I am so glad Jesus did not return before 1972; that was the year the goodness of the Lord led me to repentance. Some of you could say the same about 1990, or 2000, or maybe someone here or listening online would say that about 2024!

Peter says in his second letter with regard to the second coming of Christ, “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise.” But we could also say, the Lord is not slow. Period. He is never slow, and he is never late. It reminded me of Gandalf’s quip when Frodo said, “You’re late!” Gandalf replied, “A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins. Nor is he early; he arrives precisely when he means to.” God does everything precisely when he means to. But Peter adds that the Lord is not slack or slow in fulfilling his promise, the way we would feel if someone told us they would come and help us or see us or give us something we need. And they don’t come on time or even in the same month they told us they would come. We count slowness in matters of seconds, or at best minutes, don’t we? If we see God as our waiter, then we want that cup of coffee right now, not two minutes from now. We want God to heal us or promote us or help us or bless us right now. And if we think of Jesus’ return in the same way, we may get impatient as we see the evil and corruption of the world increasing at almost the speed of light and we do not understand why God would allow it to continue. Habakkuk wrote about the judgment of God that was coming on Judah and on the Babylonians, but not for many years. God told the prophet, “For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay.

Why has God delayed for more than 2000 years to send the Son of God, the returning King of kings? Is it because he is enjoying storing up wrath for unbelievers? No. It is because of his infinite love for those who will be saved. He is, Peter writes, “patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” Paul wrote the same thing to Timothy, that we should pray for all people, for kings and for all in authority, because God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” The way to understand this is to acknowledge that there are three ways God wills something.

The first is by sovereign decree. He spoke the universe into existence by decree. What he willed by sovereign decree came into being without fail. The second is the will of his commands for his people. He commands us to have no other Gods before him. He commands us to love our neighbor as ourselves and to forgive others as he has forgiven us. That is his will for us. Will we do that perfectly? No. The third way to speak about God’s will is illustrated in this text from Peter’s letter. R.C. Sproul calls it God’s will of disposition, or, his attitude. He does not delight in the death of the wicked. He said the same to Ezekiel: “Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked, declares the Lord God, and not rather that he should turn from his way and live?”

God certainly does decree the death of the wicked. As Peter wrote, God will rescue the godly and will “keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment.” At the same time, his sovereign will, and the reason he delays the day of Jesus’ return, is that he will not allow any of his elect to perish. Each of them, because of God’s grace, will reach repentance and be saved.

That is cause for great rejoicing.

Are you scoffer? Or are you settled in your faith?

Scoffers will come in, Peter wrote in his second letter, and we need to be ready for that. Why do they scoff at what they don’t understand? Peter tells us, and so does Jude. They scoff because they are “following their own desires,” Peter wrote. Jude said they were “following their own sinful desires.” It has been proven to me over and over since I was a young Christian. I would hear that someone had left the church and was telling people that, “You know, I don’t really believe that stuff is true anymore.” I would eventually hear that their disbelief really had nothing to do with why they left the church and walked away from the faith. It was because they had given themselves to sinful patterns of behavior that they simply did not want to give up. Peter said it, plainly: scoffers scoff because they are following their own desires. A young man may claim to have decided that he doesn’t believe anymore what the Bible teaches about sexual purity. But his sinful choices preceded his “decision” about the truth of God’s word. Again, scoffers scoff because they are following their own desires.

Peter wrote that some of the scoffers also reject the truth about God’s judgment with this argument: “Where is he? He’s not coming! I mean, look around. Ever since the beginning of this faith you people believe in, everything is continuing just like it always has!” Some would say to us that they don’t believe there is any point to anything we do as Christians. Why try to be good when you can just do what you want and be happy? The scoffers sometimes put stupid bumper stickers on their cars that say, “Jesus is coming back! Look busy.” They reject his grace. They mock his authority.

Peter answered the scoffers’ objections who say, “Where is the promise of his coming?” You can read it in his letter. But let me remind you of what 2 angels and what Jesus himself said about the return of the Lord. 40 days after the resurrection, the disciples stood and watched Jesus ascend into heaven. They needed assurance because they did not have the Spirit of God living in them yet. So two angels appeared and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” Translation: the risen Savior will return in glory.

But go back more than a month, before the crucifixion of the Son of God. Jesus said this to his disciples in the upper room on the night he would be betrayed, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.” Translation: the risen Savior is coming back for all who belong to Him by grace and through faith.

That’s all I need to hear. That’s all my mom needed to hear in November of 2021, when she knew she was dying. She said to me, her smile twisted by a stroke, “It’s ok, Mark. I’m going home.”

Lord, come quickly! I want to see my mom again. But even more than that, I want to see you.

In Peter’s second letter, he spends a whole chapter on the subject of the dangers of false teachers in the church. And he is mostly referring to false teachers who may claim to know Jesus but they in fact had false conversions. It is true that there are men and women in the church who are truly born again and then drift away from sound doctrine. They are enticed by the enemy and their own fleshly desires and begin to believe and even to teach unsound doctrine. Some of them grow huge churches and at the same time that they are preaching Christ crucified, they are also serving up deadly works-righteousness in their weekly sermons or even promoting sensuality of some form or another. They may be misguided believers but we must certainly judge their wrong teaching and hold it up to the Word of God as the good Bereans did. As Luke records in Acts 17, the believers in Berea examined the Scriptures daily to see if what Paul and Silas was teaching them was the truth!

But let’s be clear. Peter is not talking about those guys in his second letter, not the misguided believers. He is talking about false teachers who were never truly born again. They put on the uniform and learn the language but their hearts remain blackened by sin. Jude says, “These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires; they are loud-mouth boasters, showing favoritism to gain advantage.” Peter says these men actually seemed to escape the defilements of the world for a season, because they heard of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. They heard the truth and for a while conformed their lives, in their own strength of will, to what accords with sound doctrine. They cleaned themselves up! It seems. But wait. Can anyone do that? Have you ever heard someone say they can’t come to Christ right now, not until I get myself cleaned up? And you say to them, what? Don’t kid yourself, man! Jesus catches his fish and Jesus alone can clean them. How do we know these false teachers were also false converts? “They are again entangled in them (the defilements of the world) and overcome (by them), the last state has become worse for them than the first.” The disease they were born with, sin, was never actually cured through faith in Jesus, and their defilements, or the pollution of their lives is even worse now than when they were not pretending to be saved. 

Then Peter says something shocking. These false teachers who are false converts would have been better off never knowing the way of righteousness. Or he could have said, “knowing about the way of righteousness.” This is a hard word. One explanation may be this: to hear the truth and ignore it inoculates you against the truth. It is harder for you to even hear it after that. Also, to hear the truth and pretend to embrace it makes you a liar and a deceiver. And in so many cases as we see here, someone who rejects the truth starts a campaign to entice others away from it as well. Paul wrote about that to the church in Galatia: “Yet because of false brothers secretly brought in—who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery—to them we did not yield in submission even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.” 

And that must be our answer to false teachers as well. We do not yield even for a moment. We stand firmly and loudly proclaim the truth of the gospel.

“They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin.” The language Peter uses to describe false teachers is not metaphorical. It is stark, straightforward, and scary. Sexual sin was then and is now a prominent characteristic of false teachers. Along with their boldness and arrogance to believe that they can say and do anything they want, their lust and greed makes them believe they can have anything, or anyone, they want. Perhaps Peter was thinking of Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount, which became a part of the fabric of early church teaching. Words like this had never been heard before and were probably rejected by casual or nominal believers, and certainly by false teachers. What were the words? Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Sexual sin begins with the eyes, and Peter says these men were like predators, looking for the next person to corrupt. And they cannot stop, their lust is insatiable, never satisfied, as they see every woman as a potential adulteress. Who are the ones most likely to fall victim to these predators? Peter says, “They entice unstable souls.” Those who are unsettled, not grounded, and therefore the most vulnerable. It reminds me of how cults grow so often. The charismatic and heretical leader looks for the young and vulnerable, the bruised and unloved, the isolated and alone, and he entices them into the fold with promises that they will be loved and cared for there. Instead, they will be used and discarded.

Another marker for false teachers is greed. Peter says, “they have hearts trained in greed.” He uses a word and a concept that was very familiar in that Greek culture. We Americans didn’t invent gyms and places to work out and train our bodies. The Greeks in Peter’s day and way before that were committed to physical training. Green writes, “There were centers founded for the physical training of young citizens, which then became venues for mental as well as physical education, serving as secondary schools in the community.” We are body, soul, and spirit, and all three must be exercised. Paul recognized this and wrote, “But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.” He saw the connection between discipline of the body and the effectiveness of his ministry to other. He also wrote, “…Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.” There is action required, training that is intentional and committed.

But these false teachers were also committed to training. They actively exercised themselves in cultivating a love for money. They trained their hearts in covetousness and greed, yearning for more, filled with envy of those who have what they want. I was talking with a man this week about the power of addiction, as he volunteers at a ministry to those who are addicted to drugs. We have all seen it or read about it. An addict is constantly thinking about his next fix, and his mind and body are both tormented until that fix is found. His master is his drug. But the drug that gives him temporary pleasure brings long-term pain and destruction right along with it. It is the same for the man or woman who is never satisfied with what they have but are consumed with lust for more. Their master is money. And it consumes their very soul. Again, Paul warns us, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.” Those who find themselves spending most of their time thinking about money are on dangerous ground.

Peter said, “there will be false teachers.” And there are. The Bible gives us markers to look for, and warnings for our own souls as well.

I love the story Luke tells of the two men, Cleopas and another unnamed disciple of Jesus, walking from Jerusalem to Emmaus, discussing the events that they have just witnessed. And while they talk and reason with one another about these things, Jesus walks up beside them and asks them a question. Why didn’t they recognize Jesus? We don’t know, but the simple answer may be that God prevented them from recognizing Jesus. Isn’t that the case with many whom we talk to about the Lord? We have the Spirit of Christ but they cannot recognize him. Their hearts are hardened or broken over the circumstances of their lives or it is simply not the right time yet. 

Jesus asks them a question, as he has done so many times in his ministry. You know, Jesus never asked a question because he lacked knowledge, but in order to peel open hearts, that he might speak into them. (Never underestimate the power of a well-placed question! It will often provide access into a life that nothing else will.) Jesus asked them what they had been talking about as they walked.

We see that God has a sense of humor, when Cleopas responds, “Are you the only one in Jerusalem who does not know what just happened there?” I can imagine Jesus stifling a grin because he is the only one in the city who DOES know what just happened. Saints, we can come to the Lord sometimes with our prayers and say, “Lord, don’t you see? Don’t you know what is going on with me here?” And the truth is, he is the only one who knows what is going on with you. We don’t ever fully know what is going on, even with ourselves. But the Lord does, and cares.

Jesus says, “What things?” Never underestimate the power of an open-ended question.

Cleopas and the other disciple of Jesus respond with a word that reveals dashed hopes. They say that Jesus of Nazareth has been crucified, and then they reveal their hearts: “But we had hoped that he  was the one to redeem Israel.” Two things about their response: first, they had misplaced hope. Their hope was for a Messiah who would come as a victorious champion and conquer Rome and deliver Israel from bondage. They did not understand the truth, that God had always told his people that the One who came to deliver them would have to do it through his own death. That the path to glory went through suffering. They have ignored the bloodiness of Isaiah 53:5, “But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.” Instead they have gone right to Isaiah 61: 1-2 “…he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord‘s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God…”

Second, it was hope that had been buried with Jesus. We had hoped, they said. In other words, we don’t hope any more. We were hoping, but all hope is now lost. Jesus of Nazareth is dead. In fact, he was put in a tomb. That’s where you put dead people. That’s why the women went there today, to see the body, but when they got there to see the dead body, the dead body wasn’t there. He was crucified and buried, but now he is gone. An angel said he was alive, but they didn’t see him. They just know his dead body wasn’t there. You get the point, right? They were sure that Jesus was dead.

It was when he was breaking the bread and blessing it that these two finally saw Jesus. I love the way Luke says it: “And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him.” Was it that they saw the nail prints in his hands as he was breaking the bread? Or was it the way he broke the bread that reminded them of times when Jesus broke bread and fed five thousand in the wilderness? Or was it the way he spoke to the Father as he blessed the bread that reminded them of the way they had heard Jesus talk to the Father before? The truth is, we don’t know, but what a difference was made in the hearts and the lives and the attitudes of these two men!

When Jesus opens our eyes to the truth of who he is in every situation, the situation itself may not change at all, but we do. And if we have believed a lie and then Jesus opens our eyes to the truth, it is resurrection day all over again. 

The men knew they had to go find the other disciples and tell them all they had just seen and heard. Night is approaching, they have just walked seven miles, but neither of those facts deter them now. They rose up that very hour and returned to Jerusalem. How many want to wager that they ran a little, if not the whole way back? Truth sets us free. Free to run. Free to live without fear and guilt and shame. 

Jesus Christ is risen in our hearts. Jesus Christ is risen from the dead.

I attended a panel discussion several years back that was advertised with the title, “Good without God.” Knowing that one of the largest growing groups in the country is the “nones,” those who answer surveys that ask for a religious affiliation that they have none, I wanted to hear what five from academia would say about their own spiritual journeys. I also was intrigued by the idea that there are those who have spent part of their lives seeking to disprove or at least to dismiss the “God idea,” as one of them described what many of you and I embrace.

Let me first say that I respect the panelists and their courage to speak out about what they believe, or don’t believe. I also thank God that we live in a country where that is still permitted. Like the founders, I believe that one of the truths that is self-evident is that human rights come from our Creator, not from government or any other institution of man. May God help us when those rights come under attack.

Second, I was also intrigued by any idea that good can exist outside of God, or that we can call something good or bad without appealing to an objective standard of morality.  If we do not have an objective moral standard, then how do we determine whether Samaritans Purse is good or the Third Reich was bad? If we do not have an objective moral standard, how can we ask others to believe that our beliefs are good? If we don’t have an objective moral standard, and don’t care if anyone else on the planet believes the way we do, then of what value is our belief?

Third, the elephant in the room that evening was Jesus. His name never came up, and yet Jesus is the only founder of a “world religion” who claimed to be God. Buddha, Confucius, Zoroaster, and Muhammad came not claiming to be God but to be a way to God. Jesus alone said, “Truly, truly I say to you, before Abraham was, I am.” One of the panelist said that the whole “God idea” only dates back to Abraham, but that people were good for tens of thousands of years without God. Really? Tell that to the people who lived and died in Noah’s day. God destroyed the earth with a flood because he saw the “the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” Laying aside the argument over creation or Noah and the flood, Jesus plainly says he existed before Abraham, even though when he made this claim, Jesus was only 33 years old. 

The problem with Christianity has never been Jesus, but it has always been us. We Christians sometimes give it a bad name because of our pride, our prejudice, or our ignorance. But make no mistake. It is to Jesus we must look to validate Christianity. If Jesus is found to be a fraud, or a lunatic, or self-deceived,  Christianity crumbles. If Jesus did not rise from the dead after three days in a tomb, then all we who put our hope in him are fools at best.

So, here is the challenge. If you would see yourself with feet firmly planted with the nones, would you at least be willing to attack the resurrection of Jesus with every molecule in your body? Do what Lord George Lyttleton, Frank Morison, C.S. Lewis, Josh McDowell, Lee Strobel, and many others have done.  Each of these former atheists were scholars, college professor, journalists, or members of Parliament. Each of them sought to disprove the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Each of them came to believe in Jesus after carefully examining the evidence with a desire to know the truth. Be careful. The elephant in the room loves when people seek the truth.

It is an amazing thing to me that 30 years after Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus, he expresses the cry of his heart in a letter to one of the churches he planted: “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death.” What does that statement by Paul teach us about Christ, except that yes, we are able to know him! Even as a 15-year-old, this verse captured me the first time I read it. Maybe I saw then with immature faith that this was the greatest cry of Paul’s heart. He had forsaken the pursuit of fame and fortune as a Pharisee and had given himself fully to the pursuit of Christ. Could there be anybody in the first century who knew Christ better than Paul? And yet, here is Paul crying out from a Roman prison that more than anything, he wanted to know the Lord.

It has been a 51-year pursuit for me, longer for some of you, shorter for others. I know that I will finally fully know Jesus when I meet him face to face, but I want to know him on this side of heaven. I want to grow more like him. The big theological term that describes what I desire more of, is sanctification.

Sanctification is the process by which we grow in our relationship with Jesus. It is progressive and continuous until the day we die. And though God takes the initiative, sanctification requires our participation. Therefore, it looks different in different people because of the amount of participation by the individual. The disobedient Christian grows much more slowly than the obedient one. You know this is a law of physics: Speed x Time = Distance. If you drive at 60mph for one hour, you will have driven 60 miles. It is also a spiritual law. Persistent obedience over time leads to maturity. Sanctification happens as we take a “long walk of obedience” with the Lord, cooperating with the Spirit of God in the plan He has chosen for us.

How do we do it, then? How do we grow in our relationship with the Lord, to truly get to know Jesus? Let’s acknowledge that part of our growth comes from just doing the work: reading and studying the Bible, learning to pray, obeying the main things and the plain things of Scripture. But our spiritual maturity is also affected by our relationships. If we spend time with people who know Jesus better than we do, we will likely grow in our relationship with Jesus ourselves.

Ask yourself this question: “Who knows Jesus better than I do that I am close to?” I am fortunate to live with someone who knows Jesus better than I, my wife! She is not only my best friend and closest companion, she has been my example and teacher in many ways over these 41 years of marriage. I also have friends who are more mature than I in their relationship with the Lord, and I learn by being with them. I would suggest you ask someone who is close to the Lord to have coffee with you. Ask them how they know him like they do. Listen carefully, and begin to follow their walk, until it becomes your own. Be forewarned that those who draw near to Jesus will be changed. He will ask you to stop some things that are important to you and start others that have been neglected. The long walk of obedience will be worth it.

It has been stated by many that the two greatest proofs for the Christian faith are the resurrection of Christ and the conversion of Saul. You just cannot explain away the resurrection. Millions have tried, and no one has succeeded. You also cannot explain away the absolute about-face in the life of Saul. It is the most famous conversion story in church history, and the Apostle Paul, formerly known as Saul of Tarsus, is the most influential person in church history, with the obvious exception of Jesus.

Saul’s conversion is also the most unique in history. Think about the story in Acts 9 and what happened that day with Saul. What do we know for sure that does not have to happen in order for people to be saved? A blinding light from heaven. Falling on the ground. Hearing your name spoken from heaven, out loud. Having the resurrected Jesus appear to you. Being commissioned as an apostle. Being blinded for three days. Further in the text: scales falling from your eyes when someone sent from God lays hands on you and prays. If that were the litmus test for salvation, or if any of those were required for salvation, I daresay that none of us would be eligible for heaven.

What are the common elements that we all share with Paul in his conversion?

First, you must have had a personal encounter with Jesus Christ. Salvation is not mediated through a priest, or a parent. You may have heard it said that God has no grandchildren, only children.

Second, you have surrendered to him, through repentance and faith, which is a gift of God.

Third, we have received His “summons to serve,” to use John Stott’s phrase. No one who is saved is merely an acquaintance of Jesus. “Jesus? Oh, yes, I know Him. I mean, I met Him once. Wonderful man. Great words. Love that Sermon on the Mount!”

No! Rather it’s like, “Jesus? He is my Savior and Lord. He bought me with a price. I loved him because he first loved me. I am his. Wherever he sends, I will go. Whatever he says, I will do.” That was Paul’s heart attitude after his encounter with Jesus.

Why was Saul persecuting the church? Why was he breathing murderous threats? Was it because the church sang awesome songs, listened to interesting talks, and got together to think about how to improve themselves and help others? No. Saul knew the church perhaps better than we do. He knew that if they were right, and that Jesus really was the Messiah and that salvation comes not through works of righteousness but by grace through faith, then his whole life was a pile of rubbish! That’s what he said in Philippians 3. He said that he had more reason before he met Christ to boast in the flesh than any man. But after Jesus confronted him on the road to Damascus, Paul sang a different tune: “Indeed, I count everything as loss because of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him…”

You and I can meet the light of the world anytime, in the Bible. And in the lives of people who truly know him. When we do, then our lives become further proof for the Christian faith.

Some of you have seen this; many probably have not. Finished files are the results of years of scientific study combined with the experience of years. Silently count, just once, the number of times the letter F appears, and write the number down. Got it? How many wrote down 3? 4? 5? 6? There are six. Our eye tends to skip over the “of’s.” This is part of a tract from Ray Comfort’s ministry, and he uses it to make the point that if we are wrong about the number of F’s, it is no big deal. But we cannot afford to be wrong when it comes to knowing the truth about who Jesus is, why he came to the earth, and what God will do about sin with those who do not know Jesus. And most of the world finds it’s faith rooted firmly in what Peter calls “cleverly devised myths.”

Apart from faith in Jesus Christ and belief that the Bible is the Word of God, all that the world is left with to try and understand why we are here are myths. Peter wants his readers to know in his second letter that what he is giving them is the truth, and that he and the other apostles did not come to them with cleverly devised myths. Look at that phrase for a moment. There are so many myths that the world chooses to believe, and they are easy to believe because they are clever. Otherwise they would not gain any traction, at least not for long. But they are devised, which means they are made up by people. If you go to some countries in eastern Europe and ride on a city bus in the heat of summer, as I have, don’t expect the bus to have AC. And don’t expect the windows to be open. You will be crammed together and sweltering in the suffocating heat because the people there believe any kind of manufactured and moving air will make you sick. No window fans, and all windows on cars and buses will stay tightly shut. That’s an irritating myth, but probably not deadly. One that has led to the slaughter of millions is the myth that an embryo is just a blob of tissue. Another that can have deadly consequences is that all religions are the same, just like all roads lead to the top of the mountain.

I used to teach my students about the Law of Noncontradiction in college when I had a full semester and time to develop a short course on logic and reasoning. I would ask them this series of questions: What do Christians believe about Jesus, I asked? (Son of God, Savior) How did he die? (cross) What happened three days later? (resurrected!). Ok, what do Muslims believe about Jesus? (prophet; NOT God’s son). How did he die? (He didn’t. On the day of the crucifixion, another person was miraculously transformed to look like Jesus and took his place). So, according to Islam, Jesus was not God’s Son, did not die on a cross, and was not resurrected. Can both Christianity and Islam be true? No. Do all religions teach what we need to know to be saved? No.

The Greeks and Romans of Paul’s day did not care whether their so-called gods, little g, even existed. They knew they were mythical. But the story of Jesus Christ and his death, burial, and resurrection is not a myth. One of the proofs is that ten of the eleven disciples died martyr’s death because of their faith in Jesus. Only John died of old age. RC Sproul writes, “Peter was not ready to put off his mortal tent for a myth but for that which he had witnessed.”

Jesus and salvation that comes through him alone? Not a myth!