2 Peter 3 – The End of Time: Part 3 — A ‘Time With God’ Audio Devotion

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Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking. I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Saviour through your apostles.

2 Peter 3:1-2

Transcript

Good morning. We’re talking this week about the 3rd chapter of 2 Peter in the Bible, and every day we like to come and look at something in the Bible and say, God, what are you saying to us? What are you saying to me personally through this passage? This week we’re talking about a part of the Bible that talks about the end of time.

When God comes and is going to wind up this broken, fallen universe so full of hatred and injustice and all the things that just grieve us in life, God’s going to wrap it all up. He’s going to come and say it’s closing time, and then He’s going to hold this world accountable for how we’ve responded to Him and how we’ve dealt with the things He left us to do.

Well, yesterday we saw in this chapter that there’s always going to be scoffers who say, well, he’s never coming back. Jesus isn’t going to return. God’s never going to do all those things. Everything just keeps on going just like it always has.

And they’re going to face a surprise when God does wind this all up one day. And Peter says then, starting in verse 8 –

But do not overlook this one fact, beloved. That with the Lord one day is as 1000 years and 1000 years as one day. The Lord is not being slow to fulfil His promise to return as some count slowness. Rather, he is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

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Here’s why God hasn’t wrapped up this world yet. Here’s why things just seem to be keeping on going, and we wonder why does God let all the injustice continue? Why does God let evil people continue to hurt other people? Why doesn’t God just wrap it all up now?

Well, here’s why. Because when that day comes that God wraps it all up, that’s it. There’s no more chances for people to make their life right with God, to turn their life around and say, God, please forgive me. I need what Jesus did for me at the cross to make a way for me to be forgiven. I need that. I want to trust in you, to change my life and make it what you want it to be.

There’ll be no more chance for people to do that. There will only be people’s ultimate accountability to the God who made them and loved them and who they rejected and pushed out of their lives or whom they embraced and put their faith in.

And God wants to give time for more and more people to turn to Him to realise how much He loves them. Have you ever realised that in your life, that God loves you so deeply?

So much so that he’s willing to put up with all this junk that’s going on in the world to give people more time to turn to him and allow him to become the centre of their lives.

The Lord is not slow to fulfil His promise to return as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

So as a Christian when you think about that. Who is there around you who needs to encounter God, who needs to reach repentance? Do you realise that God is waiting before He returns until those people have found Him? That means it’s so important for you as a Christian to just be open about your relationship with God, to share with people who are interested, because they need to encounter God as well.

They need to know his love for them and what a difference he makes in their lives. Don’t hold back. Don’t be embarrassed. Just talk openly about your love for God and what God means to you, and you will be a part of what will bring Jesus back sooner.

I’m John North.

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