WHY DOES THE LORD DELAY?

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on July 10, 2019 under AM Bible Study |

AM Bible Study Group: July 10, 2019 from 2 Peter 3:8-9

Theme: We won’t be shaken in our faith by the seeming ‘delay’ of the Lord’s return if we will remember certain things about Him.

(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).

The believers to whom Peter wrote faced many challenges. One of these was a challenge that we share in common with them today. And that is that they experienced the scoffing of unbelieving people because the promise of the Lord’s return had not yet been fulfilled.

In 2 Peter 3:1-4, Peter wrote;

Beloved, I now write to you this second epistle (in both of which I stir up your pure minds by way of reminder), that you 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 scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts, and saying, “Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation” (2 Peter 3:1-4).

By the time that Peter wrote those words, over thirty years had passed since the Lord’s departure—and He still had not come. Those early Christians didn’t waver in their trust in the promise of God—even though they may have experienced times of ridicule and persecution and trial. But it was, no doubt, hard at times to bear up under the scoffing of the unbelieving people around them. And as much as their faith in the promise of the Lord’s return had been tested back then, it has been tested in ever-increasing ways for the followers of Jesus with each passing century. As hard as it was for them to bear up under the mocking, it may seem even harder for us as believers to explain the Lord’s delay—nearly twenty centuries later!

As we saw in our last time together, unbelieving people ‘scoffed’ at those who hoped in this promise, because of the things that they willingly ‘forget’. But Peter told them in verses 8-9;

But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance (vv. 8-9).

This passage tells us certain things about our Lord. And if we keep these things in mind, we will not be shaken in our faith by His seeming delay in His promised return.

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First, the apostle Peter urges us to …

1. REMEMBER THAT GOD IS ETERNAL AND ABOVE ‘TIME’ (v. 8).

In verse 8, Peter writes, “But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.” We should not think of days and years and time periods as being constraints upon the work of our God. God is eternal; and He does not experience the limitations of time at all—whether long periods of time or short. He is outside of and above ‘time’ altogether. A day means just the same as a thousand years to Him, because He is not, in any way, bound by days, or millennia, or any time period in between.

In this verse, Peter was quoting from Psalm 90:4. That whole Psalm is, in fact, a psalm about how the God of our salvation—the God who judges this world—is above and beyond the kind of limitations of time that frail, mortal human beings like us are under. In that Psalm, Moses wrote;

Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations.
Before the mountains were brought forth,
Or ever You had formed the earth and the world,
Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.
You turn man to destruction,
And say, “Return, O children of men.”
For a thousand years in Your sight
Are like yesterday when it is past,
And like a watch in the night.
You carry them away like a flood;
They are like a sleep.
In the morning they are like grass which grows up;
In the morning it flourishes and grows up;
In the evening it is cut down and withers. (Psalm 90:1-6).

We would be viewing things incorrectly, then, if we looked at God as if He were within the constraints of time, or to judge Him as being “late” in His actions, or as “early” in keeping His promises, or even as doing something “just in time”. He sits above the whole range of time itself as sovereign over it; and He decrees all that will occur within it—whenever, and wherever, and however He chooses—as being Himself distinct from it. All for Him—both in His intentions and in His actions—is one great, eternal ‘now’. In Isaiah 46:9-10, God Himself says,

“Remember the former things of old,
For I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is none like Me,
Declaring the end from the beginning,
And from ancient times things that are not yet done,
Saying, ‘My counsel shall stand,
And I will do all My pleasure’ …” (Isaiah 46:9-10).

And so; though we ourselves are bound to the constraints of time, we need to keep the bigger picture of things in mind. God is eternal; and He has established His purposes which will be fulfilled by Him when He knows best to fulfill them. Unlike us, nothing for Him will ever be ‘late’. It will all be done by Him ‘on time’ in His great eternal ‘now’.

A second thing that Peter would tell us, then, is to …

2. REMEMBER THAT OUR LORD’S DELAY IS NOT ‘SLACKNESS’ (v. 9a).

Peter goes on to say, “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness …” (v. 9a). How do we count slackness? In our own experiences of human relations, we might think that such a person is forgetful of their promise. But that can never be true of God. He will never forget a single one of His promises. Our Lord Jesus will certainly never forget to return for us. After all, He left heavenly glory in order to die for us. How then would He forget those He paid such a high price to redeem? In Isaiah 49:15-16, the Lord Himself says,

“Can a woman forget her nursing child,
And not have compassion on the son of her womb?
Surely they may forget,
Yet I will not forget you.
See, I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands.
Your walls are continually before Me” (Isaiah 49:15-16).

Our Lord bears the prints of the nails on His hand as a token of His ongoing remembrance of us. His delay cannot be because He has forgotten; because He absolutely cannot forget us.

Or we might think, in our own human experiences, that someone who is “slow” or “slack” to do what they promised is simply unwilling to do what they said. They made a promise that they still have not kept; and so, we assume after a while that they didn’t really mean to keep it—that they never really wanted to. But that’s not the case with our Lord. He is very willing to come for us and take us to Himself. He even said that the great desire of His heart is that we be with Him forever and behold His glory. During His last night with His disciples, the Lord Jesus prayed to the Father and said,

“Father, I desire that they also whom You gave me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory which You have given Me; for You loved Me before the foundation of the world” (John 17:24).

The Bible teaches us that it was “for the joy that was set before Him”—that is, our presence with Him in heavenly glory—that He “endured the cross, despising the shame” (Hebrews 12:2). If our presence with Him is the great desire of His heart, then how could it ever be that His delay was because He was unwilling to come for us?

Or we might even think that someone who is “slack” is just lazy. They made a promise; but now, they won’t put forth the effort needed to keep the promise they made. But that’s not at all true of our Lord. He is not lazy at all; but is busy preparing a place for us. He told His disciples,

“In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also” (John 14:2-3).

Let’s make sure we understand that the Lord is never slack concerning His promises to return—not in the way that other people may count slackness. He is very faithful to His promise, very willing to come for us, and very able to do whatever it takes to bring us to Himself forever!

Our Lord’s delay, then, must be for some other reason than for forgetfulness, or unwillingness, or laziness. And so, Peter tells us what that other reason is. He says that the Lord delays His coming out of is ‘mercy’. Peter goes on to urge us to …

3. REMEMBER THAT GOD IS LONGSUFFERING IN HIS JUDGMENT (v. 9b).

Peter says that our Lord is not slack—as others count slackness; “but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (v. 9b). That means that our Lord’s delay in coming is a matter of mercy—to allow others that He has chosen for Himself the time that is needed to be born, to live, to learn of Him, to search after Him, and eventually to believe on Him through the gospel and be saved.

We should understand His desire for all people to be saved does not mean that all people actually will be. We know this because of what Peter says in verse 7; where he wrote of “the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (v. 7). But even though some will not listen to the gospel, or believe on Jesus, or turn in repentance and be saved, it is nevertheless God’s genuine desire that all be saved and come to repentance. In Ezekiel 18:23, we read;

“Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?” says the Lord God, “and not that he should turn from his ways and live?” (Ezekiel 18:23).

He has no pleasure in the judgment of sinners! Though His holy character must demand judgment, His desire is nevertheless for the salvation of sinners. In Ezekiel 33:11, He told the prophet;

“Say to them: ‘As I live,’ says the Lord God, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn, turn from your evil ways! For why should you die, O house of Israel?’” (Ezekiel 33:11).

We find the same testimony in the New Testament. In Romans 2, the apostle Paul wrote to people who thought that they were more righteous than other sinners; and he told them;

And do you think this, O man, you who judge those practicing such things, and doing the same, that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? (Romans 2:3-4).

As He says in 1 Timothy 2;

For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth (1 Timothy 2:3-4).

This means, then, that the great reason for the apparent delay in our Lord’s return—and along with that, the delay in the execution of final judgment—is that He is a merciful Savior who is compassionate and longsuffering; and who is even now giving fallen humanity all the time that is needed to turn to Him in repentance and faith. When the very last of His chosen ones finally believes, then the Lord Jesus will come—and not one minute before then!

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So; when we feel the scoffing of this world, then, let’s always remember that the seeming-delay of our Lord is a matter of grace. This is the age of grace—the time to make absolutely sure that we have our trust in Him; so that when He returns, we are ready. In the New King James translation of verse 9, Peter said, “but is longsuffering toward us.” But the best ancient copies of the New Testament have it that Peter said that God is longsuffering toward “you”. That’s the best and most reliable version of the text. And that means that you and I need to personalize these words. We shouldn’t be looking around all the time at all the sinners in the world. Instead, we should be concentrating on the one particular sinner we see in the mirror. We should make absolutely sure we personally are ready! And then—as those who have indeed placed our trust in the cross of Jesus—let’s be faithful to tell others about Him while we can.

And let’s make sure we never let anyone sway us from our confident expectation of His return because of its delay. When He finally comes back for us, we will be so very glad we kept trusting in Him to keep His word.

EA