As we come near to the end of Peter’s second letter we find that he exhorts the saints to consider God’s intervention in this world, by destroying it, in light of their present life and how that understanding should effect their lives.

Peter has not simply been trying to teach us about eschatology, the study of last things, as though this was some sort of academic exercise in Theology. The Theology he teaches is meant to directly effect our lives to the glory of God.

As I’ve said before, if our Theology is no more than a collection of truths which we can espouse to a dying world, without it effecting our lives, as we show the world these truths with our love and obedience to Christ, then we have a faulty Theological experience.

The truth is meant to set us free, but it’s also meant to demonstrate to the world that they can be set free from the penalty and power of sin as well, as they come to embrace Christ by faith.

And so, as Peter winds things up here in the last few verses of his letter, he wants us to realize that the teachings surrounding God’s judgment of sinners and this world should have a profound effect on our appreciation of the life we’ve been given in Christ as our Lord has taken our judgment for sin and allows us to enjoy fellowship with our God and Creator.

And as this day approaches, where the entire world will come into the presence of God, Peter would show us that since there was a beginning of this world there will also be an end. For many, that end will result in everlasting damnation, separated from God forever. For others, who have trusted in Christ, the end of this world will just be a new beginning with eternal life in the Savior.

And so, we come to our text this morning and consider what Peter has to say as his desire is to help us draw close to Christ as we appreciate the plan of God for this world and for the people in this world.

2PE 3:10 "But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. (Some manuscripts be burned up)
11 Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives
12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat."

This sounds like a pretty radical way to deal with the world; burn it up and start over again. But, as we’ll see it could be no other way. Let’s take the first part of verse 10. "But the day of the Lord will come like a thief."

We’ve heard this expression of "coming like a thief" before, but not as it relates to the destruction of the world. Rather, we saw how it refers to Christ coming secretly for His saints as He snatches His people away to meet Him in the air. We know this as the "rapture" of the church.

We studied the difference between the secret coming of Christ, and His not so secret coming, when He comes back with His saints at the end of the seven year tribulation at Armageddon to set up His kingdom in this world in the city of Jerusalem. At that time everyone will see the coming of the Lord.

And so, when we come to a passage like we have in verse 10 we don’t want to attribute to it something which the rest of the word of God doesn’t teach. Obviously, when it says that the day of the Lord will come like a thief here in verse 10, which suggests a secret time which no one will be aware of and will take everyone by surprise, it is not in connection to the rapture.

We know that the destruction of the world doesn’t take place at the rapture. And so, we must see a broader meaning here in 2Peter in connection to this phrase, "the day of the Lord will come like a thief in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat and it’s works will be burned up, or laid bare."

One thing we must understand is that the day of the Lord always has as its final outcome, judgment. Since the moment that sin entered into this world through Adam and Eve, God has promised that sin and the curse of sin on this world would have to be judged by Him.

He tells us that the wages of sin is death, which necessarily involves a Divine judgment. And all of post-sin human history is moving toward this final time in which all men from all ages will stand before God to be judged forever, concerning their sin.

We know that for the believer, that judgment took place at the cross and we have been forgiven of our sin and stand before the Lord, not guilty, because of the righteousness of Christ put to our account. For the unbeliever, he will stand before God and will have to give an account of himself and make his case before God as to why the Lord should let him into heaven.

To stand before a holy and perfect God and make the case that I didn’t murder anyone, or I didn’t rape anyone, or I didn’t live such a bad life overall, is going to fall woefully short of the standard by which God will judge the sins of unrepentant men.

JAM 2:10 "For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it."

Paul put it this way in GAL 3:10 "All who rely on observing the law are under a curse, for it is written: "Cursed is everyone who does not continue to do everything written in the Book of the Law." (Deut. 27:26)

In other words, if you are going to approach God on the basis of having lived a pretty good life you are basically saying, ‘I have observed your law pretty well’. But, God says, "pretty well" comes nowhere near perfection, which is what God expects if you’re going to work your way to heaven.

But wait a minute, nobody is perfect. That’s the point and that’s why we needed a perfect substitute to take our place and pay our debt of sin to a holy God who demands perfect obedience.

So, who could be that perfect substitute who lived a perfect sinless life? The Son of God who became a man and became our perfect sacrifice taking our debt and nailing to a cross some two thousand years ago. No one can say God is unfair by demanding perfection, because God has provided the way to meet that perfection for man in His Son Jesus Christ. That’s how much he loves the world.

And so, when the day of the Lord comes to it’s final reckoning and His time frame for this world ceases, which only He knows, which is why it will come in a sense like a thief, then there will be nothing left but to destroy everything which is associated with sin, including this physical universe.

The day of the Lord then includes all of those events leading up to the final reckoning, as well as the very day itself when God judges sin.

Notice what it says there in the last part of verse 10. "The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. (Some manuscripts be burned up)

Is there any chance that God might forego His judgment? Is there any chance that God will forget the whole thing and just let this world slide as it relates to sin? Not a chance. The heavens WILL disappear. The elements WILL be destroyed by fire. The earth and everything in it WILL be laid bare.

MAT 24:35 "Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away."

It will happen because God says it will happen, and we know that God is faithful to His word. He said He would send a Savior into this world to die for our sin and it happened. He said He would die on the cross for our sin and it happened. He said He would rise from the dead three days later and it happened.

He says, He will come back for us and it will happen just as sure as He will judge this world by destroying it. What’s interesting about all of this is that He is not going to annihilate the universe out of existence, rather He is only going to destroy the present heavens and earth to bring in new ones.

The way He will do it is through fire or intense heat. The first time was through water as the Lord flooded the earth in judgment for sin. But the second time will be through fire. And this fire will destroy the present heavens. Now obviously, Peter is not talking about the present heaven where God resides.

There is no imperfection there and therefore no need to come under judgment. Most commentators agree that the present heavens being referred to include the stars and the planets and every other heavenly body in space.

In other words, God is literally going to destroy everything that He ever created. The milky way galaxy, as we know it, will no longer exist. All of the other galaxies which astronomers have discovered will be destroyed. If there are such things as black holes they too will be destroyed. All of the planets surrounding our sun, including our sun will be destroyed.

There will be no evidence that a sin-filled world, which has effected the rest of God’s creation, ever existed. That does not mean to suggest that there will be no evidence that God’s creation existed, only that the curse of sin no longer exists in this universe.

And the means by which it will be destroyed is through intense heat. What kind of intense heat? Well, what kind of heat do you think it will take to destroy the sun. The interior heat of the sun is 27,000,000 degrees F.

And keep in mind that our sun is classified as a dwarf star. There are many more stars in the universe which are a thousand times the size of our sun and much hotter than our sun. The kind of heat which will be involved to destroy such stars could only be the power which an infinite Almighty God can simply call into existence.

But this power from the hand of God will actually be used to take the existing material in the universe and form it into something new. I suppose we could liken it to something like recycling. We take our newspapers and our plastics and our soup cans and put into a bin so the city can sell it to a recycler.

And what was once something useful is either pulverized or melted down to be used to make something new. This is why you will often see on the label of certain containers, "Made from recycled materials."

God is going to recycle this universe. The present heavens and earth will be laid bare before God. Some translations use the phrase will be burned up. But, many commentators believe the better Greek translation is to be laid bare. In other words, everything will come before God to be considered for judgment in the light of His holiness and power.

But the question Peter then asks is this. "Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be?..." (2PE 3:11)

Here Peter asks a legitimate question. If God is most certainly going to destroy the world because of sin, then what role should sin play in our present lives, especially since Christ came to die for our sin as He paid our debt to God for us?

Peter wants to put into perspective for us the awfulness of the results of sin in this world. He’s saying that the result is total and complete judgment, just as Christ’s work on the cross was total and complete payment for our sin. Our judgment fell on Him.

Consider how much God hates sin. He is willing to destroy every part of His creation which has been tainted by it. I mean the sun didn’t do anything wrong so as to be judged by God. A planet, which has been endeared the status of a Walt Disney name, Pluto, didn’t do anything wrong, and yet it has been touched by sin. How so?

Well, we know that when sin entered into this world through Adam and Eve’s disobedience death entered into the world. Prior to that death among men and animals did not exist. But when sin entered so did death and everything, including the very planet we live on, and the universe we are a part of, was effected by death and its curse.

Immediately, everything, which up until this time was perfect, began to show signs of deteriorating. Man’s body began to age and slow down. The earth was effected as well. This is what we read in the judgments God pronounced to Adam and Eve in Genesis.

GEN 3:17 "To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.
18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."

Here we see that the world was cursed because of the sin of Adam. But, not only this planet, the whole creation was also cursed. This is the point that Paul made when he wrote to the Christians in Rome.

ROM 8:20 "For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope
21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time."

Paul says, that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay. What he means is that everything in the universe has been effected to where, if given enough time, it would decay. You ever see a dead opossum on the side of the road? If the buzzards haven’t gotten to it, and you come back in a week the body of that animal begins to decay and fall apart.

Science uses a technical term. It’s called entropy, and it’s in the context of thermodynamics. Entropy, according to the Random House College Dictionary, is "a measure of the amount of energy unavailable for work during a natural process."

To put it another way, that dead opossum doesn’t have the necessary energy to get off the side of the road and heal itself. In fact, even if that opossum wasn’t hit by a car the amount of energy used to live and move would eventually cease to exist and it would die on its own.

Scientists like to take the obvious and create names for laws which work in the universe, and so they came up with one called the second law of thermodynamics. And essentially it means that not only is energy running out to make something work, it also means that existing energy doesn’t work very effectively in many applications.

Take the combustion engine in your car. If the amount of energy in the fuel was burned at 100% effectiveness you’d have a car with gas mileage which would be awesome. As it is, it’s effectiveness is probably around 70%. That’s entropy at work. That’s the curse of sin at work.

God will one day put an end to entropy and the ineffectiveness of the universe because of sin and will make new heavens and a new earth out of the destruction of the old one. And what is reborn out of the old will be perfect and will never run down or be ineffective in its eternal use. God has promised to do this and He will accomplish it.

And it is precisely because God keeps His promises both of judgment and salvation that we should humble ourselves as believers in Christ and live unto His honor and glory. Again, the question, what kind of people ought we to be in light of what we’ve been delivered from and unto through faith Christ? The writer of Hebrews makes the point.

HEB 12:26 "At that time his voice shook the earth, but now he has promised, "Once more I will shake not only the earth but also the heavens." (Haggai 2:6)
27 The words "once more" indicate the removing of what can be shaken - that is, created things - so that what cannot be shaken may remain.
28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe,
29 for our "God is a consuming fire."

Here the writer of Hebrews makes it clear that God is going to shake, or violently agitate this world to the degree where it will be effected by His judgment. But, he goes on to say that because of our being delivered from God’s judgment in Christ, and then receiving a kingdom which cannot be destroyed, we should be thankful and then our thankfulness should show itself in worship to God with reverence and awe.

This is the kind of people we should be. We should be a worshipping people who realize that we will not come under God’s condemnation and therefore we will lovingly live lives that demonstrate the character and life of God now found in us through Christ.

This is what Jesus meant when He said, "Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect." (MAT 5:48)

Obviously, no one except Jesus Christ is truly perfect as the Father. But the point Jesus was making is that we should imitate the character of our heavenly Father even as a child is to imitate his earthly father.

And this is where the whole idea of holiness comes in to play. The word holy in the Greek is hagios and infers the idea of being set apart for a noble purpose. If we have been given life in Christ I can’t think of anything more noble than representing the King of the universe. This is why Paul tells us to consider the purpose to which God calls us.

EPH 1:4 "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight."

1PE 1:15 "But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do;
16 for it is written: "Be holy, because I am holy."

How many of us consider the reason we are given the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit is given to us to enable us to be holy and to live lives in the new life we have in Christ. Being holy carries with it two senses. We are holy, or set apart and clean because of the shed blood of Christ. And so positionally, we are holy before God because of a perfect and holy substitute found in Christ.

But we are also found holy in the way we live. Our lives should show the world that we are set apart by God. Our lives should show the world that because our heavenly Father is holy and perfect we are following after His ways which are revealed in the word of God, not to attain eternal life, but because we have eternal life and are now able to live in that life by the power of the Holy Spirit.

But, Peter gives us another motivation for living holy lives to the glory of God. "You ought to live holy and godly lives as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming." (2Pet.3:12-13)

Again, our desire for living holy unto God’s glory should have as its motivation the understanding that we will one day see our God face to face, and also that since Christ is returning to this earth we ought to look forward to the final consummation of His plan, desiring to be found faithful to Him when He does come.

Peter goes on to say in verse 12, "... That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat."

Why should this motivate us to live holy lives? Because it’s a reminder of what we should suffer because of our sin. But, instead of being part of the destruction and the judgment of God, we will instead receive mercy, love, compassion and forgiveness in Christ.

If you’ve been forgiven of much you will love much. But, if you see yourself as one who has been forgiven of little, you will in turn love little. But, here’s the situation. You don’t need to be a mass murderer to consider being forgiven much. If you understand that any sin will keep you out of the kingdom of God, then forgiveness of any sin will realize that we have been forgiven of much.

In turn, our appreciation for such forgiveness will produce much love for the Lord who first loved us. That’s the way Paul saw it, who was considered by many to have been a righteous and holy Pharisee during his days before Christ.

1TI 1:14 "The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus."

Paul knew he deserved nothing from the Lord except judgment and condemnation, and yet the love and the grace which he received from God was poured out abundantly on him, just as it is poured out abundantly on the vilest of sinners, or sinners like you and me.

How much do we really appreciate that?, is the question Peter asks. And in light of that question do we consider our future in Christ every day? Do we look forward to that which will be new, or do we only see the old order of things which has a tendency to drag us down?

Is our focus only temporal or do we seriously look to those things above where God is seated?

Peter includes himself when he says at the end of verse 13, "... we are looking for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells."

His focus was on the future life which included all things being made new; not only the new life he received in Christ, but how that life would work itself out. Notice too, that Peter doesn’t think of the new heavens and the new earth in terms of what neat things there will be there in that new creation.

Obviously there will be some pretty neat things to do and places to go, but what he dwells on the most is that this new heaven and new earth will be a place where righteousness dwells. Peter is excited that in this place there will be no more sin, no more sorrow, no more temptations, no more pain and no more Satan.

It will be a place of righteousness because the righteous One will be there, our Lord Jesus Christ. That’s why Peter looks to the future. He’s not as concerned with streets lined with gold or with gates made with pearls. He’s concerned with the righteous Lord who purchased him and loved him and gave him life and will spend eternity with him.

May our focus be the same as we look to the future and not become trapped in the present to the exclusion of the promises we have before us. The best is yet to come, but in the mean time we are called to give God our best to His glory. Here’s the way Paul put it.

COL 3:1 "Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.
2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.
3 For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.
4 When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory."

PHI 3:20 "But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ,
21 who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body.
4:1 Therefore, my brothers, you whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, that is how you should stand firm in the Lord, dear friends!"