Thank you for this morning. Thank you for the opportunity to open the scriptures. And we pray that you would be our teacher. Show us that which will more endear our hearts to our God, our savior, our comforter, our preserver. In the name of Christ, we pray it. Amen. Now last week, we finished setting forth the fundamentals of the grace of God, at least as far as I was going to go with them. But now I'm going to begin, and I'm not sure how many weeks this will take, but I want to deal with some scriptures that people will throw up in your face in opposition to the things that we have been teaching. I call this section Problematic Scriptures. But in truth, it's not the scriptures themselves that pose a problem. It's how people misuse those scriptures. In 2 Peter 3, verses 15 and 16, we read this, that our Lord's patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort as they do the other scriptures, to their own destruction. Now, Peter tells us here that there are scriptures which are difficult to understand and that there are those who will take these difficult scriptures and other scriptures and twist them to mean something other than what they meant. Now, if the Apostle Peter could have trouble understanding some of what Paul wrote, we should not be surprised when other people also experience some difficulty with scriptures. In fact, we must always keep in mind that we might have the wrong interpretation of a particular scripture. The proper response for those who are opposing that which is true based upon some misunderstanding of a scripture It's not to denounce them. It's not to blast them with bombast. It is instead to graciously correct them. And the Apostle Paul teaches us that. And I mention this because it is something that I've seen in a lot of preachers, myself included, more so in my younger years than now, but that error is brought up in messages and then soundly denounced, and you cannot help but detect there is in those denouncements a significant bit of self-righteousness in what they're doing. And it's a shame that we who are partakers of the grace of God and who have received vastly more than we deserve, that we should ever look at someone else who maybe doesn't understand things quite as well as we do and look down on them as though they are something less than us. Rather, in all things, in all conflicts, our place is to simply try to correct them with the truth. Henry Mahan used to say the best way to prove that a stick is crooked is to lay a straight stick next to it. And so what we do is simply tell the truth the best we can, and show them the meaning of the scriptures. Now, there are some who are merely mistaken. They are people of honest faith, operating in good faith. They just happen to be wrong. And that was true of us at one time, and I'm sure on some scriptures it's still true. And so we treat them. with grace and simply try to instruct them properly. Then there are those who, due to stubbornness of heart, a rebellious heart against the truth, when they come upon a scripture that seems to say something that they don't like, they will twist it to mean whatever they like or if they see some scripture that seems to say what they like, and they feel they can use it to contradict some point of truth, then they will accept their interpretation of that scripture without giving it any serious consideration. So that's the kind of scriptures we're approaching here in this portion of our lessons, and that is that we're looking at those scriptures which are most often misunderstood or twisted in order to form some sort of objection to the grace of God. Now let's restate what we mean when we speak of the grace of God. Throughout this series, we have spoken of grace as the favor of God towards sinners, expressed in His eternal purpose to save them, His Son's work in taking their place by bearing their sin in the presence of God and enduring the punishment that they deserved, and it's expressed in His Spirit's work in calling them and preserving them and perfecting them until the day of Christ. So God's grace begins with an attitude within his heart towards sinners. And then it expresses itself in actions that he has taken. And these actions find men in a lost condition. in a condemned condition. And when God's gracious works are finished for them, in them, with them, they are like Christ. So this business of salvation by grace is that work that finds people dead in trespasses and sins, and through various works of God They are made to be like the Lord Jesus Christ. And when we say that this salvation is by grace, we mean that at no point in that whole process does the strength, will, or works of men enter in as the deciding factor between who is lost, who remains lost forever, and who is saved. Now that's kind of a long and involved definition of grace. It's a theological definition of grace, but it's necessary because people use the word grace, but they don't always mean what the scriptures mean when they say grace. So what we have set forth in the lessons to this point is that nothing of the strength, will, or works of men is decisive in distinguishing the condemned and the blessed. The time will come when all shall stand before God. And there will be those on His left and those on His right. And it will be obvious that there is a great difference in them. And that great difference is owing entirely to the will, the power, and the works of God. That's what we mean by grace. All of God, nothing of man. Now, people will even go so far as to say they believe that, but then they'll prove that they don't actually believe it when you tell them what that means, how that works itself out. And then they begin to bring up these scriptures Most people believe that God desires the salvation of every individual and has done all that he can do to bring that salvation to pass. They believe that Jesus Christ died for every individual human being that has ever existed or will exist. that he bore the sins of every individual in the presence of God and paid their penalty, and they believe that the Holy Spirit desires to draw all men to Jesus Christ. But that view of God's activity is in conflict with the scripture's use of the word grace. So virtually all arguments against salvation by the grace of God alone are founded on the idea that God's gracious actions in behalf of sinners is equal for everyone. And that's normally how it's presented. And to say that it's not is a shock to many. And as soon as you make some of the points such as Nowhere in the scriptures does it say that God loves every individual. Nowhere in the scriptures does it say that God intends to save every individual or is trying to save every individual. Nowhere in the scriptures does it say that Christ died for every individual or the Spirit is calling every individual. And they're like, you know, I've never heard that before. And then they dig through all of their evangelistic verses that they've been taught. Things they've been told to say to people in order to convince them to make a decision for Jesus and they throw those up in our faces. How do we handle them? Well, we handle them by giving them the correct understanding of these verses and show them how that they're not defining words properly or they are quoting scriptures out of context And the context makes the scripture mean something completely other than what they're thinking. Now, the most commonly quoted scriptures that are put up to defend the belief that God desires the salvation of every human being are 2 Peter 3, 9 and 1 Timothy 2, 4, at least in my experience. If you get into a discussion with people on these matters, they'll throw these up in your face. See, 2 Peter 3, 9 says that God does not want any to perish, but all to come to repentance. And 1 Timothy 2, 4 says that God wants all men to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth. Now here's the thing, we don't deny that those verses say that. But we're going to look at those two verses, of course we won't get through both of them today by any means, but we will see that What they want those verses to mean is not what they mean at all. They have taken them out of their context, and they have also used such universal terms as all, any, world, and things like this. They have used them in a way that Greek doesn't use them, and really English doesn't use them the way they commonly use them either. Now, let's begin with 2 Peter 3, 9, in which it is stated, and you can turn there if you want, 2 Peter 3, 9, in which it is stated that God does not want any to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. Now, this statement sounds very much like God wills the salvation of every individual. He doesn't want anybody to perish. He wants everyone to repent. But it means that. It leads us to that conclusion only if we take it out of its context. So let's read this scripture within its context, beginning in verse 8, 2 Peter 3, verse 8. But do not forget this one thing, dear friends. With the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance." Now, virtually every translation that I looked at has got some weaknesses here. They give some of these words broader meanings than what is appropriate. For example, where it says, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. Actually, it just says, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. Now, it's important that that distinction be made because, particularly in the Greek language, words like all, any, every, all y'alls, all that kind of stuff, it's always defined That is, it'll say, you know, I want everyone in that city, or I want all that hear my voice, or something like that. But then when the word just stands there bare, all, any, every, you have to determine from the context who he's, what group he's talking about. You see, Peter is not speaking. to an indiscriminate group here. These words, when Peter wrote these words, they were not written to the world. And they should not be spoken to the world out of context like that, as though when he said that God did not want any to perish, but all to come to repentance, as though that is some general statement concerning every individual. And I'll show you that. Now first thing to note is that Peter is teaching about the coming of the Lord and specifically why he hadn't come yet. The Lord had made a promise that he would come and according to when they date the writing of this book, that had been anywhere from 35 to 40 years before. So 35 or 40 years has gone by and the Lord has not fulfilled his promise to come back. And so, in verse 8, Peter gives a reason. He's saying, now there's scoffers that are asking, where's the promise of his coming? You find that in verse 4. And he says, well, here's one reason. That with the Lord, a day is like 1,000 years, and 1,000 years are like a day. Now, Peter's not saying, as the folks in my religious upbringing would say, When the Lord says, I come quickly, that that really might mean thousands of years from now. That's not the way the Lord deals. I mean, the Lord is honest in the way he talks. He told his disciples in Matthew chapter 24, 25, when he was talking about the end of things, he said, now this generation won't pass away till all of this has been fulfilled. And it amazes me how many people will do theological gymnastics trying to figure out how that means those things aren't even fulfilled yet 2,000 years later. Well, if you look at those scriptures, the Lord was talking about the destruction of Jerusalem. He wasn't talking about the end of the world altogether. And that did happen before that generation passed away. And here he is speaking primarily to Jews, because he was the apostle to the Jews, he was thinking about their world, and he said to them in 1 Peter, the end of all things is near, and it was. It would happen five, six, seven years after he wrote this. But he says to them, remember, your lifetime, which seems so long to you, as you grow up and pass through youth and into adulthood and then on to old age. You think a long time has gone by. From God's perspective, this is just a blip. Now that doesn't make it so that God can say, you know, I'm coming soon, but 2,000 years he hasn't come. That would not have been honest on God's part. But it probably could stretch longer than what we might think. And then he goes to this. In verse 9, the Lord is not slow in keeping his promises. Some men understand slowness. And by that, he's saying he's not that the King James uses the word slack. He's not slacking off is what he's saying. God isn't, you know, he made that promise, but really, OK, I'll get to it. Just leave me alone. That's not what it's. That's not why he hasn't come back yet in this day. He says, here's the reason. He is patient with you. He is patient with you. Now, it's vital that we understand this matter of patience, because if we look at 15, it says, bear in mind that our Lord's patience means salvation. Whatever this patience is that Peter is talking about, up here in verse 9, whatever it is, is it results in the salvation of those for whom he exercises this patience. In fact, I don't know of any translation that makes it quite as strong as what Peter is makes it here in verse 15. He's not just saying as a matter of fact that the Lord's patience means salvation. He is giving a command, it's in the imperative voice. He says, consider this to be true in your heart. Understand that this is the way things are. God's patience brings salvation. so those for whom he was being patient in verse 9 shall be saved, period. Now it says here back in verse 9, he is patient with you. Now once again the translation and it's not that I pretend to be a Greek scholar but there are a lot of good Greek resources out on the internet that someone with a rudimentary understanding of Greek like me can do some research in these things. It'd be better translated, he is patient unto you. With the idea being that he is patient for your sake. For your sake. And I make this distinction because the word translated patient he puts up with. The King James used the old word, and it's a good word, long-suffering. It's as though the Lord's suffering something. He's having to put up with something. And he does it for a long time. In fact, the first part of this word translated patience or long-suffering is the word macro, M-A-K-R-O, and we get our prefix M-A-C-R-O, meaning big, from that word. So he's putting up with a lot. Who is he putting up with? Well, he's not putting up with the believers. Why? They aren't rebels. Yes, they sin. Not only that, whatever long-suffering God shows toward us is not what's resulting in our salvation. These people were already saved. I mean, they'd already experienced the grace of God. So they weren't going to perish, and they had already repented. So who is it he's putting up with for their sake? The unbelievers. Now, an example of this is found in the story of Noah in 1 Peter 3, verse 20. It says that God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. Now, the word translated patiently there is the same one that we find in 2 Peter 3.9. God said in Genesis 6 that in 120 years he was going to destroy mankind. And then he warned Noah and We don't know how long it was between when he said, in 120 years I'm going to destroy mankind, and when he told Noah about it. We just know, here's what he said to Noah, the end of all flesh has come before me. Now you build an ark this big, make it out of this stuff and all that, and you and your wife And your sons and your sons' wives will get in that ark. Now, Noah's oldest son was 100 years old when they got on the ark. It was 120 years before the ark that God said, I will destroy all mankind in 120 years. Now I don't know if God waited for a while before he told Noah or if he told Noah this right away and he was not only saying to Noah, I'm gonna bring a flood and kill all of mankind and by the way, you're gonna have three sons and they're gonna get married and they're gonna get on this ark too. But if it was in that 20 year period between when he first said he's gonna destroy the world and when Noah's oldest son was born, told Noah sometime during there, he was telling Noah, he was prophesying, you're going to have a family. Now, God says that by promise to Noah that Noah, his three sons, and the four wives of those four men would all be spared from the flood. What must happen in order for that to come to pass. Three sons must be born. They must grow to a sufficient age to find wives. And the ark must be built. And God waited all that time, not because he was putting up with Noah and his three sons and what they were doing. He put up with the rest of the world because he was not willing that any of Noah's family perish, but every one of them should be brought to repentance and get on that ark that had been built. Now that's how Noah's flood is described and how the patience of the Lord in that day was described. And then you come back to 2 Peter 3, verse 9, God's not slow in keeping His promise. Noah preached about that coming flood. We don't know how long, but he was a preacher of righteousness. And we assume he was preaching that even before he knew about the flood. But when he started talking about the flood and when he started building that ark and telling people what it's for, you can imagine as a lot of time went by, people saying, well, where's that flood you're talking about? Well, it wasn't coming until Everyone whom God had determined to put on that ark had been born, and that ark had to be built for them to be put on it. Now, the ark, of course, is a picture of Christ. That had already been built. Christ had suffered and died and become our ark through God's wrath. That's already done in 2 Peter chapter 3, 9. What hasn't been done? Not everyone whom God has already determined shall be upon that ark, Christ Jesus, has been born yet. In fact, seeing that the destruction that Peter was talking about was the destruction of Jerusalem, and primarily this letter was written to Jews. He was saying God has not yet gathered out of the Israelite nation all of those He has determined to save before He destroys it. And so Rome can't come in and destroy Jerusalem, tear down the Temple, slaughter the Jews, and scatter them to the four winds. until those whom God has determined to save out of that group have been brought to repentance and not made to perish. Think of how rebellious most of the Jews were in those days, and God kept putting up with them and putting up with them. Why? Because among them, in fact, let's look back at 2 Peter 1, verse 1. We'll find out who this letter was written to. It's written to those who through the righteousness of God, of our God and Savior Jesus Christ, have received a faith as precious as ours. These words, the whole book, are written to those who believe the gospel. And by extension, it's written to everyone who will in time to come, believe the gospel. And Peter says in 2 Peter, this is the second letter I've written to you, so we can go back to the first letter and see who that was written to. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to God's elect. God did not say to the world. I'm not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. He said that to his elect. He is long suffering for their sake, not willing that any of them will perish, but that every last one of them will come, will repent, will be brought to repentance. So this scripture, far from teaching that God is trying to save everybody, that that's His desire, what it is is an assurance that God will not do anything that will result in even one of His elect not being saved. He will put up with anything and everything that we could do until the last of His chosen has been brought in. Now, once the last of God's elect of that day, living there in Jerusalem and all that, once the last one was brought in, God, He lowered the boom. He did it by way of General Titus and the Roman army. But He didn't let the Romans come until the last of His elect had been pulled out of that group destined for destruction. And we can expand that. There is, in this world, a chosen people. Some of them already know they've been chosen. God has revealed himself to them. He has applied his grace to them. And they have been brought to repentance, and they will not perish. But the fact that the world still stands proves that there's more of them. There's more of them out there. There are some of God's elect who will someday have the same precious faith as all of God's people have had down through the ages. And until the last one of them is brought in, this world will not be destroyed. Because God is not willing that any of his chosen ones would perish, but rather that every one of them be brought to repentance. And in that, you and I who believe, find our assurance. He's not going to destroy us with the wicked. When the time comes to destroy the wicked, he'll get us out of the way. He'll wait till the last one is, as they say, under the blood, protected. And then he'll pass through the Egypt of this world and slay. So our hope is not in this universal but frustrated grace of God. It's in the sovereign and completely successful grace of God. All right.