Open your Bibles, please, to the book of 2 Peter, chapter 3. 2 Peter, chapter 3. While you're opening your Bibles, I want to mention to please remember those of our group that are traveling. Dale, Don, and Teersa will be on the roads. Remember those of our group that are sick. Danielle had a bad night last night. Pray for her. Remember my mom, she's under the weather this morning. And if there's any others that I've missed, please remember them as well. 2 Peter chapter 3, and we'll begin our reading in verse 1. 2 Peter chapter 3, beginning with verse number 1. The second epistle below it I now write unto you, in both of which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance, that ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets and of the commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Savior, knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers walking after their own lusts and saying, where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue the beginning of its creation. 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, whereby the world that then was being overflowed with water perished. By the heavens and the earth, which are now by the same word are kept in store, reserved to fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and as a thousand years is as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness, but is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. 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, and the earth also, and the works that are therein shall be burnt up. Let us pray. Your kind and gracious Heavenly Fathers, we come before Thee this morning. Father, we thank Thee for allowing us to be here on this snowy day. I thank you for the privileges that you've extended to us, your love and your mercy. And dear Father, I pray for those that are traveling, those that are ailing. Lord, I pray that you'd meet their needs and watch over those on the roads. Dear Father, I pray that as we look into this passage of scripture, Father, that we would pay close attention to that which is yet to come, that which is in many ways imminent. And dear Lord, I just pray that you would stir our hearts to see these truths. And dear Lord, I ask if there'd be one here this morning that's lost, this would be the time that you speak to their hearts, you draw them unto yourself. And dear Lord, what you do for us, we'll thank you and praise you for these things we do ask in Jesus' name, amen. The subject I'd like to draw our thoughts to this morning is one thing you can count on. One thing you can count on. Because of our experiences, both with individuals and various things, we know that there aren't too many things in this world that you can count on. Too many things you can truly count on. As we look around us, the stock markets have their ups and their downs, their peaks and their valleys, their good times and their bad. The economy that we have now could be much better than it is. It could be considerably better than it is. The prospects of peace in the world are about as distant as they've ever been. It seems like each day you hear the possibility of a skirmish firing up on some other corner of the world or some other part of wanting to pitch in with the conflicts that's already going on and causing problems. There are preachers and churches that are continually straying away from the Lord and causing confusion and doubt as it is so. They gave way to programs and things that are geared to make the congregation grow. And I'm all for church growth. I love to see it. But beloved, it needs to be done the right way. God's the one who needs to do it. The Bible says, and the Lord added to the church daily, does it not? Such as should be saved. So it's not up to man to concoct something. That's in the hands of the Lord. And I'm gonna leave that off there. I got something more I'm gonna be saying about that in the not too distant future. The confusion and doubt is coming from those who know what the truth is. Those who know what it's supposed to be about. I'm old enough now that I can remember what church is supposed to be. And what we see around us so much of the time isn't. It just simply isn't what church should be. It's nothing but a grand entertainment scheme. It's nothing but that which is geared to make the flesh feel good, make you feel good about yourself, feel good about what you're doing. And I like positive things as well as an expert. Sometimes we need to have sins dealt with. Sometimes all of us, myself included, need to have our coats thumped on a little bit to get our attention. And that's not what the world usually wants. In fact, if you live with your faith in people, if you live with your faith in money, then you're going to live a very disappointing and discouraging life. because it's all going to be something that's going to let you down. Yet, in the midst of all the doubts, in the midst of all the confusion that surrounds us in the world today, there are still some things that you can believe in, still some things that you can count on, still some things you can depend on. The Bible, the inspired, Infallible, inerrant Word of the Living God is something that we can completely stand on. Something that we can completely depend on. We've said many times, Brother Drew dealt with it in Sunday School, we're not talking about the perversions of God's Word either. We're talking about the genuine, authentic article of our King James Bible. I believe that wholeheartedly, that that is the Word of God for the English-speaking world. The book that we have, our Bibles, is pure and is worthy of our faith and our acceptance. Now when I talk about being worthy of our acceptance, I'm not saying here that we all understand everything that's in it. I don't understand everything that's in it. I never met anybody who did. And I feel fairly certain that if I ever come across somebody who claims that they understood everything that was in the Bible, the first thing that crossed my mind, that poor person's either a liar or delusional, one of the two. Because it's far too deep for our mortal minds to comprehend it all. But thank God he reveals some things to us that helps us and guides us as we go through this world. Every word in this Bible is inspired by the Lord and will endure Heaven and earth will pass away, the Bible says, but His Word will not pass away. It will stand forever in heaven. Every word of this book will come to pass just as it's written, exactly as it's written. And this includes within it every promise of God. Every promise that God gave in his word is worthy to be believed, for it will come to pass just as he said. Hebrews chapter six, verse 18 points that out. Now think about what that means. When he promised to save us, if we would call upon him, he meant that. And he did that, did he not? We called on him and asked for forgiveness, He saved us just like He said He would. When He promised to be with you, Hebrews chapter 13 verse five, He meant that as well. And He is with us every step of the way. When He promised to take care of us as we pass through this world, Philippians chapter four verse 19, Matthew chapter six, 25 through 34, He meant that too. And as Peter is about to tell us, when the Lord promised to come back one day, he meant that too. Just as surely as every other promise is in the Bible. When he said he was coming back, that's exactly what he meant. Take, for instance, the last recorded promise in the Bible, and it comes to us from none other than Jesus himself. in Revelation chapter 22 and verse 20. In this verse, Jesus makes it crystal clear that he's going to return to this world, that he's coming back. Now, I am very much aware that there are many people in this world who refuse to accept this truth as being fact. It doesn't matter if you can line them up by the thousands. That doesn't alter the fact that he's coming back. Just as he said he would. Jesus said that he was coming back and he will. And that is something, beloved, that you can count on. The second coming of the Lord. We'll look at it today in the broader aspect of it, and I'll get to that toward the end. So for our remaining time, Now let's look at some reasons why this fact is true. The first thing we want to see is the assurance of the scriptures. The assurance of what God said. Peter speaks of the word of God in verse 2 and calls it to witness to this great truth. Now we've already touched on in passing how that the Bible is a perfect book. A perfect book. That can't be said. of anything else that's ever been written, nor anything else that ever will be written. This is a perfect book. This is something that we can declare, that has been declared to us in 2 Timothy 3, verse 16. It is the absolutely perfect revelation of God's will to mankind. What he thinks about sin, what he thinks that we should do, how he commands us that we should live, and so forth. Therefore, when something is written in the Bible, you can consider it forever settled. Psalms 119, verse 89. It's for, thy word, O Lord, is forever settled in heaven. Definite. The Bible is the only book that can truthfully make this claim. Somebody may want to, but they can't do it truthfully. Because of this, the Bible cannot be improved upon with revised editions. I have seen and I have various books that are revisions of their first copy, or maybe two or three copies ago, or whatever the case may be. The author has decided he wanted to add, she wanted to add something to it to improve it, so they revise it. That's, in essence, I believe, what those that are perverting the word of God are trying to do, they're trying to revise it. It's perfect, you don't need no revision. To revise something is to improve it. And this book doesn't need to improve. So therefore, it doesn't ever need to be improved in Paul and Revised Edition. The Bible also is a prophetic book. Throughout the Bible, there are prophecies presented and fulfilled over and over again. In fact, there were over 300 prophecies. That kind of surprised me when I saw that, that there were over 300 prophecies given in connection with the first coming of Jesus. And as such, all of those 300 plus prophecies were literally fulfilled when Jesus came to this earth. every single one of them. Things like his virgin birth, his birth in Bethlehem, his humiliation and death, his resurrection were all completely fulfilled just as they were foretold to happen. He didn't leave one out, he completed them all. Remember when Jesus was hanging on the cross, the book of John says the last thing basically he did before he gave up the ghost is when he saw that had been written concerning him. Then he gave up the ghost. Not before, but then. There can be no doubting that the Bible is a book of prophetic content. With that being so, we can believe each and every one of them. Not some, not a part, but all of them. Looking at some things in the scripture now, These are some things that may surprise you. Maybe not, but maybe they will. We all know, for example, how important the fact of the new birth, the fact that the new birth is of the utmost importance. Yet, did you know that it was only mentioned nine times in the New Testament? Something that important was only mentioned nine times. We baptist are big on baptism, but it's only mentioned 20 times. in the New Testament. Now, what we say here, before I go any further, if it's said once, that makes it important. But I want to illustrate something here in a minute. Even the great doctrine of repentance is only spoken of 70 times in the New Testament. However, in the 27 books that make up our New Testament, which is divided into four categories, historical, Pauline epistles, general epistles, and prophetic books, there are over 380 references to the second coming of the Lord. Compare that with the others we just mentioned, 380. Somehow, I get the impression that it's an important doctrine of the Lord, the second coming. After all, he devotes one out of every 25 verses in the New Testament to the second coming. That's how important it is, how important it is that we get a hold of this. The Bible is a preserved book. Every word of this book will literally come to pass. I saw yesterday on my news feed for some knucklehead, I'm not going to mention the gender because then I'm going to be accused of classifying, and I'm not. I'm not going to say the fact that it was a woman. But this knucklehead come out and said that the Bible is nothing but a book of fiction. A book of fiction. That destroys the infallibility of the word of God. That destroys the divinity of our Bible, being inspired by God. And that is such as the way the world goes, the way the world thinks. Well, I can't remember, it hadn't been that many years ago a person would have been petrified to make a statement like that, let alone to boldly declare it. God will see to it that none of His words fall to the ground. Isaiah 55 and verse 11 talks about how it will never fall, it will never return to the void that is empty, but will accomplish the purpose whereunto it sinned. He will see that it gets the job done, whatever that might be, even the parts about the second coming. Now if you dare, to declare that you believe that the Bible is inspired, inerrant, infallible, then you had better be prepared to be ridiculed, because most people don't. They'll tell you the part of it is, some of it is. They pick and choose what they like. They pick and choose what they want. But this book in its entirety is inerrant, infallible, imperfect. You see, people think that we that are the old-fashioned, fundamental Bible-believing people are crazy for the fact that we stand on the Bible as it is the final authority for our life and practice. If the Bible declares it to be right, then it don't matter who says it's wrong, it's right. And by the same token, if the Bible declares it to be wrong, it doesn't matter who says it's right, it's still wrong. They kind of smile at us as if to say, well, you know, it'll be all right. One day you'll be enlightened like the rest of us. Nope, hate to ruin your idea, but that's not gonna happen. Some would like nothing, they view us as a dangerous element. And they would like nothing better than for all Bible believers to be locked away from the rest of quote unquote normal society. I hate to see what normal society would degrade into if there weren't those of us around to still declare what the Bible says. It would be far worse than what it is now, as hard as that is to believe. I saw this as I was preparing this. I believe it was C.A. Spurgeon who said this, and I liked it. He said, I may be a nut, but at least I'm screwed onto the right bolt. Might be a nut. I'm screwed on to the right boat. And that's where we stand, beloved. We are with and in Christ Jesus, standing on Him. Secondly, the ignorance of the scoffers. Verses three through seven, and verse 10. They deny, the doubtless see first of all, and that was in verse four, they deny the reality of Jesus coming. They find out said He's not coming back. I've heard it said that this world was far too wicked for the Lord to return to. I've heard it said that God came the one time in person to Jesus and that was it. That's contrary to what the Bible teaches, isn't it? That's contrary to what Jesus said himself. On what do they base their thinking? On what do they base their standing and their reasoning that Jesus isn't coming back? It's simple. It's on the fact that nothing ever seems to change. And what I mean by that, I'm not talking about society and things as a whole, but you know we always have summer follows spring, fall follows summer, and winter follows fall. It's been that way since the creation. The Bible declares it will continue to be that way as long as the world stands. The seasons will be exactly as they are. They use that to declare that the Lord's not coming back. Nothing's changed since the beginning. So therefore, the threat of the end of the world must not be true because everything's happening just like it always has. Their theories fail in two areas. One, They fail to remember that God has already judged and destroyed the world once, Genesis chapter 6 and 7. By the way, the people in that day and time, before the flood came, they refused to believe that judgment was coming. It had never rained. They had nothing that they could base it on in their minds. They couldn't comprehend it in their minds. They couldn't see how anything like that could happen. much like people today don't think it can happen. But it did, exactly like it said it would. Secondly, they fail to realize that God is not bound by time, as you and I are. We are creatures of time. Everything we do is governed and regulated by time. Not so with God. A day is as 1,000 years, 1,000 years are as a day. Now I'm not, please don't take this comment out of context. I'm just thinking in terms of that and that alone. In light of that, Jesus has only been gone a couple days. You put it in context of that, he hasn't been gone very long at all. When's he coming back? I don't know, and nobody else does either except God. but it could happen at any time. Verses four and five deals with the denial. Their scoffers base their doubt on their denial of God's revealed truth. They don't believe that God's word is perfect. They don't believe that God's word cannot fail. So therefore, they just simply pass it off. How? How did this happen? Beloved, it began with something as basic as creation, the very beginning. People deny creation, which is testified to by the scripture. Then for them, once they deny the creation, it's easy to deny everything else that God has to say. For you see, if the first 11 chapters of Genesis are not true, then nothing in the Bible is worthy of our faith. There are a tremendous amount of eternal truths that are established in those first 11 chapters of the book of Genesis. Things we need to grab a hold of. Again, according to verse six, God has already judged the world once. That was during the flood of Noah. The fact that he's done it once shouldn't make people realize that he can and will do it again. He's already done it once, proved that he can. Regardless of what the scoffers may say, this world did not come about as a result of some big cosmic bang somewhere. People in the animal kingdom did not evolve out of some primordial soup. That's not where we came from. We are not the offspring. of some germ placed here by something. God made the universe by his very words. And he created Adam and Eve by his very hands. He created mankind. Not with the help of evolution, not with the help of anything that we would look at through science. He did it perfectly. He did it exactly. as it's been. I've contended, and I still contend, that basically, people today look just like they did in Adam and Eve's day. Essentially, we look the same. We look at some of that stuff they come up with, a Neanderthal man, a Cromanian man, and all such nonsense as that. No, thank you. Man was created perfectly and in the image of God. I'll take it a step further before I move on. I believe, I don't have any scripture for it, but I believe that Adam was the most handsome man that ever lived and Eve was the most beautiful woman that ever lived because they were created by the hand of God. If we look a little deeper, in Genesis 1, 11 times the phrase, and God said, appears in the biblical record. This world was created by the word of God and it is sustained by the same word, verse seven. This world has already been judged and destroyed by water once. The next time it will happen by fire. The rainbow that we see in the summertime is a testimony that it'll never be destroyed by water again. We need God to help this foolish society which has been tricked into believing the devil's lie regarding the second coming. Unless children learn the truth at home and at church, they have no hope because they're not being taught it in schools. For if the evolutionists are right, you might as well live for the devil. You might as well have a big time and live it up in this life. This is because, according to their thinking, when you die, you're just like an animal. You simply cease to exist. with no hereafter. I thank God that we have a hereafter. I feel sorry for those that are going to hell. I really do. I truly wish that we could reach them. And all of God's people will be reached. And I'm thankful that we have a home prepared for us on the other side. Notice the discovery. The discovery, verses four through seven. Why are people so quick to deny the plain teachings of the scriptures? Why do they seem so eager to invent fables to explain away truths that are so clearly taught within the pages of our scripture? The problem is one of the head. It's not a problem of the heart. It's a problem of the heart, not the head. Not the heart. Not the head. It's the heart. It isn't that they can't understand. It's that they do not wish to understand. Notice verse five, call them willingly ignorant. Verse three declares walking after their own lusts, their own desires. If people admit that there really is a God, and that this God has given us a perfect revelation of himself in the Bible, then they will have to bow before God, repent of their sins, and submit to God, or be eternally damned. and that's the reality of where they are now. It is to the sinner's advantage to undermine the authority of the Word of God, which we know that they cannot understand because they're dead in their trespasses and sins, so therefore they cannot. You see, if you can dispense of thus saith the Lord, then there are no absolutes, there are no standards of right and wrong and nothing, is off limits. Anything and everything goes. That's why we have the doctrine of evolution. Because everything goes. There's no basis of scientific fact behind that. Do you realize that? There's none. But yet it's taught as a fact, not a theory. Because if we admit that there is a God, then verse 10 must be dealt with. Because if there is a holy and righteous God, then there must also be a great day of reckoning, a great day of judgment coming. This is true, even regarding the very smallest things that there are. Notice what the Bible says in verse 10. It talks about the elements, which is literally the elementum, the smallest part, In modern terms, it's talked about the atom, as small as it gets. But did you know that atomic power is all around us every day? I found this interesting as I was getting it together. I hope you do as well. I hope it's not as dry as dust. But it really struck me. Uh-oh. What on earth have I done? There we go. Oh, don't laugh at me, Connor. Every breath that we take in is filled with highly flammable and explosive gases by themselves. The water, which covers 75% of the Earth's surface, is composed of gases so explosive and volatile that even the slightest molecular change could result in total destruction of the planet. As we look closer, Oxygen, which is required for all combustion. It's what fire feeds on. I never did really understand it, because we never heated with it at home when I was growing up. But you know, if you heat with wood or coal, how that pipe, the flue pipe, it's got that damper up there. And you can adjust it to where it's drawing more air or less air, whatever it's called for, to get your fire where you want it. You take the oxygen, the fire dies. Turn it on, and the fire flares. That's a simple fact. Yet with every breath, we pull in this highly explosive material into our bodies. Nitrogen. Nitrogen is the component that makes dynamite, TNT, and nitroglycerin. Yet every day, we gulp massive quantities of nitrogen in the air that we breathe. Cannot the same God, who made these elements and combined them in such a way that they don't explode, also change the mixture and cause them to explode, if he so chose? Table salt. I still like salt. I don't care what the doctors say. They food without salt. This is where we'll go eat some styrofoam. Table salt is one-third sodium. Sodium by itself is a great putty-like substance. It must be kept in kerosene or it will explode. If a drop is placed in water, it will result in a violent fire. Yet we eat it every day on our food. Look at water. It's composed of oxygen and hydrogen. Both chemicals are extremely explosive, yet combined in manners we know that it makes them very safe. H2O. All God has to do is speak the word, and the chemical arrangement is altered, and the world is nothing more than a huge fuel dump. Yet we drink this life-giving substance every day. The atom. When the atom is split, a chain reaction is set in motion that has the power to level cities and vaporize people. Yet, we're all made up of atoms. The Earth. It has been compared or called a globular egg, that is, with a hard crust covering a semi-liquid center. In scale, the Earth's crust is the same thickness as an eggshell when compared to the vast sea of lava under it. There have been times when the lava has burst forth and killed thousands. Yet we walk on this thin crust every day and trust its safety. The Elevator is coming today when this world is going to cease to exist, the world as we know it. The third thing we had in my time is just almost gone, is the patience of the Lord. Patience of the Savior, verses 89. He isn't slack or tardy as others would be. God is a God of order. He is a God of punctuality. People look at the supposed delay and wonder, why hasn't Jesus come? The answer is easy. It simply isn't time. When it's time, He will. God never tarries. He will come swiftly at the precise time, and we will not ask permission of anybody to do so. He will appear in the cloud. He promised. God has promised. He will come again, just as He said He would. And this is what I said earlier, I will get to the next again. I am of the firm conviction that at the second coming, it can be broken up into two stages. First, he will appear in the clouds and catch away his bride and all that's saved and take them away to heaven to be with him. The marriage supper of the Lamb. I believe it was during this time that the judgment seat of Christ will take place. Then after a seven year period of tribulation here on the earth, I believe that Jesus himself will return in great glory and defeat the armies of the Antichrist and will establish his throne from which he will rule and reign for 1,000 years. What a wonderful time that'll be when he's here and he's ruling the world. I believe that this will happen when? I don't know exactly when, but I do have a good idea, my personal opinion, that it'll happen the very moment the last one of his lost sheep are brought into the fold. Whenever that'll be, He'll come back. The second coming is something that we can believe in, something we can count on, something that we don't have to worry about whether or not it's going to be. Why? Because God said He's coming back. And that should forever settle in. It's recorded many times in His inner, infallible book. So may God help us as we go through these days of doubt, turmoil, That we would grab hold of this truth and lay claim to what we have.