'But the God of all grace, Who hath called us unto His eternal glory by

Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect ...

' (1 Pet. 5:10).

The second epistle does not add materially to the teaching of the first

on this subject, but is concerned with the denial of the Lord's Coming and

the problem of its apparent delay.  'Knowing this first' are the keywords:

'Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the Scripture is of any

private interpretation (its own unfolding)' (2 Pet. 1:20).

'Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers'

(2 Pet. 3:3).

The first passage deals with the certainty of the fulfilment of the

prophecy concerning the Lord's Coming; the second deals with those who, by

misunderstanding the results of certain dispensational changes, denied the

fulfilment of the promise altogether.  In both contexts there is, as we shall

see, an appeal to Scripture:

'For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known

unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ' (2 Pet. 1:16).

This statement the apostle establishes in two ways: first, by

introducing the type of the Mount of Transfiguration; and secondly, by the

word of prophecy made more sure.

In chapter 3, Peter still holds most firmly to the truth, and will not

for a moment admit that the Lord is slack concerning His promise.  It is

unwise, the apostle declares, even to measure length of time by our own

understandings, for in some of God's dealings a day may be as a thousand

years, or a thousand years as a day.  The Coming of the Lord for which Peter

waited, however, was that Coming which is connected with the day of the Lord,

the dissolving of the heavens, and the burning up of the elements, events

that usher in the new heavens and the new earth.  There is no uncertainty as

to what Peter hoped for; the uncertainty comes in at the point where the

subject passes from Peter's province to Paul's.  Referring to the apparent

delay in the fulfilment of the promise of the Lord's return, Peter says:

'Account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our

beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath

written unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of

these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which

they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other

Scriptures, unto their own destruction' (2 Pet. 3:15,16).

Several items of importance are contained in these words:

Paul's epistles are classed with 'the other Scriptures' and these

Peter has already testified to be inspired (2 Pet. 1:16 -21).

Peter, though an apostle, confesses that some of Paul's teaching

is 'hard to be understood'.

The fact that the coming of the Lord had not taken place as had

been expected must not, says the apostle, be considered

'slackness', but for a full and inspired explanation of the