Eyewitnesses to Majesty

Intro

Many years ago, I will not tell you exactly how long ago this was, I was spending a day of summer vacation over at the house of some friends. It was just the three brothers who lived there and myself, and we were having a great time, especially because their mom had run out on an errand and we were unsupervised. We decided this was the opportunity to test a hypothesis we had—that it would be possible to ride down the stairs on an office chair with wheels. To test this theory, we of course place the youngest brother, despite his protestations, in the chair, and sent him on his adventure down the stairs. He never made it to the landing.

Where he did make it was into the drywall, where he left a gaping hole. What ensued was panic—the horror that those two children from the Cat and the Hat experienced while Thing 1 and Thing 2 destroyed their house—the certain knowledge that their mom would be coming home, and we would be headed for a Goulag on the next freighter to Siberia. In the circumstances we did the only reasonable thing we could do—we hung a picture over the hole in the drywall. And it worked gloriously. She had no idea that our new affinity for the arts was a mask for testosterone-fueled stupidity.

Imagine, however, that we knew that their mom was not returning. Imagine she told us as she left that she had had enough of parenting and had booked a one-way ticket to the tropics, have a good life and please remember to feed the dog? We could have cavorted around that house with impunity, smashing holes in the drywall willy-nilly. What does any of this have to do with our study this morning?

—>This morning, I believe the word of God places before us a litmus test of our affections. That test is the prospect of the second coming of Jesus Christ. We readily say that we believe he will return–but do we live like we believe that he will? If he is not returning, then there is no point in Christian living. We might then choose to live in whatever manner we might desire. But if he is returning, there is every reason for Christian living.

>The problem is that too often too many of us are running around with little desire or passion or love for Christ—and great and exceeding passion for the pleasures of this age.

We delight in the wrong things, in inferior things.

We worship the shabby little idols of our hearts when we were designed to reflect the glory of God in Christ.

As C.S. Lewis says:

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”- C.S. Lewis

Christians who care little for Christ’s return and care greatly for earthly pleasure delight in making mud-pies. If Christ is returning, then we should live like it. The apostle Peter informs us: have no doubt—he is returning. If we get a little more intense then usual this morning—it is because we have a glorious truth to consider.

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Turn in your bibles to 2 Peter 1:16

I am preaching from this passage for one simple reason—and that is because last time I preached a few months ago it was the from the first half of 2 Peter 1. Rather than preach from a random text, it seems good to me to continue to work through this most excellent book as I have opportunity.

You will be relieved to know that I labor under no illusions that you recall anything about that last sermon I preached—if you should remember anything, I suspect it is a poem about the unhappy misadventures of that unfortunate worm named of Ooey Gooey.

I trust you will therefore be kind enough to allow me a brief comment to refresh your recollection regarding the occasion and purpose of this letter—information that informs the content of our study this morning.

BACKGROUND OF 2 PETER

2 Peter forms a follow-up letter to 1 Peter, written by the apostle Peter to churches scattered throughout the Roman throughout Asia Minor

2 Peter serves as a kind of theological last will and testament for Peter who is imprisoned in Rome—the Lord has revealed to him he will soon die.

Two principle problems facing these scattered churches:

1) Persecution: this is the predominate issue addressed in 1 Peter

2) False teaching: this is the occasion for 2 Peter—people are bringing in heresies that go so far as to deny Christ and his second coming, and Peter warns this will only continue—and get worse

What I preached before, the first part of chapter 1, serves as the introduction and encouragement to live in God’s power and as possessors of the divine nature in Christ, whereby believers are enabled to live in a new and godly way.

Believers should live in these ways so that they will confirm their calling and election and gain entrance to the kingdom of Christ when he comes—and Peter is committed to reminding the believers of this.

This is the backdrop of our text this morning:

2 Peter 1:16–21 (ESV)

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

Our outline this morning is simple

First, to consider how the reality of the return of Christ provides the basis for Christian living

Second, to consider two proofs Peter offers for the resurrection

And finally to ask—how shall we then live—living in light of the return of Jesus.

I. The reality of Christ’s powerful 2nd Coming provides the basis for Christian living today

2 Peter 1:16 ESV

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

Two observations should be made at this point:

The “ power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” here refers to Christ’s 2nd coming.

It may seem at first that Peter is referring to Christ’s earthly ministry in the gospels, but this is clearly not the case for three reasons:

The word that Peter uses here for “coming” (parousia) is a word that appears 18x in the NT in connection to Jesus—every time it applies exclusively to the future, 2nd coming of Jesus. It is a technical term for the return of Jesus Christ.

The terms “power” and “coming” seem, in our English translation, like two things, but they are really describing one event. It is not “power AND coming” but “we made known to you the powerful coming” or “coming in power of our Lord Jesus Christ.” The “coming in power” described by Peter does not line up with Christ’s first coming—in meekness as a babe in a manager on the mission of the suffering servant. Instead the term “powerful coming” describes the return of the King.

Peter is addressing in this letter those skeptics who scoff at the prospect of the Lord’s return

2 Peter 3:3–4 ESV

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.”

2. If Christ is not returning, to redeem his church and judge the nations—then Christian living is purposeless

The “for” at the beginning of first 16 connects these verses as providing the purpose, the foundation to the argument for Godly living Peter has been developing in the previous 15 verses

The reason for living in the power of God (v 3-4), for living virtuously (v 5-7), for confirming ones calling and election (v8-11), and for Peter’s diligent reminders to do these things while facing his own death (v 12-15)—is ultimately because Christ will come again!

Peter’s basic argument is therefore: “you ought to live in this way, because I wasn’t making things up when I said that Christ would come again!”

Bottom line—for Christians who hope in Christ, that hope is futile and meaningless if Christ is not in fact returning.

If the world is not to be put to rights, if injustice will go forever unpunished, if righteousness will never be vindicated, what is the purpose of living for Christ—what is the point of Christian living?

Is the fate of the Christian cosmic abandonment? Peter answers “NO! The Lord will return in power.”

—> The question for us as for Peter’s readers—how do we know that is true?

II. Two Proofs of the Second Coming

1) The Majesty of Jesus Christ (v 16–18)

2 Peter 1:16–18 ESV

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.

The apostles are not purveyors of myths, Peter insists—they have not carefully crafted clever fables regarding the ministry of the Lord Jesus.

The very great and precious promises of the Lord to his people are not the fictional creations of cunning con artists

The prospect of the the 2nd coming is no tall tale, but truth told, told by men mastered by majesty, not malice.

It is the consuming majesty of Jesus Christ revealed on the Mount of Transfiguration that Peter points to as proof of the 2nd coming of the Lord.

The word Peter uses here for “majesty” refers to someone who is foremost in esteem, grandeur, sublimity or majesty, and it is an apt description of the Lord Jesus on the mount.

Matthew 17:1–2 ESV

And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light.

This was not the suffering servant that the disciples had grown accustomed to seeing—this was the Son of God revealed in his kingly glory!

And when Peter is impetuously tempted to build three tabernacles, one for Moses, another for Elijah and the third for Christ the voice from heaven stops him from committing an act of rank idolatry by identify Jesus as the beloved son of the Majesty in heaven.

The radiant glory of Christ on the Mount prefigures the majestic glory of the rider of Revelation who is called Faithful and True.

This majesty of Jesus Christ, Peter declares, demands his return. He will not come again in meekness, he will come to defeat the nations.

His coming will not be as the suffering servant, but as the return of the King.

Peter’s dramatic encounter beholding the indescribable majesty of the Son of God so captures him that he is going to his grave commending the faithful to live in light of Christ’s certain return.

-----> If our minds are little occupied with the prospect of Christ’s return, it is because our hearts are little captivated by the greatness of his majesty!

----> If Peter’s fixation on the return of Christ is the overflow of beholding his majesty so that Peter can think of little else then beholding the day of his glory, then our little daily interest in Christ’s return must be attributed to our impoverished view of his worth and glory.

>We must be look for, see and be consumed by the majesty of this incomparable Christ as displayed in his word.

We must worship before the majesty of Christ revealed in his eternality and divinity

God the Son—existed uncreated in the fellowship of the Godhead before all ages and before all worlds.

Our feeble minds boggle, and tremble and shatter when we try to imagine the reality of our eternal future—we finite creatures cannot even begin to conceive of future millennia stretching forward into an eternity of endless days.

the Son of God never even began to be—he simply always was—he is I AM that I AM—he is capital-B BEING, we contingent creatures are properly human becomings. There is not an isolated second in the deepest recess of eternity past where the Son is not there!

The 30yr old man Jesus Christ therefore speaks with absolute truthfulness when he says to the astonished Pharisees “Before Abraham was, I am” and John speaks with perfect rightness when he says “In the beginning was. the. Word.”

But John says more: “In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” God the Son, the second person of the triune God, uncreated, co-equal, co-eternal, co-powerful, being of one substance with the Father, light of light, very God of very God.

It is utterly without presumption for Jesus to declare “I and the Father are one!” and he speaks without hubris when he says “He who has seen me has seen the Father”

Christ is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature the writer of Hebrews tells us—he is the supreme self-disclosure of God.

—> We must worship before the majesty of Christ revealed in his eternality and divinity.

We must revel in the majesty of Christ displayed in his creation

“All things were made through him and without him was not anything made that was made” and “for by him all things were created…created through him and for him.”

In a moment through Christ all of the stars and planets and constellations of the universe sprang from nothing into brilliant existence!

A light year extends an unfathomable 5.8 trillion miles. Our Milky Way galaxy alone stretches a mind-bending 100,000 light years across its span and it contains between 100 and 400 billion stars and even more planets. And our galaxy is one of the small ones!

Yet the majesty of Christ in his creation is revealed not only in the immensity and grandeur of the cosmos, but in the intricacy and delicacy of the world. 10 water droplets contain more water molecules than the known number of stars in the universe, 1.5 sextillion molecules in every drop of water. Imagine then the majesty of the One from whom Oceans burst into being. Little wonder that at event of creation the angelic hosts of heaven shouted for joy at the majestic glory on display.

Every time a plant opens its leaves in the morning to embrace the life-giving rays of the sun, every time a child newly emerged from the womb knows instinctively to inhale, to breathe for the first time, every time the blood pressure of the giraffe—normally so forceful and strong to pump blood from the heart all the way up the long neck—is automatically modulated and decreased when the giraffe bends down to water so that it does not blow out its brains with the pressure when trying to get a drink— every time the glory of the Creator shines forth in his creation!

O Lord, my God//When I in awesome wonder// Consider all the worlds Thy hands have made// I see the stars// I hear the rolling thunder//Thy power throughout the universe displayed//then sings my soul//my Savior God, to Thee//How great thou art!

—> We must revel in the majesty of Christ displayed in his creation.

We must wonder at the paradox of the majesty of Christ revealed in his humility and compassionate love.

Jesus Christ, possessing fully the divine nature, and divine power, fit to receive the glories of heaven took into himself the troubles of earth. He entered into our griefs by uniting to himself a human nature and so setting aside the exercise of his divine rights, privileges and divine prerogatives.

He suffered loss, and hunger, and pain, sorrow upon sorrow, he was rejected by those who should have received him with joy, he received scorn from those from whom he should have received worship. He who is the theme of heavens everlasting gladness became well acquainted with human grief. He who is the source of angelic praises became an object of human derision.

Jesus—the judge of all the earth—endured the indignity of a corrupt and sham tribunal. Jesus—the king of the universe—endured the humiliation of being held prisoner before the likes of Herod and Pilate. Jesus—the Prince of Life— endured the horror of the cross. Jesus Christ—the light of the world—endured the darkness of the grave.

What compassionate love animates humility like this? What praise should not belong to him, what joy should not be his? On account of his humility, Paul declares that God has “highly exalted him, and given him a name that is above every other name.”

Come behold the wondrous mystery// in the dawning of the King//He the theme of heavens praises//robed in frail humanity.//In our longing//in our darkness/now the light of life has come;//look to Christ who condescended//took on flesh to ransom us.”

—>WE must wonder at the paradox of the majesty of Christ revealed in his humility and compassionate love.

And we must marvel at the majestic goodness and obedience of Jesus Christ.

We are incapable of conceiving of what a moment’s perfect righteousness might look like—what it would feel like. Imagine if you can even an hours span of time in which you were not enticed toward sin by some evil desire of your heart, an hour in which you were not harried pride, or anger, or irritation, or lust, or gluttony, or greed. An hour in which you did not covet, or murmur or complain or criticize or judge or sneer in your heart.

There has not been a single moment of perfect obedience toward God in ANY of us—and there was not a single moment without such obedience in Christ. He never had a sinful desire, he never had a passing wicked thought. He is always faithful, he is always true. It is not simply the absence of all vice in him that makes Jesus Christ glorious, but it is the presence of all that is virtue in him. Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, whatever is excellent, whatever is worthy of praise—it may be found in Jesus Christ.

—>We must marvel at the majestic goodness and obedience of Jesus Christ.

We must understand the majesty of Christ’s power

What can we say of his power that will do justice to it? What human language can we employ to describe it? Jesus Christ with but two words makes the miraculous seem mundane for him, and with two words makes the immutable laws of nature mutable.

So he says to the leper: “Be clean!” and to the raging wind and sea “Be still!” and to the dead Lazarus “Come forth!” and uncleanness, and wind and water, and death itself obey him.

In the wake of Jesus the blind see, the deaf hear, the lame walk.

He bids paralysis to cease, orders demons to depart, he multiplies food to nourish multitudes.

He walks on water, he discerns secret thoughts, he raises the dead.

Those who touch his garments are made well, he heals at a distance, his curse withers a fig tree, he plunders the house of the strongman, he overturns the moneychangers tables........and the third day he walked out of his own tomb.

—> And so we are left to ask like his disciples “What manner of man is this?”

—>We must understand the majesty of Christ’s power.

And we must trust in the majesty of Christ’s sovereignty and justice

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” says the Lord Jesus

The risen Jesus Christ is the sovereign Lord of heaven and earth—nothing happens apart from his sovereign purpose. The universe itself is upheld by the word of his power so that in him all things hold together. No Passion flower in the depths of the Amazon Rainforest has ever withered, no Scandinavian glacier has ever melted, no comet has ever flashed across the reaches of deep space apart from his knowledge and will.

There is no power of hell or scheme of man that exceeds the jurisdiction of Christ’s rule. The kings of the earth take their stand and the peoples plot but they do so in vain, they cannot lift a finger apart from the sovereign purpose of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is sovereign over the American congress, the Supreme Court and the President, he is sovereign over the British parliament and crown, he is sovereign over the Russian Duma and authoritarian leaders, he is sovereign over North Korean autocrats and radical Middle Eastern regimes. He is sovereign over Somali pirates, and genocidal dictators in sub-Sarahan Africa. He is sovereign over culture, and education, science and philosophy.

And while these in arrogance raise their fists in defiance of his Lordship , the majestic sovereignty and justice of Jesus Christ will be supremely, finally, and eternally displayed in his second coming and unending reign as king! As George Frideric Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus triumphantly exclaims “The kingdom of this world has become//the Kingdom of our Lord, and of his Christ. //And he shall reign forever and ever.” All authority in heaven and on earth belongs to the majesty of the Son of God.

What will we say of Christ’s majestic sovereignty and justice in the face of the Taliban overrunning Afghanistan, of the horror facing thousands of innocent people there, of the death that awaits many Afghan believers? What will we say?

We must say this: That Jesus Christ sits enthroned in heaven filled with holy anger against the wicked, storing up divine wrath, and fury, and fire that will one day break forth against the ungodly. We must say that one day he will arise in fury to dash to pieces the nations arrayed against him. On that day he will enter the winepress of the anger of God Almighty and tread the grapes of his wrath and blood shall flow from it.

As David declares in his Messianic Psalm 110:1 “The Lord says to my Lord: “Sit at my right hand, until I make your enemies your footstool.”” and again Psalm 110:5-6 “The Lord is at your right hand; he will shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses; he will shatter chiefs over the wide earth.”

Therefore the present horror of the Taliban does not impugn the majestic sovereignty of Jesus Christ, but reveals his longsuffering mercy in restraining his wrath until the gospel has reached every unworthy sinner who has been appointed to be a recipient of sovereign grace. But his justice is not sleeping and his wrath will not be restrained forever.

—>We must trust in the majesty of Christ’s sovereignty and justice.

>Time fails us to speak of the majesty of Christ’s beauty, or of his majestic wisdom, of the majesty of his grace, and holiness, the majesty of his passion and vindication and resurrection.

>We cannot now speak of the majesty of his knowledge, or headship over his church, his majestic lordship over salvation, and angels, his majesty over and above the dominions of darkness ranged against him, or how his surpassing majesty reveals the inestimable glory of the the Father.

>We have spent but a few moments contemplating the theme that will be our joy to investigate in the ages of light to come—the surpassing greatness of Jesus Christ!

Application:

How is it then that we devote so much of our lives, so much of our affections, to inferior objects of worship?

Too many of us are too often guilty of living our lives for inconsequential pleasures.

We devote our lives to the pursuit of feelings, and emotions, sensations, experiences, relationships and things.

We chase after the “American Dream” and homes with white picket fences, bloated retirement accounts, fancy cars, bigger houses, larger barns.

We seek to live for leisure—to spend exorbitant time living for pleasure behind a screen, or in a clothing store, or on a golf course, or on a sports field, or traveling to exciting vacation destinations—

These can be fine and good things --I have no desire to shame our enjoyment of God’s good gifts-- BUT DON’T LIVE YOUR LIFE FOR THEM. DON’T RESERVE YOUR WORSHIP FOR INFERIOR THINGS.

How do we deceive ourselves into believing that these idols of the flesh contain a majesty worth living for, when all they poses is a passing, fleeting moment of shabby pleasure when compared to the enduring majesty of Jesus Christ who is the same yesterday, today and forever!

—>We were not made to delight in making mud-pies in slums—we were made for the infinite joy of knowing Christ! To KNOW him and the Power of his resurrection!

And as we ascend higher and higher the heights of the knowledge of Christ and see more and more of his incomparable beauty and majesty we call to one another, like the characters from Narnia “brother, sister come with me higher up and further in!”

>>>Living in light of Christ’s return is living in light of His majesty.

2) The trustworthiness of the Scriptures (v 19–21)

2 Peter 1:19–21 (ESV)

And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

The second proof of the reality of Christ’s future return that Peter marshals for his argument is the authority of the Holy Scriptures.

His argument from the Scriptures has two parts:

The Scripture—the prophetic word— has been more fully confirmed as a result of the earthly ministry of Jesus in his first coming.

Jesus is the end and aim of the OT Scriptures—his arrival in Bethlehem announces the that the law and prophets are being fulfilled.

It is important to note the presence of Moses and Elijah on the Mount of Transfiguration— Why Moses, and why Elijah?

Moses the one who stands for the law

Elijah the foremost prophet

on the Mount the law and the prophets are testifying to the revealed majesty of Jesus Christ and the voice from heaven confirming the prophetic word declaring that this Christ is indeed the long-awaited beloved Son.

And so if Jesus is the end and aim of the OT Scriptures, then it is right that Moses and Elijah, the law and the prophets, are standing there as witnesses to the Majesty of the Son of God.

But there is more that the Scriptures say regarding the Son of God then was fulfilled in his first coming.

The disciples did not get the idea-- that Messiah would come as a conquering King who would lay waste to his enemies and establish an everlasting Kingdom of righteousness—they did not get this idea from nowhere, they got it from the Scriptures!

Scriptures like Psalm 110 that we considered earlier, and Isaiah 9 “Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it with justice and righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.” The Psalms and Prophets are filled with expectations of the visible, eternal reign of Messiah as King.

What the disciples got wrong was the order— they failed to understand that Jesus had to come first as the suffering servant of the LORD before he would come in power as King.

Therefore, even as the majesty of Christ demands he must return in power and glory (as we considered a moment ago) so the Scriptures to be fulfilled demand that Christ return in victory as King.

The prophecies of the Scriptures are reliable because they are not the product of human invention, but because they are the result of divine inspiration.

Even as the testimony of the apostles is not a series of cleverly composed myths but reliable eyewitness testimony, so the testimony of the Scripture is not private human interpretation, but the message of the Holy Spirit.

As the word of God the Scripture is therefore without error and authoritative—there is no authority on earth that can rightly contradict the word of God.

I was reading a book recently by an author who styles herself as an evangelical—her book published a few months ago has quickly become a massive best-seller in Christian circles.

She argues that the doctrine of inerrancy is wrongheaded and has led to evil abuses.

She and others us the term “biblicist” as a pejorative label to cast aspersions on those who take the Bible literally and as authoritative.

Well, if being a biblicist—that is taking the bible as inspired, inerrant and authoritative —if being biblicist is, as this author supposes, a disease—then to borrow from Fiddler on the Roof, may the Lord strike me with it, and may I never recover.

If this is not God’s word without error, then we would have no hope!

no hope in the cross

or the resurrection

or the second coming

or of life everlasting

Because the Bible is the word of God...

it must be believed—in all that it affirms including the return of the Lord Jesus

it must be obeyed— including all that it tells us about how we ought to be living in light of Christ’s coming

If we would turn from the idols of our hearts to serve the living God then we must pour over the Word. If our affections would turn from making mud-pies in slums to the revelling in the joy of the seaside of the glory of God, if we would think God’s thoughts after him, then we need more than a passing familiarity with the Bible!

If we would see and savor the surpassing majesty of Jesus Christ , then we must immerse ourselves, we must drink deeply from the well of this life-giving water.

III. Living in light of Christ’s return

Oh Christian, live in light of Christ’s coming.

The return of the King is certain, yet today, or a thousand years from now, but it is certain—and then these evil days of darkness will pass away forever.

Live in a manner worthy of his majesty—devote your life to his glory.

Oh unbelieving sinner—behold, Christ is coming, and his reward is with him:

But his rewards are not equal

To the redeemed, he will he will usher them into the everlasting joy of the Father

To the damned, his wrath and fury will be exercised against them for an eternity of conscious, unbearable punishment.

Turn this day, while his grace is yet extended, humble yourself before the Majesty of the Son of God and receive his offer of mercy and mastery of your life.

Crown him with many crowns// The lamb upon the throne// Hark how the heavenly anthems drown// All music but its own!// Awake my soul and sing// Of Him who died for thee//And hail him as thy matchless King//Thru all eternity.