What Kind of People?

The view of God’s judgment at the end of the world is intended to prompt us to ask this question: “What kind of people ought you to be?”

We do everything in the world to avoid this question. Instead we want to figure out when the day will be and what group we should join and correlate the prophecies to contemporary events. We are all prone to run from the question, “What kind of person?”

Today we stop running. We take this text where Peter talks about the end of this earth, and we hit the question head on.

Practice Humility:

“With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day” 2 Peter 3:8

Some people think this verse is a formula for decoding prophesy. Every time a “day” is mentioned in prophesy they take that to mean a thousand years. I think that is faulty interpretation of Peter here. He is not trying to give us a way to decode prophesy so we can figure out what we cannot know.

Peter is telling us why we cannot comprehend God’s timing. We do not know the timing because God is not bound by minutes and hours and days and years. He is outside of time.

Think about it: One day is like a thousand years. I can comprehend a day. A thousand years, though, sounds like forever to me. It’s more than 10 lifetimes for humans. Yet God experiences it as a day.

Timing is different for God because God made time. God has “no beginning of days nor end of life” (Hebrews 7:3) Whenever you think about being in the presence of God, then, you need to forget about your watch, your clock, and your calendar. They are of no help in God’s presence. The idea that loved ones are up in heaven waiting for us to join them is comforting and makes sense from the point of view of this dimension in our solar system. But God lives in an eternal present, someone said. From his perspective, maybe all of us die at the same time.

We won’t know this till we get to the other side. But I suspect that at my death I will be ushered into the banquet hall. All that Jesus said about the great feast and the welcoming party will be going on when I arrive. And all the sinners saved by grace of all the ages of the earth will be gathering there at that very moment “when time shall be no more.”

Receive and Extend Patience and Forgiveness:

“He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” - 2 Peter 3:9

 God is being patient with me.

• We all know this about our own lives. God is so patient with us in all our stumbling and shortcomings.

• We think about how we have resisted him and disobeyed him and disappointed him. And we wonder why he has not just flattened us like a bug.

• God loves to forgive. He wants no one to perish.

God is patient with the human race.

• He created humans and the world we enjoy. He gave us all that we needed for abundant living, for love and joy and peace.

• And we just messed it up. And we keep messing it up. We hurt ourselves and one another. We fall into destructive patterns of behavior. We are truly fallen and broken.

• Yet he waits patiently for us to repent.

We know for sure that God wants all humans to repent. That is his will, according to the Apostle Peter. You can slice that truth anyway you want to, and many have done so. But I am going to hang on to this verse as the revealed will of God for every human who ever breathed God’s good air.

Be Vigilant:

“Look, I come like a thief! Blessed is the one who stays awake and remains clothed” - Revelation 16:15

The thief surprises the homeowner. “But you, brothers and sisters, are not in darkness so that this day should surprise you like a thief” (1 Thessalonians 5:4).

• Nothing more terrifying than to hear noises at night and think, “Someone is in the house.” We all have done the mental exercise of responding to such a discovery.

• The thief has the advantage because we are asleep, stretched out in our bed, unresponsive and ill-equipped to do anything. That’s why he comes at night. “Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; hold it fast, and repent. But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief ” (Revelation 3:3).

This “thief” metaphor: “you know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians. 5:2).

• They are quoting Jesus: “One shall be taken and the other left…” (Matthew 24:41).

• “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him” (Matthew 24:42-44).

• “Who then is the faithful and wise servant…?” (Matthew 24:45).
• This is the point of the teaching. The wise servant is the one who keeps doing his job faithfully. He is a fool if he decides the master is not coming, and he turns to wicked conduct because he supposes there is no consequence.

• Jesus uses the “thief” picture because it illustrates the truth that we simply do not know when he will return. “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” (Matthew 24:36).

Reject Materialism:

"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” - 2 Peter 3:10

The earth will be destroyed by fire. That is what Peter says here. The “elements will be destroyed.” God will melt this planet.

God is going to bring about a “new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:13). I think this language indicates our new heavenly home as described in Revelation 21 where there is no need for the sun and every tear is wiped away.

I think it is futile to speculate that this old earth, growing old like a garment, is going to be the eternal abode of anybody. In his resurrected body Jesus was no longer subject to the laws of gravity and mass and energy as we know them. This world is not a fitting home for beings with such glorified bodies. God has a different home for us, his abode in the heavens. We are not going to be exiled on this earth for eternity. We are going to be in heaven with Jesus, our Savior and Lord.

• All of us get visits from the Jehovah’s witnesses. They are not Jesus people. They do not believe that Jesus is God. They focus on the Old Testament Jehovah rather than Jesus. This happened to them because they bought the lie from the very beginning of their religious group that they knew when Jesus was coming back. They publicized it. They gathered the faithful. And nothing happened. Nothing, except that the group came together to form a new movement out of the error they had all believed. Since that first false prediction, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have predicted the coming of the Lord half a dozen times. They draw up cartoon-looking books telling us all what is going to happen even though they have never been right about any of their dates. They have alarmed people for more than 100 years with dire predictions that equated current events with end-time prophesies. Why would anyone be part of a group that was birthed in a false prediction and that continues to pretend to know what no one can know, not even the angels?

• Jehovah’s Witnesses do not believe 2 Peter 3:10-12, this passage we read. They say it is all symbolic. They believe the earth is eternal and that they are going to inherit it. As my father said, “Well, they can have it.”

Live Godly and Holy Lives:

“You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming” - 2 Peter 3:11-12

We can stop confusing the church and world with silly predictions that discourage believers and encourage scoffers.

We can stop chasing after the false prophets who keep saying in every generation, “Oh, there he is!” In Luke 17:23 Jesus told us, “People will tell you, ‘There he is!' or ‘Here he is!' Do not go running off after them.”

We can live knowing that all the stuff will burn up one day.

We can live holy and godly lives as we wait for the Day of the Lord and speed its coming.”

• We cooperate with God in his purposes on this earth as made known in his Son and our Savior. God has chosen to involve us, his church, in his plan of redemption for all humans. We are commissioned to carry the gospel to the nations. We are called to be his ambassadors in the world. Therefore, we are participating in God’s unfolding plan and so may speed the coming.

• We pray for the Lord’s return, “Thy Kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

• We help others know God’s love and forgiveness, helping them come to a place of repentance where they turn from their sin to the Savior.

• We live lives that honor God.