3. Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. 4 They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” 5 But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens came into being and the earth was formed out of water and by water. 6 By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. 7 By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly. 

What do we know now of the earth that they didn't know in Peter's day? The earth is a ball of fire.  A very thin shell or crust upon which we live is covering a form of burning lava and volcanic substance. God has promised to judge with fire. How He chooses to work that out, we can only speculate.  He used rain, which they were unaware of, in Noah's day. Maybe the manner will be unfamiliar to us all in His future world - but it will come.         

We have many other incidences of God intervening continually in His world and in the lives of His followers. Certainly, Peter and the apostles could mention a million examples of God's intervention. The events related to Jesus and the miracles of Christ are the most vivid illustrations of the truth of the Word and the world conflicting over the opinions of men. 

In 587 BC God caused the Babylonians to completely destroy the temple of Solomon and the Holy City. He carted off the Israelites to another land. Then God restored them again to their territory. In the inter-testamental period, the Maccabees fought off the Greeks and there were the miracles of lights, which is celebrated at Hanukkah. In AD 70 there was the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple by the Romans. Explore the unexplainable events which point to the miraculous recorded by human sources.    

There was the Great Wind that miraculously came and destroyed the Spanish Armanda. There was the unusual snowstorm that brought about the defeat of Napolean in 1812. During a time of the British Invasion during the Revolutionary war, there came such heavy fog that blinded them of the stranded Americans on one harbor and when the last rescue boat came the fog lifted, so when the British were ready to attack there was no one there. There was an unusual intervention in weather and nature to bring decisive losses to the Nazi regime during WW II.  We saw the events that are still considered miraculous, in the 6-day war of Israel against the Arabs back in 1967.  

The problem isn't that the world doesn't give examples of God's involvement, but people‘s hearts are filled with sin and refuse to acknowledge or look at God's reality around them. (Colossians 1:16-17 reminds us of God’s sovereign control. “16 For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17 He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.”         

God’s time will come and that is what Peter wanted them and us to realize.

Ponder this truth today:   All the world will bow down before Him and declare Him LORD!

Prayer:  Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty!  It is You we worship, the creator and sustainer of heaven and earth.