2 Peter 3

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All right.

Now we're ready.

Good morning.

Good morning.

It's so awesome to be here in July.

I tell you what, I know that July is always a happy time for me for multiple reasons.

For one, we're starting to get closer and closer to the end of the year.

And as somebody that works outside, I count down those days.

And also it means the start of football.

Go Pat, go! The NFL, I reported to a training camp and it's been 15 years for me since I last reported to a football camp.

But I did it for nine years.

And so I apologize that during this time of year, I apologize to my wife.

During this time of year, I'm a little bit more jacked up than normal.

It's just ingrained in my being that right about now I got to be ready to put on the pads and start playing some football.

And it just hasn't gone away.

I'm very excited for the Lions this year.

There's so many things that are being talked about for the Lions.

I'm a new convert to the Lions.

Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! in 2nd Peter, so a quick recap as to where we're kind of at, 2nd Peter is a letter written by Peter towards the end of his life, right before he was about to die, and so anytime somebody takes the time before they're going to die to write something down, it means it's important, right?

It's absolutely important to us because it's in the Bible, amen, but Peter wrote this at the end of his life, and so what he had to say in here was important.

Now oftentimes, 2nd Peter kind of gets lost in the wash towards the end of the Bible, and you probably don't spend a lot of time in there, but there's a lot of great stuff in there, and it's very important, and it's been great to spend time over the last month, along with the church in this study, and especially in deeper study over the last couple of weeks preparing for this lesson.

The things that he's talking about, and have been talking about in there, there's some false ideas that are circulating from within the church, and these false ideas are around that, and he described that, that there is no second coming, that Jesus is not going to return, and the way that that manifested itself, and it showed up in there, there's a softness on sin and repentance, and it absolutely points to that there is a need to have that understanding that Jesus is going to return, and in the process to act in response to that.

I really like what Jaron did last week with the lesson, and he called us to take the Bible and point it to ourselves.

Yes, absolutely, you want to take the Bible, and you want to understand the context of what's going on, right?

You want to read it as its whole story, where its place is in the entire Bible.

We always want to read the Bible as an entire story, and we want the Bible to make sense as a whole story, as we read it, but then ultimately, as we are mature and thinking of what we're reading, we need to point to ourselves and be a leader to ourselves and our sinful nature and how to fight it.

It's really cool that this is exactly what Peter does at the end of 2 Peter, he's talking about all these things that are going on, and he finishes off with what we ought to do, and so Peter does the same thing that Jaron did last week, and I'm going to read all of 2 Peter today, and we're going to pull out different parts as we go, and before we start in 2 Peter 3, verse 1, I'm going to say a little prayer.

2 Peter 3:1

Father in heaven, God, holy is your name, and we are so grateful for your word, so grateful for how it guides us in Christian life, how it is a mirror for us to show us our sinful nature, God, and it shows us how to fight it, how to go closer to God.

Help us to have soft hearts here today as we read your word, God, guide me with your spirit as I bring forth this lesson, God, and help us to go closer to you today through your word, and please give me a prayer.

All right, 2 Peter 3, verse 1.

2 Peter 3:1

It says, Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you.

I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to pull some thinking.

I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Savior through your apostles.

Now, what this is essentially saying is that the Bible wants us to know the Bible and wants us to live a righteous and pure life.

As we're going about it, as we're reading, as things get complicated when you're reading, as things get complicated in your life, this is always good to start with and to remember.

This is the ultimate goal, and this is what Peter is reminding us of here.

As we continue in verse 3, it says, Above all, you must understand that in the last days, stalkers will come stalking and following their own evil desires.

They will say, Where is this coming you promised?

Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.

But they deliberately forget that long ago, by God's word, the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water.

By these waters, also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed.

By the same word, the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction on God.

But do not forget this one thing here, friends, that the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.

The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness.

Instead, he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief.

The heavens will disappear with a roar, the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.

Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be?

You ought to live holy and godly lives, as you look forward to the day of God, and speak his coming.

That day will bring about the destruction of heavens by fire, and the elements will be bound to the earth.

But in keeping with his promise, we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth for righteousness for us all to experience.

All right, Spencer.

How can you comment on the last days and when Jesus is coming?

This scripture, along with some other scriptures, can oftentimes be used to create some sort of mathematical equation and kind of get it lost in the clouds and focusing on when exactly is Jesus coming.

But I'm here to tell you today that that is not what this is meant for.

It's pretty simple, right?

The Bible is meant to be simple for us, not meant for us to make it more complicated than it is.

And the last days, what the last days mean, are the time between when Jesus first came and when he is going to come.

So yes, we are in the last days.

And yes, today we are closer than we were yesterday to Jesus coming.

And that's all that we know, right?

That's all that matters.

He is going to come at some point.

And when it's talking about a thousand years or like a day and a day is like a thousand years, all that that's giving us to say and understand is that God is outside of man's time.

God is outside of our man-made created time frame.

He exists outside of that.

And that's what that's telling us.

And then it also is telling us that when it happens, it's going to be noticeable.

It's not going to be something that we have to kind of, oh, is it now?

Is this a sign?

Is this a sign?

Is that a sign?

It's like, no, it's going to be obvious.

It's going to be noticeable.

It's going to happen quickly.

And so the Bible, it tells us here and in other places, one place specifically I'd like to turn to when things get complicated is Deuteronomy 29.29. It says the secret things, essentially the secret things belong to God.

And it tells us that we are not supposed to know exactly.

That's not what's important.

And let's continue on to read and find out what's more important things than knowing exactly when Jesus is coming.

I want to read again verse 5 through 7.

All right, it's my turn.

For this very reason, verse 5 says, make every effort to ask your...

Oh, excuse me.

Wrong one.

Sorry.

But they deliberately forget that long ago, by God's word, the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water.

By these waters also the world of that time was daily to be destroyed.

By the same word, the present heavens and earth are required to be kept for the day of judgment and destruction of our God.

What this is saying literally is reiterating that, yes, God created the earth, there was a judgment in the form of Noah, and there is going to be another judgment.

Now, it's important to know that this judgment that Peter is talking about here, Jesus spoke about in every single one of the Gospels.

Paul spoke about this in every single one of his writings as well.

This is not the only place that it is talked about in the Bible.

Every time that I read this, and in fact, even before preparing for this study, and it still happened when I was preparing this lesson as well, in verse 9, it really plugs on my heart in a very specific way.

And I want to share that with you all today.

Verse 9 says, The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness.

Instead, he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Every time I read this, I think of the people that are close to me in my life that I have consistently interacted with that I've lost.

And it really is heavy on my heart, and more recently, I've really kind of felt bad, and I haven't been as consistent in planting seeds on their hearts, continuing to share the Gospel, and more specifically, I haven't been really preparing for that.

Now, that is something that really interfered to my heart, the consistency of reaching out to somebody that is close to you.

Because it happened to both myself and Maya, my wife, that's the way that we ended up coming out to church.

That wasn't just one singular time that we were reached out to, and that we just had that interesting coming to Jesus moment, like, oh yeah, I'll be there.

Like, there was multiple times that Darren invited me out to church, and I just, you know, pushed him off and did it, and he continued to invite me out, plant seeds, show his wife, and I know, and I was talking to him back there, that I'm still missing Claire, or me.

The same thing happened to my wife.

She was reached out to multiple times over many months, and then eventually started to come around, and then, slowly but surely, came to Jesus.

And so, my question for all of us here today, and our reflection this week is, where have you been at recently, and how has it been going with you continuing to reach out to those that are close to you and lost, and how has your career been going?

That's a great question.

Now, these spoffers that Peter is talking about here throughout 2nd Peter, I wonder how do they show up today, and how do these ideas show up in our lives?

Don't necessarily see it as there's people that are shoving at the rooftops, that there is no second coming.

It shows up a little bit differently.

As you see it play out, and his focus on repentance, and the way that their lives look, like pigs returning to wallowing in the mud, and just the focus on a lack of repentance, it shows up that they doubt God's judgment, and they have a lessening stance on God's judgment.

And then, ultimately, that means a softer stance on sin, and the need for repentance.

Yeah, it's a good point, actually.

And this is a tough question to ask, but I've been asking myself this all week long, so I've got to bring you all with me here.

Where have you been soft on your own sin?

And that's important.

It's important to be constant in repentance.

It's not just a one-time deal, right?

As verse 9 says, he wants everyone to come to repentance.

In Luke 5.32, Jesus says, I came to call sinners to repentance.

In both Gospels, Luke and Matthew, the same exact chapter in verse 3, 8, it says, So we need to continue to ask ourselves this question.

It is not easy.

It's hard.

It is really tough to continue to reflect on ourselves, and try to find ways to dig into and keep with repentance.

Now, I don't know if everybody knew that house church this week, or all house churches' challenge ended up being the same, but I think a great way to help with this is, the challenge that we had this week at our house church was to liberate somebody else to tell you somewhere in which you are falling short.

And that's a great part of this process, that we should be in each other's lives.

Yes, we should be loving on each other, and a part of that love is liberating each other to call each other out, so to say, and leaving open, making open those conversations to help each other to grow.

Amen?

Amen.

Now, verse 13 is really cool.

That's right before it hits the call to action.

The final four or five lines are a call to action.

And verse 13, it is reminding us of the promise of heaven, right before the final call to action.

I'm going to read it again.

It says, And yes, we are to be aware that there is a judgment, right?

We are to be aware of that, absolutely.

But at the same time, we are to be aware of, and live in response to, the promise of heaven.

God's mercy and His grace and heaven wouldn't be as sweet if we didn't know of His righteous judgment.

Right?

September and October are really awesome in Michigan because of June, excuse me, because of January and July, right?

If you don't have that contrast, it's not as great, right?

So we need to be able to hold both those things in our mind at the same time and live in response to them at the same time.

If you live with one and not the other, there becomes issues, right?

If you're just focusing on fear and judgment, that loses steam, that runs out, and the message grows tired on a lot of people.

If you're only focusing on flowers and butterflies and good things and, you know, let's just sing worship songs and put on Jesus and sing nice things to each other, well then you're going to miss out on growing closer to Jesus through the repentance of Jesus and growing closer to sin, right?

So we need both of those together, all of the time.

Let's continue in chapter, excuse me, verse 44.

Right, that's it.

So then, dear friends, since you're looking forward to this, make every effort, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless, in that peace with Him.

Bear in mind that our Lord's patience means salvation.

Just as our dear brother Paul also wrote in with the wisdom that God gave him, he writes the same way in all his letters, speaking to them of these matters.

His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort as they do the other scriptures to their own destruction.

Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the air of the lawless and falter in your spiritual position.

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

To Him be glory both now and forever.

Amen.

Amen.

Now what I see in there is I see work, right?

Making every effort is work.

It is work to fight our sin.

It is work to be selfless, right?

It is work to serve.

It is work to make extra time to read your Bible and to pray.

But as all of us here know, and all of us that are older know more, that in this life the things that you look for are the most worth it.

Yeah.

As the teams are reporting the football camp and the NFL, and at the beginning of September they're going to have their final roster of 53 men that make every roster.

It takes a lot.

Once you make that 53-man roster, it takes a lot for you to end up being cut from the team after you've made that initial 53.

Right?

So you're on the team.

You're in the NFL.

You are an NFL football player when you make the 53-man roster.

That is awesome, right?

But there is a lot of those men that make those 53-man rosters that don't put in the work.

They don't put in the work during the preseason.

Before they report to camp, they don't put in the work during camp.

They don't take care of their bodies.

Right?

And then they end up not having success.

They end up being on teams that aren't successful.

The ones that put in that extra work, that do get extra points every day, look at the extra weights, that deny them going out a little bit later and eating the right food and not drinking as much alcohol so their bodies aren't prepared.

They have success.

They win championships.

They get bonuses.

They get glory by winning the Super Bowl.

Every single one of those guys that have gone through that are going to tell you that it's worth the work.

Now the ones that fail, but they're still NFL football players.

Right?

They're still there.

They simply say that they're NFL football players.

But they miss out on that opportunity for all that much more.

Yeah.

And the same is true for us in the Christian life.

Right?

You can still be called a Christian and live your life in heaven.

Right?

And you're going to miss out on a lot of fruit and a lot of blessings.

Yeah.

And a lot of extra peace and just really feeling a closeness to God right here and right now if you don't put in that work.

Yeah.

So the work is worth it.

Yeah.

When he talks about Paul, it's really cool.

This is the canon scripture writers pointing kind of back on themselves in real time and establishing the New Testament canon as we live it out with them.

And that's a really cool thing.

It's really cool to kind of think about.

And you know like Peter and Paul and the other apostles and how did it all work out?

They were working together.

These letters that Paul wrote were already being circulated and were known among the churches and Peter is pointing back to them.

It's really cool.

What are some of the things that Paul said?

Just a couple of highlights.

In Romans 2.4 he said, God's kindness is intended to lead you to repent.

Wow.

Sound familiar?

In Philippians 2.12, work out your salvation with fear and tremble.

Yeah.

Consistent.

In Romans 6.1, shall we go on singing so that grace may increase?

By no means.

These guys are on the same page.

The Holy Spirit was connecting them and they were already putting these things down at that time and we get to learn from them now.

It's really cool that it's not just in this isolated place that we see these ideas play out in the Bible.

It's consistent in the Bible.

As we stay in the Bible, we will see it.

And in our critical minds that we have as human beings, we need that.

We need that repetition.

We need that consistency and that constant of the message.

What he ends with here in his final line is a reiteration of what he began with in Chapter 1.

These graces that he's talking about is just essentially gifts from God.

And as I read from Chapter 1 again, it will all make sense.

I think reading from Chapter 1 really kind of brings it out a little bit more than this final line.

The Bible always points back to itself, which is really cool.

So in 2 Peter 1, 5-9, it says, For this very reason make every effort to add to your faith goodness and to goodness knowledge, and to knowledge self-control, and to self-control perseverance, and to perseverance godliness, and to godliness mutual affection, and to mutual affection love.

For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed in their past sin.

So, in conclusion, Jesus is coming back to know your Bible.

So, repent, be saved, and put in effort into your Christian life.

And let's prepare ourselves for communion.

Father in Heaven, thank you so much for doing this sacrifice on the cross that allows us to live this Christian life that we can work with God.

And we're not working at it all the time, but you have given us everything that we need to be successful.

Help us to realize how we can better use all that you have given us to have success for our faith and our family.

God, we love you so much.

Amen.

Take a moment to take your communion, and if you'd like that, I'll finish up with God with another drink.

Thank you so much for listening to the Kalamazoo Church of Christ podcast.

If you're in the Kalamazoo area, we'd love to get connected.

Please go to kalamazoo.church and fill in your information to come to a Sunday service or any other event that we have going on.

In any case, you'll be hearing from us next week.