After warning about false teachers and prophets, Peter warns about mockers and scoffers in the midst of the church.
3:3 “Above all, be sure to remember that in the last days mockers will come, following their own desires and taunting you, saying, “So what happened to the promised second coming of Jesus? For everything keeps going just the way it has since our ancestors fell asleep in death; since the beginning of creation, nothing’s changed…”
Peter notes that God has warned that a day of judgment is coming, then says,
“Now the Lord is not slow about enacting his promise—slow is how some people want to characterize it—no, he is not slow but patient and merciful to you, not wanting anyone to be destroyed, but wanting everyone to turn away from following his own path and to turn toward God’s.”
The day of the Lord will come unexpectedly like a thief in the night; and on that day, the sky will vanish with a roar, the elements will melt with intense heat, and the earth and all the works done on it will be seen as they truly are… Knowing that one day all this will come to pass, think what sort of people you ought to be—how you should be living lives of holy conduct and godliness, waiting hopefully for and earnestly desiring (hastening? hastening toward?) the coming of God’s day when the heavens will vanish in flames and the elements melt away with intense heat.
What will happen next, and what we hope for, is what God promised: a new heaven and a new earth where justice/righteousness reigns.
It’s clear: the day of the Lord is coming, The world as we know it will end in a kind of fire that will allow “all the works done on it to be seen as they truly are.” The difference in translations is striking:
• “the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment.” (NLT)
• “everything done in it will be laid bare.” (NIV)
• “the earth and its works will be burned up.” (NASB)
• “vanish” (Good News)
• “be discovered” (Aramaic Bible)
The idea that this final fire is something either different or at least more than a physical fire is in line with what the Apostle Paul had written elsewhere:
1 Corinthians 3:13, "Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is").
The commentaries aren’t in agreement about the best way to understand this fire – is it literal? Spiritual? Both? – but the New Testament writers were in agreement on a crucial point: the day of the Lord - the second coming of Jesus - will happen. The world’s history and the world as we know it will end, and there will be a day when all is tested by physical and/or spiritual fire. This fire will either obliterate or refine. What follows will be a New Heaven and new Earth where injustice and unrighteousness is gone. All that is bad will be undone and remade.
Therefore… speculate on the timing? Argue about what all the fire will do? Split churches over end times timelines? Prepare for the apocalypse by building a fortress? No.
“Knowing that one day all this will come to pass, think what sort of people you ought to be—how you should be living lives of holy conduct and godliness…”
• ‘Holy’ is from the Greek hagios. “Places sacred to God which are not to be profaned.” Christians are temples, sacred spaces set aside for God.
• ‘Conduct’ is from the Greek anastrophe. It’s outward behavior; literally, a change as drastic as “down to up.” This is in line with the classic definition of repentance as ‘a change of direction.’
• ‘Godliness’ is from the Greek eusebeia. It’s an Inner reverence for what God has called sacred or worthy of veneration.
Notice how all three of those work together: our lives are a unified inner and outer reflection of the sacred space that we become as temples in which God dwells. It gives us glimpses of a new heaven and new earth where justice/righteousness will one day be ultimate and perfect. The definition of justice/righteousness (your Bibles may translate that word differently) gives us a glimpse into what Peter meant.
dikaiosýnē - "Divine approval" is the regular NT term used for righteousness… what is deemed right by the Lord (after His examination), i.e. what is approved in His eyes. (Strong’s Concordance)
We aren’t yet in a New Heaven and Earth where we are perfectly living lives that get the stamp of God’s divine approval, but we can surely anticipate it and point towards it as God equips us to do that to which he has called us. And as we live lives of holy conduct and godliness, I suspect that hope becomes increasingly real to us as we see the glory of a life and world under the blessing of God’s approval.
* * * * *
As we’ve been going through 2 Peter, we’ve talked about a number of images that the Bible uses to describe the value of people (in general) and the identity of Christians (in particular)
• Living as image-bearers of God. “Don’t make an image of God” because God has already done that – it’s us. We represent God’s presence in the world. We are to live such that when people see us, they learn truth about God.
• Living as duolos (servants) of God. We must think of God as master and king.
• Living as children of God. We must remember that this master and king brings us into His family, with all the rights, responsibilities and privileges that follow from being the child of a king.
• Living as temples of God. We are a sacred space in which God dwells.
What are the implications? How do we faithfully put this into practice?
When I was teaching in Costa Rica last week, the last two sessions were about the character and nature of God and what it means to be bearers of that image. I split this into two ways to approach the world, particularly as it pertains to people . We can be stewards of what God has given us or blasphemers against God himself.
Stewards
A. Help everything flourish as God’s design intends
B. Return what has been given to us by God in better shape than we got it.
C. Give proper reverence to that which is sacred
Blasphemers
A. Misuse or mock God’s design for the world
B. Desecrate (or vandalize) that which is holy
C. Disdain what God has made sacred. (Genesis 1 records God making the earth as a temple, a sacred place, into which on Day 7 he “rests,” which is best understood as a priest and king moving in to enjoy and rule over that which He has created. The Old Testament focuses this idea first in the Garden of Eden, then the tabernacle, then the temple. The New Testament says that Christians and the church are now the temple of God because of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit in followers of Jesus.)
In other words, when you look at the entire Bible, at some point everything has been part of God’s ‘sacred space’ (or kingdom, if that’s helpful). He is the High Priest and King of Kings over everything. We are called to treat with respect all that God has made – not worship these things, but treat them with reverential service as stewards, not abuse or desecrate them like blasphemers.
We can be stewards or blasphemers with anything that is part of what God created, since God is the Artist and Creator, High Priest and High King of it all. And while this has implications for the entirety of our lives, I want to focus today on people, because that’s the only thing in God’s creation that bears the very image of God.
• We bear God’s image; every human being reflects God’s plan to place an image of Himself in the world. Jesus explains why this matters: “Whatever you do to the least of these, it’s as if you have done it unto me.” (Matthew 25:45) If you spray graffiti on a work of art, you insult the artist. If you leave all your trash on the ground in Yellowstone Park, you spoil the beauty of what God has made. If you deface or defile or spoil a human being…
• As Christians, we are identified as a temple as well, a particular kind of sacred space established by God. This raises stakes that were already high.
This is why we cannot deface or vandalize other human beings, particularly those who are living temples in whom the spirit of God dwells.
First, this addresses core issues of identity and self-worth.
• If you are a human being, God has stamped His image on you. Don’t vandalize it. Don’t insult it. Steward it.
• If you are a follower of Jesus, God has made you a sacred space. Don’t desecrate it. Decorate it with the interior and exterior decorations befitting a temple. Use gold, not dirt.
Second, this might be helpful for thinking about what it means to “love your neighbor as yourself.” If we are to show this kind of stewardship to ourselves because of our value and dignity, surely we are to show this to others.
• When you interact with other human beings, remember that God has stamped his image on them. Don’t vandalize them with your words, your eyes, your actions, your attitude. Steward them with all those things. What you do to any of them, it’s as if you have done it to the God whose image they bear.
• When you rub shoulders with other Christians, remember that you are engaging with a sacred space. Don’t desecrate them with your words, your eyes, your actions, your attitude. Decorate them with all those things.
This is what “hopeful waiting” and “earnest desire” looks like on a practical level. The result? I suspect – and I am reading between the lines here – that we get an imperfect but important glimpse of what the New Heaven and the New Earth will hold in its fullness: the goodness and wonder of a world in which everything “ is deemed right by the Lord after His examination [and] approved in His eyes.”
That is ultimately the future for which we hope.
That is currently the future toward which we point with the surrendered worship of our lives.