Waiting for Jesus

Which do you like better: beard or no beard?

2 Peter 3:1–14 ESV

This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly. But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace.

Context: not believers complaining about the wait for the second coming, but scoffers saying the second coming isn’t happening.

Three reasons for the delayof Jesus:

Different clock

His patience is greater than ours and yet time is nothing to Him

Time for all to repent

All as in every person? Yes. And no. Yes that every person has access to the cross and the sacrifice and payment Jesus made. No, not every person will be saved (no universalism.) Yet God knows every heart that has and will turn to Him. You might be one that has not turned to Christ but He already knows the day and the second when you will.

It’s not a delay

His plan is perfect.

Three things to do in the waiting:

Be diligent

Get off the couch in the things you already know you should do. Blessed assurance was never meant to morph into placid inactivity.

Be spotless

Wash, rinse, repeat. Confess, repent, repeat. Jesus is your spotlessness so be diligent to abide in Him.

Be at peace

Peaceable with other believers, peaceable with your neighbors, but most of all, peaceable with God being in control; peaceable in the waiting. Fist shaking feels good in the moment but there is no humility found there, no surrender. Between you and God, you will never win a war unless you are on His side, submitting to His orders, surrendered to His plan. Be at peace with that.