them new truths, but only to put them in remembrance of old truths. They had a sincere mind, i.e., open to the light. They would not therefore object to truths because they were old, or to their being re-stated, but would rather welcome being reminded of them, that they might be stirred up to a deeper sense of their importance.
2. To stir them up by reminding them of certain holy words. "That ye should remember the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour through your apostles." He first refers them to the words of the holy prophets, i.e., who wrote on holy themes, and under holy inspiration. He has specially in view the holy theme of the second coming. Their words spoken before had received striking, yet partial, fulfillment in the first coming; they would receive their complete fulfillment in the second coming. He also refers them to the commandment of the Lord and Saviour, than which surely nothing could be more binding. Christ first saves, and then commands: where is the teacher who is in that commanding position? He first teaches the fact of his second coming, and then he commands the corresponding life. "Watch therefore," says Christ: "for ye know not on what day your Lord cometh. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken through. Therefore be ye also ready: for in an hour that ye think not the Son of man cometh." This commandment, having the highest authority, was delivered to them through their apostles, i.e., the apostles that had laboured among them. The chief of these thus echoed his Lord. "The day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night: so then let us not sleep, as do the rest, but let us watch and be sober". (1Th_5:2-7)
II THE MOCKERS.
1. The time of their appearance. "Knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery." Peter refers to the advent of the mockers as of primary importance in its bearings. They were to come in the last of the days, by which we cannot understand simply the time immediately preceding the second advent. The last period is to be regarded as extending from the first advent to the second advent. During this period, as time went on, they were to come, and to come in character. In Hebrew style, it is said that the mockers were to come "with mockery with their mocking at holy things.
2. What they were to mock at. "Walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?" What they were to say was to be determined, not by truth, nor by fact, but by prejudice, and by prejudice founded on their walking after their own lusts, i.e., their loose mode of life. In the first psalm those that "walk in the counsel of the ungodly" are next represented as "standing in the way of sinners," and then as "sitting in the seat of the scornful." So here those whose life cannot bear looking into, disliking the coming because it meant a check to them, are represented as saying, with an air of mocking triumph, "Where is the promise of his coming?" i.e., it has turned out to be vain and mendacious.
3. How they were to argue.
(1) Fact on which they were to base their argument. "For, from the day that the fathers fell asleep." By "the fathers" we are probably to understand the men of the first Christian generation. The promise was made to them, and they lived in hope of its being fulfilled in their day. But the day came when, without its being fulfilled, they fell asleep. There is an example here of the use of language from which there has been receding. Christians speak of their friends in Christ as falling asleep. The sentiment comes out in the word cemetery, which means "sleeping-place," with which we associate an awaking. The mockers, no longer in accord with Christianity, use Christian language. The fact on which they base their argument is not to be denied: the use which they made of it is taken up at verse 8.
(2) Argument drawn from uniformity. "All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." We are warranted in proceeding on the uniformity of nature on the sun rising tomorrow as it has done today, and in days past. Nor is it surprising that scientific men should be more than ordinarily impressed with the fact of uniformity, by their researches into nature. Peter here prophesies that in the last days mockers would seek to turn the fact of uniformity against Christianity, and it has remarkably turned out as he prophesied. This is really the line that has been followed by many skeptics. They have said, "All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." On this ground Hume argued against miracles. "A miracle," he said, "is a violation of a law of nature: but the universal experience of ourselves, and of the whole human family, proves that the laws of nature are uniform, without exception." Strauss and his school have sought to establish, not merely the incredibility, but the impossibility, of miracles. Their argument bears against such a subversion of the present order of things as is connected with the second coming. They have thus unconsciously fulfilled prophecy.
III CATASTROPHISM IS THE PAST. "For this they willfully forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and amidst water, by the Word of God; by which means the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished." Peter, in putting his finger on catastrophism, refers to it as what they willfully forgot. It required an effort of their will to shut it out. The impression of the event, though it had taken place centuries before, had not died out. His reference to the Flood is introduced by a statement bearing on the way in which it was brought about. This is founded on the Mosaic account of creation. The first part of the statement refers to the bringing of the heavens into existence. There were heavens from of old, by the Word of God. This is the first thought of the Bible: "In the beginning God created the heaven." It did not exist from eternity, but was brought into existence by the creative word of God. The second part of the statement refers, not to the bringing of the earth into existence, but to its receiving its present form. An earth was compacted out of water, i.e., as material. The reference seems to be to the waters of chaos in the Mosaic record. (Gen_1:2) It was also compacted, not "amidst water," as it is unwarrantably in the Revised Version, but "by means of water," i.e., as the instrumental element. The reference seems to be to the gathering together of the waters into one place. Behind the water as material and instrumental element was the directing and potent Word of God. Having made this statement, Peter introduces the Flood as his answer to the mockers. The connecting words are," by which means." The use of the plural creates a difficulty. The most probable solution is that the reference is to the water and the Word of God. This is favoured by the latter being carried forward in the next verse. Water, let loose by God, flooded the then world, i.e., not the earth simply, but the earth as supporting its then inhabitants. There was catastrophism of the most impressive nature. There was (let the mockers note it) a mighty disturbance of uniformity. The world that then was perished.
IV CATASTROPHISM IN THE FUTURE. "But the heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men." There is suggestion, not of their ceasing to be heavens and earth, but rather of there being still heavens and earth, only not such as we now see them. The Word of God has fixed the destiny of the new heavens and earth. There is catastrophism in store for them. They are here represented as stored up for fire. The agency is not far to seek, being in the heart of the earth. There is suggestion of the fire being needed for the new heavens and earth on account of the ungodly men that have defiled them. For their God-forgetting, God-defying life, they when the appointed day comes are to be adjudged to destruction. The heavens and earth that they have defiled are to be subjected, not to water (which is forbidden by promise), but to an agency more penetrative and subduing. The same Word that carried out the catastrophism of water is to carry out the catastrophism of fire.
V THE DIVINE MODE OF RECKONING. "But forget not this one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." This is Peter"s answer to the suggestion in the argument of the mockers, "From the day that the fathers fell asleep." By addressing his readers as "beloved," he bespeaks their attention. He bespeaks their attention to a thing which they were in danger of forgetting. He bespeaks their attention to a thing which was principally to be considered. "Forget not this one thing." The language in which this one thing is expressed is an extension of what is found in Psa_90:4, both sides being presented here. Peter teaches that our ideas of short and long in time are not to be applied to God"s mode of reckoning. A day is what is short with us. We think of there being many, many days of life. But a day may be long with God. If we think of the days of creation, how much was crowded into each of them! If we think of the day on which the Flood came, how much characterized it! If we think of the last day of our Lord"s Passion, how much affecting human history, and affecting angelic history, and affecting even God himself, was crowded into it! We are taught to think of a nation being born in a day. So we do not need to think of more than a day as required for the events that are to be included in the second coming. On the other hand, a thousand years is what is long with us. Men used to think of that as the limit of human life. But we cannot now think of our living a hundred years. But a thousand years may be a short time with God. "A thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night." There was a waiting for thousands of years before the arrival of man on the earth; and if thousands of years have to elapse before the winding up of human history, in the sure and effectual evolving of his purpose that may not be long to God.
VI EXPLANATION OF SEEMING DELAY. "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness; but is long-suffering to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." When a promise is made for a specified time, and is not fulfilled at that time, there is real delay there, the explanation of which may be found to be slackness. Such slackness cannot be attributed to God. There is apparent delay, and some, in the disappointment of their expectation, and in the working of unbelief, may say it is slackness; but that cannot be justified. It is said that "the Judge is before the door," which may be construed as an immediate coming. But the real meaning is that Christ is ready for judgment. Why, then, does he not come? The answer is that things are not ready for his coming. Christ"s people are charged with making things ready for his coming, so far as they themselves are concerned, and so far as others are concerned; and they have not things in sufficient readiness. It is not, then, that God is slack concerning his promise, as though he were not sufficiently interested; it is, says Peter, that he is long-suffering to you-ward. He is bearing with Christian people in their dereliction of duty, in their slackness in performing their part. And not merely they, hat others, arc thought of by God. He does not wish that any should perish. It is not according to his heart that even one whom he has created, and for whom Christ has died, should remain in misery. This is a thought Which comes out strongly in the prophecy of Ezekiel. "Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die, saith the Lord God? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God." "Say unto them that pine away in their sins, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked." The positive side of the Divine wish is that all should come to repentance. He has not an interest merely in some, but in all. None can be happy in sin; it can only be pining away, as the prophet puts it. None can be happy without repentance, i.e., change of mind; but this change of mind he wishes for all. And it is not a mere wish, but it is a wish that has been manifested in the cross of Christ; and, in the operations of the Spirit, and in the workings of Providence, this is the end which is sought. Let us all respond, then, to the Divine wish which accompanies the Divine long-suffering.
VII THE COMING CHARACTERIZED. "But the day of the Lord will come as a thief; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up." By "the day of the Lord" we are to understand the day of Christ"s glorious manifestation. The interest of that day will all center round his appearance and judicial action. The coming of the day is regarded with certainty. In the original "will come" has the emphatic position: "Will come the day of the Lord." Whether our thoughts are contrary to it, or whether we have not thoughts about it at all, it will come. Peter touches on the suddenness of the coming, in this echoing the Master, as Paul also did: "Will come the day of the Lord as a thief." He more than touches on an awe-inspiring association of the coming. There will be a general conflagration. It was said in prophecy that the heavens shall vanish away like smoke. Here it is said that they shall pass away with a great noise. This is to be explained by the clause which follows, which is to be taken with it. The elements, i.e., of which the heavens are composed, shall be dissolved with fire. The noise, then, is the rushing sound of the destroying fire, or the consequent crash. The conflagration is to embrace the earth: "The earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up." The works must be understood as including man"s works. Some works long outlive the workers. It is hoped that some works of art may survive for centuries. But, however long they survive, they will at last be burnt up. That teaches us that there is what is higher than art. And we need not wonder at this being the destiny of man"s works on earth, when it is to be the destiny of even God"s works on earth. Lift up your eyes to the heavens in the stillness of night, or look upon the earth beneath bathed in the sun-light of a summer day: can it be that catastrophism shall reign wherever your eyes rest? can it be that the wild, all-devouring element of fire shall lay hold on all this material fabric? So prophecy tells us that it will be. It will come, the day of general conflagration. R.F. This Second Epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; literally, this Epistle already a second one I write unto you. The hdh ("already") implies that the interval between the two Epistles was not long. The expression "beloved," four times repeated in this chapter, shows the apostle"s affectionate interest in his readers; and the word "second" forces us to make our choice between the Petrine authorship of the Epistle or the hypothesis of a direct forgery. In both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance; literally, in which, i.e., "Epistles;" the word "second" implied an allusion to a First Epistle. St. Peter repeats the words which he had used in chapter 1:13, "I think it meet to stir you up by putting you in remembrance." Mind (dianoia) is the reflective faculty; (see 1Pe_1:13) that faculty should be exercised in holy things. The thoughts that pass through the Christian"s mind should be holy thoughts; his mind should be pure. The word rendered "pure" (eijlikrinhv) occurs in; Php_1:10 (where see note) the corresponding substantive is found in 1Co_5:8; 2Co_1:12 2Co_2:17. It is said of things which can bear to be judged in the sunlight, and so means "pure, clear," or (according to another possible etymology) "unmixed," and so "genuine, sincere.
Vers. 1-10.
The certainty of the Lord"s coming.
I CONFUTATION OF SCOFFERS.
1. St. Peter"s purpose in writing, He took a deep interest in the spiritual welfare of the Christians of Asia Minor; he felt a great affection for them; he calls them "beloved" four times in this chapter. We do not know whether he had ever seen them face to face. It may be that Silvanus had made known to him their circumstances, their dangers, their temptations. So he writes to them. In the First Epistle he comforts them in the presence of great persecution; in the second he warns them against the seductions of false teachers. He is an example to Christian ministers of diligence, of affectionate care for souls. He writes:
(1) To stir up his readers. Their minds, he says, were pure. They were single-hearted Christians; their religion was genuine, sincere. Nevertheless, it was well to stir them up. We all need to be aroused from time to time. We live on in the same way day after day; the daily prayers, the daily life, are ordered according to rule; there is danger of becoming lukewarm, formal, of acting from habit rather than from the conscious desire of pleasing God. Hence the need of exhortation. We ask God to "stir up the wills of his faithful people." It is he only who, by the power of his Spirit, can really arouse us; but he uses men as his instruments. He used the agency of St. Peter to stir up the minds of the Asiatic Christians.
(2) To remind them of the words of the prophets and apostles. He had urged the study of prophecy in the first chapter of this Epistle; he had dwelt upon the subject of prophetical inspiration in both Epistles; he was constantly referring to the prophets both in his speeches and letters. Christians ought to study the writings of the prophets; they ought to give heed to the Word of prophecy. So also they should be always mindful of the Lord"s commandment given through the apostles. "God who in times past spoke by the prophets, hath in the latter days spoken unto us by his Son." The writings of prophets and apostles come from the same source the inspiration of God; both have a message for us. It becomes us to be mindful of that message; to forget it is to be wanting in reverence and gratitude to him from whom the message comes. The commandment, delivered to us by the apostles, is in truth the commandment of our Lord and Saviour, who, as our Lord, has a right to our obedience, and, as our Saviour, has a claim upon our tenderest feelings of love and gratitude.
2. Scoffers will come. It has always been so; there have always been men who mocked at those who trusted in God. It was so with Lot in Sodom, with Isaac the heir of the promise, with the psalmist, with the Lord Jesus himself. Those of whom St. Peter speaks were men of sensual habits, walking after their own lusts. There is such a thing as honest doubt, like that of St. Thomas; there are men who would give the world to believe, if they could; their temperament, their education, their habits of thought, throw immense difficulties in their way; such men, we hope and trust, will be guided, sooner or later, to the truth. But in all ages a very large proportion of the prevalent skepticism has issued out of an ungodly life. Men have rejected the faith because they were unwilling to believe. The pure morality of the gospel offends the self-indulgent; it is a constant reproach to them; the teaching of Scripture concerning the judgment is repulsive to them; they try to keep such thoughts out of their minds. And, besides this, sin hardens the heart; a sensual life blinds the eye of the soul, and makes men incapable of appreciating spiritual truth. "The natural man the yucikov, in whom the animal soul is predominant receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned". (1Co_2:14) Such men come with their mockery, saying, "Where is the promise of his coming? The fathers have fallen asleep; generation after generation has passed away. Christians have lived in expectation of the Lord"s coming according to his promise; they have waited for him, but he came not; they are in their graves. Are men still to pass their lives in waiting for an advent which seems to be continually receding? All things continue thus, as they are, and as they have been; the laws of nature work on in their changeless uniformity. Where is the promise?" These men took the Epicurean view of the Deity. God might have created the world; he might have called into being the forces which are working in the universe. But now, they thought, he leaves those forces to their mutual action and reaction upon one another; he does not interpose either in the natural world or in the affairs of men; he leaves all to the silent rule of law. The teaching of Holy Scripture is directly opposed to this form of agnosticism. "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," said the Lord Jesus to the Jews. "In him we live, and move, and have our being," said St. Paul to the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers, as well as to the men of Athens generally. God sustains the universe from day to day, from hour to hour, with his continued agency. Without his support the world would fall into ruin; without his providence the order of society would collapse. The laws of nature are but observed uniformities, sequences of cause and effect; they are not forces; they have no life, no power; they are the expression of the Divine will. God changeth not; and those laws which he has impressed upon the material universe exhibit the hand of the Creator, they too are changeless within the sphere of the all-controlling will of God. He can suspend their operation, for he is the Lord God omnipotent; but as a rule his working is uniform, continuous. If it were not so, the world would be a scene of disorder all its rare beauty would be lost, life in its present conditions could not be sustained, society would be impossible. That uniformity which is the result of the wisdom of God must not be made an argument against the providence of God. He works in the uniformities of the laws of nature as certainly as in disturbances of those uniformities. There have been such disturbances; the uniform course of nature has been broken by Divine interpositions on a great scale.
3. The answer to the scoffers. All things have not always continued as they are. For:
(1) Creation itself was the introduction of a vast change; it was a mighty interposition of Divine power. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." We are not concerned here with the scientific interpretation of phenomena. The Bible was not intended to teach us that knowledge which men may by patient labour obtain for themselves, but to reveal to us the relations between man and God, so far as those relations are within our comprehension, and to show us the duties which arise out of those relations. We are not told how many ages, or what processes of evolution, may have their place between the second and the third verses of the first chapter of Genesis. It is the great fact of creation which is forcibly declared in those emphatic words with which the first of the sacred books begins. "By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear." This is the great truth: "By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth." It was he who said, "Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear." The scoffers willfully forget this; even if they do not formally deny the possibility of creation, they shut their eyes to it, and forget that he who made the world can also destroy it, that the great change of creation may be preparatory for other changes as great in the future.
(2) One such catastrophe was the Deluge. The earth, which God had once pronounced to be "very good," had become corrupt, and was filled with violence. Then God brought in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly. By his Word "were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened." "And all flesh died that moved upon the earth." That awful visitation was a warning of coming judgments. All things did not go on in the same unvarying course as the scoffers said. When all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth, then God interposed in his awful justice, and the earth was, by a baptism of water, restored and purified, prepared for a new beginning.
(3) All things will not always continue as they are. By God"s Word the heavens and the earth were made at the first; by his Word they are now maintained in being. But as the old world contained in itself the element which swept away the ungodly race of men, so the world that now is contains in itself the agent of its own destruction. It is stored with fire; there are stores of fire hidden within it, which are to work the last most awful change, which are to destroy the present order of things, and by their purifying and refining power to work, as by a baptism of fire, the regeneration of the universe into a new life. And it is stored up for fire, reserved unto the day of judgment, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven in flaming fire. That great day is presented to us in Holy Scripture as a day of terror with surroundings most awful and overwhelming. It will be a day of destruction to the ungodly; it will sweep them into utter death that death of the soul which is so much more dreadful than the death of the body, for it is death eternal, a state of separation from the life of God, separation from light and joy and love, felt in all its blank and utter misery. Then all things will not continue as they are; he who made the world at the first, he who interposed when that world had become corrupt, and swept away the wicked with the waters of the Flood, he will come again, but this time "in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." The mockers may mock; but the Word of God abideth; it must be fulfilled he will surely come.
II EXPLANATION OF THE DELAY OF THE JUDGMENT.
1. With the Eternal time is not. We think under the laws of time; time is an essential element in our thought we cannot think without recognizing it. It is not so with God; the thought of God is not subject to the law of time. He is eternal; past, present, and future are all within the sphere of his immediate knowledge. To him one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. To him that inhabiteth eternity the longest time that human thought can conceive is but as a speck. Even we can understand that real life is measured not by mere time, but by action. How much of life was there concentrated in the three years of our Lord"s ministry, those years filled full with works of love and holy teaching! while,
2. on the other hand, the seventy years or more of many men pass by in careless living, in listless idleness, without energy either of thought or action, without any good results either for themselves or for others. It is thought, love, action, that measures life, not the hand of the clock, not the mere lapse of hours and years. "He, being made perfect in a short time, fulfilled a long time". (RAPC Wis 4:13)
3. The Lord is long-suffering. The delay does not mean indifference; it does not mean that the Lord heedeth not the conduct of men. The ungodly say, "Tush, God hath forgotten: he hideth away his face; he will never see it." But it is not so. The delay of the judgment comes from a far different reason. God is not willing that any should perish. Alas! men do perish in their sins; the day of judgment is the day of perdition of ungodly men. But it is not of God; it is of their own willfulness and obstinacy; they bring upon themselves swift perdition. God has bestowed on man the awful gift of power to choose good or evil; without that power there could be no moral action, no responsibility, no obedience, no holiness, no love; life without that power would be the working of a machine, not the energy of a creature made after the likeness of God. Man, alas! has too often abused that great and perilous gift, and has turned that which should have led to holiness into an occasion of sin; and "the wages of sin is death." But God hath "no pleasure in the death of the wicked;" his desire is that "all should come to repentance." Therefore he gives them time. "The goodness of God leadeth them to repentance". (Rom_2:4) We cannot enter into life without repentance, without a deep and real change of heart. "Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand," was the first sermon of John the Baptist, the first sermon of our Lord. "Repent, and be baptized every one of you for the remission of sins," was the exhortation of St. Peter in his first great sermon. And God willeth that all should come to repentance; for "the Lord is loving unto every man;" and Jesus Christ our Lord "tasted death for every man." And "there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth." Therefore he gives us time. The delay comes from the long-suffering love of God. How sad that men should scoff at that which should be the ground of adoring gratitude!
1. But the day of the Lord will come. It must be so, for so it is decreed in the counsels of God. The mockers may mock in their mockery; they may ask in bitter sarcasm, "Where is the promise of his coming?" The Christian knows the answer; it is hidden in the secret purpose of God, in the mystic book sealed with seven seals, which none can open save the Lion of the tribe of Judah. But the day of the Lord will come that we know, though we know not the time.
(1) Its coming is certain, sure as the Word of God; the Bible tells us it will come; our consciences bear witness also; the warning voice of conscience points forward to the coming of the awful day. And it will come suddenly, as the thief cometh when men are not looking for it. Men will be living, as, alas! so many men are living now, heedlessly; eating, drinking, marrying, and giving in marriage, without a thought of God and the solemn future. Then, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, shall the sign of the Son of man be seen in heaven, and the archangel"s trump shall sound. "Therefore take ye heed," saith the Lord, "lest that day come upon you unawares.
(2) And its coming is terrible. St. Peter"s words bring vividly before our thoughts the awful scene the crash of falling worlds, the roar of the destroying flames, the dissolution of the elements into chaos, the conflagration which shall burn up the earth and all that is therein. All the works that are therein, the palaces of kings, the fortifications of cities, the cathedrals and churches built for the worship of God, all shall be involved in that one tremendous ruin. This is the apostle"s answer to the scoffers.
LESSONS.
1. Scoffers will scoff; men of science will point to the unchanging laws ofnature. Neither sarcasms nor the hypotheses of scientific men can shake the Christian from his faith.
2. Therefore we must stir up one another and ourselves; we must keep thesolemn words of Holy Scripture in our memories.
3. God has intervened in his judgments; he will intervene again.
4. God is long-suffering; but there must be a limit even to that long-suffering patience. The day of judgment must come; therefore repent while there is time.
HOMILIES BY U.R. THOMAS Vers. 1-9.
The Divine commandment.
A careful study of this passage is necessary to a clear understanding of the apostle"s meaning, and of the place of this urgent exhortation in his argument. For such a study it may be welt to gather up his teaching here round three points.
I THE "WORD" OR "COMMANDMENT" HERE INTENDED. Concerning such we ask:
1. By whom is it proclaimed?
(1) "Spoken before by the holy prophets;" i.e., perhaps chiefly, though not solely, of the Old Testament. Forth-tellers as well as fore-tellers.
(2) "Your apostles;" i.e., those that brought you the gospel.
(3) "The Lord and Saviour." He is the Source; the prophets and apostles are but the channel.
2. How is it to be received?
(1) "Stir up your mind;" active intelligence.
(2) "Sincere" mind; unprejudiced intelligence.
(3) By way of "remembrance;" intelligence that recalls what has been revealed. Not a novelty, not a discovery.
3. What is it? The theme of both Epistles Christ"s coming.
II THE OBJECTION OF MEN TO THIS "WORD" AND "COMMANDMENT.
1. What are the men who object? "Mockers with mockery." Not the troubled truth-seeker.
2. What is the spirit in which they object? "Walking after their own lusts." Strong unbridled desire is the explanation of their scornful unbelief.
3. What is the argument of this objection? "Where is the promise of his coming?" Not, where written? but, what has come of it? Since the fathers fell asleep it seems to lie like a dead letter.
III THE THREEFOLD ANSWER TO THIS OBJECTION.
1. It arises from willful ignorance of history. There is the "Flood probably one among many, but the chief of which tradition, science, the Bible, have much to say. And that Flood, and all coming destruction, is to be traced, not to a fortuitous concourse of atoms, but to "the Word of God.
2. It arises from fixing time as a condition of God"s ways, as it is of man"S."one day," etc. Look at "the dial of the ages, not the horologe of time.
3. It arises from misreading the apparent tardiness of God. He is slow, butnever late. What seems to us delay is not an interval of Divine neglect, but a period of Divine mercy, granting an opportunity for human "repentance. U.R.T.
HOMILIES BY R. FINLAYSON
Vers. 1-10.
Fact of second coming, especially in its accompaniments.
I AIM OF THE EPISTLE.
1. To stir them up by reminding them. "This is now, beloved, the second Epistle that I write unto you; and in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by putting you in remembrance." There is here the first of four designations of them as beloved in this chapter. It was already a second Epistle that he was writing to the same circle; not much time had elapsed since the writing of the First Epistle, which in all probability is that which has come down to us under that title. The aim of both Epistles was the same. It is expressed in accordance with language used in the first chapter of this Epistle. lie did not profess to be revealing to them new truths, but only to put them in remembrance of old truths. They had a sincere mind, i.e., open to the light. They would not therefore object to truths because they were old, or to their being re-stated, but would rather welcome being reminded of them, that they might be stirred up to a deeper sense of their importance.
2. To stir them up by reminding them of certain holy words. "That ye should remember the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour through your apostles." He first refers them to the words of the holy prophets, i.e., who wrote on holy themes, and under holy inspiration. He has specially in view the holy theme of the second coming. Their words spoken before had received striking, yet partial, fulfillment in the first coming; they would receive their complete fulfillment in the second coming. He also refers them to the commandment of the Lord and Saviour, than which surely nothing could be more binding. Christ first saves, and then commands: where is the teacher who is in that commanding position? He first teaches the fact of his second coming, and then he commands the corresponding life. "Watch therefore," says Christ: "for ye know not on what day your Lord cometh. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken through. Therefore be ye also ready: for in an hour that ye think not the Son of man cometh." This commandment, having the highest authority, was delivered to them through their apostles, i.e., the apostles that had laboured among them. The chief of these thus echoed his Lord. "The day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night: so then let us not sleep, as do the rest, but let us watch and be sober". (1Th_5:2-7)
II THE MOCKERS.
1. The time of their appearance. "Knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery." Peter refers to the advent of the mockers as of primary importance in its bearings. They were to come in the last of the days, by which we cannot understand simply the time immediately preceding the second advent. The last period is to be regarded as extending from the first advent to the second advent. During this period, as time went on, they were to come, and to come in character. In Hebrew style, it is said that the mockers were to come "with mockery with their mocking at holy things.
2. What they were to mock at. "Walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?" What they were to say was to be determined, not by truth, nor by fact, but by prejudice, and by prejudice founded on their walking after their own lusts, i.e., their loose mode of life. In the first psalm those that "walk in the counsel of the ungodly" are next represented as "standing in the way of sinners," and then as "sitting in the seat of the scornful." So here those whose life cannot bear looking into, disliking the coming because it meant a check to them, are represented as saying, with an air of mocking triumph, "Where is the promise of his coming?" i.e., it has turned out to be vain and mendacious.
3. How they were to argue.
(1) Fact on which they were to base their argument. "For, from the day that the fathers fell asleep." By "the fathers" we are probably to understand the men of the first Christian generation. The promise was made to them, and they lived in hope of its being fulfilled in their day. But the day came when, without its being fulfilled, they fell asleep. There is an example here of the use of language from which there has been receding. Christians speak of their friends in Christ as falling asleep. The sentiment comes out in the word cemetery, which means "sleeping-place," with which we associate an awaking. The mockers, no longer in accord with Christianity, use Christian language. The fact on which they base their argument is not to be denied: the use which they made of it is taken up at verse 8.
(2) Argument drawn from uniformity. "All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." We are warranted in proceeding on the uniformity of nature on the sun rising tomorrow as it has done today, and in days past. Nor is it surprising that scientific men should be more than ordinarily impressed with the fact of uniformity, by their researches into nature. Peter here prophesies that in the last days mockers would seek to turn the fact of uniformity against Christianity, and it has remarkably turned out as he prophesied. This is really the line that has been followed by many skeptics. They have said, "All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." On this ground Hume argued against miracles. "A miracle," he said, "is a violation of a law of nature: but the universal experience of ourselves, and of the whole human family, proves that the laws of nature are uniform, without exception." Strauss and his school have sought to establish, not merely the incredibility, but the impossibility, of miracles. Their argument bears against such a subversion of the present order of things as is connected with the second coming. They have thus unconsciously fulfilled prophecy.
III CATASTROPHISM IS THE PAST. "For this they willfully forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and amidst water, by the Word of God; by which means the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished." Peter, in putting his finger on catastrophism, refers to it as what they willfully forgot. It required an effort of their will to shut it out. The impression of the event, though it had taken place centuries before, had not died out. His reference to the Flood is introduced by a statement bearing on the way in which it was brought about. This is founded on the Mosaic account of creation. The first part of the statement refers to the bringing of the heavens into existence. There were heavens from of old, by the Word of God. This is the first thought of the Bible: "In the beginning God created the heaven." It did not exist from eternity, but was brought into existence by the creative word of God. The second part of the statement refers, not to the bringing of the earth into existence, but to its receiving its present form. An earth was compacted out of water, i.e., as material. The reference seems to be to the waters of chaos in the Mosaic record. (Gen_1:2) It was also compacted, not "amidst water," as it is unwarrantably in the Revised Version, but "by means of water," i.e., as the instrumental element. The reference seems to be to the gathering together of the waters into one place. Behind the water as material and instrumental element was the directing and potent Word of God. Having made this statement, Peter introduces the Flood as his answer to the mockers. The connecting words are," by which means." The use of the plural creates a difficulty. The most probable solution is that the reference is to the water and the Word of God. This is favoured by the latter being carried forward in the next verse. Water, let loose by God, flooded the then world, i.e., not the earth simply, but the earth as supporting its then inhabitants. There was catastrophism of the most impressive nature. There was (let the mockers note it) a mighty disturbance of uniformity. The world that then was perished.
IV CATASTROPHISM IN THE FUTURE. "But the heavens that now are, and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men." There is suggestion, not of their ceasing to be heavens and earth, but rather of there being still heavens and earth, only not such as we now see them. The Word of God has fixed the destiny of the new heavens and earth. There is catastrophism in store for them. They are here represented as stored up for fire. The agency is not far to seek, being in the heart of the earth. There is suggestion of the fire being needed for the new heavens and earth on account of the ungodly men that have defiled them. For their God-forgetting, God-defying life, they when the appointed day comes are to be adjudged to destruction. The heavens and earth that they have defiled are to be subjected, not to water (which is forbidden by promise), but to an agency more penetrative and subduing. The same Word that carried out the catastrophism of water is to carry out the catastrophism of fire.
V THE DIVINE MODE OF RECKONING. "But forget not this one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." This is Peter"s answer to the suggestion in the argument of the mockers, "From the day that the fathers fell asleep." By addressing his readers as "beloved," he bespeaks their attention. He bespeaks their attention to a thing which they were in danger of forgetting. He bespeaks their attention to a thing which was principally to be considered. "Forget not this one thing." The language in which this one thing is expressed is an extension of what is found in Psa_90:4, both sides being presented here. Peter teaches that our ideas of short and long in time are not to be applied to God"s mode of reckoning. A day is what is short with us. We think of there being many, many days of life. But a day may be long with God. If we think of the days of creation, how much was crowded into each of them! If we think of the day on which the Flood came, how much characterized it! If we think of the last day of our Lord"s Passion, how much affecting human history, and affecting angelic history, and affecting even God himself, was crowded into it! We are taught to think of a nation being born in a day. So we do not need to think of more than a day as required for the events that are to be included in the second coming. On the other hand, a thousand years is what is long with us. Men used to think of that as the limit of human life. But we cannot now think of our living a hundred years. But a thousand years may be a short time with God. "A thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night." There was a waiting for thousands of years before the arrival of man on the earth; and if thousands of years have to elapse before the winding up of human history, in the sure and effectual evolving of his purpose that may not be long to God.
VI EXPLANATION OF SEEMING DELAY. "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness; but is long-suffering to you-ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." When a promise is made for a specified time, and is not fulfilled at that time, there is real delay there, the explanation of which may be found to be slackness. Such slackness cannot be attributed to God. There is apparent delay, and some, in the disappointment of their expectation, and in the working of unbelief, may say it is slackness; but that cannot be justified. It is said that "the Judge is before the door," which may be construed as an immediate coming. But the real meaning is that Christ is ready for judgment. Why, then, does he not come? The answer is that things are not ready for his coming. Christ"s people are charged with making things ready for his coming, so far as they themselves are concerned, and so far as others are concerned; and they have not things in sufficient readiness. It is not, then, that God is slack concerning his promise, as though he were not sufficiently interested; it is, says Peter, that he is long-suffering to you-ward. He is bearing with Christian people in their dereliction of duty, in their slackness in performing their part. And not merely they, hat others, arc thought of by God. He does not wish that any should perish. It is not according to his heart that even one whom he has created, and for whom Christ has died, should remain in misery. This is a thought Which comes out strongly in the prophecy of Ezekiel. "Have I any pleasure at all that the wicked should die, saith the Lord God? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God." "Say unto them that pine away in their sins, As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked." The positive side of the Divine wish is that all should come to repentance. He has not an interest merely in some, but in all. None can be happy in sin; it can only be pining away, as the prophet puts it. None can be happy without repentance, i.e., change of mind; but this change of mind he wishes for all. And it is not a mere wish, but it is a wish that has been manifested in the cross of Christ; and, in the operations of the Spirit, and in the workings of Providence, this is the end which is sought. Let us all respond, then, to the Divine wish which accompanies the Divine long-suffering.
VII THE COMING CHARACTERIZED. "But the day of the Lord will come as a thief; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up." By "the day of the Lord" we are to understand the day of Christ"s glorious manifestation. The interest of that day will all center round his appearance and judicial action. The coming of the day is regarded with certainty. In the original "will come" has the emphatic position: "Will come the day of the Lord." Whether our thoughts are contrary to it, or whether we have not thoughts about it at all, it will come. Peter touches on the suddenness of the coming, in this echoing the Master, as Paul also did: "Will come the day of the Lord as a thief." He more than touches on an awe-inspiring association of the coming. There will be a general conflagration. It was said in prophecy that the heavens shall vanish away like smoke. Here it is said that they shall pass away with a great noise. This is to be explained by the clause which follows, which is to be taken with it. The elements, i.e., of which the heavens are composed, shall be dissolved with fire. The noise, then, is the rushing sound of the destroying fire, or the consequent crash. The conflagration is to embrace the earth: "The earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up." The works must be understood as including man"s works. Some works long outlive the workers. It is hoped that some works of art may survive for centuries. But, however long they survive, they will at last be burnt up. That teaches us that there is what is higher than art. And we need not wonder at this being the destiny of man"s works on earth, when it is to be the destiny of even God"s works on earth. Lift up your eyes to the heavens in the stillness of night, or look upon the earth beneath bathed in the sun-light of a summer day: can it be that catastrophism shall reign wherever your eyes rest? can it be that the wild, all-devouring element of fire shall lay hold on all this material fabric? So prophecy tells us that it will be. It will come, the day of general conflagration. R.F.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you.
2Pe_3:1-2
This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you.
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St. Peters love token
I. The nature of it--a letter written. What shall we render to the Lord for His mercy in writing these blessed covenants?
II. The number of it--a second after the former. This second; not so much fearing the miscarriage of the first, as hoping to work better confirmation by the next.
III. The tenor of it--to stir up their minds. Why are the words of the wise compared to goads (Ecc_3:11) but to show that the best in Gods team need pricking forward?
IV. The order--by way of remembrance. This is a just order and method; first, to teach the way of the Lord, then to remind men of walking in it. We are not only called teachers, but remembrancers (Isa_62:6). (Thos. Adams.)
I stir up your pure minds.
A Christian memory
The power of memory is, perhaps, the most amazing part of our mental equipment. It is a golden thread that links infancy and age, on which are hung, like pearls, varied facts and experiences of every hue. Memory has her servant, recollection, an invisible librarian running about the chambers of the mind, to find what she calls for. Now God uses this faculty in the work of building up Christian character.
1. The gospel has a history to be remembered.
2. History repeats itself ordinarily; but this history of the gospel can never be repeated. Christ has suffered once for all. A Christian memory is swift to remember this.
3. In the revelation of His memorial name Jehovah has emphasised the significance of memory. He is not an abstraction, a far-distant personality, even, but the Father of Abraham, of Isaac and Jacob--a historic God.
4. Again, keep in mind that the life of our Lord in glory is linked with that of His redemptive work on earth, as truly as your existence there, some day, will be connected with your residence here on earth.
5. Finally, a Christian memory holds in trust these historic dates of Christ and His redemption, because of the fact that they are to be the theme of adoring praise throughout eternity. (J. M. English, D. D.)
Mindful of the words which were spoken before.--
Mindfulness
I. The object of their mindfulness.
1. Words, for their plain certainty; not shadows and abstruse paradoxes.
2. Spoken before, for their antiquity; not things of yesterday; no new devices.
3. By the prophets, for the authority; men that had their commission immediately from God Himself.
4. Holy prophets, for the sanctity; they passed not through the lips of a Balaam, or Caiaphas.
5. The commandment of us, etc. The prophets were legal apostles, the apostles are evangelical prophets. Both these came to the world with commandments.
(1) Neither prophets nor apostles did ever command in their own names; but the former came with Thus saith the Lord, and the other in the name of Christ.
(2) St. Peter refers us to the words of the prophets and commandments of the apostles, and precisely chargeth our mindfulness with these lessons.
(3) Neither the prophets without the apostles, nor the apostles without the prophets, but both together. The gospel without the law may lift men up to presumption; the law without the gospel may sink them down to desperation.
(4) The rule of truth is delivered to us by the prophets and apostles.
II. Their mindfulness of that object. This consists in two things:
1. Observation. God never meant His Word for a vanishing sound; that which is kept upon eternal record in heaven, and is a constant dweller in the elected heart (Col_3:16), must not be a sojourner, much less a passenger, with us.
2. Conversation. It is a barren mindfulness that does not declare itself in a holy fruitfulness. Conclusion:
1. Let us desire the faculty and facility of doing; earnestly to desire it is one half, yea, the best half.
2. Let us be thrifty husbands of time and means to be spiritually rich.
3. Let us reduce all to practice. (Thos. Adams.)
Compendious commandments
Cultivate the habit of reflective meditation upon the truths of the gospel as giving you the pattern of duty in a concentrated and available form. It is of no use to carry about a copy of the Statutes at Large in twenty folio volumes, in order to refer to it when difficulties arise and crises come. We must have something a great deal more compendious and easy of reference than that. A mans cabin-trunk must not be as big as a house, and his goods must be in a small compass for his sea voyage. We have in Jesus Christ the Statutes at Large, codified and put into a form which the poorest and humblest and busiest amongst us can apply directly to the sudden emergencies and surprising contingencies of daily life, which are always sprung upon us when we do not expect them, and demand instantaneous decision. (A. Maclaren.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain Chapter 26
Chapter 26
AS WERE THE DAYS OF NOAH
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2Pe_3:1-4
IN the previous chapter the Apostle showed how the renegade false teachers had published among the brethren their seductive doctrine declaring that Gods fatherly discipline was something which they need not undergo, that the trials which He sent them might be escaped, and the natural bent of mans heart indulged as fully as they pleased. The foul results of such lessons, both to the flock, and to the teachers, he also depicted in such wise as to render them abhorrent. Now he tells of a further lesson which these guides on the downward road added to the former. Those who do not accept Gods judgments here soon go on to deny the coming of judgment hereafter. It could hardly be otherwise. The wish is father to the thought as truly in matters of faith as of practice. Men whose lives are all centered on this world must try and convince themselves, if possible, that the day of the Lord, of which Gods word speaks so often, is a delusion, and may be cast out of their thoughts. This these men did, and it is against this scoffing of theirs that St. Peter directs his exhortation in this chapter.
"This is now, beloved, the Second Epistle that I write unto you." Judging from the adverb which he uses (η) now, (already), we should conclude that no long time had elapsed between the Apostles first letter and the second. And by calling this the second, he shows that it is intended for the same congregations as the former, though he has not named them in the salutation with which the letter opens. Afore-time they had been tried by inward questionings, and he sent them his exhortation and testimony that, spite of all their trials, this was the true grace of God which they had received, and therein they should stand fast. {1Pe_5:12} Now the danger is from without false doctrine and evil living as its consequence. So, though he may have written but a little while ago, he will neither spare himself nor neglect them. For the danger is of the utmost gravity. It threatens the overthrow of all true Christian life.
"And in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by putting you in remembrance." Mark how trustfully he appeals to the sincerity of the minds of the brethren, just as before {2Pe_1:12} he said they knew the things of which he was putting them in remembrance, and were established in the truth which they had received. And what he means by the "mind" we may see from 1Pe_1:13, where he uses the same word: "Gird up the loins of your mind"-do not indulge vain, lax, and speculative opinions, as though these would forward you in your travel through the world-"be sober, and set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you." A mind so braced looks onward to the revelation of Jesus Christ, looks for every token of its drawing nigh. And because it is sincere, the man dare look into its inmost recesses, and by self-examination and discipline maintain its purity. He can think soberly of the Lords coming because he is preparing for it. But he whose mind is dark, within whom the light has been turned into darkness, dare not think on these things, but with all his might endeavors to forget, ignore, and deny them. All that St. Peter thinks needful for these Asian brethren is that he should remind them. He knows that mens minds are prone to slumber, especially about the things unseen as yet; and his aim is to rouse them to thorough vigilance. But he has no new lesson to give them.
"That ye should remember the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets." On few themes do the prophets dwell more earnestly than on those visitations of Jehovah which they publish as the coming of the day of the Lord. With Joel {Joe_2:2; Joe_2:32} it is to be a time great and terrible, the prospect of which is to move men to repentance, for whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered. And Israel were taught in many ways that this great day was constantly at hand. They were pointed to it by Isaiah {Isa_13:6} when the overthrow of Babylon was foretold. For that nation the day of the Lord was coming as destruction from the Almighty. Jeremiah {Jer_46:10} and Ezekiel {Eze_30:3} preach the same lesson with the ruin of Egypt for their text. It is a day of vengeance, when the Lord God of hosts will avenge Him of His adversaries; a day of clouds, in which a sword shall come upon Egypt, and her foundations shall be broken down. By what they beheld around them Gods people were to learn that a like day would come upon them also, upon everything that was high and lifted up against God; and for those who were unprepared another prophet {Amo_5:18} declared that it would be darkness, and not light. Before its coming, therefore, they were urged {Zep_2:3} to turn to the Lord, that they might be hid in the day of His anger. For God designed by it to make Himself King of all the earth, {Zec_14:9} wherefore it would be great and terrible. For though Elijah should first be sent {Mal_4:5} to turn the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, in its manifestation that day should still be like a refiners fire to purge the evil from among the good.
Not without solemn purpose were all these words written aforetime, and the Christian preachers who felt that God was faithful were sure that such a day would come upon all the earth. How it would be manifested was for God, and not for them. Some of those who lived when St. Peter wrote beheld part of its accomplishment in the overthrow of the Holy City. But they felt-and their lesson is one for all time-that it is presumptuous in men to compute Gods days, and that it is rebellious blindness not to acknowledge the coming of His day continually in the great crises of history. How many a time since St. Peter spoke has the Lord proclaimed by partial judgments the certainty of that which shall come at the last. The day of the Lord is attested when empires fall, when hordes of barbarians break in upon the civilized world that has grown careless of God, when convulsions rage like those which preceded the Reformation and which shook Europe at the French revolution, and we may add to these the troubles which harass our own land today. All these things preach the same doctrine; all proclaim that verily there is a God that judgeth the earth. Not yet is the voice of prophecy silent. Oh, that men would but remember how long and how surely it has been speaking!
"And the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles." In connection with the subject on which he is writing, the commandment of Jesus to which St. Peter alludes can hardly be other than that which occurs in the address of our Lord to His disciples after His last visit to the Temple: "Watch, therefore, for ye know not on what day your Lord cometh; therefore be ready, for in an hour that ye think not the Son of man cometh." {Mat_24:42} And with the last judgment in his thoughts, we cannot fail to be struck with the frequency with which the Apostle in this letter repeats as the title of Christ "the Lord and Savior". {2Pe_1:1; 2Pe_1:8} This precise form occurs in no other part of the New Testament. And it seems from the Apostles use of it as though, while speaking of the certainty of the coming of the day of the Lord, he desired to give special prominence to the thought that to such as were looking for Him He would manifest Himself as the Savior and Redeemer.
The words "your apostles" also appear to be used with design. They contain a direct acknowledgment of the mission of St. Paul as an apostle. By him more than by any other had these regions been brought to the knowledge of Christ, and we may rest confident that the gospel which he preached elsewhere he preached to them also. The lesson of watchfulness is oft repeated in his letters. To the Corinthians he writes, "Watch ye; stand fast in the faith; quit you like men; be strong," {1Co_16:13} while, in connection with this subject of the day of the Lord, his words to the Thessalonians are, "Ye yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night But ye are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Let us watch and be sober". {1Th_5:2-6} St. Peters letter was to be read in those Galatian Churches whose members in past days had doubted about the apostolate of St. Paul. Its warnings would sink the deeper because enforced by the authority of him who even in his rebukes had spoken to them as his "little children". {Gal_4:19}
"Knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery." St. Peter says the mockers will come; Polycarp says in his day they had come. He terms them the firstborn of Satan, and tells how they pervert the oracles of the Lord to their own lusts and deny that there is either resurrection or judgment. The signs of the times were not difficult to read; and the Apostle would have the brethren know what to look for, know in such wise that they should not be shaken in mind by what they saw or heard. For this the first need was Christian sobriety. Thus settled, they could ponder on the words of ancient prophecy and recall the lessons of those who had spoken to them in the name of Christ; and therewith their hearts might take comfort, and their heads be lifted up with expectation, knowing the last days were bringing their redemption nearer. The mockery of the sinners would keep no bounds. This he expresses by his emphatic words, just as largeness of blessing is described: "In blessing I will bless thee."
"Walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming?" They would be a law unto themselves, and so they followed an evil law. As sinners before them had said, "Our lips are our own," {Psa_12:4} so these men by act and word alike proclaimed, "Our lives are our own, to use as we please. We have no account to give." Thus they made themselves bond slaves to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, and, with these fetters heavy about them, boasted of their liberty. They strengthened themselves in their evil way by jeering at the thought of Christs return to judgment. "We have heard of the promise," they said, "but we see no signs of its fulfillment. The angels, you say, spake of His return when He was taken away from you. Let Him make speed and hasten His coming, that we may see it. You are forever speaking of it as sure and pointing us back to the ancient Scriptures, as though they were a warrant for what you preach. Where is the word of the Lord? Let it come now". {Jer_17:15}
"For, from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." Here the mockers pass from the promise of Christs return, and fall back upon the more distant records as supplying a stronger argument. "The fathers" of whom they speak cannot be the Christian preachers. Not many of them could as yet have fallen asleep in death. But the ancient prophets of the Jewish Scriptures had long ago passed away, and against them the scorners direct their shafts. "Centuries ago," they urge, "the prophetic record was closed; and its final utterance was of the day of the Lord, which has not yet come." Their word "fell asleep" may have also been used as part of their mockery, classing the words of prophecy among baseless dreams. It may be they intended a special allusion to that one among the prophets who dates the time of the Lords coming. Daniel {Dan_12:12} speaks of a waiting which shall last a thousand three hundred and five-and-thirty days. But say these scorners, "When his word was complete, he was bidden, Go thou thy way till the end be. For thou shalt rest, and shalt stand in thy lot at the end of the days. He has fallen asleep, and the other fathers also. They all are at rest, and the end of the days is no nearer. The world stands fast, and will stand. It has seen no change since it was brought into existence."
Those who in faith clung to Christ could not fail, as they heard these scorners, to think of the Masters question, "When the Son of man cometh, shall He find faith in the earth?," {Luk_18:8} and of those other words of His which told them that the last days should be a parallel to the days of the Deluge: "As were the days of Noah, so shall be the coming of the Son of man. For as in those days which were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and they knew not until the flood came and took them all away, so shall be the coming of the Son of man". {Mat_24:37-39} The strong earth was under the feet of those antediluvian mockers, the firmament above their heads. So in ignorance they jeered at what they would call the folly of Noah. But the Flood came, and then they knew. Yet the last days have seen, and will see, men as blind and as full of satire and scoffing as they.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 1–4. This second epistle. This language implies a former…
1–4. This second epistle. This language implies a former letter written to the same persons to whom this is addressed. I stir up your pure minds. In both letters his object was mainly to exhort them to holy lives. By way of remembrance. By reminding you of the claims of Christ as shown by prophets and apostles.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain THE apostle now deals with those who made the…
THE UNFULFILLED PROMISE OF THE COMING
CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES
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THE apostle now deals with those who made the delay of the Lord’s coming, and the disappointment consequently felt by many Christians, an occasion for mockery. The sense in which the Early Church expected an early personal return of the Saviour, and based their expectation on the words of our Lord, and the teachings of St. Paul and St. Peter, needs to be carefully considered. Probably both the apostles and the Christian people gave a materialistic setting to what was intended to be spiritually realised. It has recently been confidently argued that our Lord’s supposed eschatological teachings should be limited to the destruction of the Jewish religious system in the Roman overthrow of Jerusalem, save when those teachings must have a spiritual application.
2Pe_3:1. Second epistle.—Assuming not only a first, but that first sent but a little while before. “This epistle, already a second one.” Pure.—That is, separated, so unsullied, sincere (Php_1:10). “Its primary application is to that which will bear the full test of being examined by sunlight, and so it carries with it the idea of transparent sincerity.
2Pe_3:2. Of the apostles.—“Through your apostles.”
2Pe_3:3. Scoffers.—“Scoffers shall come in their scoffing.” Own lusts.—“The habit of self-indulgence is at all times the parent of the cynical and scoffing sneer.” Scoffers revelling in scoffing, a cumulative expression to denote shameless scoffers.
2Pe_3:4 Fathers.—Here probably the first believers in Christ, who are represented as having proved the hope of Christ’s coming to be an illusion, as they died before it was realised.
2Pe_3:5. Willingly.—Wilfully forget, because it does not suit their purpose to remember. Ignore. Standing, etc.—More precisely, “formed out of water, and by means of water”; implying possibility of the Flood. See the account of Creation in Genesis 1,
2. Plumptre says, “The apostle speaks naturally from the standpoint of the physical science of his time and country, and we need not care to reconcile either his words, or those of Genesis 1, with the conclusions of modern meteorological science.”
2Pe_3:6. Whereby.—By the two outlets of water. Gen_7:11. World.—This term distinctly assumes the universality of the Deluge. Perished.—A term strictly applicable only to living creatures.
2Pe_3:7. Reserved unto fire.—This is part of the teaching of the book of Enoch. Scriptural allusions are thought to be found in Dan_7:9-11; 2Th_1:8, “stored up for fire.” “By analogy with 2Pe_3:5 we understand that the fire for which the present heavens and earth are reserved, exists now as a constituent in their original constitution, but prepared and designed as the agent of their dissolution. Science corroborates this.”
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—2Pe_3:1-7
Doubts Concerning Christ’s Coming.—It is important to notice that the apostolic letters assume previous apostolic teachings. In the progress of the years the apostles found various intellectual and moral evils were seriously affecting the religious thought and life of the disciples. Their epistles are mainly designed to be corrections of these evils, and special effort is made to recover the neglected features of apostolic teaching which ought to have made such errors and evils impossible. So St. Peter here speaks of “stirring up their pure” (sincere and reverent) “minds by way of remembrance.” A certain measure of authority was, from the first, felt to attach to apostolic utterances, because they were persons who had immediate and direct experiences, instructions, and revelations concerning the matters of which they spoke and wrote. We can fully recognise this reasonable authority without presenting in any exaggerated way their absolute freedom from error. It is manifested by the facts of history that they did not adequately apprehend the spiritual character of Christ’s coming, or the period that must elapse before He would come in any sensible manifestation.
I. Christ’s coming as apostles taught it.—Their standpoint is indicated by the question which they asked of their Lord just before His ascension: “Wilt Thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?” Christ, in reply, only told them that He could give no account of the precise time, but left them to understand that the kingdom would be restored; and they had an immediate and pressing duty to perform, and keep on performing, until the time for setting up the kingdom came. With this in their minds they put their own meanings into the message of the angels who appeared when their Lord had passed out of sight: “This Jesus, which was received up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye beheld Him going into heaven.” On this basis an apostolic doctrine of Christ’s coming grew. At first they expected Him to appear when the cloven tongues appeared. Then they shifted their expectations to an immediate future, and, when they began to suffer persecutions, comforted themselves with the assurance that He was coming to vindicate them, and to judge their persecutors. Time passed on, and He did not come just as they anticipated; and some of their number died, unvindicated and unavenged, and deprived of whatever privileges were to attend the coming. But still they persisted that the “day of the Lord is at hand.” It does not appear that the spiritual sense in which believers have always felt that Jesus has fulfilled His promise was ever apprehended by the apostles. They had the promise and the hope, but they could only realise it when placed before them in a carnal and earthly setting. And that setting put it in limitations which started criticism and encouraged unbelief.
II. On what grounds could doubts of Christ’s coming again be cherished?—There do not appear to have been any special forms of doubt in those days. The objections urged are precisely those which have been heard in every Christian age, and are heard to-day. They may go under two heads, and be put in relation to the two conditions of human thinking—time and space; but they always assume, what we are by no means prepared to admit, that the coming is altogether and only sensible, material, and earthly. It is said
(1) He is always coming now, but the now never comes. It is said
(2) If He came in a material form He must put Himself in space-limitations, and could not possibly be the help and blessing that He is as an unlocalised, everywhere present, spiritual Saviour.
III. What facts of Divine dealing make all such doubts unreasonable?—The scoffers put their scoffing in this form: “You have told us of a coming affliction such as there has not been from the beginning of the creation, and lo! we find the world still goes on as of old, and no great catastrophe happens.” St. Peter’s answer is that men spoke in just the same way concerning certain other great historical catastrophes and calamities. There is always human confusion when time-measures are applied to the Divine Being and His dealings with men. The threatened catastrophes always have come, and what men called “delay” had a Divine mission of warning and opportunity. Divine time-delay is never a basis on which doubts can reasonably rest. The only doubts in relation to the coming of the Lord permissible to Christians are those which lead them to question whether as yet they have quite sounded the fulness and depth of their Lord’s meaning, when He promised to “come again.” We ought to be advancing in spiritual power and insight, and so better able to read our Lord’s spiritual meanings. And he who can enter fully into the blissful reality of our Lord’s spiritual presence is relieved of all undue anxiety concerning a possible bodily manifestation. “That is not first which is spiritual; but that which is natural, and afterwards that which is spiritual.” Judgment of mankind is spiritual work. The reward of the righteous is spiritual reward. Christ is king of souls, and, here or yonder, then or now, He is the spiritual Christ who comes in spiritual ways. Still, for so many the spiritual truth has yet to keep its material shapings and dress, and they can only realise His coming at all when they can picture to themselves a majestic, sensible manifestation, wrapped about with clouds.
SUGGESTIVE NOTES AND SERMON SKETCHES
2Pe_3:4. Christ’s Coming.—Notice—
I. How St. Peter answers five questions relating to the last day.—
1. Whether we are yet to wait confidently for the last day.
2. When, and at what time, it will come.
3. Why Jesus has not come for so long a time.
4. How, and in what manner, the last day will come.
5. What Christ will perform on that day.
II. How thoroughly he instructs us as to the manner of our preparing for it.—
1. In holy conversation and godliness.
2. To wait patiently for, and hasten to it.
3. To give all diligence, that we may be found blameless by Christ.—V. Herberger.
2Pe_3:4. Death as Sleep.—In the use of the verb to “fall asleep” for dying we are reminded of our Lord’s words, “Our friend Lazarus sleepeth” (Joh_11:11); of St. Paul’s, “many sleep” (1Co_11:30). So in Greek sculpture Death and Sleep appear as twin genii, and in Greek and Roman epitaphs nothing is more common than the record that the deceased “sleeps” below. Too often there is the addition, as of those who are without hope, “sleeps an eternal sleep.” In Christian language the idea of sleep is perpetuated in the term “cemetery” (κοιμητήριον= sleeping place), as applied to the burial-place of the dead, but it is blended with that of an “awakening out of sleep” at the last day, and even with the thought, at first seemingly incompatible with it, that the soul is quickened into higher energies of life on its entrance into the unseen world.—Dean Plumptre.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain 1... “In which I stir up your pure mind…
ARGUMENT 4
GOD’S MILLENNIUM SABBATH
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1... “In which I stir up your pure mind in remembrance.” We are born into the world with the carnal mind, transmitted from Satan through Adam. In regeneration this carnal mind is conquered and grace given to hold it in subjugation, till it is utterly destroyed in sanctification, leaving in you nothing but the “pure mind” of Christ. The Greek eilikrinee, “pure,” is from eilee, a sunbeam, and krinoo, to judge. Hence it is a wonderfully strong adjective, describing the mind imparted by Christ in the gracious economy. It simply means a mind or heart so pure, that when illuminated by the infallible Sun of Righteousness, the omniscient eye of God discovers no impurity in it. Oh, how grandly does the Holy Ghost preach Christian perfection!
2. In this valedictory of the senior Apostle, he importunately reminds the saints of their momentous responsibility to hold pertinaciously the words spoken by the holy Apostles and prophets.
3. “Knowing this primarily that in the last days mockers in scoffing will come forth, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? For since our fathers fell asleep, all things remain as from the beginning of creation.” We are living amid the fulfillment of the prophecies. Many preachers are now mocking and scoffing at the idea of the Lord’s near coming. They stand in the popular pulpits and preach evolution (which is really the Ingersoll infidelity), proclaiming to the people that the world is growing better, whereas the Bible says, “Wicked men and seducers,” i.e., the world, will wax worse and worse even to the end.
5, 6. Here Peter confirms his argument on the world’s deterioration and divine intervention by reference to the antediluvians who waxed worse and worse, till the flood swept them away. While God’s true people progress in wisdom anti-holiness, Satan’s people make similar progress in knowledge and wickedness. As the antediluvian world increased in wickedness till the flood, so the post-diluvian ages will progress in wickedness till the Lord comes. These pulpit evolutionists and progressionists, whose name is legion at the present day, are leading the people into practical infidelity by ignoring the divine administration and substituting the human. The trend of this preaching is to obscure the epochs of conversion, sanctification and the Lord’s personal return to the earth, thus taking all epochs out of Christian experience, and running into gradualism, i.e., humanism. Rest assured, when you leave out the epochs you eliminate God and run into infidelity.
7. “But now the heavens and the earth have been preserved by the same Word, kept for fire in the day of judgment, and to the destruction of ungodly men.” Thus you see Peter proves the future epochs by the past. As the earth was baptized with water when converted to God in Noah’s day, so it is to be sanctified by fire, preparatory of its final restitution and celestialization at the end of time.
8. “But let this not escape your memory, beloved, that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” This brings us the clear revelation that God’s millennial day is a thousand years. Scoffing infidels bring up geology to refute the Mosaic history of creation, as they construe, in six twenty-four hour days. The fact that the sun did not appear till the fourth day does away with the hypothesis of there having been solar days. As here we learn that God’s day is a thousand years, applying the schedule to creation, we have ample time for the geological period discovered by scientists. Many authorities certify to an error of one hundred years in Bishop Usher’s chronology, thus winding up the sixth thousandth year with the present century. Regardless of the chronological disparity, we are certainly rapidly approaching the end of Satan’s week, full of toil, sin, suffering and calamity, and denominated “night” (Rom 13:12), in contradistinction to the bright day of Eden, which preceded it, and the glorious millennial day destined to follow it.
Oh, glory to God, for the swift retreat of Satan’s long, dark night, and the glorious dawn of God’s long prayed-for millennial day.
9. Mat 16:28 affirms the probability of our Lord’s return before the death of the living generation, involving a human contingency which did intervene, postponing the advent. Perhaps He has been waiting these centuries to give time for the accumulation of a sufficient number of charter members to organize His kingdom. It is certainly a great mercy to all who are disposed to appreciate a place in the bridehood for Him to delay till we wash and put on our white robes and get ready to meet Him.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain 2Pe 3:1
2Pe 3:1
The Way of Remembrance.
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Here, then, the message of an Apostle, nay, even the teaching of the Holy Spirit, is identified with sacred remembrance—remembrance of holy words and deep impressions dropped upon the heart in the highest moments of life. The apprehension of Divine things consists, it would seem, not in new discoveries, not in strained and laboured thought, but in the reawakening of the pure and simple mind and the gathering up of every Christlike image and affection from behind and from within.
I. This power, already known to Plato as reminiscence, is no other than that appeal to remembrance which Christ identified with the function of the Holy Spirit. This appeal, instead of passing downwards, like knowledge upon ignorance, or forward, like reason from point to point, moves inward towards a centre of faith and feeling that holds us all. It is by reversing our ambitious steps, not by advancing into original ideas, but by relapse upon simple affections, not by seizing new stations in philosophy, but by recovering the artlessness of the child, that we must find the joy of redemption and the wisdom of faith.
II. We have perhaps two sorts of memory, two ways at least in which we are referred to a prior state of the given object, and enabled to recognise it as not new. (1) There is the purely personal memory which reflects always the image of our individual selves, revives our actual experiences, writes our own biography, and hangs round the gallery of thought the portraits on which we love to gaze. Without this our being would have no thread of conscious continuity, our character no liability to judgment, our affections no root of tenacity. There are few lives which have not thus their secret store of natural pieties, their holy font of sweet and reverent affections, wherewith to rebaptise the dry heathenism of the present. (2) But besides this personal memory of our own past states, we have another, deeper and more refined, but not less real: an impersonal faculty which has another object than our own individual selves; a power of recognising, as ever with us, the secret presence of a Holy, a True, a God, that is not our own, that is above us, though within us, that has a right over us, which may be slighted, but cannot be gainsaid. When you wake up to the perception of deeper obligation or the consciousness of a sanctity unfelt before, your instant recognition of it is ever with you, seen or unseen, does not deceive you; it is not a new glory that is kindled, but the dull mind that is cleansed; and if the secret of the Lord were not consciously with you, it only waited till you were among them that fear Him.
J. Martineau, Hours of Thought, vol. ii., p. 92.
2Pe 3:3
Righteousness the School of Hope.
Note:—
I. The cause which led persons to argue that Christ was gone never to return. It was the absence of change; the unvarying order and course of nature; the undisturbed, unhalting progress of events. "Things continue as they were from the beginning of creation." Against this dead weight of custom we, too, have to struggle. The common and deadly form of unbelief in our time is the atheism of hopelessness, which, recognising no change in past or present, looks for none, and therefore believes in none, for the future.
II. It is not only or principally the contemptuous derider of Christian faith and hopes who grounds his rejection of Christ’s Gospel upon the unvarying course of nature. Rather is it the jester, the trifler, the player upon the surface of things, unwilling and unable to be earnest and to contemplate the seriousness of life and its momentous issues. These are the unbelievers most abounding and most difficult to convince. The scoffer scoffs as a defence against himself. There is more hope for him, just for this reason, than for the dilettante, the mere butterfly of infidelity, who enjoys his careless life in the sunshine, knowing nothing of any hour but the present. He does not wish for a world purged from evil and redeemed by Christ; he sees nothing of the good that is already in the world.
III. But, says the Apostle, there is an end to come, soon or late. Sin, and frivolity, and the cold heart must die, though good is imperishable. St. Peter may be in part appealing to the fears of the frivolous and the worldly, but he does not think the evil of their life to consist only in the punishment that may be in store for them; he reminds them that there can be no place for them in the new and redeemed world which God has promised, for the essence of the new heaven and the new earth for which they looked was that "therein dwelleth righteousness."
A. Ainger, Sermons in the Temple Church, p. 210.
2Pe 3:4
The Promise of His Coming.
I. Here we have the language of those moods of the human soul which lead in the end to entire rejection of the second coming of Christ. (1) "Where is the promise of His coming?" See here the language of natural impatience. To many a man, in religious as in other things, the one thing that he cannot put up with is to be kept waiting. He gets angry with Almighty God when a truth is not immediately verified, when a grace is not instantaneously given, when a promise is not kept without delay. He gets angry with God, just as he would with an inconsiderate or neglectful servant who kept him standing at his front door, exposed to the wind and to the rain, instead of hurrying to open it at once. This was the temper of some souls at the close of the apostolic age. They had fled for refuge from the storms of heathen life, from falling fortunes, from blighted hopes, to lay hold on the hope set before them. They wanted to see as soon as possible with their bodily eyes the object of their hope. Years had passed since the ascension of Christ to heaven; yet He had not come to judgment. The Apostles, those first fathers of the faith, had one after another fallen asleep; yet Christ had not come to judgment. The first generation of believers, then the second, then perhaps the third, had passed away; yet Christ had not come to judgment. Why this delay? Why this protracted expectation? Why these disappointed hopes? Was He, was He, coming at all? Why should men wait for that which they had expected so earnestly, expected so long, why hope almost against hope for a fulfilment of the promise of the Advent? (2) "Where is the promise of His coming?" Here we have the language of incipient disbelief in a supernatural event yet to come. I say, "yet to come." It is easier to believe in that which is above nature in a distant past, than at the present moment, or in a future which may be upon us at any moment. Many a man will believe in miracles eighteen hundred years ago who would not have believed in them at the time, who would not believe in the same miracles with the same evidence in their favour now. The promise of Christ’s coming in bygone ages, as now, has seemed to be in conflict with the idea that the supernatural has passed away for good, and that henceforth only such events as can be brought within that circle of causes which we term "nature" can reasonably be expected. (3) "Where is the promise of His coming?" There is a kind of half-faith, half-unbelief, which receives Christ with one hand, which repels Him with the other, which is willing to admit much about Him, but not to admit all that He says about Himself. In this state of mind men are glad that He came to teach, to save them, to leave them an example, that they should follow His steps, nay, to "bear their sins in His own body on the tree." "He has done all this," they say to themselves. "He has died, risen, left this world. He is seated in a distant world on a throne of glory." And, if they said out quite frankly what they feel and think, they would add that they are grateful for what He has done, but that for the future they wish to be left alone, left to themselves, left with their memories about Him.
II. Let us place ourselves under St. Peter’s guidance, and see how he deals with this way of looking at things in the verses which follow my text. (1) Now, first of all, he raises the question of fact. The objector says to him that there have been no catastrophes, and that, therefore, none are to be expected. St. Peter points to the Deluge. The Deluge, whatever else may be said of it, was a catastrophe both in the history of nature and in the history of man. All through the ages during which man has inhabited this planet, and we know anything of his annals, there has been a succession of tragic occurrences, whether on the face of nature, or in the realm of human history. Holy Scripture calls these occurrences judgments, and they are judgments. They effect on a small scale, and for a race, or a generation, or a family, or a man, what the universal judgment will effect once for all for all the races of men. Sometimes they are the work of nature, or, to speak as Christians ought to speak, the work of God in nature. Such in the old days of the patriarchal history was the destruction of the corrupt cities of the plain—Sodom, Gomorrah, and the rest. Such in the splendid days of the Roman empire, and in a neighbourhood most favoured by the wealthy citizens of the capital of the world, was the destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum. In the last century, our great-grandfathers were accustomed to look upon the earthquake of Lisbon as an event of this character; and that mighty wave which, along the seaboard of Bengal, the other day swept some two hundred thousand and odd human beings into eternity, is a recent instance of nature doing what it will achieve hereafter on a yet more gigantic scale, winding up the account of a vast number of reasonable creatures with the God who made them. It is a mere difference, you will remark, of the area or scale of the operation. The principle is the same as that of the Deluge, the same as that of the convulsions which will accompany the coming of the Son of man. (2) And, secondly, St. Peter grapples with the complaint that the Second Advent is so long delayed: "Beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." For the infinite mind time means nothing. There is no such thing for Him as delay. For Him all that will be is. The only question is how and when it will be unrolled to us. True, we may have to wait, we know not how long. (3) But, thirdly, can a reason be assigned for the delay, as it seems to us, of Christ’s coming to judgment? We know that this delay is not accidental; we know that it is not enforced; we know that it is not the result of caprice. But then what is its reason? St. Peter answers this question too. He says that there is a moral purpose, highly in accordance with the revealed character of God, in this delay: "God is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness. He is long-suffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." As love was the motive which moved God to surround Himself with created beings who could never, as He knew, repay Him for the privilege of existence, so in love does He still linger over the work of His hands when it has forfeited all title to exist. As "God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life," so He would fain extend, though it were to no purpose, the priceless blessings of this redemption so long as any soul may be redeemed. The delay is not accidental; it is not capricious; still less is it forced; it is dictated by the throbbings of the heart of God bending over the moral world in an unspeakable compassion.
H. P. Liddon, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 903.
2Pe 3:4
The Three Comings of Christ.
The Scripture speaks of the three comings of our Lord Jesus Christ: the historical coming "in great humility" more than eighteen centuries ago, and the future coming "in glorious majesty" at a day and an hour when we think not, and the present coming of Christ into the hearts of His true servants, and through them into the world. This we should call a spiritual coming.
I. I would remind you of the simple historical fact that less than two thousand years ago Jesus Christ came into this world. The more thoughtful we are, and in proportion partly to our age, partly to the range of our intellect, chiefly to our acquaintance with the things of God, will the real richness and manifold significance of Christ’s coming upon earth be felt by us. My present object is simply to remind you of it, to counsel you amid the busy, exciting rush of life to think once again over this most extraordinary and most momentous of all historical facts, the coming of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in great humility, and the complete revolution in the history of the world which His presence inaugurated, His love and holiness inspired, while His Divine power rendered it possible and permanent.
II. There is a second coming of Jesus Christ. It is often spoken of by the name of the "Second Advent." "We believe that He will come to be our Judge." This human life of ours on earth is not intended by God, who gave it, to last for ever. Here it is stamped by three dark shadows: the shadow of sin, the shadow of sorrow, and the awful shadow of death. They will not be for ever. There will be a close of what is expressively, if unconsciously, called this earthly "scene"; and then a great change will come. Jesus Christ will be revealed to good and bad alike with a "glorious majesty" that may be either feared or welcomed, but cannot be questioned or ignored. "Heaven and earth shall pass away; but My words shall not pass away."
III. We must speak, lastly, of His third coming: His coming now into our hearts—shall I say His actual coming or His desires, His efforts, to come? Try to believe that Jesus Christ is striving to enter your hearts. Whenever you feel your hearts touched; whenever your relish for prayer is quickened; whenever you are more certain that you are heard; whenever the call of duty sounds loud in your ears, bidding you be more bold and decided than heretofore in your Master’s service; whenever you come to hate, as hateful to Him, some form of evil which you had hitherto tolerated, this is for you an advent of Christ. Then is He indeed knocking at the door of your hearts, urging you to let Him enter and "make His abode with you."
H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 2nd series, p. 292.
References: 2Pe 3:4.—R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons, p. 269; G. Huntington, Sermons for Holy Seasons, 2nd series, p. 1; H. P. Liddon, Advent Sermons, vol. i., p. 300; W. Skinner, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xiii., p. 107. 2Pe 3:8.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. ii., p. 109; J. Keble, Sermons for Advent, p. 58; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. viii., No. 447; Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 4. 2Pe 3:9.—E. Garbett, The Soul’s Life, p. 357.
2Pe 3:10
The Suddenness of the Advent.
This truth of the suddenness of the advent of Christ we do not perhaps take sufficiently to heart; but if it be a truth that the second advent of Christ will be sudden, then some very important questions will arise out of that truth, which, whether welcome or unwelcome, must not be withdrawn from our consideration.
I. Let us look how far this truth of the suddenness of the coming of Christ is set forth in the Gospel. That the day of the Lord is to come suddenly is a truth laid down in the New Testament, not in one place only (though that would have been enough to make it true, as we have said, and, being true, to make it important), but in several places. It thus becomes a feature in the future aspect of the coming of the Son of man to be carefully borne in mind at all times when treating of this subject. "The day of the Lord shall come, and all men shall see the light." The similitude of the thief is used in the text also as showing the striking suddenness of the Second Advent.
II. What is the inference from the suddenness of Christ’s coming as to the probable state of the world at that time? Were Christ to appear in the present age of the world, He would come suddenly to most of us. He is not generally expected. Few of us think of His actual appearance, though the hope of His coming is extensive enough. If, then, He is to come suddenly in whatsoever age of the world He may come, it is probable that the state of the world will be very much the same as it is in our own age, neither much better nor much worse. We may also infer from this suddenness, which is so frequently and specially predicted, that the world will not be prepared for Christ’s advent, for that the Lord will come suddenly when He does come does but show that there will be as little preparation then as there is now, and His coming will be sudden to most of us, owing to our own want of preparation. This truth, then, of the suddenness of the day of the Lord is a very practical one. Death is not necessarily sudden, but the coming of the Son of man is. Death is sudden always to those who are not prepared for it. And yet how few of us can endure to think upon the possibility of a sudden death! How many are there who are not prepared for death at all! Remember that they only are prepared to die who are prepared for a sudden death; and they only are prepared for the coming of the Son of man who are prepared for His coming suddenly. Preparation for the one. involves preparation for the other.
A. B. Evans, Church Sermons, vol. i., p. 65.
Reference: 2Pe 3:10, 2Pe 3:11.—Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. xix., No. 1125.
2Pe 3:11
Advent.
I. The Apostles lived, and prayed, and laboured in the continual expectation that Christ would come again to them, and speedily, and that this promise would be fulfilled in their own lifetime. Thus He was always at the door of their life; and their attitude was just that in which we listen for every footfall, and watch the door that is soon to open when we are waiting for some honoured and expected visitant. And this eager, hopeful belief of theirs laid its strong hand on all their converts; the eye of every Christian was turned upwards every day with a strange sense of expectant awe. The mysterious vault of the sky overhead was to them not an unfathomable immensity peopled with unknown worlds, but the curtain which shut out from their vision the throne of God, and they expected it to open before them at any moment. This expectation was one of their chief means of grace. It supported them through unparalleled difficulties and suffering; it made them feel all the burdens of their painful life comparatively light, because heaven was at their doors, and the reign of Christ was expected shortly to begin. Through the force of this expectancy they were, in fact, risen with Christ, their thoughts were fixed on things above, their home was at the right hand of God, in a far stronger sense than can be said of any of us.
II. After the lapse of eighteen hundred years we have learned rather to feel that with the Lord a thousand years are as one day, and that we cannot read the signs of His final coming; but we have lost thereby what was to those who laid the foundation of Christian life among men an all-powerful incentive to absolute and entire devotion to the service of Christ. Let us try to build up our life on a foundation of fear and reverence. Let us catch something, some faint reflection, of that spirit in which men once approached Him of the incommunicable name, and whom we, out of reverence, have styled "Lord." We cannot recall or recover those vivid expectations which filled the soul of the apostolic Christian, because we have learned by a long experience that we know not the end nor what we shall be, and that we cannot read the signs of any millennial time; but we can learn to wait for Him with the feeling of those who are in a holy presence, and waiting daily for that presence to manifest itself in clearer light and greater glory.
J. Percival, Some Helps for School Life, p. 206.
2Pe 3:12
From the Bibles that have marginal readings, it will appear that these words admit of a different construction: "Looking for and hasting the coming of the day of God." As I understand the intention of God in the place, His will and command is this: that we should do both—"hasting unto," and ourselves "hastening," "the coming of the day of God."
I. But now the question necessarily presents itself, Can anything which a man does really "hasten," by a single moment, such an event as the second coming of Christ? In every age Christians are to be praying and labouring for the extension of the Gospel over the whole earth. They are so to pray and so to labour as if they knew that the conversion of the world would be given to their faith, their diligence, and their love. And so labouring and so praying, they may command results. The Church shall grow; souls shall be saved; God shall be glorified. But, nevertheless, all this is only the earnest of a better dispensation—the falling drops which tell that the shower is coming.
II. But can mortal wishes or mortal feelings accelerate that "day of God"? Assuredly. God has oftentimes, in His mercy, changed His times for His people’s sake, in answer to their supplications, and in consideration of what they said and did. Many things have gone back. Death has retired for fifteen years. The destruction of a city has been postponed indefinitely when it had been most decidedly declared as imminent "within forty days." Great calamities, threatening a king and his people, have been handed down to the third and fourth generations. But has anything with God gone forward? Has the shadow on the dial ever gone on? "In those days shall be affliction such as was not from the beginning of the creation which God created unto this time, neither shall be. And except that the Lord had shortened those days"—What does that "shortening" mean? That the day of deliverance, the fixed day of deliverance, was put forward "for the elect’s sake." Then here is a great and happy event "hastening" on for man. God Himself has ever instilled the thought that there are certain things which for a period let or hinder the accomplishment of prophecy.
III. What, then, must we do to "hasten the day of God"? (1) Pray for it. What is the promise ought always to be emphatically the prayer of the dispensation. When we pray for any promise, what the prayer means is that we pray it to "come quickly." Is the Second Advent an exception? Nay; has not our Lord encouraged us when He has given us His words, that ourselves may have the echo—for all prayer, if rightly looked at, is the echo of God’s word—"Surely I come quickly".? Well, therefore, does the Church, in the most solemn of her services, teach us, over every opening grave, to say, "Accomplish the number of Thine elect, and hasten Thy kingdom." (2) Let the Church live in love and union, in order that a united Church may attract her Lord to "come." We can never forget that in His own last prayer He linked together inseparably the unity and the glory of His people—our oneness with His return. (3) Make great efforts for the evangelisation of the world. There are three things which have to be done before our Lord can "come." The "knowledge" of Him must be coextensive with the habitable globe, the appointed sheaves of the Gospel harvest must be gathered in, and the Jews must be brought back to their own land and to Him. The first is already well-nigh accomplished; the second is altogether in the bosom of God; the third we must promote. (4) Cultivate personal holiness, as for every other reason, so for this: that every one who really loves God, and serves God, and is like God, as far as in him lies, is making that preparation by which the Church is to be ready for her Lord, just as "a bride is adorned for her husband." Will He "come" until His bride has put on her jewels? And when she is decked and when she is meet indeed, can He stay away? It seems to be the law of all that is great that its movement at first is slow, and grows rapid at the last. We have seen it with the mercies and with the judgments of God; will it not be so with that grandest event which goes to make the climax of our world’s history?
J. Vaughan, Fifty Sermons, 12th series, p. 197.
References: 2Pe 3:12.—H. P. Liddon, Advent Sermons, vol. ii., pp. 133, 148, 162, 177; Bishop Barry, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiv., p. 374.
2Pe 3:13
I. The man who saw this vision may be described as a dreamer, and the glorious dream which he has put before us here still waits for its fulfilment. But dreamers are the pioneers of workers, and there are few movements of progress which have not had them amongst their leaders. It is the dreamer by whom the thought is first presented. A glorious dream surely is this: "A new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." There is, in fact, something pathetic in the attention that is given to every man who professes to have seen a vision or dreamed a dream provided only it be one that promises to deliver us from the power of that callous selfishness which has made the lives of multitudes so bare of all enjoyment, so full of care and misery, so abandoned to vice and wickedness. The new prophet may have little help to give, but he is heard, and heard with a patient thoughtfulness which indicates the desire to profit by any hint for a solution of the terrible problems by which the minds of enlightened men are exercised. The danger of the hour is scarcely "faithless coldness."
II. It would be useless, indeed, to deceive ourselves into the belief that some marvellous change has come over the spirits of men, that the demon of selfishness has been exorcised, that the lessons of the past have been wisely learned, and that we are about, under the influence of nobler thoughts and purposes, to enter upon an uninterrupted course of reform. In times of depression, looking at the force of opposition which all such changes have to encounter, a feeling of despair comes over the heart. The inroads made upon the kingdom of selfishness seem but small, and are with difficulty effected. The tendencies which in the past have not been altogether infrequent to reaction awaken the fear that the date of reform must be postponed to a very distant future. But in such moods we show not only a lack of faith, but also an inability to read correctly the signs of the times. We are progressing; we are in the midst of changes whose full significance we do not yet appreciate. The Church and the world are feeling the living forces of the Gospel as they have never felt them before. The victory is not yet, but the signs of success are many. We, at least, who believe in Christ "according to His promise look for a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness."
J. Guinness Rogers, Christian World Pulpit, Dec. 1892.
References: 2Pe 3:13.—F. D. Maurice, Sermons, vol. vi., p. 257. 2Pe 3:14.—R. Roberts, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxiv., p. 116; Homiletic Magazine, vol. viii., p. 326. 2Pe 3:14, 2Pe 3:15.—R. L. Browne, Sussex Sermons, p. 15; J. Keble, Sermons for Christmas and Epiphany, p. 214. 2Pe 3:15, 2Pe 3:16.—G. Dawson, Sermons on Disputed Points, p. 166.
2Pe 3:16
Consider the best means of avoiding the danger of professing to honour the word of God while yet you degrade it to purposes most alien from its spirit.
I. First, I would say, study the Scriptures. What a source of mischief is a rude and blind literalism! What ravages have been wrought in the use of Scripture by utter neglect of the context, making its isolated words the talisman to conjure with, while we profanely ignore their application! The whole field of Biblical exegesis is only too rich in error. The guide for moral conduct is to be found in the strength and unity of Scripture teaching, not in this or that precedent or text.
II. Let us be sternly on our guard against that inferential method against which Coleridge warned the Church so long ago. The general teaching of Scripture on all things necessary is plain and clear enough; and if we were not all as narrow, and as fierce, and as ignorant as we are, we might all draw water together in peace from these wells of salvation. Love, not hatred, is the key to open the difficulties of Scripture. Search the Scriptures as Christ bade you; and if you do so in the spirit of love, which is alone His spirit, you will find therein that good news of God which is the sole secret of individual salvation and of the progress, blessedness, and amelioration of the Church and of the world.
F. W. Farrar, Oxford and Cambridge Journal, May 6th, 1880.
2Pe 3:16
I. Strife, controversy, word-war, have gathered round the doctrine of atonement, the theory of justification, the mystery of the new birth, the everlasting sentence of God’s predestination, the possibility of falling from grace, the certainty of salvation, the full assurance of faith, the eternity of punishment. In all are "many things hard to be understood." In all these there are what St. Paul calls αἰνίγματα—puzzles, riddles, hard sayings, paradoxes. In this searching of the Spirit into the deep things of God, as in all venturous voyages, no small peril has to be encountered. Happily for mankind, God, when He manifested Himself to the world in the person of His Son, hid these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed them unto babes. The doors of the kingdom of heaven were easiest found by those that felt most their need of entrance there, by publicans and harlots sooner than by learned scribes or proud, contemptuous Pharisees. "Non in dialectica complacuit Deo," says old St. Ambrose, "salvum facere populum suum." "They that would do the will should know the doctrine." "The kingdom of God," cries Paul, "is not in word"—in a logically developed system—"but in power."
II. The very principle of faith, and with it, I venture to think, the only sure and permanent guarantee of holiness, is imperilled from two opposite sides: from the dogmatisers who call upon us to receive as truths propositions from which sometimes our conscience, sometimes our reason, revolts; and from the men of science who bid us, as a duty we owe to truth, give up everything that the reason cannot explain. Both parties make upon us what I cannot but consider unreasonable demands. There are mysteries in science, as well as mysteries in faith; and if philosophers are not disloyal to science by accepting a "working hypothesis," which they cannot fully prove, but which explains phenomena sufficiently well for practical purposes, neither are we disloyal to truth or false to our duty as reasonable beings for accepting as our hypothesis the principle of faith—faith which can give a reason for itself in part, though not wholly, and on which we think we can dare to work out our own salvation, albeit in fear and trembling. But the perils from the side of ultra-dogmatism are, perhaps, even greater than the perils from the oppositions of science falsely so called. Under the specious names of catholic dogma or of infallible truth, weak minds are lured to accept propositions about Divine things which, if not simply unmeaning, are utterly incredible, and which when examined are not found to rest on any authoritative or undoubted warrant of God’s word, but upon the precarious or over-subtle inferences of fallible man. And when this is discovered, the inevitable law of reaction comes into operation, and those who have believed most get to believe least, and the credulity of the youth is replaced by the scepticism of the man.
III. With regard to points of faith or doctrine, it was a memorable saying of Channing’s that men are responsible for the uprightness of their opinions rather than for rightness. The desire to be truthful at all hazards is a nobler temper than the mere desire to be what men call "sound." The spirit of truthfulness is what Christ tells us the Father seeks in those who worship Him.
Bishop Fraser, University Sermons, p. 97.
2Pe 3:18
Divine Grace and Human Effort.
I. Whenever we have to consider any joint action of God and man, we are in danger either of thinking of God to the exclusion of man, or of man to the exclusion of God. If we think of the Bible as a Divine book, as given by the Spirit of God, we dwell upon the Divine element in it, until we almost forget that all the writers of these books were human beings like ourselves, until all the reality of the human side of the book fades away; and we forget that the love of John, and the logic of Paul, and the fervour of Peter, and the rapt, visionary mind of Isaiah, and the tender and sorrowing heart of Jeremiah—that every one of these was just as real, and is just as real, in this book, as the mind and the heart of the author are in the last book that was published and advertised yesterday. We forget the reality of the human element in the Bible while we dwell upon the Divine. And so, on the other hand, there is the danger that in attempting to make this book a real, and living, and human book to us, dwelling upon the human element, men forget the Divine, and they think and speak of these books and writings as the work of Paul, and Peter, and John, and Jeremiah, and Isaiah, and Moses, and forget that in and through all these the living and Eternal God is speaking words of eternal truth to men.
II. The word "grace" in the text gives us, of course, the idea of the Divine power. What is the idea that the word "growth" gives us? It gives us an idea of the Divine power and life, developing itself naturally and subject to natural influences. When you put a seed in the ground or plant a root in the ground, what happens? You have two things working together: you have the human hand that sets the seed and the human skill that trains and watches the seed. But in the seed what happens? Something that no man can give: you have a Divinely given life and power in that seed, and it is by virtue of that power that the seed grows up into the perfect plant, or the root into the full-grown tree. In the heart of every one of us is planted at his baptism the seed of grace, in which is the whole future life and growth of the Christian man. Just as in the acorn lies folded up the summer glory and beauty of the oak, so in the first sowing of the seed of grace in the human heart lies all the possibility of the perfect Christian life. But this life, if left to itself, perishes. This life, like all other life, must have its food, must have its suitable soil and clime, must have its careful tending, and watering, and pruning. Neglect these, and although the life that is in it be Divine, the human sin, the human carelessness, will stunt and stamp out eventually that very life itself. There is no Divine gift in man that may not be utterly lost by man’s treatment of that gift.
Bishop Magee, Penny Pulpit, New Series, No. 531.
References: 2Pe 3:18.—A. Raleigh, Quiet Resting-places, p. 145; J. Edmunds, Sermons in a Village Church, p. 263; Clergyman’s Magazine, vol. iii., p. 80; Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iii., p. 100; Spurgeon, Sermons, vol. viii., No. 427; Ibid., Morning by Morning, p. 46; E. Blencowe, Plain Sermons to a Country Congregation, vol. ii., p. 296; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit, vol. viii., p. 27; Ibid., vol. xxviii., p. 33; T. V. Tymms, Ibid., vol. xxxiv., p. 45.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
F. W. Grant 1903 · Public Domain Division 3. (2Pe 3:1-18.)
Division 3. (2Pe 3:1-18.)
The death and resurrection of the earth.
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And now we come to what has been noticed as peculiar to Peter among the writers of these inspired epistles, although the apostle John will treat of it more in detail in the prophecy which closes the books of Scripture. We may expect from the apostle of the circumcision a reference to that which was already a promise in the Old Testament itself, and which has to do with the judgment, and yet the renovation, of that earth with which Israel’s promises are always connected. The whole fashion of this world is to pass away. As the earth, as we know it now, has had already its baptism of water, so it is yet to have its baptism of fire. The scene of sin and corruption and death must itself be purged from all that reminds of this. And this, as we have already seen in Titus, lies beyond that which we have learnt to speak of as the millennial time of blessing, which is but, after all, "the regeneration," and not the perfect state, which alone satisfies God. Peter gives us, indeed, but a mere glimpse of this; and the description of the after-prophecy is little more than such a glimpse; yet there is that in it which has the deepest interest and instruction as to the ways of God, ways which are the necessary outcome of His own nature.
1. First of all here, the apostle once more brings before us the lawless ones of the last days, now, indeed, in another character, as infidel scoffers against all that threatens their own security in evil. In stirring up the minds of those he addresses, by putting them in remembrance of the words both of Israel’s holy prophets and of the later commandment of the Lord and Saviour by the apostles, he would have them understand and note especially the coming of mockers in the last days, their infidelity taught them by the lusts they seek to gratify. These have an argument which is already, in certain quarters, beginning to show itself. They ask: "Where is the promise of His coming?" and they assert that all things continue, in fact, as they were from the beginning of the creation. It is the argument of "uniformity," only thoroughly carried out; and the judgment of God by the flood is ignored as men have of late been seeking to ignore it. What proof have we of the flood that can be derived from the great teacher, science? Science has, in fact, been giving its voice of late in correspondence with Scripture, but it is not welcome to those who desire no supernatural interference of God with the machinery of this world. This is hidden from them, says the apostle; really hidden, so that they may be sincere in it, and yet by the subtlety of their own wills, which so often deceive the keenest. The dependence of the heavens of old upon the word of God, how far is this to be admitted? The earth "subsisting out of water and in water" presents itself as readily in accordance with the fate of that old world overflowed with water. Did it, in fact, perish? or is there some partial flood or a tradition of many different ones that has been mistaken for this? Are there not races that came through it, after all? Are there not races that have no such tradition? Raise a question here, and it is enough. A question, as against Scripture, is always available. We will believe it, if we must, but we must show our readiness, at least, not to believe, if another theory may better approve itself. Let the record of the past be out of the way, and what need we fear as to any prophecy of a fiery judgment which these invalidated memoirs of an old time have preserved for us? It is by the same Word, and no other, that the heavens that are now and the earth have been stored up, reserved for fire against that which has its character as a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. A moral character, as we see, attaches to these things, and will surely loose the tongues of immoral men against them. Yet conscience prophesies too of a judgment to come, a testimony which it costs men much to be able to silence; while the world, as we look at it, spite of all reforms and all outward embellishments of it, is not such that one can readily even believe in a holy God going on with it forever. An anger that vents itself in the destruction of the very material scene which everywhere bears witness of the evil that has defiled it, is, after all, not without its approval in the heart that knows God.
2. But what about this long waiting time, which, as we know, science would enormously protract, in which God has been going on with such a world as this? The apostle has a word to say about this. "Let this not be hidden from you, beloved," he says, "that one day, with the Lord, is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." In the presence of God’s eternity we must not reckon things just as we are prone to do. After all, how can one compare all the length of time that might be granted, and the largest claim that could be made, with that immeasurable eternity which can furnish no proportion whatever to it? But there is another thing. "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some account slackness." His slackness is but His longsuffering. He "wills not that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." This is what is in His heart, His desire for men, however little they may respond to it. Yet that day of the Lord, so slow to come, will yet surely come, and come as a thief, stealing unwelcome upon men who put the thought of it willingly away from them, and thus invite deception. "But the day of the Lord will come,." "in which the heavens will pass away with a rushing noise, and the elements burning with heat shall be dissolved; the earth also, and the works in it, shall be burned up." We must not confound this with the coming of the Lord for His saints, nor even with His after-appearing with them, and the judgment which will take place upon the earth when He appears. We have, as we know in the after-revelation, the very interval measured which will be between this judgment of the living and the judgment of the dead before the great white throne; and it is in connection with this last, as Peter also speaks here, that the earth and its works will be burned up. We must realize the difference, too, between "the day of the Lord" and "the coming of the Lord," and must not wonder if "the day of the Lord" stretch over 1,000 years or more, if it do not reach on, indeed, to eternity. It is the day when the Lord will be once more manifestly supreme, and all opposition to Him be put down with a strong hand. Thus it may begin from the time of that appearing of the Lord itself, and so in its first beginning come as a thief, surprising the world; while, in the course of it further, the earth itself is subjected to His power and things are put into that condition, ready for the coming eternity which the reign of Christ as Man over the earth is ordained to bring about. Every enemy is to be put down, and death itself and Hades cast into the lake of fire; and then, at last, with no enemy or evil occurrent, "the day of the Lord" shall be peace, and nothing else but peace. Christ as "the Father of eternity" shall introduce the reign of peace forever.
3. We come now to the fulfilment of that promise for which we wait. If we are looking for things to be in this way dissolved, "what manner of persons ought we to be, in holy behaviour and godliness," waiting for and even hastening, with desire, the coming of that day of God when all this shall take place! Beyond it, according to His promise (we can have no evidence of it except that sure and blessed promise, that Word which we must learn to trust here or we shall be beggared forever), there remains for us the cheer of new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. This is manifestly a reference to Isaiah’s word: "Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former things shall not be remembered nor come into mind." It is but a glance, for the prophets of the Old Testament, apart from this, never seem to go beyond that kingdom which we, indeed, have learned to call "millennial," as having its limits defined for us in this way. For Israel, there was no such necessary limitation; there was a bright scene before them upon which their eyes should rest, assured that whatever might be beyond could only be additional blessing; and the prophet here goes on immediately to speak of God’s creating "Jerusalem a rejoicing and her people a joy," in terms which very plainly imply the presence of sin, and therefore not an earth upon which dwelleth righteousness, not characterized by that. But we must not on that account lose sight of the distinct character of that which the apostle here, with divine insight, brings forward as what was to be really final -an absolutely "new heavens and new earth." We have one more reference to it in Isaiah, and that is where the Lord promises that as the new heavens and the new earth which He will make shall remain before Him, so Israel’s seed and their name shall remain. This is naturally taken by many to imply that therefore the new earth itself only speaks here of a temporary, that is, of the millennial condition. If so, it is plainly contrary to what Peter gives us of it here, for it is plain that the dissolution of the heavens and earth that are now is in order to the bringing in of a perfect condition which is to follow it. The picture that we have in the book of Revelation is in complete accordance with this. We have only the alternative, therefore, that this is an absolute promise of God that not only the blessed of Him in Israel shall remain amongst those blessed forever (which, of course, will be true), but that their very seed and name would remain. Here then, of course, is the assertion that Israel has not merely a temporary place as a special people of His upon the earth, but that it will have such a place forever.
But this will involve a difficulty for many. It has often been dwelt upon that when, in the new earth, "the tabernacle of God shall be with men and He will dwell with them," nations shall have disappeared, with all the distinctions incident to this. It is now henceforth only God and men. Can we, however, press this so far? Exactly the same thing has been thought with regard to the company of the redeemed in heaven, as we know. It has been thought and contended that they are all one company. Spite of the distinctions that we see in such a passage as that in the twelfth of Hebrews, where "the spirits of just men made perfect" (clearly by resurrection) are distinguished from "the assembly of the first-born ones whose names are written in heaven," it is so generally considered that the Church, which is Christ’s body, is that which has continued through all generations, and which embraces in it all that have ever believed from the beginning, that to speak of any such distinction as is implied here has been thought unwarrantable. Yet very many now have learned to think otherwise, and the passage itself which speaks of "the assembly of first-born ones" must necessarily imply some after-born, who are, therefore, not of this assembly. It may be said, perhaps, that these are millennial saints. Even so, there is a distinction admitted amongst the redeemed. But it may be questioned whether the first-born are that in time, or in place, rather. Israel has been, as we know, God’s first-born upon the earth, and these "first-born ones registered in heaven" are plainly in opposition to the "first-born ones written upon earth." When God says of Christ even, prophetically, "I will make Him My first-born, higher than the kings of the earth," it is plainly prerogative and dignity that are in question, rather than time. Again, among the angels, although they are in this passage in Hebrews spoken of as "the universal gathering," yet we are accustomed to recognize distinctions -authorities, principalities and powers, whatever may be implied in these. The distinction between earthly and heavenly saints must abide. If there be a new earth for those upon earth, the heavenly saints have not their portion there. Thus there is no antecedent argument against Israel’s name remaining forever in connection with the new earth. The redeemed will be all redeemed. The children of God will all be children; but if it please God that all that He has wrought in Israel should be preserved in this way, as a memorial forever, what is there to stumble any in such a thing? In any case, if the "new heavens and the new earth" mean just what the apostle is speaking of here, then it is positively declared by the prophet that Israel’s seed and name shall remain as long as these do. We have no reason whatever to say that the new heavens and the new earth are millennial, simply. To what other promise can Peter refer here than that in Isaiah? There is no other; and the apostle gives this distinctly, not as a new revelation, but as the fulfilment of God’s word of old. Thus we have no alternative, surely, but to take it as it stands. Distance on the part of any from God will indeed be over. Those words of revelation, "The tabernacle of God shall be with men, and He will dwell with them," are assurance that now, what has always been in God’s heart, what we have seen as revealed in Christ Himself among men,Immanuel, -will be at last fully effectuated. There will be no distance anywhere; but that does not imply that there will be no differences, which, if it be maintained, must be insisted on in the fullest manner -no difference between the Church and Old Testament saints; no difference between the heavenly saints and the earthly; and this would naturally end in what is the thought of many, that the new earth will be the final abode of all these, and that the New Jerusalem itself, therefore, must lose finally its distinctly heavenly character. Scripture surely does not lead to this, nor justify it. The blessing of all will be perfect, but there will be distinct circles of blessing, none the less.
Just a word as to the expression itself, "new heavens and a new earth." The heavens here are simply the heavens of the earth itself, that is to say, all that is connected with the firmament of the second day. The heavens have too manifestly to do with the earth to be omitted in any description of the final change. The heavens rule the earth, and thus are naturally changed in order to the new condition of things upon it. As we find them connected in the creative account in Genesis, so we find them connected again here at the close. The new earth, let us remember, is new in the same sense that the man in Christ is a new man -not a new individual. It is the same person who was the sinner and is now the saint, but there is a new condition altogether. The millennium, as we have seen in Titus, is the regeneration of the earth; but that is not the prelude to its mere destruction. On the contrary, it is the first step towards abiding blessing and the change of the heavens and the earth; for the coming in of that which is new is as the change upon the body for the saint, when the body itself may be dissolved and everything seem to pass away, the very elements of it dispersed in every direction; and yet there is a resurrection of the dead. The great condition of blessing is announced. Righteousness must be the basis of all, and abiding righteousness upon the new earth means abiding blessing.* Whose heart that has known what it is to "hunger and thirst after righteousness" but must look with expectation for that time? "Wherefore," says the apostle, "seeing that ye wait for these things, be diligent to be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless." How unsuitable for the looking for this condition of perfect righteousness would be the least laxity with regard to it now!
{*We have three distinct relationships of righteousness in connection with three ages. During the present age, it is the basis upon which grace reigns -"Even so might grace reign through righteousness" (Rom 5:21). In the cross and the resurrection of our Lord, God’s righteousness has been manifested and vindicated, and a divine basis laid upon which grace may reign. During the Millennium, righteousness will reign (Isa 32:1). No longer will forbearance wait upon the ungodly, but swift and sure retribution will fall upon the disobedient. During the eternal age there will be no need for the repression of evil, for there will be no evil, save in the eternal prison house of Satan and the lost. But righteousness will dwell, have its house, in the new heavens and new earth. -S.R.}
4. But the apostle closes still with the word of warning. We are to account, as he reminds us again, that the longsuffering of the Lord is salvation. That is His meaning in it. It is not tolerance of evil in any wise, and we must not use it as an argument for any tolerance on our part of what is contrary to Him. The fruit of this longsuffering we are, every one of us: therefore we may well rejoice in it. And Peter has here a tender reference to that beloved brother, Paul, to whom the gospel of salvation was in an eminent way committed. It is the only passage, perhaps, in the New Testament in which we find the commendation of one inspired apostle by another. How suited here, where there had been, as we know, for a moment an apparent breach, which men have worked, after their manner, into a strife between two contradictory systems -Christian both, and which had finally, by some way of compromise, to be brought together and welded into one. Peter’s words here are surely intended in divine wisdom to meet any such thought, and the very letter to the Hebrews is what Peter refers to in this case. "According to the wisdom given unto him," he says, he "hath written unto you." Yet here, above all, were, as we know, some of those things hard to be understood which would be found especially by Jews, more or less, in all his epistles. That does not, in Peter’s eyes, evidently, diminish the wisdom of them. There are those who wrest them to their own destruction, but they have to wrest them in order to this, and those who do so are the untaught and ill established -the people who, therefore, have not bent their hearts really to the establishing truth, and have not submitted their souls to the discipline of it. Destruction could not come otherwise to any from the blessed Scriptures, the witnesses of the fulness of God’s love for men; yet even those truly His might need the admonition. God works in this way, by His admonitions; and the apostle bids them, knowing these things before, to beware lest, being carried away with the error of the wicked, they fall from their own steadfastness. He returns in his last words here, to that with which he had begun the epistle. If they would not fall or be carried away, they must "grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." They must learn more and more the grace expressed in Christ; for growth in grace is surely, on the other side of it, but growth in the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour. In that knowledge he has told us at the beginning, all things are found that pertain to life and godliness. "To Him," therefore, "be glory, both now and forever."*
{*Most have noticed the marked similarity between the second chapter of second Peter and the Epistle of Jude. Unbelief would put a slight upon inspiration, claiming that one was but the copy of the other. Faith, however, sees only perfection in the word of God, and where there are difficulties, looks for special reasons for them. Most likely, one of the writers may have had the words of the other before him, and in speaking of the same state, would be led by the Spirit of God to use the same illustrations. But the differences between the two portions are also clearly marked. -S.R.}
F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain Antidote Against Despising the Day of the Lord. Exhortation.…
Antidote Against Despising the Day of the Lord. Exhortation. Doxology
2 Peter 3 may be subdivided into three parts: (a) 2Pe_3:1-7. 'This Second Epistle is a reminder of what prophets and apostles have said. Those who would understand it must first know that, though mockers will deny this, there will be an end of the present world by fire, as once it was overwhelmed by water. This will be a day of judgment and destruction for the ungodly. (b) 2Pe_3:8-13. As for the delay, which induces some to doubt this, time to God is not what it is to us, and His delay is due to His longsuffering will that men should be saved. When the day does come, it will be sudden, and since it is surely approaching, we ought to be preparing the way for it by holy living. (c) 2Pe_3:14-18. Be holy then, and consider that God's longsuffering is a means of attaining spiritual health. This is the teaching of St. Paul's letters, though some mischievously pervert their meaning. Do you keep free from error and grow in grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ, to whom be glory now and when that day of eternity shall come.' The mockers may be different persons, but are probably the same as the false teachers. Here, as in 2 Peter 2, the Apostle speaks of an evil which is expected in the future, but of which he already sees the signs: cp. Act_20:30; 1Ti_4:1-5; 2Ti_3:1-9.
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1. This second epistle.. I now write] RV 'This is now.. the second epistle that I write': see Intro. Your pure minds by way of remembrance] RV 'your sincere mind by putting you in remembrance.'
2. Us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour] RV 'of the Lord and Saviour through your apostles.' Prophets of old and Apostles now have alike uttered the commandment of Christ: cp. 1Pe_1:11.
3. Shall come.. scoffers] RV 'mockers shall come with mockery,' a repetition in the style of 1 Pet.
4. The fathers] i.e. the men of Old Testament times: cp. Rom_9:5; Heb_1:1.
5. Willingly are ignorant of] RV 'wilfully forget.' That by the word of God, etc.] RM 'that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and through water, by the word of God' (cp. Gen_1:2); a thing is made both out of and through its material. What the mockers forgot was that God who made can also break up what He has made by His word. Note the emphatic position: cp. Heb_11:3.
6. Whereby] i.e. by means of the water and of the word: cp. Heb_11:7, 'word' and 'fire.'
8. Be not ignorant] RV 'forget not': cp. 2Pe_3:5. Another characteristic repetition.
That one day, etc.] from Psa_90:4.
9. Not willing] RV 'not wishing'; in spite of this different word we are reminded of 1Ti_2:4.
10. As a thief in the night] cp. 1Th_5:2. RV 'as a thief': cp. Mat_24:43. All through this passage the Apostle has in mind the prophecy of our Lord which is recorded in that chapter The elements] the parts into which we might, roughly speaking, divide the world, e.g. earth, sea, sky. But the heavenly bodies (RM) may be meant. The works that are therein] i.e. the processes of nature. Hence the expression, 'shall be discovered' (RM), is quite appropriate: cp. 1Pe_1:7.
11. Conversation] RV 'living.'
12. Hasting unto] RV 'earnestly desiring,' RM 'hastening.' It is written in the Talmud, 'If Jews exercised penitence for one day, Messiah would straightway come.' Wherein] RV 'by reason of which.' The Day of God is the cause. 'There will be a judgment,' not, 'the world will come to an end,' is the point of this c.
13. According to his promise] given in Isa_65:17. After all, the world will be renewed rather than destroyed: cp. Rev_21:5. Wherein dwelleth righteousness] cp. Rev_22:3.
14. Such things] RV 'these things,' i.e. new heavens, new earth, righteousness.
That ye may be found] the same word as that which is translated 'discovered' in 2Pe_3:10 (RM). There may be a reference back to it: whatever the earth and the works therein may be found to be, take care that you are found in peace.
15. Hath written] RV 'wrote.' Such teaching is found in Romans and in the Pastoral Epistles (Rom_2:4 cp. Act_17:30; 1Ti_2:4), but the letters referred to in this v. may not be preserved in our collection of St. Paul's Epistles. As the author of this Epistle has noticed, patience and confidence in God's patient working out of His purpose is everywhere characteristic of St. Paul.
16. The other Scriptures] RV '.. scriptures.' The Scriptures proper of the Apostolic Church were the books of the OT. But the letters of the Apostles were read publicly in the churches to whom they were addressed, and in others: see Col_4:16. Hence they would gradually come to be called 'scriptures' also. Here, as perhaps in 2Ti_3:16, we discern the beginning of this habit.
18. Grow in grace, and in the knowledge of] RV 'grow in the grace and knowledge of.' Grace is the gift of, as knowledge is directed towards, Christ. 'Grow' sums up in one word the admonitions of 1 and 2 Pet. For ever] RM 'unto the day of eternity.' This is the goal of hope in both Epistles.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain 1. Mocking at the Lord’s coming (2Pe 3:1-7)
III. THE FUTURE OF THE EARTH AND THE CONCLUSION
CHAPTER 3
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1. Mocking at the Lord’s coming (2Pe 3:1-7)
2. The future of the earth (2Pe 3:8-18)
3. Exhortation and conclusion (2Pe 3:11-18)
2Pe 3:1-7
The opening statement shows conclusively that Peter is the author and that this second Epistle was sent to the same believers to whom the first Epistle was addressed. The critics claim that this chapter marks a separate Epistle in itself and that it was combined by mistake with the preceding two chapters. Like so much else the critics put forth this is a foolish speculation wholly unwarranted. Peter states the reason for this second Epistle “to stir up their pure minds by way of remembrance.” He had already used a similar statement in the first chapter (2Pe 1:12), but now exhorts them to be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour through the apostles. The evil had been prophetically pictured by Peter and now he charges them to use the Word of God in the coming days of peril and apostasy, and remember especially its prophetic forecast. The apostle Paul did the same after he had given the warning of the coming of grievous wolves and false teachers (Act 20:30).
Such is the resource of the true Church today, and in the degree, as we remember the words spoken by the prophets and by the apostles, give heed to them, we shall be kept in the perilous times. Both the prophets and the apostles warned of the evil to come as each age closes with apostasy and judgment; so did the Lord Himself when He predicted the future of the age and the conditions which precede His physical and glorious return. All have given the warning. Enoch was a prophet, as we learn from Jude; he prophesied about the coming of the Lord to execute judgment. There were apostates in his day who ridiculed his testimony and who spoke against him (Jud 1:15).
Noah was a preacher of righteousness; he built the ark and sounded the warning, but no one paid any attention to him, and “as it was in the days of Noah so shall it be when the Son of Man cometh,” said our Lord. The prophets warned of the judgment in store for Jerusalem ; the warning was not heeded, and such a great one as Jeremiah was not believed, and cast into the dungeon. The prophet Amos speaks of those who “put far off the evil day.” There were mockers and unbelievers each time an age ended. As already shown, the combined testimony of the apostles is on the same lines. Peter then writes: “Knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? for, from the day the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.”
While before Peter had shown the quality of the false teachers, he now points out by the revelation given unto him, that there would be unbelief and outright mockery touching the visible return of the Lord Jesus Christ. In both Epistles this great coming event, the coming of the Lord in the clouds of heaven, has a prominent place. The false teachers, whose doom will be sealed when Christ comes again, also ridicule and scoff at the idea that He will ever show Himself again. And why do they mock and sneer? It has its source in unbelief These men are infidels. Every destructive critic is an infidel. The records of the past embodied in the Holy Scriptures are denied to be authentic and reliable. The prophets of God were Jewish patriots who dreamt of a great Jewish future. The magnificent prophecies as to the coming kingdom and the rule of the King of Kings are classed with the apocalyptic ramblings of the “Sibyline writings.” The Lord Jesus Christ is even impeached as to His knowledge and is regarded as being under the ignorant prejudice of the times in which He lived. It all emanates from the rejection of the Bible as the inerrant revelation of God.
Never before has this prophecy been so literally fulfilled as now. The Holy Spirit has revived the study of prophecy. The midnight cry has gone forth. The blessed hope has been restored to the Church, and the forgotten prayer, “Even so, Come, Lord Jesus,” is being prayed by the members of the body of Christ as never before. There is more preaching and teaching going on today on prophecy than ever before in the history of the church. It is one of the signs that the end of the age is very near. But the revival of prophecy has resulted in the activity of Satan. He both perverts and ridicules the coming of the Lord, and as that blessed event draws near, there will be increasing ridicule and mockery from the side of the apostates. (Of late certain presses of “evangelical denominations” have turned out tons of literature warning against the premillennial teachings. The Methodist church of Canada circulated a series of 5 pamphlets which attacked the blessed hope. They were the production of an infidel. The Chicago University and similar institutions also fight prophecy. Sneers and ridicule about His coming, the end of the age, the increase of evil and the coming are constantly multiplying. It is all a fulfillment of what Peter has written.)
The apostates dream of human progress, for they are “evolutionists.” Their pet law, “the survival of the fittest,” must work on till the last vestige of the beastly in man has worked itself out by a natural process, for they deny the need as well as the power of redemption. They call a belief in the coming of the Lord “pessimism,” and have even attempted to brand those who believe in a catastrophic ending of this present evil age “enemies of civilization and human progress.” What God hath spoken, what the mouth of all His holy prophets have declared, that the hope of the world is the coming and the enthronement of the Lord Jesus Christ, is extremely distasteful to them, for it conflicts with the program they have invented, a program which has no scriptural support whatever. They take the ground of an assumed unchangeableness of the world, that a sort of cycle governs nature, and thus they deny the positive statements of the Word of God and exclude God from His own creation. Science, meant to be a helpmeet to faith, is used by them to uphold their infidelity. They constantly speak of science contradicting revelation, which is not true.
The deluge which Peter mentions as an evidence of a past catastrophe, when the world was overflowed with water, they wilfully forget or, as it is now generally done, class it with myths of other nations, though science has abundantly proven that there happened such a judgment. But they do not want to believe that there can be a supernatural interference with the world. They believe in things continuing as they are and steadily improving. Up to the very time when the predicted sudden destruction shall come upon them, they say “Peace and safety” (1Th 5:1-28). It was so, no doubt, when the deluge swept the unbelieving and secure generation of that time to eternal doom.
(Some apply the words relating to a past judgment to the judgment which passed over the original earth on account of Satan’s fall. That there was such a judgment the second verse of the Bible teaches and geological facts confirm that the earth passed through a prehistoric destruction. But the reference is to the deluge. Almost every nation on earth has traditions of the deluge, though often in a perverted form. While the apostates and sneerers make everything of historical evidence and tradition, they ignore the universality of traditions concerning the flood.)
2Pe 3:8-10
A great revelation follows. The heavens that are now, and the earth by the same word have been stored up, reserved for fire against a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. Then in 2Pe 3:10, “But the day of the Lord will come as a thief; in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” As the earth was once judged by water so shall it be judged by fire in the future, and not the earth only but also the heavens, that is the heavens surrounding the earth. Years ago infidels used to ridicule the statement of Peter that the earth and the surrounding heavens would be consumed by fire. They spoke of it as an impossibility that the earth with its rivers, lakes and oceans could ever pass through such a conflagration, so that all is consumed. Well informed infidels no longer ridicule this statement, for astronomy with the help of the spectroscope has revealed the fact that other bodies in the heavens have passed through great conflagrations, that other globes have been burned up, and not a few astronomers have advanced the theory that this will be the fate of the earth on which we live. Peter had no telescope, nor did he know anything about astronomy. How did he find out that the earth would be destroyed by fire? It was the Spirit of God who revealed it to him.
The question arises what event is it of which Peter speaks here? He speaks of “the day of the Lord.” What phase of that coming day is it? It certainly is not the coming of the Lord for His saints as revealed in 1Th 4:1-18. Nor is it the day of the Lord in its beginning, when the Lord appears in power and great glory. Now it is still “man’s day,” and when He appears the Day of the Lord begins. One day, Peter tells us, with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. From Revelation we learn that Christ will reign over the earth with His saints for a thousand years and that is “the Day of the Lord.” The beginning of it will be as a thief, and it will bring fiery judgments, for He will be revealed “in flaming fire.” But what Peter speaks of is not so much the beginning of that day of the Lord as it is the end, when the thousand years have expired.
When the thousand-year reign of Christ as King is over there follows a little season during which Satan is loosed from his prison; the revolt of which Rev 20:8 speaks is followed by fire falling down from God out of heaven, and after that we see the great white throne, the judgment of the wicked dead. “And I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away, and there was found no place for them” (Rev 20:11). It is this of which Peter writes, when the day of the Lord is ended, the earth and the surrounding heaven will pass away; it will be through a mighty conflagration from beneath and from above. [“It will be observed, that the Spirit does not speak here of the coming of Christ, except to say that it will be scoffed at in the last days. He speaks of the day of God, in contrast with the trust of unbelievers in the stability of the material things of creation, which depends, as the apostle shows, on the word of God. And in that day everything on which unbelievers rested and will rest shall be dissolved and pass away. This will not be at the commencement of the day, but at its close; and here we are free to reckon this day, according to the apostle’s word as a thousand years, or whatever length of period the Lord shall see fit.” (Synopsis of the Bible).] When Peter writes in 2Pe 3:13 of new heavens and a new earth, he states what John beheld in his vision of Rev 21:1. “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away and there was no more sea.”
Some of these Jewish believers were evidently thinking that the Lord was slack about the fulfillment of the promise concerning that day. The apostle tells them that the Lord’s slackness is His long-suffering, “He is not willing that any should perish but all should come unto repentance.”
2Pe 3:11-18
In view of such a future the apostle exhorts once more to holy living and godliness, “waiting for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God.” The thought which is often expressed in the words “hastening the coming of the day of God,” that we might act and serve, sending the gospel to the heathen, and do other things, thus hastening the coming of the Lord, is not warranted by the text, nor is it true. God cannot be hastened by the creature, nor can He be delayed in the execution of His eternal purposes.
As stated in the preceding annotations, the fiery ending of the Day of the Lord, and with it the Day of God, the eternal Age, when God is all in all, is what Peter teaches. “But we, according to His promise, wait for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” The promise is found in Isa 65:17, “For, behold, I create new heavens and a new earth; and the former shall not be remembered, nor come to mind.” This is not the millennium, which in this chapter of Isaiah is described in Isa 65:18-25, but that which comes into existence after the earth and the surrounding heavens have passed through the great conflagration. Once more Isaiah speaks of the earth and heavens which will remain forever. (See Isa 66:22.) This new earth and the new heavens will be the glorious and eternal dwelling-place of the redeemed, for the new Jerusalem comes finally out of the highest heaven to find its eternal resting place there (Rev 21:1-27). “Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye wait for these things, be diligent to be found in Him in peace without spot and blameless.”
in conclusion, Peter refers to Paul as “our beloved brother Paul.” The Epistle to the Galatians was then in circulation and everybody could read there of Peter’s failure in Antioch (Gal 2:12-16). The loving remark by Peter shows that he had readily seen his mistake and that there was no clash between the two servants of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Epistle which Paul had written to the same Jewish Christians to whom Peter wrote is without question the Epistle to the Hebrews. (See Introduction to Hebrews.)
The Second Epistle of Peter ends with another warning, so well suited for our times, “Beware, lest, being carried away with the error of the wicked (destructive critics and deniers of Christ), ye fall from your own steadfastness.” And the safeguard is “Grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”
“To Him be Glory both now and forever, Amen.”
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain The Certain Coming of Christ and Its Lessons.
The Certain Coming of Christ and Its Lessons.
A warning against scoffers:
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v. 1. This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance,
v. 2. that ye 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;
v. 3. knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts
v. 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 the creation.
The apostle here, in his usual manner, opens a new section of his letter, and the tone employed by him shows that he desires to impress the truths now following with special solemnity: This letter, beloved, I now write you as the second, in which I rouse your pure mind by way of remembrance. Both letters of Peter had had the same aim, in a way, his purpose being to teach his readers, to remind them of the fundamental truths of Christianity once more, to give them practical hints as to the performance of Christian obligations, to arouse and encourage them in their Christian duties. He says that he wants to stir up their pure, their sincere Christian mind, that mind which is always open to instruction and admonition from the Word of God.
Of this aim Peter writes: That you may be reminded of the words spoken before by the holy prophets and of the commandment of your apostles, of the Lord and Savior. That is the chief function of the teacher in the Christian Church, to put the souls entrusted to him in remembrance of all the truths which were revealed to us by both the prophets and the apostles. There is no discrepancy between the Word of God in the Old and that in the New Testament, no contradiction. The chief content of both is Jesus Christ the Savior, the Hope of the believers in the time before His incarnation and the Trust of the believers ever since. The commandment of the apostles briefly characterizes the entire content of the Christian doctrine, for it is given to us for obedience in faith and in holiness, 1Jn 3:23-24; 1Ti 6:14. What the apostles taught was, at the same time, the commandment of our Lord and Savior; for it was He that called them as the teachers of mankind to the end of time; it was He whose Spirit inspired them to write the great truths that are to make us wise unto salvation.
The apostle now singles out one great truth with the purpose of warning his readers: Knowing this first of all, that there will come in the last days mockers with their scoffing, going on according to their own desires and saying, Where is the promise of His coming? For since the time that the fathers fell asleep all things remain just as they have been from the beginning of creation. His readers, the Christians of all times, should know this, in order not to be surprised at its coming. There would be mockers, or scoffers, at the end of the days, just before the Day of Judgment. These men, many of them highly intelligent, learned men, are noted for their scoffing denial of the coming of Judgment. In books, articles, and lectures such men calmly and with a great show of wisdom, demonstrate that it is against science, against reason, to believe in the corning of the Judgment Day; they treat the very idea of a possible truth of the Bible-account with scorn and derision. The nearer the last day comes, the more rapidly the number of these scoffers increases, and the bolder they grow in their assertions. There is a real source of danger here, especially for inexperienced young people that are overawed by the show of learning displayed by the mockers. But the Christian should note the reason for this attitude, namely, the fact that such people go on, walk, conduct themselves, according to their own desires and lusts. Of God and of His holy will they want to know nothing; their one object in life is to enjoy to the full the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. And it is because of the fact that the thought of the Lord’s return to Judgment disturbs them in their life of sin and shame that they attempt to ridicule the idea of the last day. Their conscience tells them that, no matter what form their selfishness assumes, they will have to render an account to the Lord. Hence their mockery, the outflow of a bad conscience: "Where is that promised coming of the Lord in whom you Christians profess to believe? The laws of nature are unchangeable; matter is eternal; and this world will remain forever. The believers of the Old Testament that hoped in the coming of the Lord died without having seen the fulfillment of their hopes, and thus it will be always."
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 General Information:
General Information:
Peter begins to talk about the last days.
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to stir up your sincere mind
Peter speaks of causing his readers to think about these things as if he were waking them from sleep. AT: "to cause you to think pure thoughts" (See: Metaphor)
the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets
This can be stated in active form. AT: "the words that the holy prophets spoke in the past" (See: Active or Passive)
the command of our Lord and Savior given through your apostles
This can be stated in active form. AT: "the command of our Lord and Savior, which your apostles gave to you" (See: Active or Passive)
translationWords
beloved
epistle
mind
holy
prophet
command
lord
Savior
apostle
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 3:1-13 Peter shifts from denunciation of false teachers to…
3:1-13 Peter shifts from denunciation of false teachers to exhortation of believers. The false teachers’ skepticism about Christ’s return required clear teaching. Christians need to hold onto the apostolic message about the day of judgment and live godly lives in anticipation of that day.
3:1 This is my second letter to you: The previous letter was probably 1 Peter.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.