Psalm 73:2 - But as for me, my feet came close to stumbling, my steps had almost slipped.
Psalm 73:3 - For I was envious of the arrogant as I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
Psalm 73:4-9 - For there are no pains in their death, and their body is fat. They are not in trouble as other men, nor are they plagued like mankind. Therefore pride is their necklace; the garment of violence covers them. Their eye bulges from fatness; the imaginations of their heart run riot. They mock and wickedly speak of oppression; they speak from on high. They have set their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue parades through the earth.
Psalm 73:10 - Therefore his people return to this place, and waters of abundance are drunk by them.
Psalm 73:11-12 - They say, “How does God know? And is there knowledge with the Most High?” Behold, these are the wicked; and always at ease, they have increased in wealth.
Psalm 73:13-14 - Surely in vain I have kept my heart pure and washed my hands in innocence; for I have been stricken all day long and chastened every morning.
Psalm 73:15-16 - If I had said, “I will speak thus,” behold, I would have betrayed the generation of Your children. When I pondered to understand this, it was troublesome in my sight.
Psalm 73:17 - Until I came into the sanctuary of God; Then I perceived their end.
Psalm 73:18-20 - Surely You set them in slippery places; You cast them down to destruction. How they are destroyed in a moment! They are utterly swept away by sudden terrors! Like a dream when one awakes, O Lord, when aroused, You will despise their form.
Psalm 73:21-28 - When my heart was embittered and I was pierced within, then I was senseless and ignorant; I was like a beast before You. Nevertheless I am continually with You; You have taken hold of my right hand. With Your counsel You will guide me, and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. For, behold, those who are far from You will perish; You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to You. But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord God my refuge, that I may tell of all Your works.
2 Peter 3:18 - …but 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.
3 responses to our God who will someday execute perfect justice
I. Be Sobered by God’s Judgment on the Unrighteous
A. The angels
2 Peter 2:4 - For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment…
Jude 6 - And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day…
2 Peter 2:4 - …cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment…
Revelation 5:11-14 - Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.” And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.” And the four living creatures kept saying, “Amen.” And the elders fell down and worshiped.
B. The ancient world
Genesis 6:5-7 - Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. The Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them.”
Genesis 2:16-17 - The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
Genesis 3:4 - The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die!”
2 Peter 2:5 - …and did not spare the ancient world…
C. Sodom and Gomorrah
2 Peter 2:6 - …and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter…
Genesis 13:10 - Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the valley of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere – this was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah – like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as you go to Zoar.
Genesis 18:20 - And the Lord said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave.
Genesis 19:24-25 - Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven, and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground.
II. Be Amazed by God’s Rescue of His People
2 Peter 2:3 - …their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
2 Peter 1:19 - So we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts.
A. Noah and his family
2 Peter 2:5 - …and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly…
Genesis 6:8-9 - But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time; Noah walked with God.
Genesis 6:13-21 - Then God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence because of them; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth. Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; you shall make the ark with rooms, and shall cover it inside and out with pitch. This is how you shall make it: the length of the ark three hundred cubits, its breadth fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. You shall make a window for the ark, and finish it to a cubit from the top; and set the door of the ark in the side of it; you shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. Behold, I, even I am bringing the flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish. But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall enter the ark – you and your sons and your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind, and of the animals after their kind, of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. As for you, take for yourself some of all food which is edible, and gather it to yourself; and it shall be for food for you and for them.”
Genesis 6:22 - Thus Noah did; according to all that God had commanded him, so he did.
2 Peter 1:1 - …to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ…
Romans 4:3 - For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”
B. Lot
2 Peter 2:7-8 - …and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds)…
“While certainly far from perfect, Lot never lost his basic orientation to the Lord. The word ‘righteous’ that Peter uses need mean no more than this. In the New Testament, this word often refers to a person’s status before the Lord rather than to one’s innate moral virtue. Moreover, it is important to note that Peter does not say that the Lord rescued Lot because he was a righteous man. Similarly, it will be not by virtue of their inherent goodness that God will deliver Christians in Peter’s day, or in ours, from the judgment that he will bring on the ungodly. Rather, it will be because of their ‘knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord’ (2 Peter 1:2) and because they are distressed, as Lot was, at the rampant sin around them.” (Douglas J. Moo, 2 Peter, Jude , The NIV Application Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996, 105.)
Genesis 19:16 - But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the Lord was upon him; and they brought him out, and put him outside the city.
III. Be Encouraged Because God Knows How to Make Things Right in the End
2 Peter 2:9 - …then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment…
Practical Take-Aways
1. Be sure that you have received the righteousness of God by faith.
2. Rejoice in our Savior who makes righteousness and our eternal destiny with Him possible.
2 Timothy 1:12 - For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day.
3. Remember that because the Lord will make all things right in the end, often your role today is to simply return good for evil.
Romans 12:17-19 - Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord.
4. Choose your teachers wisely. Remember their end.
Have you ever struggled with the apparent lack of justice in the world?
- Young children wrestle with it constantly...”That’s not fair!” they say...
But it’s not only children that struggle with that...
- Perhaps you’ve been at a job where someone gets promoted over you...but the rub is that person has lied and passed blame on projects to other people that was actually his, and he’s taken credit for things that he didn’t do...
Or as I can remember so clearly when I was at Purdue...I was trying to live for the Lord and was growing in my faith and so there were things that in seeking to please Christ I wasn’t going to engage in. I wasn’t going to parties that featured drinking and sexual promiscuity...I was seeking to live in purity and soberly before the Lord.
- But I remember really wrestling for a season with why life seemed to be so challenging to me when I was seeking to honor the Lord, and the myriads of students who were living obviously immoral lives were so happy!
- Why if I was seeking to please the Lord was my life not obviously more blessed than those that weren’t living to please the Lord???
There are tons of other examples of this very question that I know every person in this room has wrestled with...and I’m sure some are really wrestling with right now.
The good news is, you’re not the first person to ask that question...in fact if you know you’re Bible well you may be thinking of a famous Psalm that address this very question of justice.
Psalm 73 begins with “Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart! 2But as for me, my feet came close to stumbling, my steps had almost slipped.”
That’s a pretty honest person right there...he’s not talking about a minor fall...he’s confessing that he is on the verge of a real crisis...
He explains in the next verse why he’s almost at crisis point...again with incredible transparency and honesty...
Psalm 73:3 “For I was envious of the arrogant as I saw the prosperity of the wicked.”
That’s bad enough to admit in general terms...but that’s not where he stops. Asaph, the author of Psalm 73 then goes on to gives specifics of his envy of the arrogant....
Psalm 73:4–9 (NASB 95)
4 For there are no pains in their death, And their body is fat. 5 They are not in trouble as other men, Nor are they plagued like mankind. 6 Therefore pride is their necklace; The garment of violence covers them. 7 Their eye bulges from fatness; The imaginations of their heart run riot. 8 They mock and wickedly speak of oppression; They speak from on high. 9 They have set their mouth against the heavens, And their tongue parades through the earth.
This is like the athlete that looks at the un-sportsman athlete getting to play ahead of him or make the team they got cut from and thinking I shouldn’t have listened to all that character and winning isn’t everything teaching...
Asaph is regretting the teachers he’s followed...
Psalm 73:10–12 (NASB 95)
10 Therefore his people return to this place, And waters of abundance are drunk by them. 11 They say, “How does God know? And is there knowledge with the Most High?” 12 Behold, these are the wicked; And always at ease, they have increased in wealth.
As we read through those descriptions of how he sees the arrogant and the wicked...are you getting the sense that Asaph is seeing one or two prospering arrogant people, or that he is looking at the culture around him and seeing lots of prospering wicked people?
- It seems to be the latter...he seems to be seeing lots of prospering wicked people.
- Probably not all the big of jump to bring it to our culture today...often people look around and feel like evil doers, liars, cheats and so forth are prospering...
If that’s not full on spiritual depression that Asaph is describing himself in, then we’d at least have to admit he’s really, really close.
- And how many of us can relate to his line of thinking? How many in this room might be on his line of thinking right now?
But if you know the Lord, as Asaph did—that’s not where the Psalm ends or where Asaph’s story ends.
Psalm 73:15–16 (NASB 95)
15 If I had said, “I will speak thus,” Behold, I would have betrayed the generation of Your children. 16 When I pondered to understand this, It was troublesome in my sight
- - In other words...he was missing something in his calculation and it was causing him real trouble...he needed to figure out what he was missing and the next verse tells where he found what he was missing
Psalm 73:17 (NASB 95)
17 Until I came into the sanctuary of God; Then I perceived their end.
It is very important to chew on the phrase, “Then I perceived their end.”
The question of who you’re going to follow and who you are going to listen to should include their end...not just how things go in the next few weeks, months or even years...what is their end??
What Asaph is helping us learn, through his own story, is that we need to learn the discipline and skill of thinking through all the way to eternity rather than just the here and now.
So with eternity factored into the equation Asaph pulls out of the spiritual depression...
Psalm 73:18–20 (NASB 95)
18 Surely You set them in slippery places; You cast them down to destruction. 19 How they are destroyed in a moment! They are utterly swept away by sudden terrors! 20 Like a dream when one awakes, O Lord, when aroused, You will despise their form.
Where the Psalm began was with Asaph saying he was in a slippery place...but now that he sees things in light of eternity, he finds himself on solid footing and it’s the wicked that he now rightly sees as being in slippery places.
- All the arrogant boasts of the wicked have confused God’s patience with apathy and impotence.
Asaph ends the psalm with this...
Psalm 73:21–28 (NASB 95)
21 When my heart was embittered And I was pierced within, 22 Then I was senseless and ignorant; I was like a beast before You. 23 Nevertheless I am continually with You; You have taken hold of my right hand. 24 With Your counsel You will guide me, And afterward receive me to glory. 25 Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth. 26 My flesh and my heart may fail, But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. 27 For, behold, those who are far from You will perish; You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to You. 28 But as for me, the nearness of God is my good; I have made the Lord GOD my refuge, That I may tell of all Your works.
The point is pretty clear...when it comes to who you are going to follow you better consider their end...
Now you might be thinking, that’s all when and good but I thought we were studying the book of 2 Peter...so what does Psalm 73 have to do with 2 Peter? Well, we are studying 2 Peter and this Psalm really helps us consider Peter’s main point in the passage we are studying today...he’s going to make the same point in a very different way...a very powerful way, but very different and the by beginning with Psalm 73 I’m hoping that will help us keep focused on Peter’s main point and not get lost in some of the more challenging details.
The annual theme we’ve been considering all year is Hope for Everyday Life. And this fall we are studying the book of 2 Peter in order to help us Grow in Grace and Knowledge.
The theme of the series comes from the last verse in 2 Peter.
2 Peter 3:18 (NASB 95)
18 but 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.
We concluded chapter 1 in our study a couple weeks ago. And in many ways chapter 1 is very positive.
- In chapter 1 Peter talked about the beauty of the gospel and the delightful fruit it produces in a believers life, and then he talked about the sufficiency of God’s Word.
- So chapter 1 gave us 2 very positive reasons why we can have hope to grow in grace and knowledge.
But once we breach chapter 2, as we did last week, the book changes rather dramatically.
When Pastor Viars’ introduced the book he quoted a commentator that called Jude and 2 Peter the “dark corner of the NT.” So you might have been wondering by the end of chapter 1, “what’s so dark about this?”
Well, chapter 2 immediately dives into the “dark” as he begins to talk about false teachers which is what we’ve said is a primary purpose in him writing the book.
We studied 2 Peter 2:1–3 last week thinking about how to discern false teachers...
1 But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. 2 Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; 3 and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
Peter at this point in his life is near the end of his life...possibly with the severe persecution under the Roman Emperor Nero already underway.[1] And so with earnestness, knowing that he is about to pass from the scene he pens this letter, hoping and praying these believers would not follow false teachers...and the logic of the passage we’re looking at today follows the same point of Psalm 73...consider their end.
[Read 2 Peter 2:4–10a]
This morning we are talking about Choosing Teachers Well by Considering Their End.
In order to accomplish that we’re going to consider 3 responses to our God who will someday execute perfect justice.
The first response is to...
I. Be sobered by God’s judgment on the unrighteous
To help us be sobered Peter uses three examples, and these examples are fascinating...
He starts with...
The Angels
When you study Scripture, many people are often surprised to find that angels and demons do not even come close to talking up a large portion of Scripture.
- In fact most of the things that people claim to know about angels and demons don’t even come from the Bible!
Lots of movies and popular culture has there take on angles...again which may be interesting but are usually incorrect.
- As a child of the 90s, I can remember growing up watching “Touched by an Angel”.
Well, Peter isn’t thinking in line with those cultural concepts.
2 Peter 2:4 (NASB 95)
4 For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment;
In a parallel passage Jude seems to describe the same angels saying
Jude 6 (NASB 95)
6 And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day,
Now you’d be right to be asking the question, “Well what angels are those?”
And I’m going to give you one of the best theological answers I can... “I don’t know.” And in all seriousness...there is a lot of truth to that being a good theological answer, because God hasn’t told us everything.
- Now what we do know, is that neither Peter nor Jude give much detail.
- Instead, they mention it very briefly without introduction or any further explanation.
- With the other 2 examples that follow after this we can be fairly sure that 1) whatever he’s referring to is historical and not made up, 2) chronologically whatever angles he’s talking about, it probably happened before Noah’s flood.
There is a lot...I mean A LOT of debate around what angels these are. And I’m not saying there isn’t a place for really digging and researching and trying to come to a conclusion on what these angels are...but the good news for us, is we don’t have to know exactly what he’s referring to in order to benefit from the point Peter is trying to get across – namely, that if God would judge angels for their disobedience THEN he’ll surely judge people who either teach false doctrine or follow false doctrine.
**since this book is on false teaching...just a quick note on one of the strategies that false teachers use: In order to cloud the truth and deceive, they will do what Paul warns against in Titus 3...
Titus 3:9 (NASB 95)
9 But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and strife and disputes about the Law, for they are unprofitable and worthless.
So we don’t want to spend our time in a foolish controversies which is unprofitable and worthless.
So just consider the contrast between where the angels that Peter mentions are—which is “in hell and committed to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment”...and then the future voice of angels in Revelation 5:11–14 (NASB 95)
11 Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, 12 saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.” 13 And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.” 14 And the four living creatures kept saying, “Amen.” And the elders fell down and worshiped.
Jude described the angels “not keeping their own domain, and abandoning their proper abode.”
Revelation gave us a picture of the angels that kept their domain and didn’t abandon their proper abode...well when we consider their end...which angel would you rather be??
So whatever situation you may be in now or in the future where false teaching is whispering...or perhaps shouting that justice is never done on earth and that everyone else is doing it so you might as well to...stop to consider the angles that God judged and consider their end...
The judgment on the angels is sobering, and we should be sobered by it ourselves...
The 2nd example Peter gives is...
The Ancient World
This example is speaking about the judgment that came on the world through the Flood back in Genesis.
The words used to describe the word at that time are stark...and what’s more amazing is considering that these words are penned about the world that is only 6 chapters into the Bible!!
Genesis 6:5–7 (NASB 95)
5 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. 6 The LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. 7 The LORD said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, from man to animals to creeping things and to birds of the sky; for I am sorry that I have made them.”
God had spoken in Genesis 2 before sin entered the world these very...very true words...
Genesis 2:16–17 (NASB 95)
16 The LORD God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; 17 but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”
The first false prophet and false teacher, and the one that is still very active today—Satan! His false prophecy was...
Genesis 3:4 (NASB 95)
4 The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die!
Peter is reminding his readers...2 Peter 2:5...God did not spare the ancient world...consider their end...
We are living in time when it is quite poplar to believe that saved by grace and not by works means that I do not need live a holy life. It’s like Jude says in his letter, “certain persons have crept in unnoticed...who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness/or sensuality...
- The point is, they make the grace of God into a license to get away with sinful lifestyles.
Well, among that kind of false teaching the idea of the wrath of God isn’t a poplar or welcomed topic...they would prefer to talk of God’s grace, his love and acceptance...
- But if we ignored God’s just wrath and judgment we’d have to ignore large portions of Scripture...and Peter’s whole point in this section is that false teachers and those that follow false teachers go to a terrible end...
**Just a quick side note...I hope you believe in the Flood. There are lots of people that don’t believe the truth of Genesis and a global Flood...
- Peter told us in chapter 1 that we have the inspired Scriptures that came from God and that men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke on behalf of God...
- I hope you believe in the inspired Word of Genesis and the global Flood...
- If you don’t, then Peter’s point that God will judge the unrighteous, really becomes more of a metaphorically God will judge the unrighteous...
- My point is, what you believe about the historicity of the events that Peter gives as examples in this chapter will have a massive bearing on whether or not you truly trust the Lord to be a justice God.
The third example Peter gives is...
Sodom and Gomorrah
2 Peter 2:6 (NASB 95)
6 and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter;
This event occurred about 450 years after the Flood. The bible describes where Sodom and Gomorrah was as being very fertile and beautiful...
Genesis 13:10 (NASB 95) (probably not reading for sake of time)
10 Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the valley of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere—this was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah—like the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt as you go to Zoar.
What a blessed place to live, where people should have been living in thanksgiving to God...but instead the Lord said this to Abraham about the place...
Genesis 18:20 (NASB 95)
20 And the LORD said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave.
- For sake of time we cannot read the account Sodom and Gomorrah being reduced to ashes...but it’s found in Genesis 19 and the sin of the place is shocking...
- One commentator said that one of the greatest protections against sin is being shocked by it...
I wonder how shocked we are by sin?
The Lord seemed quite outraged by the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah to the point that...
Genesis 19:24–25 (NASB 95)
24 Then the LORD rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven, 25 and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground.
Maybe your not familiar with these passages or your new to church and you’re thinking...wow this is a fire and brimstone church...
- Perhaps a better way of saying it is, “The Bible is a fire and brimstone book at times.”
- We really believe that there is a REAL heaven to be gained and a REAL hell to be shunned.
Now would be a good time to just pause and ask all of us, “are you properly sobered by the judgment of God?”
- There are lots of positive reasons to have joy in the Lord...we’re going to talk about one of them in the next point...
But we would be really remiss if we pause on this point...
- After all, we can get pretty flip when it comes to the kinds of teachers that we listen to...
- Whether it be through music, or social media, movies, books, podcasts and so forth...
- The flippant way in which we listen to false teachers might reveal that we’re not properly sobered by God’s judgment...as if a little sin and rebellion isn’t that bad.
- I hope you really do consider the end...consider the angels...consider the ancient world swept away by a global flood...consider the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah...consider them and be appropriately sobered to the point of caution and carefulness...
When’s the last time you chose not to watch something, or better yet...you chose to watch something and then realized it needs to be shut off because you realized you don’t need any of that in your mind or heart...
II. Be amazed by God’s rescue of his people
At this point in the study we should be able to clearly see the contrast between the reliable truthful prophets Peter mentioned in chapter 1, that are giving us everything that we need for life and godliness and then the false prophets of chapter 2 that secretly introduce heresies, maligning the way of the truth.
We’ve considered their end 2 Peter 2:3 (NASB 95)
3 ...their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep.
- Anyone who doubts that needs to consider the end of the angels, the ancient world and Sodom and Gomorrah...
But that still leaves open the question of what happens to those that follow the truth of 2 Peter 1:19 So we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your hearts.
What’s the outcome of those who do pay attention?
- Well, lets ask Noah and Lot...
Noah and his family
2 Peter 2:5 (NASB 95)
5 and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly;
So what do we know about Noah from Genesis?
Genesis 6:8–9 (NASB 95)
8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD. 9 These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time; Noah walked with God.
That’s completely different than how the Lord view the false prophets and teachers Peter has been warning us about...
So the Lord himself comes and prophecies to Noah...
Genesis 6:13–21 (NASB 95)
13 Then God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence because of them; and behold, I am about to destroy them with the earth. 14 Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; you shall make the ark with rooms, and shall cover it inside and out with pitch. 15 This is how you shall make it: the length of the ark three hundred cubits, its breadth fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. 16 You shall make a window for the ark, and finish it to a cubit from the top; and set the door of the ark in the side of it; you shall make it with lower, second, and third decks. 17 Behold, I, even I am bringing the flood of water upon the earth, to destroy all flesh in which is the breath of life, from under heaven; everything that is on the earth shall perish. 18 But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. 19 And of every living thing of all flesh, you shall bring two of every kind into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. 20 Of the birds after their kind, and of the animals after their kind, of every creeping thing of the ground after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. 21 As for you, take for yourself some of all food which is edible, and gather it to yourself; and it shall be for food for you and for them.”
So what does a righteous man, who pays attention to truthful prophecy do? And by the way...the project God gave to Noah in making the ark would take 120 years...
Genesis 6:22 (NASB 95)
22 Thus Noah did; according to all that God had commanded him, so he did.
Why did he do what God commanded? Because he was a righteous man...
But don’t misinterpret the kind of righteous man Noah was...it was the kind of righteousness that Peter describes in v.1
2 Peter 1:1 ...To those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ:
Noah was like Abraham, who wasn’t saved by his works...because no one is...but rather Romans 4:3 ... “ABRAHAM BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS CREDITED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS.”
The same was true of Noah...he believed God, and God’s righteousness was credited to him...which was secured centuries later in Jesus Christ’s life, death and resurrection.
And because of the favor and righteousness he received from God by faith, he became as James tells us in the NT a “doer of the Word!”...
But Peter also tells us something else about Noah...that he was preacher of righteousness?
- - What does that mean? We don’t exactly know what that preaching was or looked liked because Genesis doesn’t tell us...but what is pretty clear from the Flood and the fact that only 8 were saved—his family—was that Noah’s preaching wasn’t producing any converts...
Now, I don’t say that to Noah’s shame at all...Peter instead is pushing us to consider their end...Noah and his family were preserved and the rest of the ancient world was destroyed...
Friends, the lesson is clear faith in God’s Word preserves while following false teaching brings judgment...
- - Noah was mocked about building the ark, because it had never even rained at that point in history...
- - There is all kinds of Biblical truth being mocked today and it might seem like Biblical truth is losing...
- People may say it’s “outdated”, its no longer “relevant”, its “restrictive” or “repressive”.
- Especially things like sexual purity...the notion that sex is only for the confines of marriage between one man and one woman...
- Or even that marriage is life long commitment, for better or worse till death do us part!
If it looks like “no one is listening”...which by the way, look around the room...God has blessed us with a few more than 8 people...so we have a lot more to be thankful than Noah did...
- - But even if no one seems to be listening...please consider the end of those that do not pay attention to Word of God...
I hope we’d all say, “I want to be preserved” by the Lord...then lets pay careful attention to the truth of Scripture.
Similarly, we have the example of...
Lot
2 Peter 2:7–8 (NASB 95)
7 and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men 8 (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds),
Now perhaps you’re scratching your head at the description of Lot as “righteous” because the Genesis account doesn’t seem to highlight that...at least certainly not like Noah...
Here’s how one commentator helps us understand Lot as “righteous”...
While certainly far from perfect, Lot never lost his basic orientation to the Lord. The word “righteous” that Peter uses need mean no more than this. In the New Testament, this word often refers to a person’s status before the Lord rather than to one’s innate moral virtue. Moreover, it is important to note that Peter does not say that the Lord rescued Lot because he was a righteous man. Similarly, it will be not by virtue of their inherent goodness that God will deliver Christians in Peter’s day, or in ours, from the judgment that he will bring on the ungodly. Rather, it will be because of their “knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord” (2 Peter 1:2) and because they are distressed, as Lot was, at the rampant sin around them. (Douglas J. Moo, 2 Peter, Jude , The NIV Application Commentary; Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1996, 105.)
Lot was the nephew of Abraham and lived with Abraham for a good chunk of his life...so undoubtedly Lot must have been impacted by Abrahams life and teaching. So when it came time for Sodom and Gomorrah to be destroyed the angels warned Lot to get his family and flee...Genesis 19:16 (NASB 95)
16 But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the LORD was upon him; and they brought him out, and put him outside the city.
When and angel seizes you and your family and yanks you out of a city that’s about to be destroyed, what is that called?...Rescue...
And can we agree that being rescued is a much better end than being reduced to ashes?
Well what’s the point of God’s judgment and his preservation and rescue of the righteous??
III. Be encouraged because God knows how to make things right in the end
2 Peter 2:9 (NASB 95)
9 then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment,
If you believe those three examples Peter gave, then we’d have to powerfully concluded with Peter that “the Lord knows...”
Please consider the situation that really bothers you right now because injustice and false teaching seems to be winning...
- Perhaps even like Asaph you might be right on the edge of slipping, thinking like him that “in vain I’ve kept my heart pure and washed my hands in innocence.”
Before you slip any further...consider their end, as well as the end of the godly that God promises to rescue...
Practical Take-Aways
1. Be sure that you have received the righteousness of God by faith.
- Noah and Lot were imperfect people…but they were people of faith…
- they believed God, and He credited it to them as righteousness…
- if you’re not sure that you’ve ever done that, why not schedule a time to talk to one of our service pastors and make sure?
2. Rejoice in our Savior who makes righteousness and our eternal destiny with Him possible.
- 2 Timothy 1:12 - For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day.
3. Remember that because the Lord will make all things right in the end, often your role today is to simply return good for evil.
- Romans 12:17–19 - Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord.
4. Choose your teachers wisely. Remember their end.
[1] Douglas J. Moo, 2 Peter, Jude, The NIV Application Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1997), 25.
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