EXPAND TO READ: 2 PETER 2 (HCSB)
PERSONAL JOURNAL:
SIN (verse 14a): I lived in the way this verse speaks of for quite some time, even since coming to faith. I am not proud of it, but I do feel this verse convicts my heart to confess about it because I do not feel I ever truly repented. You tell us that there are some who have eyes full of adultery and are always looking for sin. I lived in this verse for most of my life. I lusted over the visual appeal of many women that came across my sight and even gave into the temptation of porn more times than I can even remember. I do still struggle with the weakness of my eyes here-and-there when walking around in this life, but no where near how I once did. Thank You for building me up stronger to resist these temptations of the eyes, Father, but I must ask for Your forgiveness for all the times I failed to resist the temptations and chose to lust with my eyes, essentially committing adultery in my heart through these acts as You’ve stated in this verse and many others. Forgive me for living in the worldly ways through my eyes instead of living in Your ways. Continue to help me to resist these temptations, Father, so that as I continue to mature in my faith, my eyes continue to become far less of a weakness of mine than ever.
PROMISE (verse 1a): Your promise in the first half of this verse seems to be more abundant nowadays than before because of how connected this world is. You promise us that there definitely will be false prophets amongst us and I have been witness to this many times throughout my short life. I have seen televangelists preach that the more we pay out of our pockets, the more blessings we’ll receive from You. I have seen them state that we are only saved by the good works we do in this life for You, rather than prophesying the sacrifice Jesus made for us and accepting Him as Lord and Savior as the way to eternal salvation. I have seen many false claims that go completely against Your truth, yet there are millions of people in this world who follow them. My heart hurts for those people because they are living in a false belief of eternal salvation and a false belief of Your truth in their lives instead of truly receiving the grace and love that You provide freely! I’m sure I have given into some false prophecies over my spiritual life as well, although likely far more minor than those I mentioned above. Regardless, I ask that You please help me with Spiritual discernment so that I can be better at identifying those who are speaking Your eternal and absolute truth versus those who are corrupting Your truth for their own gain or agenda.
ATTITUDE (verse 20): I really like the way this verse is worded, but also know from experience how so true these words are. You tell us that for those who have escaped the world’s impurity through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior and later returned to such a state are worse off the second time than the first. WOW! How so true this is! It seems that with Your help we get ourselves out of the holes we created, but sometimes try to dive back into that same hole later. I imagine swimming in a filled pool of corruption and slowly but surely you remove us from that pool and begin to drain all of that corruption out of the pool for us. When we dive back in there’s less liquid in the pool, meaning that diving back in will likely cause more pain than the first time as we hit the bottom. Help me to be better at running my spiritual race with endurance, Father, so that I do not regress anymore. Continue to bless with Your strength, so that I can truly embody the spiritual attitude of endurance in my life through all trials. I need Your endurance and strength to help keep me from regressing as I have done so many times in the past and I know that the more I lean on You the less likely I am to regress. Keep reminding me of this, Father.
COMMAND (verses 1-3): Just as I mentioned this in the promise, I also feel these verses give us a command. The command is to always be on alert and cautious in our spiritual journey in this world. You tell us that there are false prophets amongst us who preach heresies/blasphemies and will attempt to exploit Your people with their deceptive words. As the world becomes far more connected than it has ever been and communication has become more far-reaching than anyone could have imagined, this reigns far truer than ever before. We see so many people on TV, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, etc. preaching what they claim is Your Good Word, yet when you truly dig into what they are saying it has absolutely no direct relation to Your truth or it has several corrupted and crippled the Truth You have given to us. Help me to always remain alert, vigilant, and cautious in my Spiritual journey, Father, so that as I mature in my faith and begin to listen to far more people in search of more Godly wisdom that I am not deceived by false words from false prophets.
EXAMPLE (verses 4-10): The examples You list here, which are plentiful, give me a great picture as to Your own discernment and great power. You are able to rescue the godly from trials for the purpose of keeping the unrighteous under a state of punishment until their day of eternal judgment comes. You are able to severely punish those who blatantly and openly rebel against You without punishing those who hold You close and dear to their hearts. You show us here through the rebellious angels, Noah, Sodom & Gomorrah, and even Lot that You are able to see all of the good in this world and like a surgeon can delicately isolate from the righteous those who are corrupt. We may not see the punishments of those corrupted souls in this life as we are not privy to everything You are, but You assure us that they are undergoing punishment. Sometimes that punishment is blatantly obvious, but sometimes it’s a punishment that’s more “under the hood” in their lives, such as depression, loneliness, etc. It’s hard to truly see from my human eyes that all those who rebel against You are being punished in this life by You, but I know that they are in a way unique to them. You are the greatest disciplinarian, the greatest judge, and the greatest surgeon of this world and I am grateful for the examples You’ve provided here that prove this.
*DAILY NOTE: For me personally, I feel that this chapter in 2 Peter shows that Peter was really trying hard to prove a point about these topics. He seemed to be trying to drill into all the readers of this portion of the letter that corruption is out there and we need to be alert; that we are worse off when we fall back into sin than if we had never removed ourselves from it in the first place. This doesn’t mean that I just simply continue sinning. It means that when I do go to You for removal of a sin from my life, that I truly lean on You through all of that to build up the endurance I need to stay out of that sin moving forward. This has likely been my biggest fault since coming to faith. I seem to get out of a sin with Your strength, then I get complacent thinking I am good to go with that, but the enemy is always prowling. You reaffirm me in this scripture that I must stay alert, vigilant, and always walking with an attitude of endurance from You. Thank You for these reminders today, Father, and for always trying to keep me facing the right direction in my spiritual journey, even though I have had quite a rebellious nature most of my life.
EXPAND TO READ: GENERAL NOTE FOR MY QUIET TIMES
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