Quote:
Originally Posted by good samaritan
2 Peter 3:7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us- ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.
I am sorry I have tried to see it the way you present, but it just doesn't register for me. I have too seen this verse applied to creation days and other things, but it still carries the same meaning God's time is not our time.
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That is only partly right. My opinion, mind you.
Here is a step b step exegesis as I see it, anyway:
We have to go back further in the chapter than you just did.
2 Peter 3:3-9 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, (4) And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
Notice the subject is scoffers who claim too much time passed since God promised the Lord's coming. Now, this was only decades after the cross. So in a few decades, people were scoffing the Lord's coming as being impossible since too much time elapsed already.
Obviously they felt that after a certain amount of time, God's word cannot come to pass. That is the subject.
(5) For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: (6) Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
They forget that God foretold the flood that would cause the world to perish. That took place how long after God told Noah about it? 120 years! Peter's point was that Christ foretold His coming a lot less than 120 years before Peter wrote this chapter! If he could do that after 120 years, and it was not even 120 years since Jesus foretold His coming, then Jesus can still very well be coming!
Again, the issue is too much time having elapsed in the minds of the scoffers for Jesus to come.
(7) But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
The same word that comes from God's mouth to predict the flood that took place 120 after it was spoken, also said Christ would come. So, if the scoffers could believe God was right in foretelling the flood that took place after 120 years since it was first spoken, what is so hard about believing Christ would come and it was not yet 40 years after He spoke of that? 1/3 the time!
word (8) But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. (9) The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
Whether it takes one day for a thing to come to pass after it's prophesied, or one thousand years, it makes no difference to God's ability to make it come to pass. Time is of no issue when it comes to whether or not God can make a promise come to pass.'
THAT is the context.
here are some scholars' words saying it better than I can:
CLARKE
...no lapse of ages impairs his purposes, nor need he wait to find convenience to execute those purposes. And when the longest period of time has passed by, it is but as a moment or indivisible point in comparison of eternity.
GILL:
...suggesting, that though between thirty and forty years had elapsed since the promise was given out that Christ would come again, and should even a thousand, or two thousand years more, run off, before the coming of Christ, yet this should be no objection to the accomplishment of the promise; for though such a number of years is very considerable among men, ye not "with God", as the Arabic and Ethiopic versions read, with whom a thousand years, and even eternity itself, is but as a day, Isa_43:13.
BARNES:
The objection was, that much time, and perhaps the time which had been supposed to be set for his coming, had passed away, and still all things remained as they were. The reply of the apostle is, that no argument could be drawn from this, for that which may seem to be a long time to us is a brief period with God. In the infinity of his own duration there is abundant time to accomplish his designs, and it can make no difference with him whether they are accomplished in one day or extended to one thousand years.
We hear too many traditional erring thoughts and it's hard to get them out of our heads when we read these passages.
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