Judgment On Hold Giving Time to Repent

Transcript

GR 1968
10/30/2016
Judgment on Hold Giving time to Repent
II Peter 3:6-9
Gil Rugh

We are looking at the closing portion of Peter’s second letter so turn there in your Bibles, all the way back toward the end of our New Testament. Peter, one of the most well-known men of the New Testament, greatly used of God in the early history of the church following his being part of Christ’s earthly ministry. We all appreciate Peter for what you might say is his “humanness.” He is the one who speaks up and asks the question or makes the comment and we learn from it. We learn from him and his life and now his letter.

He is writing in the face of his impending martyrdom and you appreciate the spirit that comes through this letter as the Holy Spirit is using him. There is nothing morbid about it. There is nothing discouraging or depressing. You see the attitude of Peter right up to the end. You wonder, what is the impact on his family? We know he was married from the Gospel account. We don’t know anything else about family. We wonder, how does this all impact? You are telling even your loved ones, you know I am going to experience martyrdom here at any time. The Lord has made that clear and yet here he is writing this letter to believers to encourage them, to prepare them and it shows something of his attitude.

He opened chapter 3 by indicating this is his second letter. We have studied the first letter that Peter wrote and he is writing to again remind them; so crucial that they remember these truths. Remember what the prophets said in the Old Testament. Remember what the apostles of our Savior have revealed and the messages that have been given through them. Peter now brings one of those recording such a message. Then in verse 3-7 he has been speaking of those who will come in the last days. we noted that expression, “the last days” really compasses the entire time from the first coming of Christ down to the second coming of Christ because we often remind ourselves that the Old Testament did not reveal the gap or length of time there would be between the first coming and the second coming of Christ. It just talked about the two events, that He would come and suffer and die. He would come and He would rule and reign but it did not show the time gap. So when it talked about what would happen in the last days, those are days of Messiah, the period of time in which we live would be part of that and at sometimes it would be worse, sometimes there is less pressure and persecution but the overall pattern we are moving toward the worst of times we are anticipating in the book of Revelation and that closing seven year period.

He is telling them so that they won’t be caught off guard. “In the last days mockers would come,” they would say people have been talking of His coming. Here with Peter it has been thirty plus years since Christ has been crucified and they have been talking about the coming of Christ. Here we are now 2,000 years later talking about the coming of Christ and those scoffers would come and nothing has changed. The world moves on in its pattern and cycle and it’s always been the same. That is the uniform pattern that is being followed. “Everything continues,” verse 4 “just as it was from the beginning of creation.” And when they say this it says in verse 5: “It escapes their notice that God created all things by the Word of His power.” “It escapes their notice that by the Word of God the heavens existed long ago. The earth was formed out of water and by water” and that takes us back to the opening chapters of Genesis where water covered the earth as God began His work of creation and then He gathered the waters on the earth and brought out dry land and gathered waters above the earth with the unfolding of creation.

Back up a few pages into Hebrews. This is the material we covered in our previous study but Hebrews chapter 11 and note verse 3. “By faith we understand that the worlds (the ages, all the period of time) were prepared by the Word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.” So we know this by faith. We believe what God said about His creating with the power of His Word. God didn’t need something to start with. He brought it all into existence and then as Genesis 1 unfolds He molded it, shaped it and brought it to be what it would be, the inhabitable place it is but He didn’t need how am I going to get started? I need something to work with. No. He created it by the Word of His power from the very beginning. Then with the waters that He brought into existence then He is going to progress so it becomes a place where man created in His image can live and carry out His will.

So they are ignorant. It hasn’t always been the same. In fact God intervened to bring about the beginning, “In the beginning God created.” Don’t say things have always just gone on and we have our version of it for billions of years and somehow, somewhere life was created. Maybe there was an explosion but where did the substances come from to create the explosion? Well you know so we end up with I guess eternal matter. Somewhere out of nothing came something. Well some choose to believe that. We believe that there is an eternal God who brought something out of nothing when He brought creation into existence.

So they are wrong from the starting point and then and he talks about the water that was present about the water that was present from the beginning of creation because the next point that he brings up is God has intervened in a dramatic way to destroy what He created. And that is with the flood of Noah which destroyed the known world, the whole world, all humanity, all air breathing life except that small amount preserved on an ark.

The world at that time was destroyed by the Word of God using the water. Out of the water that existed at the beginning he created something. Now destroys it by His Word with water; “Being flooded by water.” This is the account beginning in Genesis 6 and following in subsequent chapters.

So let me just read to you some verses from Genesis 7, verse 11: “All the fountains of the great deep burst open. The flood gates of the sky were open.” “The water prevailed more and more upon the earth so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered,” chapter 7, verse 19. “Thus He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the land.” Peter has already used the flood as an example of God’s judgment on those who rebel against Him.

Back in chapter 2, verse 5: “God did not spare the ancient world but preserved Noah a preacher of righteousness with seven others,” Noah, his wife, children, the families there. “He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly.” The idea that you know everything’s always gone the same. They choose to exclude from their knowledge the facts that God has revealed. He created it and He destroyed it. Don’t say it’s just always been as it has always has been. That’s scoffing, mocking at what God has done but it doesn’t change reality. Now that becomes the pattern showing God does intervene. He intervened to bring it into existence. He intervened to destroy it. And that carries us to the future. He says He will intervene again to destroy it so we have verse 7: “That by His Word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.” It is God’s Word at work. We begin with the presupposition there is a God who is sovereign. The Bible is the revelation of God and what He has done, what He is doing and what He will do. We are in this by faith. Those who don’t believe it are in it by faith. They just believe something in opposition to what God says. They say no one was there at the beginning who is living now. No one was there to see the flood who is alive now. Those who believe it happened a billion or three billion or how many billions you want to put in there, years ago none of them were there either. So this is my faith system. God tells us about the future.

Here we have the world really divided into three major periods: the period from creation to the flood, the present period from the flood to the future destruction by fire and then the new heavens and the new earth. So that is really how He is dividing things up here. “By His Word,” the same thing in verse 5: “By the Word of God.” And it was this through which the world was destroyed in the days of Noah and now “By His Word the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire.”

Now water was the instrument of judgment in the days of Noah. Remember at the end of that period when Noah came out of the ark and offered the sacrifice part of the covenant God has established with Noah and that is a universal covenant encompassing creation. He put the rainbow in the sky and that is a testimony that the world will never again be destroyed by water. It doesn’t mean the world will never again be destroyed but water will never again be the instrument in which the whole world will be destroyed. So even though we are in a panic about global warming and I am not taking a position on that. The world could be warming. It could be part of the disaster of the coming tribulation. I don’t have a particular view on it, no less than probably most of you about the science of it but it wouldn’t surprise me but I know the waters aren’t going to rise so much that someday the whole world will go back to being covered by water. That is just not going to happen but the world is going to be destroyed again. “It is being reserved for destruction by fire.”

So we are going to come into this now in the following verses but God is at work. He is preparing it and if you will holding it until it is time for judgment to come. Remember in Genesis 6, the iniquity of mankind got so bad we just moved from Genesis 3 to Genesis 6 and the iniquity of humanity in the world go so bad God said “No more.” They had ripened to the point of judgment.

I have shared with you often when God told Abraham that it would be 400 years when his descendants would have to be in Egypt waiting for what? Waiting for the sin of the Canaanites to ripen for judgment. God is always at work exactly as He has planned it in His schedule and so “the world now being reserved for judgment.” And we say how much worse can things get? Much, much worse but all on schedule. We can’t turn it back. We can’t rush it forward. So the world right now is where God intends it to be. That doesn’t mean that the world is not accountable for its iniquity. Of course it is. That is what the judgment will be dealing with but the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire. That will be the instrument of judgment the next time that world-wide judgment, “Kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.”

We won’t go through the passages that associate fire with the coming judgment. We have seen that just in the beginning of our study of Revelation, the fire associated with the presence of God. It consumes the dross, it consumes the wicked and the ultimate death of the wicked will be eternity in the lake of fire, the picture but this earth is going to be destroyed by fire, the Day of Judgment, the destruction of ungodly men. Now that is the negative.

We say, “Well boy, was there anything here to encourage me?” Well when he said, “These present heaven and earth are being reserved for fire for the Day of Judgment” there is something encouraging in this for us as believers because we are not anticipating that event to consume us. We realize what God is doing while He is reserving the present heaven and earth for the destruction by fire, God has a plan that is in operation. He is not just doing nothing while He holds the world until it is time to pour out His wrath in destruction but He is accomplishing something today in and through us as His children.

So he writes now picking up with verse 8 to encourage believers and remind them of God’s grace in delaying judgment. We sometimes get caught up in our day talking about all the wickedness and all the bad decisions being made and laws being passed and you know. It would be silliness if it wasn’t such serious sinfulness.

Now the Supreme Court of the United States will consider an issue regarding transgender use of bathrooms. We don’t even know the difference between a man and a woman, boy and a girl? I mean, open your eyes, look. You know they choose to be blind. Everything about God escapes their notice. They choose to be ignorant, not take it into account.

“But for us,” look at verse 8, “do not let this one fact escape your notice beloved.” And we went through, remember and noted the four uses of “beloved.” One of the modern translations translate it, “dear friends” but all the commentators say that is not a very good translation. This is “Those who are loved by Him.” There is more depth and meaning in it when you write “loved ones.” I am not against calling people dear friends but here the word is those who are the objects of His love. It was used in verse 1 as an address, “this is now beloved.” It is used down in verse 8, “beloved.” Used down in verse 14, “therefore beloved.” Verse 17, “You therefore, beloved ones.” So as he closes out this letter you can see this. Here is Peter writing to these that are so precious to him. This is the end of what he has to say. There will be no third letter of Peter. He anticipates he may well be martyred very, very soon. So he writes out of love for them. “Do not let this one fact escape your notice, loved ones.” Now it is interesting to me he uses the same expression that he used up in verse 5. “But when they maintained this it escapes their notice.” It escapes their notice because they have rejected and refused to believe it. The danger for believers is it escapes their notice because we forget it and we fail to take it into account. That is why he is reminding them as he started out in verses 1 and 2, “Stirring up your pure mind by way of reminder.” You should remember because if you don’t you will fail to take into account this one fact. Then believers begin to get confused and that is why we end up with believers who begin at times to function like unbelievers. Sometimes in our conversations as believers we don’t sound much different than the unbeliever. All upset about what is going on in the world, and what is going to happen.

I got a letter in the mail a week ago from people in Omaha. I don’t know but they write it saying they are Christians and they want to say that the future of the country hangs on the election. I was embarrassed. I quickly tore it up so nobody else reads it. I mean this sounds like what you can watch on the secular news. You know everything is under control. That doesn’t mean we can’t vote. We can’t have opinions but we are not going to be swept up like the unbelieving world is but if we allow this to escape our notice these are facts we have learned somewhere, they are somewhere in the back of our mind but we don’t take them into account. Well, we are functioning then in the same way the unbeliever does. He doesn’t take them into account because he rejects them. The believer doesn’t take them into account because he just doesn’t remember them; put them into practice in this situation.

So we end with a believer and an unbeliever unsettled. So “don’t let this one fact escape you notice beloved.” We are not in the same hopeless, emptiness of the unbelieving world who thinks there has never been a God who has brought creation into existence, who has intervened in creation in many ways. I don’t think all things just continue on as they have always been. We see all as a result of the hand of God accomplishing His purposes.

We have to start out, you know, all things have been going on for thousands of years. We can agree on that. We can’t agree on the billions but we can agree, yes, it has been a long time. I have to admit even from New Testament times 2,000 years we have been saying, “The Lord is coming, the Lord is coming, yes the Lord will be returning, judgment is coming.” You know sometimes you will see cartoons in the newspaper and they are mocking it. They show a sign of an old guy walking along holding a sign “Repent or perish.” Of course, everybody has always been saying that but remember this, “That with the Lord one day is like a thousand years and a thousand years like one day.”

And this is not new. Peter draws this from a Psalm written by Moses. Go back to Psalm 90, and in this Psalm Moses is contrasting the brevity of man’s life with the eternality of the God who has no beginning and has no end. The work of creation in Psalm 90, verse 2: “Before the mountains were born or You gave birth to the earth and the world, even forever lasting to everlasting You are God.” You can see Peter has something of the flavor of this Psalm in what he is writing. It probably is on his mind and he takes us to creation as we have seen and then you will note verse 3: “You turn man back to dust. You say ‘Return O children of man.’” Man was created out of the dust. God said, “to the dust, you will return.”

What a contrast with the God who is from everlasting to everlasting. Man is from dust to dust yet verse 4 and here is our verse: “For a thousand years in Your sight are like yesterday when it passes by, or as a watch in the night.” It is you know, as a day. That is all it is. It is like yesterday when it passes by but a thousand years to the Lord, we look at yesterday and think well yesterday, that went by quickly, it is over, a thousand years in God’s sight.

Now note here. He does not say “A day is a thousand years or a thousand years is a day.” Some pick that up and that apparently how they get the 6,000 year period and then the 7,000 years. That wouldn’t be a valid way to support that. Just because he uses that little two letter word “as.” It is a two letter Greek word as well, “hos.” Some of you are taking Greek, “as.” So it is a comparison. He doesn’t say “One day is a thousand years with the Lord.” So we can start counting out. No. It is “as a thousand years.” In other words, it is nothing. Like yesterday when it passes by. You know it is over, it is quick but with God a thousand years could go by and it is nothing. It is like a watch in the night.

Come down to verse 10: “As for the days of our life, they contain seventy years” and maybe because we have extra strength we make 80 years but you know we labor, sorrow, soon it is gone, we fly away. I am living on borrowed time. I passed 70. I got my three score years and 10 in. You know some make 100 as my mother-in-law did. But you know that is the exception and the decline continues and we see some people are healthy, some people die early but we are reminded life is short.

Seventy years, two months. Well two months is a short time, if we were going to use a comparison. The point is we are dealing with time from God’s perspective. Our life is short. God is not bound by that. We say, 1,000 years, 2,000 years it is nothing. Keep in mind you will be living, functioning, serving God in 200 trillion years. Try to put that out there. There is no limit to it. We have a beginning but we will have no ending so he says, “Don’t let this escape your notice.” Otherwise we get drawn in and we get discouraged and we say, “I am sort of embarrassed to talk about the Lord coming because you know, this has been going on for so long.” Peter is not embarrassed. It looks like he is not going to make it to the return of the Lord because the Lord has made it clear he is going to be martyred but it is not like you know, “I have been waiting for years and the Lord hasn’t come. I guess we just sort of adjust our perspective.” No we don’t change our perspective.

So come back to Peter, 2 Peter. So “Don’t let this escape your notice.” It has not been that long put in the perspective of an eternal God who is at work. Verse 9, now what is going on? “The Lord is not slow about His promise.” In other words He is dragging this out. There are delays. He promised it but He still hasn’t been able to do what He said He was going to do. “The 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.”

We have a patient God. Long suffering is the word here. He is willing to wait. That is part of His plan. He is not slow about doing what He has promised as some would count slowness. We promise we are going to do something but you know, we don’t get it done and you know the time schedule and so we drag it out. It just seems to get dragged out. This isn’t being dragged out by God. This is part of the plan of God.

We won’t go back to Habakkuk but in Habakkuk chapter 2 verse 3 listen to what God says, “For the vision is yet for the appointed time. It hastens toward the goal and it will not fail though it tarries wait for it for it will certainly come, it will not delay.” That is what Peter is saying. God is not slow. He is not behind schedule. He has not missed the appointed time. He is not slow, He is not late. It is not delayed. It will come on schedule.

We can be impatient people. Why is He doing this? He is patient toward you. What God is doing is showing patience withholding His judgment. The world looks at it and scoffs and says, “Oh see, nothing has happened and it has been 2,000 years. You say your Messiah, Savior came and He promised judgment and then before that you had prophets and they promised judgment. Here we are.” Well they don’t take into account what Peter has said about intervention. He covered some of that in chapter 2 as well but don’t appreciate why God is doing it, giving time for people to repent. He is patient toward you.

Come back to Exodus chapter 34. You know we can be thankful that God is a God of patience. He is a God of mercy. You know there is the balance in God. We don’t want to emphasize one aspect of His character at the expense of the other. He is a God of infinite wrath, of infinite anger. His wrath is so great He will cast people bodily into the eternal suffering of fire forever. I don’t like to think that about God. I don’t even like to think about the awfulness of hell and I may have friends or family – that just can’t be. But he is a God of infinite love, kindness, mercy but the balance is in Him and the exercise of it.

So in Exodus and again to encourage God’s people and that’s what it is in Exodus 34:6 as well as what Peter is writing, 34:6 “Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, (now note this) compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin.” I mean what a great God but don’t presume upon His graciousness and so on. “Yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations.” In other words this is what is happening, what Peter writes because God withholds judgment to give them opportunity to escape judgment by repentance. They take it as an indication there won’t be any judgment. Sort of like you know, in a situation where to avoid certain punishment you may be given time to rectify a situation but since you are given time you say “well that means I am off the hook.” No it doesn’t.

This is where the mockers, the scoffers don’t appreciate. God gave the people in the days of Noah 120 years while Noah and his family build an ark. During that time chapter 2 told us that Noah was preaching God’s righteousness, telling them of coming judgment of their sin of their need of righteousness. They were a wicked, sinful people. After 120 years he didn’t have any converts. He has the seven people of his own family to get on the ark. That is not God’s fault. Would God wipe out the whole world? He waited 120 years preaching coming judgment, the need for righteousness. So that is the character of God
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An interesting statement back here and then we are going to come back to the Old Testament. Back in 2 Peter chapter 3, verse 9. You know and remember it when you share the Gospel with people. You talk about sin, you talk about hell. They say, “I don’t think God would do that.” You can honestly say, “God doesn’t want to do that. That is why He is giving you the opportunity to hear what He has done for you so you don’t have to experience that.” So it is not that God is up there wringing His hands. I just can’t you know, I am looking forward to this because verse 9 says, “God is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.” People don’t perish because that is God’s desire. They perish because they desire to continue in sin and rebel against God.

Now God is not obligated to intervene to save them but He has made provision and calls them to repentance. So when you are talking to someone and you shouldn’t avoid sin and the coming penalty of sin. The beautiful thing is this is the time when God is withholding judgment because He doesn’t want you to perish. That is Scriptural. “He is not wishing for any to perish.”
Sometimes we as believers get on this and say, “Well I don’t want to tell them God doesn’t want them to perish because He does want them to perish.” Both are true. He does desire and intend to bring His wrath on the unredeemed but His desire is for all to turn to Him. Note He says, “Not wishing for any to perish but all to come to repentance.” So it is Biblical to tell them, “God does not desire for you to perish” “Well then why would He send me to hell?” “Because you won’t accept the free gift He offers you of the forgiveness and the life. Now what is He going to do with you? You persist in rebelling and rejecting and said ‘I don’t want His forgiveness.’ What is He to do?”

I want to look at a few passages that show the consistency of this emphasis. Come back to Ezekiel. It starts in the Old Testament and just a limited number here but it gives the point. Ezekiel 18 is where we are going. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and then Daniel, those large prophetic books right there in the middle portion of your Bible. Ezekiel 18, look at verse 23: “Do I have any pleasure in the death of the wicked” declares the Lord God. “Rather then that he should turn from his ways and live.” The pleasure that I would have is not in bringing judgment on the wicked but that the wicked would turn and experience the life that God brings.

Come down to verse 32: “For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone who dies declares the Lord God. Therefore repent and live.” You see the responsibility is placed on the sinner. It is not God’s fault that people are going to hell. He didn’t make them sin but in His grace He has made a provision so they can escape the just penalty for their sin.

Come over to Ezekiel 33, verse 11 and this is in the context of verse 7, a reminder to us. It is addressed to Ezekiel but it would be an analogy for us. “But as for you son of man I have appointed you a watchmen for the house of Israel so you will hear a message from My mouth and give them a warning from Me. When I say to the wicked, ‘O wicked man, you will surely die’ and you do not speak to warn the wicked from his way, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity.” He is accountable for his sin but “his blood I will require from your hand.” You are accountable for not telling him and God holds us accountable for that.

So this is a day when God is withholding judgment on the wicked because He is long-suffering. He doesn’t want them to perish. He’s entrusted us with the message to tell them that judgment is coming. This is a time when you can believe and escape the coming judgment.

Verse 9: “But if you on your part warn a wicked man to turn from his way and he does not turn from his way he will die in his iniquity but you have delivered your life.” You see the accountability comes with me fulfilling my responsibility. It is not the result from the perspective of the results, Noah was a failure. He preached for 120 years and didn’t get any converts. He just got the seven members of his own family but he was a quote, “success.” He fulfilled his responsibility. He was a preacher of righteousness.

So verse 11: “Say to them, ‘as I live’ declares the Lord God, ‘I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked but rather that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back. Why will you die?’” That is what we go tell them. “Turn back. Why do you want to go to hell? I am amazed that you would choose hell over heaven.”

We think, well we don’t want to talk about sin we don’t want to talk about hell, that might turn them off. We do because if there is no real seriousness in sin, there is no real hell, what the difference. What am I getting saved from? Well your life will be more fulfilling and satisfying if you trust Christ. Well my life is already fulfilling and satisfying. I am enjoying my life as it is. The real issue that God says is “I don’t want you to perish.” “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son” so you could have a meaningful life. So that everyone who believes in Him would not have to perish. “He that has the Son has life. He that does not have the Son will not see life but the wrath of God abides on him.” You don’t want to hold back. You get the sense of the urgency from God here. “Turn back, turn back. Why will you die?” Well, this is serious. This is what we come to tell people. This is the message entrusted to us that God will hold accountable. I withheld my wrath. I was patient and long-suffering. I made a provision for your salvation for their salvation. I didn’t desire them to die and you never told them. We will be accountable won’t we? We are entrusted with the message.

By God’s grace someone brought the message to us. You realize you would be just as lost as the most lost if it hadn’t been the grace of God in bringing you the message of salvation as someone in some way brought it to you. That’s the condition we are in. So this is not a time for us to be discouraged and the world is getting worse and I don’t know what is going to happen if this person gets to be the president or this person. What are we going to do with the Supreme Court? You know what the bottom line message for us is? This is a great day. God is withholding judgment for another day. It is a day of salvation. It is a day of opportunity for men, women, young people to escape coming wrath. God doesn’t want them to perish. God doesn’t want you to perish. Make it personal. I realize God didn’t want me to perish. He made a provision for me to escape coming judgment and it is the same provision you can take. It doesn’t cost you anything because He paid everything. What a message.

Alright, we are not done looking at the verses. Acts 17, come over to Acts 17 in the New Testament. What is Paul doing? He is acting as God’s spokesman, the same message God gave to Ezekiel. Verse 30: “God having overlooked the times of ignorance God is now declaring to all men that all everywhere should repent.” Why? Here is the reason. “Because He has fixed a day (note that) he has fixed a day.” We are not off schedule. We are not behind schedule. We are not ahead of schedule. “He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.” Now many scoffed at this but some, verse 34, “Believed.” But if Paul hadn’t come and told them that none of them could have believed because “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the message of Christ.” Apart from that there is no salvation. Those that we love so dearly, that we are so concerned about there can be no salvation until they hear. That’s what this time is.

Come over to Romans chapter 2. Look at verse 4, talking about religious people and those who pass judgment on others, he has the Jews in mind here. Their self-righteousness made them think they were better than others. Not sinners like other people. They knew they were sinners. They went through the offering system and all that but it was superficial. They didn’t realize that their condition was so serious they could not work themselves into acceptance before God. So you come down to verse 3: “Do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice these things and do the same, that you will escape the judgment of God? Do you think rightly of the riches of His kindness, tolerance, patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance? But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” That’s it.

Those who are confronted with the message and refuse to believe it, they are storing up wrath. It will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment because they have had greater light as we bring them the Gospel. But we don’t bring them the Gospel with the desire that they reject it. We bring them so that they understand God is rich in kindness in tolerance, in patience. This is so you have opportunity to turn from your sin, place your faith in the Savior that He provided to die in your place. But if you continue to reject them there is an awful destiny ahead of you.

One more passage, I Timothy chapter 2, verse 4, I Timothy chapter 2. You see there is a consistency running. We just sampled the Old Testament, the New Testament. We are to pray for men at all levels of the kings, those in authority and so on. Verse 3: “This is good and acceptable in the sight of God, our Savior.” That’s why He is today. This is the day when God is saving people. “He desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God and one Mediator also between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus who gave Himself as a ransom for all.”

And this is what I was appointed a preacher. That is what I do. I tell people this wonderful truth. Think about it. We have this. We ought to be experts if nothing else. I am not that good at many things but I can do one thing for you. I can tell you how you can escape the wrath of God in hell and experience His forgiveness. We ought to be experts at that. We ought to fix it in our mind. God is going to hold us accountable. Well I never was very good at that, Lord. You better get good at it. Why weren’t you good at it? I tell our children, “Well I am not good at that.” Well you never worked at it.

He has entrusted this truth to you not as a dead end, not well now, oh, I am glad somebody brought the Gospel to me and I believed it. Now I am happy. I will leave it there. No, now I have to tell someone else.

Again the emphasis, here, “He desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” And there is only one way because “there is only one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus. He gave Himself as a ransom for all.” Does the message get any better than that? I can tell you, you are not excluded. You know when Christ died on the cross it was for you. What excuse will you have to reject that? You refuse to place your faith in Him. You will not have that credited to your account. You will stand before God and tell Him, “I said no.” What is God to do with you? So that is the period of time in which we live.

Come back to Peter. “He is not slow about His promises as some count slowness. He is patient.” So we as God’s people don’t get caught up and you know, don’t let this fact escape your notice. We get so ground down in the turmoil of what is going on around us in the world that we lose perspective. It doesn’t matter who gets voted in. It doesn’t matter what the Supreme Court does in the context of what we are talking. What matters most to me is that people have to hear about Jesus Christ. That’s what matters for eternity, right? God will determine. That doesn’t mean you can’t vote. You can’t have an opinion and those things but we get distracted and we act like boy if you tell someone to talk to an unbeliever about the Gospel their mouth becomes cotton balls. To talk about what they think about the presidential race and they are off and running. You can’t shut them up. You can tell this is on their mind. This is, we have the most meaningful presidential race in our history. I will tell you what we have. We have the most important message that will be given in all of eternity. That is what matters. Boy, you realize how important this election is? I can understand. People are really involved in this but you know what? There is something of much greater importance, so important that God says, “You cannot afford to miss it.” Let me tell you what is most important. I don’t want to get caught up I mean we can never talk about anything else but we get good at talking about everything else so don’t let this escape your notice. Time is not grinding on. God is not just delaying things. He has a purpose. This is the time of salvation. This is the day of God’s grace primarily to the Gentiles as Paul wrote to the Romans. “But the day of the Lord will come.” That is looking toward the coming of judgment.

So as we have seen He is patient. He is long-suffering but don’t think this will go on endlessly. The world is ripening for judgment. The world in Noah’s day was ripening for judgment. Everything is on schedule.

You know it takes a while for the crop to get to the place to be harvested. Someone like myself will go out and say “why don’t we just get this harvested now while the weather is good?” It is not ready. It is not ripe for harvesting. That is where the world is. It is not God’s time yet. He has appointed a day for judgment. Everything is moving on. “The day of the Lord will come” and it will catch the world off guard.

We don’t have time now to go into this. It will “come like a thief” and then the destruction and we will talk about the day of the Lord in our next time. So we know judgment is coming. We know God’s timing is right. We are not discouraged that it didn’t come in my parents’ time and if I keep moving, it won’t come in my time, I don’t know. Peter knew it was not coming in his time. It didn’t change anything but the Day of Judgment will come. What do we do? Well this is what God wants today. This is why He is giving time today. That’s why by His grace He didn’t come before you believed? And now He has entrusted us with the message that makes us accountable to share it with others so that they by God’s grace might fulfil the desire that He has for all men not to perish but to have life.

Let’s pray together. Thank You Lord for the riches of Your grace, the wonder of salvation. Lord it is easy for us even as Your children to get sidetracked, to get distracted, to get caught up in things that don’t matter even as Peter is going to tell us. Things of this world are going to be consumed. They are transitory. They are passing. Even our physical life is short. You are a God of patience, giving time. Lord we are testimonies of Your patience. You brought Your salvation to our hearts. Lord we have been entrusted with an awesome responsibility to share the beauty and the simplicity of the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ so that others might hear, be warned of coming wrath, be told of the greatness of your grace. We pray for the week ahead of us Lord that we will be quick and ready to share with others this glorious truth while there is time. Pray for our fellowship now as we enjoy a time of relaxation. Bless the fellowship and our conversation we pray in Christ’s name, amen.