2 Peter

Here we go again! Yet another letter talking about false teachers, backsliding, and working to guard the faithful from wandering away. It really looks like every one of the top leaders of this new religion had their hands full keeping people on board. Maybe it was because the rank and file weren't very happy with it?

2 Pet 1:4 - Thus he has given us, through these things, his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and may become participants of the divine nature.
What I think is sad about this whole thing is that Jesus' promises have not been fulfilled. Not even the promises concerning the life of believers in this world. They may be great promises, but they mean nothing if they aren't actually delivered!

2 Pet 1:16,17 - 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 had been eyewitnesses of his majesty. For he received honor and glory from God the Father when that voice was conveyed to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, "This is my Son, my Beloved, with whom I am well pleased."
I have to admit that Peter's first statement here is, strictly speaking, true. His preaching is indeed not based on cleverly devised myths. Rather, it was based on shoddily copied myths that anyone with a little extra time on their hands and internet access can shred in a few hours.

2 Pet 2:1 - But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive opinions. They will even deny the Master who bought them-bringing swift destruction on themselves.
I wonder just what Peter had in mind when he predicted "swift destruction"? I also wonder at exactly how he would identify a false teacher. If an opinion is destructive in some form, the things that it destroys could not be so very stable or sound, so destroying it might be seen as a good thing. In any event, the only way I'd consider this as a true statement would be if a person taught the wrong thing in church and at the least contracted a horrible disease within a day or so. How often has that happened, I wonder?

2 Pet 2:6-8 - ...and if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction and made them an example of what is coming to the ungodly; and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man greatly distressed by the licentiousness of the lawless (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by their lawless deeds that he saw and heard)...
Peter considered Lot to be righteous - called him that twice, so it couldn't be a mistake. Yet that "righteous" fellow had no problem with offering his daughters as sex toys to a crowd in front of his home! Later, according to Genesis, those same daughters got him drunk and raped him twice. That's righteousness!?

2 Pet 2:10(b)-13 - Bold and willful, they are not afraid to slander the glorious ones, whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not bring against them a slanderous judgment from the Lord. These people, however, are like irrational animals, mere creatures of instinct, born to be caught and killed. They slander what they do not understand, and when those creatures are destroyed, they also will be destroyed, suffering the penalty for doing wrong. They count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their dissipation while they feast with you.
Boy, Peter had a bit of the judgmental Puritan in him! In fact, he sounds pretty dangerous, talking about non-believers as if they are beasts, only good for being killed. He, like so many others in the Bible, expressed a finely grown sense of hatred and disgust over those who were different from him, thinking, apparently, that he was better than they.

2 Pet 2:20-22 - For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overpowered, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment that was passed on to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, "The dog turns back to its own vomit," and, "The sow is washed only to wallow in the mud."
Peter has some choice words for the likes of me! It appears that he thinks the people who leave the faith are somehow worse than "regular" sinners. In a way, he's right - most of us know exactly what is wrong with the religion itself and can tear apart all the normal ploys that are used on us by preachers. I also agree, personally, with Peter's first statement. I would have had, in my opinion, a much happier life if I had never decided to join a Christian church!

2 Pet 3:3-6 - First of all you must understand this, that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and indulging their own lusts and saying, "Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since our ancestors died, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation!" They deliberately ignore this fact, that by the word of God heavens existed long ago and an earth was formed out of water and by means of water, through which the world of that time was deluged with water and perished.
Peter tries to address a very salient problem with both his religion and the religion of his birth - the fact that people have a problem with unfulfilled prophecies. First, he accuses those who question of indulging in their own lusts - though I fail to see why that should have any bearing on the issue. The statement strikes me as being quite non-sequitur. He then points to Noah's flood as proof that God follows up on his promises, apparently oblivious of what exactly facts are, and that the story of Noah is a Mesopotamian myth copied directly into the Bible and that there's no good reason to believe it ever came close to actually happening.

2 Pet 3:8 - But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.
Peter tries to explain away the difficulty of the long wait for Jesus to return. He basically says that time means nothing to God. Unfortunately, God should know that it really does mean something to us, and it would have been more to his advantage to communicate in a manner that's meaningful and accurate to us.

2 Pet 3:11,12 - Since all these things are to be dissolved in this way, what sort of persons ought you to be in leading lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set ablaze and dissolved, and the elements will melt with fire?
Here's a little of Peter's idea of the Apocalypse! He appears to have thought of the sky as an object to be burned away. Obviously, God didn't inspire him with much in the way of scientific knowledge!

2 Pet 3:14-16 - Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish; and regard the patience of our Lord as salvation. So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, speaking of this as he does in all his letters. There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures.
Here's the only mention I've found of Paul in the letters from other early Church leaders. He admits that some things Paul wrote are hard to understand, but implies that those who argue over those difficult things are ignorant or insane. The last part of this passage I think is most interesting. Why would Peter (or anyone of that day) consider Paul's letters to be "scripture"? At the time Paul wrote those letters, they were advice from Paul, and in no place did he state that what he was writing should be considered the equal of the Jewish sacred writings. It sure looks to me that this is an addendum placed in the letter long after Peter's death.