The Believers View of Judgment Day

By Tim Brown Bible Text: Preached on: 2 Peter 3 Sunday, March 6, 1011

Grace Particular Baptist Church 5725 Imperial Lakes Blvd Mulberry, FL 33860 Website: Online Sermons: www.graceparticularbaptist.org www.sermonaudio.com/graceparticular

Let us pray. Gracious heavenly Father, we thank you for this day, Lord, that we can come together and worship in thy name. We pray this day, Lord, that thy peoples hearts will be knitted in love, that we would see the great fellowship of the saints above, that we might know an come into a greater knowledge and understanding of you this day, Lord, that you would take our sight away from this world, form the cares and the concerns of this world, Lord, and that we would come with thy grace and that we would come with thy mercy and lay aside those sins that so easily beset us, that weigh us down, that there, Lord, we may see the blessed fellowship of thy life and thy truth, Lord. We pray, Lord, that thy people would be made sober this hour, that thy people would be made aware and awake unto the comings of thy being, of the comings of thy person, Lord, that we may know you more this day, that we may know you more each hour. We pray, oh Lord, that you would forgive the sins of thy people, that you would speak grace and mercy unto them, free them from their conviction, from their guilt. Pray this day that you would be with me, that you would be up on my lips, upon my heart, upon my mind to bring forth the message in which you have purposed this day, that it would be one that would cause great sobriety of thy people, cause great joy and encouragement to proceed on, to press on to seek you to know you and to look for thy coming day, Lord. We pray, oh Lord, for thy grace and for thy mercy. We ask these things in Jesus name we pray. Amen. We will look today, as the Lord has purposed, in 2 Peter and chapter three. We live in a day and age where it seems that the evil of life and the evil of the times and the days are filled up and to their greatest extent and how easy it is that we would pray and cry out that God would come and judge the world. But here in those persuasions and in that influence the Lord brought me to this passage that I may be founded, that I might be grounded in the purpose and the time of when God shall judge the world. He purposed and grounded in that time that this day is now called today. We are not living in the day where God is past and said this is the day of judgment. We live in the day where this is the day of salvation. This is the gospel day. This is the time and the season where God sends forth his Word, sent it in great abundance throughout all the times and the seasons to pronounce life and salvation in Christ. But we, as we have already been instructed by the pastor many weeks now, we are to be sober.
Page 1 of 16

We can see the times and the seasons. We can hear the instruction of what our Lord Jesus Christ was instructing his disciples to, to know him when it was at hand, knowing when the time in the coming of the Lord was coming forth. Here we have the great difficulty if we come and we try to reason and we try to discern of our own selves of what that day means to the people of God now. Are there signs? Are there wonders? Are there manifestations that give us sight into that moment, into that hour? This was the same thing that afflicted the Church and troubled and had the Church question and understand that the apostle Peter thought it was necessary to encourage, thought it was necessary to encourage the Church of God to have the proper sight of the day of when it is that God would come, when Christ would come. Here in 2 Peter and chapter three Peter writes: This second epistle, beloved, I know write unto you.1 It seems very strange that it would come at this point of the epistle. This epistle that he had writtenhe had written a first as we have studiedthis second one that he is writing he warns them of false teachers, false preachers, those who would come and trouble the Church. And now he says unto them, This second epistle, this further speaking of in this epistle, I speak to those who are the beloved. That is always key for the people of God to know that the Word of God is directed to the people of God. It is very key to speak in this world this day that the Word of God is spoken to the people of God, not in the generality of humanity, not to the general population of those who dont fear the Lord. But they are spoken to the people of God. We live in a day and age where Christianity has been made to be the savior of the perils of humanity out of their moral discouragement, their moral depressions, their moral brokenness. And there they are called to become a Christian not by repentance, but by their own works, by accepting him. What a great destruction that has done to the preaching of the Word of God and how it would even be that it would take the elect away and deceive the very elect if it wasnt in Gods purpose that the elect would be saved. This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance.2 What a blessed, blessed introduction in this last chapter where the apostle Peter is saying, What I have longed to do and what I pray that this epistle has done unto those that are my beloved is to stir up your pure minds.
1 2

2 Peter 3:1. Ibid. Page 2 of 16

Well, those who are the people of God they would first say, Well, how do I have a pure mind? If I am undone and I am wretched and I am unrighteous, there is no purity in my mind. There is in Christ Jesus. He calls us to stir up in our pure minds by way of remembrance. Be free from the deceptions, from the deceit, from the lies, from the persuasions, from the lust, from all the distortions of truth that exist in this world and to a greater abundance at this day than it ever has before. And the people of God are to put far from them the things in which they are being told are new, but look unto that which is of God, to look unto that which has always been. And so the people of God are told to, Stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance.3 This mind in which the people of God are given I pray that we dont take it for granted. I pray it is something we utilize not under our own power and strength, but in the measure and grace that gives us daily, that there God awakens our minds to know him, to see him, to understand him, to reason the Scriptures not of our own understanding, but in the framework of Gods sovereignty. This world reasons the Scripture by the sovereignty of man and not the sovereignty of God. Therefore they wrestle with the Scriptures. Therefore they cannot understand what the Scriptures say unto them, because they have not the Spirit of God. They have not the Spirit of God that speaketh unto them life dependent strength, all ability, all being, all consisting in Christ Jesus. And so the apostle Peter is speaking unto those that are come into the faith. He speaks unto those who have a great measure of grace of life, but have heard the teachings of the prophets, that have heard the teachings of the Lord Jesus Christ and heard the teachings of the apostle of the coming day of the Lord. And he tells them, That ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets.4 Dont discount them. Dont put them away from you. They ...were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour.5 The prophets and the apostles are in agreement because they are the commandments of the Lord. And so the people of God are not to lose heart. They are not to become discouraged when they see evil about its way in the land. They are not to lose heart and
3 4

Ibid. 2 Peter 3:2. 5 Ibid. Page 3 of 16

faint because that is a sign, that is a time, that is a manifestation of the day of Gods judgment is when men begin to faint and fall away, not when men are encouraged that there is peace in the land, not when men are encouraged that all is well, but where they see the destruction of God at hand. But there that is not even the time in which God comes. That is the time that precedes that day. That is the time that precedes that day because when it is that men become faint and they start to fall away, then there becomes the preaching and the teaching that all is well. All is at peace. All is merry. Drink and be merry. Enjoy your life. Be intoxicated with the pleasures of this world. And then in that moment is when the Son of Man comes. It happened in the day of Noah. It happened in the day of Jerusalem. And I would have to suspect it will happen in the same hour for the people of God that remain. Those when the world is about their joviality and the enjoyments of their life, not sensing, not understanding the destruction of God is the day that Christ shall come. All of that reasoning we could focus on. All of that reasoning we could find hope and encouragement on. But the apostle Peter doesnt take us there. He takes us to understanding the reasons why Gods time for judgment hasnt come. Because this is the time, this is the hour where the people of God should manifest upon Gods longsuffering, upon Gods time where it is that he waits. He doesnt wait in a delay because he doesnt know the hour and the seasons and the purpose. But he waits out of the great abundance of his love to testify to this world how much he loves his people. And so that which it is that you are to stir up the pure minds, get rid of the old philosophies, get rid of all the new teachings, the new instructions, that which your flesh has been exercised in constantly, seeing dependence upon wealth, seeing a dependence upon your own abilities, seeing your dependence upon your own ways to cry out to God to get to God. But you are to stir up in your pure minds that everything subsists in Christ. And, ...by way of remembrance: [we are to] be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets.6 Go to the Psalms, that which the apostle Peter is about to speak of, of how the world was formed and how it was shaped, by how it was fitted for destruction in its very initial parts of creation. The world is now fitted for judgment and destruction in creation. The apostle Peter speaks it very loudly and clearly. The Holy Spirit speaks this by this hand of Peter. And he says, Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts.7
6 7

2 Peter 3:1-2. 2 Peter 3:3. Page 4 of 16

That is where the apostle Peter begins. He says, Here is why you have to be mindful. Here is the reason why I pray this stirs you up to pure minds, that you put into remembrance the teachings of the prophets and the commandments of the apostles of the Lord and Savior. They are the only ones that the people of God should hear because they are Christ speaking. We should only hear the voice of the Son of God. As God has certainly pointed out to me over this last year, the only way God speaks now is by his Son, no other way. He has spoken in these last days, in these last ages by his Son. He will not speak by any other course, by any other way. And those who would proclaim the name of Christ and preach the gospel of Christ, they dont speak of themselves. They speak of the Lord Jesus Christ who rejected, put it far from you. But, Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts.8 Many times I will hear the religionists of the day, the Christians of the day more and more nowadays they speak of grace. They speak about it continuously. They speak about attaining and living and walking and dwelling in the ways of grace, being free in grace. And I sit there among myself and I have to ask God. I say, Are you bringing these people into the truth? But then I look at how they worship. What is the foundation of their worship? They are not opening up the Word of God and preaching and hearing the teachings of God. They are singing in repetition songs, little Scriptures that they pull out and put their own reasoning on. And they sing them in great pleasures of their own lusts because it satisfies their flesh. The ways of their worship is what promotes their worship, not God. The ways in which they worship and they say Gods name and they even say Christs name and they will even stand in rejection to those who dont name the name of Christ. But in their worship and their ways to go about and establish their own righteousness, they walk after their own lusts. Jesus is the Savior of his people, but not the way in which the religionists teach it in this day. They are scoffing at the sovereignty and the design and the purpose of Gods salvation unto his people. We look and we see the deterioration here in the United States, a people that in the beginning looked unto Gods sovereignty. But the point of revolution and which took place in this land, they saw it within the design of Gods providence.
8

Ibid. Page 5 of 16

We dont hear that throughout this world this day. We see revolution, but we dont hear the pronouncement that this is within the sovereignty and the providence of God. The instruction of the people of God is to seek his sovereignty, to be aware of those who scoff at the truth, to be aware of those who would scoff at the teachings of the Word of God. And in this time of the apostle Peter what it is they were scoffing at was the preaching of the coming of the day of the Lord. We have those in this day and age that are of the Christian persuasion that say they are Christians. They believe the day of the Lord is at hand. They are pronouncing it and proclaiming it, television station after television station. They are pronouncing that this is the day that we have been waiting. But how have they distorted the coming day of the Lord? That there is going to be an Armageddon, that there is going to be a rapture where God will bring in the end of the world, put his people up there so this world can remain of another 1000 years. When it is that when Gods judgment comes it comes immediately and it is final. So the people of God are to clear all the corruptions of their minds, stir up those pure minds to what the Word of God says, because those who come about those reasonings and religion, they dont come without Scripture. They come with the Scriptures to testify, to promote what it is that they assert, but not the fullness of the Scripture, not the fullness of Gods sovereignty, not the fullness of the position that all things are consistent in Christ Jesus. Those we are to mark. Those we are to know and those we are to put away. We come into a time where the elect of God must be very sober and awake to the dangers that are laid, that those who would name themselves as Christian will purport that which is truth and use the Scripture. If you are not schooled in the Scriptures, if you are not exercised in the free grace of God daily, oh, how it is that you leave your own selves unto your own preservation. You leave unto your own selves the ability to preserve yourselves and not being deceived and not seeing that it is the life of God that keeps you. It is the exercise of the life of God in you that testifies to you that you have fellowship with God, that you have fellowship with Christ. I think I have to agree in what Owen says in how Christ comes. He comes first in redemption. He comes next in vocation. And he comes lastly in judgment. That is the way the people of God understand and come to a knowledge of Christ in greater measure now of that which awaits them by stirring up into remembrance all that Christ has said, stirring up in remembrance all that the prophets have said, stirring up in remembrance all that the apostles have said of what our estate is in Christ Jesus, how we are made free,
Page 6 of 16

how by the grace of God we have been delivered from sin. We are no longer in bondage to sin. And then the instruction of why it is that you would continue in that bondage. Know ye not that ye who yield your members to you are servants to. But more importantly there is a day when the people of God shall rise. There is a day when the people of God shall be brought into glory. There is a day when the people of God shall come into their perfect rest that that which they believe in, that which they are exercised in in the rest and the sabbath of Christ they will live and dwell in it in that day of glory. This the apostle Paul and all the apostles taught. This is what they scoffed at. This is what they were scoffing at. And so he says those that are scoffing and walking after their own lusts and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.9 They look around. They see, dont we have a land? Dont we have people? Dont we have nations? Dont we have sky? Dont we have water? Do we not see the world as it always has been? And what the apostle Peter is going to teach here is a great thing that the people of God should be very mindful of. As the world was from the beginning, God has destroyed and recreated. And there as he has recreated, he will do it again. That he is not speaking it out of nothing, he is transforming it. He transformed it after the flood. He will transform it once again in the fiery judgment, but not made of this world, not made of the substances of this world, but perfectly in eternity. So he says they that speak, they speak against the promise of his coming. For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.10 Oh, that is the instrument in which God allows man to remain in their reason so they cant see this truth. They become hardened to his truth. That is what science and most of its inventions and imaginations are this day. To declare that they know how the world was created millions and millions of years ago. They cant date it to the proper dates in which the Word of God testifies because they dont believe in Gods sovereignty. They dont believe in Gods sovereignty. They try to define and recreate life. Bu they never will be able to because this is reserved unto God. And they say, For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water.11
9 10

2 Peter 3:4. Ibid. Page 7 of 16

Who he is speaking about are not the philosophers of the day. He is speaking about the false teachers and the false preachers of the day, that there they speak of how things always were they are now when God has left a declaration in his creation. Those who dont obey him, those who dont fear him, he will judge and he will destroy them to the uttermost. And the creation, when it was founded, it was set upon the water and the water was above it. This is what the apostle Peter is teaching them, that if they would read the Old Testament and read the Psalms, read the prophecies, they remain ignorant of it even though they have been schooled in it. And, For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water.12 We know when the flood took place it didnt just come from above. It came from below and above and engulfed the whole creation. This they are ignorant of willingly. They throw it aside. That is why preachers this day dont preach repent. They dont preach the effects of sin because they are ignorant of Gods destruction. They are ignorant of Gods righteousness and judgment, willingly, willingly. And he says, Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished.13 Stirred up, stir up in these pure minds not through the corruption of this world and understand and acknowledge what God did with his creation. He founded it upon his Word. He created it. He brought the land to be sustained by the waters to hold it up, to keep it informed, to keep it in shape, that is where the Spirit of God moved across, across that deep. Why? To reserve it for that day of destruction, the day where the earth would be overflowed with water and perish. But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.14 This is what the people of God should be pronouncing to this world. Can you not look throughout all the creation? We dont see the floods of water from underneath. We see the fires underneath. But we see volcanoes erupting. We see cauldrons out and national parks and all around us. And how do the false teachers look at it? Nuclear warheads that is going to consume and wipe away the world because they
11 12

2 Peter 3:5. Ibid. 13 2 Peter 3:6. 14 2 Peter 3:7. Page 8 of 16

dont see the sovereignty of God. They dont see that there is a world of creation that has been transformed from its old position to its new, that in the end it will be engulfed by fire. We have remnants of water throughout all the earth in the land that speak and testify to Gods destruction of it by water. But now we even know that man in their understanding of science knows there is a core of fire at the earth, that you will be burned up. And they dont understand there is a core of fire sitting above them as well waiting to unroll the scroll, waiting to dissolve this earth and all the elements of his fire. And all the people of God they sit and they say an hearty amen and they long, Oh, Lord, when shall you judge thy people? When shall you judge the nations? When shall you bring all the nations to fear before you? Well, the apostle Peter is dealing with this. He is dealing with this in great detail. But he appeals unto those with a purity of mind. He appeals unto those who think back unto the Scripture as that which I was saying and the Spirit was moving me to speak. I believe the Spirit probably moved unto you those Scriptures that were being spoken of, speaking about taking into remembrance how God created the earth, taking into remembrance how God destroyed the earth, but saved his remnant, testified of salvation. But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word [by the same sovereignty commandment, by the same sovereign purpose, the sovereign design, they] are kept in store, [they are] reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.15 Encourage the people of God. It is not for your end. It is for the destruction of the ungodly men. What this says unto the ungodly men is they are going to be burned up first materially in the substance of creation. And that fire will not end because then they are going to come back, stand before the judgment seat of God and burn in the eternal fires of hell. As the earth burning and all of its materials and substance will be cast into the lake of fire, into the torments of Gods righteousness. With the terror of the Lord do we persuade men. But even that terror wont awaken them. Even that discussion of destruction will not awake men to come unto the true and living Lord. For there the people of God know that we are made beloved and acceptable in Christ Jesus. Not in anything that we have done, not any works of ours that we can boast, but by his grace. And so there Peter says, But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.16

15 16

Ibid. 2 Peter 3:8. Page 9 of 16

Though you may not see it in your lifetime, though many have not seen it in their lifetime, they are not to believe that God will not do what he has purposed. They are not to believe that God is delaying or you will be as those virgins who have no oil in their lamp. They profess the name of Christ, but they have not his grace. They have not his Spirit. They have not the Spirit manifesting itself by their willingness to watch and wait, to be in labors of his love, to meet Christ now in this earth as we labor in obedience, to meet Christ here in this earth as we study to show ourselves approved and not sit complacently by in the sleeplessness and the intoxication of this world. In this country that is easier for the people of God to become intoxicated and inebriated with all of the pleasures of this world because there we testify as many so often do in this country of the freedom and the liberty they have. But, oh, if we were brought into a society of bondage as many of these Christians were, where is our liberty to be found? The same place it is to be even when we believe ourselves to be free naturally. Our liberty is always to be found in Christ. And the bondage of dictator governments or an oppressive governments through moral philosophies of democracy. The people of God are not to turn their attention to those days. They are to turn their attentions to their freedom and their liberty in Christ. So the apostle Peter says, Be not ignorant of this one thing.17 Dont measure God upon the same measurement of life that you put, because when God acts there is no measurement of time in his person. There is no measurement of time in the being of God. Gods sovereign decree comes. It may seem as eternity to us, but it has no time position with God. God brings it about in time. So the people of God must understand. Then why is it that it seems it is 1000 years to us? It seems so long. This is what the apostle Peter is telling the people of God to focus on. Dont focus on simply the destruction that is coming. Dont simply focus on, boy, I cant wait until the heathen get theirs. But understand what God is testifying form heaven to this time that seems like an eternity of season for us here on this earth. He says, The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness.18 That is why we get those wonderful sayings, God helps those who help themselves, that the old man sitting up there, is he asleep? Is he awake? Because they dont understand the sovereign position of God and they certainly dont see what is about to be shown here by the apostle Peter.

17 18

1 Peter 3:8. 2 Peter 3:9. Page 10 of 16

The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward,19 to those who are his people. And the direction and the influence and the persuasions of all his time and his creation has been moving to the purpose and the goodness of his people. So be very carefuland the preacher here this day includedwhen we mock and we scoff and we speak against the powers and the events that are taking place in this time that the people of God are to be concerned with. They are to be sober to them. But they are not to be concerned and influenced by them and intoxicated with them. Not even with that president that seems to be against us. But so what? God is for us if we be his people, if we be his people. And even that one that seems on the face to be against us, God has made him for us. All the proclamations and the declarations that come out of all the governments across the land will work to the good of Gods people. Do you believe it? Do you stir that up in a pure mind? Do you take heart and bring that into remembrance not of your own ability, but in the dependence of the grace of God and his Spirit? So, The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.20 The desire of God to those us-ward, to those in which the apostle Peter addressed, the beloved, is that not one of them should perish. It is consistent. It is in perfect agreement with the Word of Christ of why he came, of how the people of God should be kept. So as we live in this world and we call for the destruction and the judgment of it, we should be calling for the salvation of his people perfectly, because until that day comes, destruction will not come. And there may be passing off of the scene of this country and that country. There may be a passing off the scene of a form of government in the country that you live. But the people of Gods sight is to be upon the salvation of Christ and Christ alone, not perfect salvation alone for just you, because it is not perfect salvation if it is not in the full embodiment of his Church. And so the apostle Peter says unto them that this time it seems like a season and if it seemed like a season that was long for them, what must it feel like to the people of God today? That here in the Word that has been preached to the Puritans, to the Pilgrims, to the believing Americans, to all the foreign nationals across the land that the truth has been spoken, the promises, that hope in which you have in those promises. They dont make ashamed. They will not make ashamed.

19 20

Ibid. Ibid. Page 11 of 16

And how easy it is for us to faint and to give up and to stop running the race because we believe that the promises of God are failing, because there we havent exercised ourselves in the faith of knowing Christ. There we have not exercised and labored constantly and consistently with learning Christ and his Spirit and his grace and his life. There we filled up our lives and we made provisions for our flesh by filling our pleasures up, becoming intoxicated with this world. As a man in this life becomes intoxicated with alcohol, they lose all sense. They lose all control of their faculties. Well, the people of God it is no different when you do the same with this world. That mind in which the apostle Peter is constantly calling for them to stir up is not under the intoxication of the world. It is being free and absent from this world, from tasting it no longer, but tasting of the labors and the sufferings and the persecutions of Christ if it must be. So there as we look at these days it does seem judgment may be at hand. The more what the people of God should see as their salvation is drawing nigh. Their salvation is not just drawing nigh for themselves, but drawing nigh unto a child of God that is yet to be regenerated, yet to come to life. Because in the season and the moment when it is that Gods operation of grace has worked in them that they can have faith, that they can come and be called out of the darkness of this world. God has purposed in time that all creation should move to testify of his salvation to his people. That is what it means his long suffering to us-ward.21 He will take whatever moment of time, whatever length of season to save his people to the uttermost. Let us be encouraged to that end because vengeance isnt ours. It is Gods. We are to give way and give place to the vengeance of God. How? By leaving it unto his sovereign hands, because today is that day in which the apostle Paul spoke of. Today this is the day of salvation. This is the day where if Gods judgment is not come then all his people are not gathered in. If his final judgment has not come, then all of Israel has not come in. This is what this testifies to us. And there he says, But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night.22 We have heard this terminology. Even many theologians have tried to think of what is the word night, that night meaning when Christ will come is not in the enlightenment of the age, but in the darkness of the age. Whether that be the case I leave that unto God. But certainly in the purpose here that when he comes we wont know it. Even Christ himself said that the Son of Man knoweth not the day, meaning that Christ perfectly in his humanity was not given to know the day, but as God he most assuredly did. But as the representation of man, of the first fruits of the first born of the people of God, that day was not to be known, because the people of God were to be endured and kept by faith in
21 22

Ibid. 2 Peter 3:10. Page 12 of 16

the life of Christ Jesus. They were there to remain where others would fall away. They were there to remain where others would go [?] and leave and make the grace and the life and the righteousness of God into lasciviousness. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.23 It is going to take an invention of man to destroy this world again. It didnt take an invention of man in the beginning to destroy this world. Man could never envision, could never create the judgment in which God has restored, has stored for this earth. But, oh, greater than that no man could ever invent or imagine the great salvation that he has for his people. We are given great glimpses of it. We are given great sights of it here upon this earth to encourage us as we labor, not to give up, not to stop running. But when that day comes, the heavens shall pass away with a great noise,24 the created heavens. It will be known. No man will be able to reject what is taking place. And the elements shall melt with fervent heat.25 So that tells me that if man is out there proclaiming that the day of the Lord is at hand, then it is not the day of the Lord because in the frivolity of their life is when God will come. When they believe it is safe and all things are kept, then Christ will come. But those that are in their salvation, their own man made salvation, they may believe they are safe and they are kept. But when the judgment hand of God comes there certainly shall be a great shaking, a great noise. And the elements shall melt with fervent heat.26 All of the substance of creation that you see will melt and pass away in the fervency of Gods stored up heat, fire for this creation. And also, The works that are therein shall be burned up.27 We saw it in the flood. Only that which was purposed to be preserved and kept and reserved for life lived. And that which was purposed and reserved for destruction is destroyed. And it will be no different in the end times, in that end day in that last day that all creation will be burned up and consumed with the fire of God materially and spiritually.
23 24

Ibid. Ibid. 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 Ibid. Page 13 of 16

So, Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversation and godliness?28 Did that not speak to us? Does it not put in the proper position this creation? Are we to worship this creation? Are we to live for this creation? Are we to go about depending upon this creation? If it is that God by his own Word, when that purposed day comes that he will destroy it and he shall dissolve it, we shall look up to God. We, knowing that there is a day of terror and a day of judgment to come, we shouldnt be slack in our duty. We shouldnt be slack in our life of faith. We shouldnt exercise ourselves in the things of this world in a greater extent than we do the things of grace. We should see that the ways and the parables and the teachings of the kingdom heaven teach that the people of God should enjoy the benefits and the wealth of Gods kingdom is to be exercised in it, to walk in it, to habitate in it, not to earn it, but to enjoy that which has been given freely of Gods grace. But when we make provisions for the flesh and we go about living our life after lusts and persuasions and the emotions, we do none of that. We give room for the flesh to grow and for that corrupted nature to stay brute and if need be try to take us away from the life and the fellowship of God. So, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?29 Certainly many have come here and believed this speaks of the destruction of the Jerusalem. Certainly that was a representation of what is coming. But in the discussions of the creation and how the creation will end and how it began, I would have to believe this speaks of this... of the final day. It is an agreement with the apostle Paul as the apostle Peter will say here, how he has spoken in the epistles, how he has spoken in Hebrews, how he has spoken in Corinthians. But, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God,30 is not for the people or God to be asleep. But it is to have those lamps prepared and ready. That which God has given us in the grace, let us exercise ourselves in that grace. Let us add to those, that blessed faith that he has given to us, that which he has instructed in his first epistle. And all those that will hear that instruction, those who truly are the people of God know it is not of themselves to do it of themselves. It is given by the grace of God. But, oh, the people of God, we are not to be lazy and slothful. This day that is coming should stir us up unto that end. There the love of God should stir us up that we may fellowship in his joy.
28 29

2 Peter 3:11. 2 Peter 3:12. 30 Ibid. Page 14 of 16

So, Looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God.31 That is what those virgins who had oil in their lamp were looking for. They were waiting for the day of their bridegroom. And we, as the people of God, that hold forth the profession of our life of faith, if it be not by grace and be not by his Spirit then that day will come as at thief in the night when we are not watching. We wont be watching and when we come to him in that last day, especially those who hold the profession but have no light, have no oil in their lamp, he is going to tell you, Depart from me. I never knew you. Let us not be deceived in this life. Let us with all that is within us love our God, come to our God, pray to our God, obey our God. The people of God that are given into obedience, let it be that we would live in obedience. Let us come quickly. Let us look for him where he can be found. Look for him in his tabernacles. Look for him in his grace. Look for him in the Scriptures. Look for him in our meditations. Look for him in our prayers. And he says, Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.32 We look to live in the place where righteous people are, where our righteous God is. We look to live where sin no longer is. We look to live with a purity of Gods love and being is seen. Not corrupted, not that which is stored up for judgment and that which is stored up for destruction, but we seek to live in a new heaven and a new earth, seeing that day in which Noah saw. That old world that he knew had been destroyed. Now there is a new land. Now there is a new earth. And the people of God that see have been promised there is coming a day of destruction coming. That ark in which Noah fitted together, we know is the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we who are the people of God let us come safely into the ark. Let us come into his life and know that the floods of fire are coming. But there until every last creature, every last spiritual child of God is brought into the ark of life in Christ Jesus the floods will not come. So our sight is not simply unto the destruction and the judgment day, but it is unto the final act of salvation, the final act of salvation where every last child of God has been brought safely in and that are bodies are redeemed to see and live in the new heavens and the new earths in righteousness. I pray this day that the Holy Spirit would encourage you to seek him, to know that the time of Gods season, the hours of the days of his judgment are not yet come because all the people of God are not gathered in. Let that be our focus. Let that be the sobriety in
31 32

Ibid. 2 Peter 3:13. Page 15 of 16

which we live, that God has appointed a day of judgment, but this day is the day of salvation. And when this day passes, then the judgment day will most assuredly come. Dear Lord, we thank thee this day, Lord. We thank you for thy mercy and thy grace. We pray, oh Lord, that you would give us a heart that would not feint, that we would seek you this day for we would rely upon you, that we would live unto you, Lord. Let us be found in diligence. Let us be found in vocation. Let us be found in the work and the labor of love that we may profess our love to you, Lord, because thy love has encompassed us in our life. We pray ,oh Lord, that we would not be entangled with the affairs of this world, but that we would come out of this world, that we would see that thy sovereign hand has appointed all powers in this world and you have fitted this creation for its proper end. There, oh Lord, let us rejoice in the day of thy salvation. Let it be, oh Lord, that we would not hold back our tongue, that there we would not reject thy Word, that we would speak as thou hast purposed us to speak, that we may proclaim thy gospel to those that the gospel is intended to go. We pray, oh Lord, for thy grace and thy mercy to be upon thy flock this day. We ask these things in Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Page 16 of 16