2 Peter Outline

2 Peter Outline

Chapter One:

• I have to come at this verse-by-verse. The first thing I noticed was in the very first two verses: “Simeon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Saviour Jesus Christ: May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.” What I see here is that 1) faith comes from the righteousness of our Saviour, Jesus, and 2) grace and peace come from the knowledge of our Lord, Jesus. The two must go together. We cannot have Jesus as Saviour and not as Lord. We cannot have Him as Lord and not as Saviour. We cannot believe in Him properly without admitting that we are nothing without Him.
• Also from verse 1 we can glean that Peter himself states that the faith he has is the same as the faith we have, because Christ’s righteousness is not depleted. Christ cannot change, so neither can His righteousness. We can neither add to nor take away from the righteousness of Christ. It is not by our works that we are saved; through Christ’s righteousness we are worthy of salvation.
• Grace and peace are multiplied in the knowledge of God and of Jesus Christ. Without Christ in our lives, there is no grace, no peace, and therefore no hope. It’s all about Jesus, and it always will be.
• (verses 3-4)“His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.” God is the provider of all our needs, whether in living or in living righteously. By His own glory He grants us His precious promises – through no goodness of our own! We cannot hope to earn it, and yet He does it. He grants it before we ask, before we even think to ask. He wants us to become partakers of His divine nature – this is why Christ said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.” (John 14:15) Christ wants us to be like Him. The question is, if we have everything before us that pertain to life and godliness, why do we not grasp them? We ought to be striving and clutching at these gifts God has given us by His grace. Precious promises! Do we count them as precious?
• Peter breaks it down for us so that we can understand: (verses 5-7) “For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.” What does each of these words mean in relation to the others?
• For this very reason = because we have escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. We ought to be seeking to put our faith to action. We ought to mature in our faith, if it is in fact a real faith. As we know, if we are truly saved we will truly want to be like Christ. If you have true salvation you will have true desire to work in righteousness. Peter doesn’t say, “For this very reason, you could try to make an effort…” no. He is commanding us as believers saved by God to make the effort. To do. Do or do not, there is no try, right? We either obey or disobey. We either give all or nothing. “Make every effort” – go into it whole-heartedly, with your all. True salvation brings maturing, and sanctification.
• The reason why we ought to make an effort to supplement our faith with these things: they keep us from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ! If we make a mental effort to practice these things, they will be on our mind. If they are on our mind, we think about them! Does it get any easier than this? On the other hand, whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind; having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins!
• Let’s backtrack for a moment and check out the list: 1) Virtue. It is defined as moral excellence, goodness, righteousness, upright life and conduct. What does that mean? We supplement (compliment, enhance) our faith with virtue. We should not just believe in God, but act on that belief. A reaction. Because we believe in a morally upright and good God, we should follow His attributes. Application is necessary to faith. If faith is real, there are consequences. “Faith without works is dead”, because something that is alive bears fruit. If our faith does not bear fruit, we ought to question whether or not it is dead. 2) Knowledge, defined as acquaintance with facts, truths, or principles, familiarity or conversance, acquaintance or familiarity gained by sight, experience, or report, perception of fact or truth, clear and certain mental apprehension, awareness, the sum of what is known. So. The big question is, without applying virtue to our faith, how could we apply knowledge? Without living with moral excellence, how can we know the truth of moral excellence? How can we be familiar with godliness if we are not living righteously? We cannot have experience if we do not have experience! 3) Self-control. Control or restraint of oneself or one's actions, feelings, etc. How can we control ourselves if we do not know right from wrong? 4) Steadfastness is defined as fixed in direction; steadily directed: a steadfast gaze, firm in purpose, resolution, faith, attachment, etc. Without virtue, knowledge, and self-control we cannot possibly be fixed in direction. We cannot hope to be firm in purpose, resolution, or faith. 5) Godliness is being like God. How can we be like God? The closest we can get is by living upright and moral lives, with goodness, and everything else mentioned in the first four definitions! 6) We cannot have brotherly affection without the first five definitions we have seen. Brotherly affection is affection over and above what reason would indicate is right and customary. Brotherly affection is going the extra distance. We couldn’t possibly do that ourselves; our own natures get in the way of us. And finally, 7) Love is the benevolent affection of God for His creatures, or the reverent affection due from them to God. Or a profoundly tender, passionate affection from one person to another. Love encompasses all these other things. Love is the reason why God saved us.
• Peter says, “If you practice these qualities you will never fall.” Do these qualities save us? No; God saves us. These qualities are the fruit that comes from that salvation. They do not save us; they are a result of our salvation. So then, why do we practice them? Don’t forget there are other Christians and even non-believers watching our conduct. These make our calling and election sure to those who are watching.
• Peter reminds us of these qualities in order that we shall have them in our minds. Just as our parents wish for us to know the Scriptures after they are gone, Peter wants us to know the Word of God in order that we may “never fall.” We will only remember these things if we practice them, if they are continually “stirred” through our minds.
• Christ Jesus is not a myth. We know this because of the eyewitnesses, Peter himself being one of them, and also because of the prophetic word. Peter warns us to pay attention to this prophetic word. This is an argument against those who believe that the Old Testament is rubbish, to be discarded, because “I live under the covenant of grace.” Peter, writing in the New Testament, says, “Pay attention to the prophetic word, as to a lamp shining in a dark place.” The Old Testament is still necessary: the New Testament writers proclaim it is.
• “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.” Scripture is written by the will of God. Scripture is breathed out and inspired by God. It is His holy infallible Word, ever necessary to us, the believers. Without this word, we cannot grow in faith and knowledge and virtue etc.

Chapter Two:

• The second chapter of 2 Peter begins with “the other kind” of doctrine. Peter warns us of false prophets and teachers, not saying that they could come, but that they will. And their words will be “destructive heresies”. The worst heresy of all will be the denying of Jesus Christ as their Master. This is happening even today, with people declaring that Jesus was “a good man”, which takes away from His divinity and authority. They mock Jesus! How dare they? Yet they do it, secretly, because many think they’re just being “open-minded” and “accepting” toward the rest of the world. Since when are we supposed to be accepting toward the rest of the world?
• “Because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed.” Jesus Himself will be mocked and derided and blasphemed by these false teachers. They will do anything to gain what they want, no matter what it is. Their greed is never sated.
• Peter gives a dire warning: even the angels were judged harshly, cast into hell and committed to chains. These celestial beings of majesty were subjected to chains. How much more should the ungodly tremble at this mighty God?
• The conduct of the wicked is distressing to the righteous. The example of Lot is shown; his soul was tormented by their lawless deeds that he saw and heard. This is a warning to us. We ought to guard ourselves against all these forms of evil, being careful what we allow into our minds. There are many things that could torment our souls in this day and age; especially with communication so easy for us, knowledge so easily grasped from television and the internet.
• There is hope, however: The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials. He is ever-present and ever-almighty. He will never leave us nor forsake us; and He loves us.
• The wicked are “like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed…” They kill for the fun of it, and will be destroyed in their time. What a warning for all to heed!
• The wicked blaspheme “about matters of which they are ignorant…” They do not know Christ and they do not know God, and yet they seek to try and seem like they do. This happens in much of the world, of people trying to be “good” and “fair”. This is why Christians are called religious bigots who have no acceptance for the rest of the world. “What’s wrong with the world,” they say. “We’re all right.”
• They commit their acts of wickedness in plain view, while everyone watches! I can think of many examples from today that would fit this, mostly from television and the sex and lust and murder and thievery that goes on in television shows. They do not care, because it’s now “socially acceptable” to view such things.
• “They entice unsteady souls.” Each and every one of us is an unsteady soul if we take our eyes off Christ and pause for even a moment to listen to their enticements.
• They have wilfully forsaken the right way! They are not blind to the truth, but they have blinded themselves to the truth. They are related to waterless springs; if you see it when you thirst it gives you such hope, until you realize that it was a ruse to take you off the correct path, and there is no water there…if you remain beside a waterless spring, you will eventually perish.
• Even though they know the truth, they turn from it, going back to their wickedness as a dog returns to its own vomit. What terror there is reserved for these; as believers we should tremble at the justice of God, and praise Him for His grace in redeeming us from the same fate. For in fact, we were just as these sinners, except by the sovereign grace of God saving us out from it. All praise goes to God, for without Him we would even now turn back to their enticements.

Chapter Three:

• Peter’s reason for writing the letter was to remind the people to have sincere minds – to remember what they have been taught. He was speaking to men and women who already knew “the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Saviour”
• He warns them (and us!) that scoffers will come. They follow their own sinful desires – in personal life, that could be translated to a conversation with someone who merely wants to mock what you say, who speaks with sarcasm and “scoffing”. They come along and say “prove that Christianity is true” or “prove that God exists”, not really wanting you to do so, but delighting in the fact that you can’t, at least in their eyes. Their sinful desire in this case is pride, to make themselves feel better than those who follow blind “religion.”
• Such people deliberately (wilfully, intentionally) overlook the facts that stare them right in the face.
• God is always patient with us – even those who will never be saved. God is gracious for the present, giving all men time. God wants all to reach repentance – God does not take delight in any man who goes to Hell. This is where our responsibility comes into play. We are responsible for our sins, and for closing the door on God’s face. “The gates of Hell are locked from the inside”, and those in Hell do not want to come out. God is not sadistic. God is Holy.
• We ought to be ready at every moment for the return of our Lord. No one will expect it.
• “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! – Here Peter is really saying “People, smarten up! Live as you are called to live! Our God is a powerful God, and He is not going to wait forever! Do not be slack in your service to Him.”
• God’s promise of a new Heaven and new Earth is repeated here, to give comfort after reading that the old will be set on fire and dissolved.
• Peter calls us to diligence – to be found by the Lord without spot or blemish, and at peace. How do we do that? By living our lives focussed upon what God has left for us – namely, His word and His Spirit. The Spirit helps us to a greater sanctification, and the Word guides us by showing us what has been done for us! We also have the privilege of speaking directly to our Lord and Saviour.
• Peter warns us that there are some things in the Scriptures that are hard to understand – which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction. It could be that we Christians are sometimes the ignorant and unstable ones. We must be careful to search the Scriptures daily, to be sure the things we believe are so. We must guard ourselves against falling into some false belief, which can easily happen when our focus is drawn away from God.
• “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” Christ is gracious, and we will grow in Him. He will teach us.

“To Him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”