End Game – Week Five

 

2 Peter 3:1-7

 

 

What is your biggest takeaway from this Sunday’s message?

 

***For Leaders – Answers will vary.

 

 

Read 2 Peter 3:1-2 This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them, I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles,

 

What is Peter’s strategy here in both of his letters? (Don’t over think it!) In what ways does how we live cause the need for reminders?

 

***For Leaders – Peter’s strategy is to simply give reminders to the essentials that are easy to forget. Thinking about unfulfilled prophecy is something we need to be reminded to do. Why? Because the most natural way to live is to focus on what is in front of us rather than having our eyes on the horizon to see what is coming! It highlights the inner struggle of doing what we want most vs what we want now. We need to take care of what is in front of us, but we can’t be myopic about it either. Kingdom work is happening all around us and we don’t want to miss it.

 

 

Why do you think that Peter refers to the “sincere mind”?

 

*** For Leaders – It’s easy to be hard on people and say it’s for selfish reason that we don’t look at unfulfilled prophecy and the End Times. Peter doesn’t do that. He’s gentle by saying he “is stirring up our sincere mind”. The sincere mind wants to focus on God’s overall kingdom work but it gets knocked off track by distractions all around us. Our best response to this is to be honest that is happening and ask the Holy Spirit to help us.

 

 

 

Read 2 Peter 3:3-7 Knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. ⁴ They will say, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.” ⁵ For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, ⁶ and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. ⁷ But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

 

What is a “scoffer”? Why is it important to be prepared for them when discussing the End Times?

 

***For Leaders – The definition from the Cambridge Dictionary is “someone who laughs and speaks about a person or idea in a way that shows that they think that person or idea is stupid or silly.”  Answers will vary, but overall, scoffers have no answers themselves. Everyone agrees that the earth had a beginning so it’s not outlandish or absurd to say that there will be an end (vv5-7). It’s rational to say God knew how to birth the creation and bring about its end. Sir Francis Scott Key, who penned the Star-Spangled Banner, responds to scoffers with this saying, “Men have argued for centuries against our faith, but what can they say in defense of their own?”

 

 

Why is it important to regularly examine what is happening in our imagination?

 

***For Leaders – There is an old cliché that “the mind is an excellent servant, but a terrible master.” What does that mean? We’ll start with an example. We can know the truth that the Bible says to be prepared to share your faith to anyone (Acts 1:8). But if we just imagine being humiliated by a scoffer then we won’t say a thing! This is an example of the mind being our master and filling it with half-truths to scare us. We process life in our imagination! So we make our mind our servant when we don’t let it run away from us with half-truths. The whole-truth is that we overcome the evil one by the word of our testimony (Rev 12:11), so we can then imagine being victorious rather than at the mercy of scoffers! Our testimony is our best weapon for God and it’s difficult to attack what God has done for us.

 

This is ultimately how we prepare for scoffers because they can beat us in our imagination before we ever get face to face. A scoffer can beat you before you open your mouth by having you be too afraid to speak. When you understand that your testimony is bullet proof, you will be more bold.