Awaken and Heed Peter’s Warnings

The Apostle Peter, a godly man who was called and chosen by our Lord knew he was close to death when he wrote his last Epistle to the early church.  This letter was written to us today and I want to walk you through the final chapter in hopes your eyes will be opened and you will be alert for the day of the Lord is at hand.  My commentary in black, the inspired Word of God in blue.

2 Peter 3 This is now, beloved, the second letter I am writing to you in which I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder,  ²that you should remember the words spoken beforehand by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior spoken by your apostles. 

Peter urges us to remember the words spoken through the Holy Prophets.  These Old Testament prophecies were for today, they spoke about the Day of the Lord, the end.  Anyone that tells you the words of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Joel, Zechariah, Amos, Hosea, Jonah, Daniel, etc are just old stories and not applicable for us today are deceivers.  In fact Peter told us in Acts 3 what happens to the soul that ignores the words of the Prophets.

Acts 3:17-24 And now, brethren, I know that you acted in ignorance, just as your rulers did also. ¹⁸“But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled. ¹⁹“Therefore repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord; ²⁰and that He may send Jesus, the Christ appointed for you, whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time. ²²“Moses said, ‘ THE LORD GOD WILL RAISE UP FOR YOU A PROPHET LIKE ME FROM YOUR BRETHREN; TO HIM YOU SHALL GIVE HEED to everything He says to you.  ²³And it will be that every soul that does not heed that prophet shall be utterly destroyed from among the people.’ ²⁴“And likewise, all the prophets who have spoken, from Samuel and his successors onward, also announced these days.

Peter references the prophets of the Old Testament, stating that they, like Jesus announced the judgment, salvation and the Day of the Lord in their testimonies.  Without understanding the Prophets, and the DIRECT applicability of their words for today, one can easily be deceived by an angel of light that has falsely exalted himself into the position of being God, but he is a false god and the other Jesus we were warned about.  The Prophets foretell all that is happening right now, which the Book of Revelation just confirms.  God willing,  I will be putting forth my understanding to those who have the ears given to them by God to hear.  Let’s continue with 2 Peter 3.

 ³Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lusts, ⁴and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.” ⁵For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water, ⁶through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water.  ⁷But by His word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

Scoffers and mockers walk around practicing sin and harboring impurity in their hearts.  They have listened to liars in Babylon telling them they are secure yet they are not.  They have a false peace and a false security and our fast asleep just as their fathers were before them.  I see the shaking in their spirits, the abomination in their hearts, yet it is up to God to show them the truth.

Job 16:19-21 Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven, and my advocate is on high. ²⁰“My friends are my scoffers; My eye weeps to God. ¹“O that a man might plead with God as a man with his neighbor!  Like Job cried out, my own family and friends scoff at me, yet my eyes cry out tears over their apostasy.  Indeed my rebellion as the head of the house contributed to their rebellion.  I am praying hard that my own family will come to knowledge of the truth.  I cry to the Father to forgive them as they know not what they are doing.  The desire of my heart is to minister together and have true fellowship, not the pagan religion of the Babylon church.  I just pray there is time.

The mockers forget the lessons and prophecies of God.  I have often written about the flood that is upon us, not a flood of water, but the flood of lies that come from the powers of darkness.  This is what dragons speak — LIES that deceive God’s people.   It is indeed just like in they days of Noah and even Daniel spoke of the second flood in Daniel 9:26.  After the flood sweeps away the ungodly, then the fire of judgment comes on that great and dreadful day of the Lord.  It will be great for those chosen and under the protection of God, the ones that kept His commandments and sought Him with all their hearts.  For everyone else, it will be a terrifying day and just like in Noah’s time, God shuts the door and it is therefore too late.  Mercy ends and judgment begins.  This is the truth my brothers and the Judge is standing right at our door. 2 Peter 3 continues…

But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day.  ⁹The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.

Praise God for the patience He has shown to His people.  I shouldn’t even be writing this given all the sins and abominations I have done.  Neither mercy or grace is every earned, but judgment is always earned by what we do.  I deserve judgment, I have earned it, but God in His goodness has poured out mercy and now grace upon me.  God will do that for you, IF you will turn back to Him and repent and seek His righteousness with your whole heart.  Foolish men that do not know the things of God view God’s mercy as slackness in bringing about judgment.  That is what Peter is writing about in the above passage.  Time is running out now and those that scoff at God’s slackness and point to prior predictions about judgment that did not come to pass, don’t understand this aspect of God.  The Scriptures tells us many times where God decreed judgment on people but later relented and changed His mind because of the repentance of even a few people.   Here is just one such case.

Jonah 3:10 When God saw their deeds, that they turned from their wicked way, then God relented concerning the calamity which He had declared He would bring upon them. And He did not do it.

So the good news is there is still time, God’s judgement can be forestalled or delayed, it is up to God.  God does not want to destroy us, He does not want to punish us, but He is a Holy God and He is a Just God.  Romans 2:13 says, it is the DOERS of His commandments that will be just in His sight, not the hearers.  I do not want to be right, I hope my exhortion on the pending judgment is wrong, but God is telling me to speak it.  Wakeup, please wakeup and come out of Babylon where you have been unconciously exiled from the true God.  Continuing in 2 Peter 3….

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be burned up. ¹¹Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, ¹²looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by burning, and the elements will melt with intense heat!

The Prophets tells us that deceived Christians, God’s people that call themselves by His Name will be stunned and astonished when He appears.  Peter tells us how we should be walking.  We should be seeking to be perfect in our conduct and conforming to the image of God, which is godliness.  This only comes from a true love for Christ, where we obey His commandments because we love Him.  If we do not obey, we hate Jesus Christ regardless of what we tell others.  Jesus said, If you love Me, you will obey Me.   I am finally ready my brothers and sisters but by no means will let my guard down.  Now I understand why Peter told us in this passage that we were to be looking for the hastening (quickening) of the day of the Lord.  I no longer fear death as I know the promise of eternity awaits me.  I want you to join me and it is for that reason, I write this from my heart.

Isaiah 13:6-9

Wail, for the day of the LORD is near!
         It will come as destruction from the Almighty.
    ⁷Therefore all hands will fall limp,
         And every man’s heart will melt.
    ⁸They will be terrified,   

    Pains and anguish will take hold of them;
    They will writhe like a woman in labor, (the labor pains spoke of Mt 24, Lk21, Mk 13)
    They will look at one another in astonishment,
    Their faces aflame.
    ⁹Behold, the day of the LORD is coming,
     Cruel, with fury and burning anger,
     To make the land a desolation;
     And He will exterminate its sinners from it. (not non-believers, sinners)

Luke 12:46 The master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not aware of. He will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the UNBELIEVERS. Jesus did not come to call sinners as widely taught, He came to call sinners to repentance.  God has relented and relented and relented.  Repent and turn from the world before God shuts the door.

Many will be astonished because very few of them will be found worthy to enter and they will awake to the deception that had so easily ensnared the vast majority of them.  Very few are going to be on alert, the rest will be sleeping off the hangover they received from drinking the poison wine of the Babylon church and all the false teachers and prophets.  Continuing 2 Peter…

But according to His promise we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells. ¹⁴Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless, ¹⁵and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given him, wrote to you, ¹⁶as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.

A couple of points about this passage.  Paul taught that we are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.  Peter said the same thing here essentially stating we need to be diligent and pursue peace and holiness without which NOBODY shall see the Lord.

Hebrews 12:14 Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will  see the Lord.

The second point is one I have made many times.  It pertains to Peter’s warnings that many would continue to twist and pervert the writings of the beloved Apostle Paul into false doctrines and false teachings, leading many to their destruction.  I see this played out every day where blind shepherds quote from Paul, typically Galatians or Romans, which can easily be twisted into false doctrines.  This where the concept of grace gets perverted into a license to sin, this is where people misinterpret our call to obey God and falsely call that works, this is where people get the idea that salvation is a cakewalk that be attained by merely saying I Believe with your lips one time.  Peter continues and warns the real church to be on guard and not be carried away by these doctrines of demons.  You see, we can lose our salvation if we become deceived and stray from the path of righteousness.  We must endure to the end and actually finish the race to receive the prize.

 ¹⁷You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of lawless fall from your own steadfastness, ¹⁸but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.

Many have fallen from their secure position because they got drunk with false doctrine and followed after men that have drawn disciples unto themselves in their works of the flesh in serving God.  Ears have been tickled and lies have been built upon lies such that what we call church today is actually serving the devil.  All but very few are bowing to the beast and worshipping his image.  They know a false Jesus.

Growing in grace, means growing in the power of God working inside of us.  It does NOT mean  growing an unlimited supply of forgiveness to sin.  Grace is the power of God in you to overcome and destroy the works of the devil, which is SIN.  

1 John 3:8 The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.

Peter’s story is an inspiration to me.  Not just that we share a name, but that Peter was called and then overtly and expressly denied His Lord and Master, not once but three times.  I have done the same, but thousands of times.  Because of my denial I had the wrath of God abiding upon me for most of my life.  But God is good and He is so forgiving that He forgave a wretch like me.  If we turn to Him and truly repent, He restores us to His Kingdom and our inheritance but we must respond to the discipline and chastisement brought upon us by God.  When we suffer and endure His righteous judgments, we are are refined and purified through His fire.

I love God and He is testing me just as He will test you.  I am heeding His call and His mission for my life and I am getting stronger every day.  Once we are restored to God and overcome the power of sin in our lives, we have an obligation to God.  Jesus told Peter about this.

John 21:15-17 So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me more than these?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You ” He said to him, “Tend My lambs.” ¹⁶He said to him again a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.” He said to him, “Shepherd My sheep.” ¹⁷He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love Me?” Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, “Do you love Me?” And he said to Him, “Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You ” Jesus said to him, “Tend My sheep.

May God Bless You Richly!