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 Peter 3:4
Peter is writing about people who scoff and reject the notion that Jesus will return to judge this earth. Interestingly, there were those in the immediate decades after Jesus’ ascension who heard from eyewitnesses to the teaching of Jesus and still offered their objections. It seemed “slow” to them that the return of Christ had not yet happened in their own lifetimes. They relied on a very naturalistic line of resistance: “Where is a promise that hasn’t seen even a bit of change in our lives? Everything around us just goes on as it has before.” They were comfortable in all the sameness. They scoffed at the notion that Jesus would come to hold anyone accountable in judgment when every day was a mirror of the day before.
Peter first dismisses their naturalistic uniformitarianism: God made everything from nothing by His Word. he can disrupt the cosmos and its order any time He pleases. God has also previously judged the world with a flood… a fact that their observations had completely ignored. God will choose to do the same again.
Peter than reminds these doubters that God’s timetable is vastly larger than our own. He is eternal. He is timeless. Neither a minute nor a millenium concern Him as significant. He isn’t pressured by time, neither is God diminished by the passing of time. He is not slow. But in grace God is patient, not wanting to see people perish in judgment. Instead, in His good time, God is urging them to repentance by His mercy (2 Peter 3:9).
Make no mistake… Jesus will return. But the timing is all God’s… not ours. Faith trusts God, believes God, and prepares to one day be face to face with our Savior.
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