WWUTT 348 Eyewitnesses To His Majesty?

Peter makes an apologetic argument for the truthfulness of Scripture in his second letter when he says that we didn't come up with cleverly devised myths, but were eyewitnesses to His Majesty, when we understand the text.

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Pastor Gabe Hughes. Thank you, Becky. We're in 2 Peter 1 again today, and we'll be looking at verses 16 through 21.

But before moving on to that section, I come back again to the qualities that Peter encourages us to be growing in so that we would not become ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our

Lord Jesus Christ. It begins in verse 5 where he says, And it's that word virtue

I'm hung up on. I wanted to know more about this concept of virtue that he's putting forth.

The word, as I had described it last week when we were looking at it, means moral excellence. So in order to have that moral excellence in Christ, that pursuit of godliness that we are supposed to have, we need to be set apart from the world.

There's going to be that necessity. So we're not following what the world says moral excellence is.

We're pursuing what God says is excellent and virtuous according to the commands of Christ.

So it is not according to the world. It's according to the word, the word of God.

Now this word that's used here, the Greek word that's used, that's translated virtue.

I noticed that in the New American Standard Bible, it's actually translated moral excellence. That's the way that comes out, which is what virtue is.

But that particular word is only used by two different people in the

New Testament, Paul to the Philippians, and it's Philippians 4, 8, where he says,

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

And it's that word that's translated excellence in the ESV. It's that same

Greek word that comes out as virtue in 2 Peter 1, 5. So it's not just if there is any excellence, if there is any moral excellence, if there is anything that contributes to our sanctification, our pursuit of godliness, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Maybe that changes your perspective on Philippians 4, 8 a little bit. I don't know. But anyway, Peter uses this word that is translated virtue in 2

Peter 1, 5. We also saw that same word in verse 3. His divine power is granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence.

There it is. That word appears there again. And Peter had used it previously in his first letter in 1

Peter 2, 9, where he says, But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light.

And when you understand that word as being moral excellence, it calls back to David in Psalm 119, where he praises

God for his law because all of his laws are wonderful. That's the very same praise that David gives to God in Psalm 119 that we are to have as his saints, as his children, to the praise of his glorious grace, we are proclaiming his excellence, the moral goodness that we are able to pursue in a way that is pleasing to God because of the transformation that has happened in our hearts by the

Holy Spirit. So again, I read these qualities to you again out of 2

Peter 1, beginning in verse 5, Make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue and virtue with knowledge.

And that word supplement means we're adding to. So we came to the faith and now we're adding a moral excellence.

We're adding to that knowledge, knowledge of God growing in the understanding of his word. We're adding to that self -control, not being blown around by all these different shifting winds of doctrines.

But we are we're staying the course whenever there is something that seems to pull our mind or our heart another direction.

We don't immediately jump ship from one doctrine to another, but we meditate on it for a long time. We let the spirit convict us and come to a deeper understanding of the truth before we ground ourselves in understanding, well, this is the doctrine that I believe that these scriptures are teaching here.

OK, and so then from their knowledge to and self -control, adding to that a steadfastness to our faith, we are growing all the more solid and sure and firm, steadfast in this faith that we believe we're adding to that godliness.

We're adding to godliness, brotherly affection, and we're adding to brotherly affection, affection, love.

So there are things that we are growing and attaining in our own maturity as we continue this walk with Christ, Micah 6, 8.

What does the Lord require of you, O man, but to do justice, love mercy and to walk humbly with your

God. So there is there is going to be a certain maturity that we as individuals will attain as we grow in these things in Christ Jesus.

But ultimately, this growth is to develop into something that is benefiting the whole body, not just ourselves, which is what which is where brotherly affection and love come in.

So as we grow in maturity, we're helping to mature others as well. And the whole body builds itself up in love, which is the illustration that Paul gives in Ephesians chapter four.

So having visited these qualities once again, I hope that that this is something that continues to nourish and flourish in your mind as you consider the qualities that we must be attaining to so that we will be effective and fruitful in the knowledge of our

Lord Jesus Christ. Let's look now at second Peter chapter one, verse 16, for we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our

Lord Jesus Christ. But we were eyewitnesses of his majesty for when he received honor and glory from God, the father and the voice was born to him by the majestic glory.

This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven for we were with him on the holy mountain and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man.

But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

So this continues a thought that we ended with yesterday as in verse 16, Peter says, for we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our

Lord Jesus Christ. Once again, he made a mention that before his departure, he was going to do everything that he could to make sure that they would be able to at any time, recall the things that have been taught by the apostles, by Peter, by Paul, anything else that had been written,

James, Jude, written by the apostles. We have these things written down so that we can come back to them.

We can meditate on them, that we can grow in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And Peter says of these things that we have written down to you, these things that we have chronicled for you to be able to recall these things and grow in the knowledge of God all the more.

We didn't follow cleverly devised myths like we didn't get together in an assembly and kind of decide what's the best story that we can come up with that would be convincing to another person.

The apostles simply were not getting famous off of this. Peter was written from a place of capture, from a place where he was awaiting a sentence of death.

So there was no fame and fortune to attain from the things that had been preached by the apostles.

And those who would have been reading Peter's letter would have known that was exactly what Peter was referring to. This is a guy who's about to die for the faith that he's been sharing.

There's no fame and fortune in this. This cannot come from a person who just made this up, that they would be willing to lay their lives down for this.

This was a bunch of people who saw

Christ Jesus alive, resurrected from the grave. Over 500 of them, as Paul recalls in 1

Corinthians 15. And so there are hundreds of eyewitnesses that can attest to Christ being crucified, put to death, buried in a tomb and coming back again from the grave, hanging out with him for another 40 days between his resurrection and his ascension into heaven.

These are not cleverly devised myths. This isn't one or two or three people or even 12 guys who came up with this.

This is hundreds of witnesses, thousands of witnesses. When you throw in the people who had seen the miracles that Jesus had done and yet refused to follow, many of them probably came to belief after Jesus's resurrection.

And then the gospel was proclaimed, which was how the church was able to grow as rapidly as it did, as recalled in the book of Acts.

And so we have these things that are attested to by eyewitnesses to the truth.

We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power incoming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

For when he received honor and glory from God the Father and the voice was borne to him by the majestic glory.

This is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.

Now, what is Peter referring to? They're not the baptism of Jesus, even though that was a place where we heard the voice of God come from heaven saying, this is my beloved son, with whom

I am well pleased. When you read that story in Matthew four, you have Jesus being baptized by John the

Baptist in the Jordan River. Heaven opened up, the Holy Spirit descended upon Christ in the form of a dove and a voice from heaven, from God the

Father saying, this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased. You have all three persons of the

Trinity presented right there, father, son, and Holy Spirit. So that is one place where the voice of God from heaven was heard saying that of Christ, but where Peter is referring to the holy mountain, this is talking about the transfiguration.

As we read in Matthew 17, Mark nine and in Luke nine, I'm going to read the Mark nine edition.

Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, James and John, who were brothers referred to as the sons of thunder and led them up a high mountain by themselves.

And he was transfigured before them and his clothes became radiant, intensely white.

So as no one on earth could bleach them and there appeared to them Elijah with Moses and they were talking with Jesus.

And Peter said to Jesus, rabbi, it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.

For he did not know what to say, for they were terrified and a cloud overshadowed them and a voice came out of the cloud.

This is my beloved son. Listen to him. And suddenly looking around, they no longer saw anyone with them, but Jesus only.

In the Matthew 17 account, I kind of like the humor that is sort of incorporated there because it says that that Peter was still speaking when

God interrupted him and said, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased.

Listen to him, which is more the account of the way Peter recalls it here. This is my beloved son with whom

I am well pleased. So Peter was, you know, he was terrified, had no idea what it was that he needed to say in the midst of seeing

Jesus transfigured before him like this. And Elijah and Moses are standing there having a conversation with him.

So he comes up with this idea, hey, let us make places for you to dwell in. But God cuts off Peter and is basically saying to him, here's

Jesus, my son, who is right here before you. He does not dwell in places that are built by human hands.

Instead, he speaks to you, listen to him and do what it is that he says.

And so in Christ, we have all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. As Paul said it to the Colossians, we have everything that we need to know in Christ Jesus.

And the writer of Hebrews says long ago at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom he also created the world.

And so you have the indication there of the writer of Hebrews almost kind of giving an explanation of the transfiguration and what

God meant when he said to Peter, James and John, this is my beloved son with whom

I am well pleased. Listen to him. So you have the prophet standing there with him, Moses and Elijah, who you're going to listen to is

Christ. I spoke to your forefathers through the prophets. Now I'm speaking to you through Christ.

So listen to him. This isn't going to be the kind of a place where he dwells in a temple and you have to go to the temple in order to hear from God.

My son is with you now. And as Jesus said to his own disciples, be behold, I am with you always to the very end of the age.

We have that in the Great Commission at the end of the book of Matthew. And so it is Christ who speaks to us now through his

Holy Spirit, through his apostles. And Peter gets to that here in second Peter chapter one.

We go on. We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.

And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man.

But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. And Peter being humble in this sense as well, because he's he's not he's not boasting before his readers here and saying, hey,

I have the Holy Spirit in my heart in such a way to tell you these things, this prophetic word which you need to listen to.

He almost speaks of himself in the third person here, the same way that Paul spoke of himself in the third person in second

Corinthians, chapter 12, because of the great and exceeding revelations of God that were being given to him.

So Peter says no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men, including himself, spoke from God as they were carried along by the

Holy Spirit. These are not my words that are being proclaimed to you. These are the words of Christ and I, as one of his apostles proclaiming this word to you, of course, coming from Peter, not from me,

I'm not an apostle. And I reiterate once again, there will be no new apostles. The apostles, as we have them given in the first century between 30 and 70

AD, they were the apostles. There would be no others. Paul said of himself in first Corinthians 15, 8, that as to one untimely born,

Christ appeared last of all to him. Last of all, there would be no other apostles appointed after the apostle

Paul. And so Peter is saying this word that has come to you from the apostles is a word from Christ himself.

Listen to it. Just as God said from that holy mountain, this is my beloved son with whom

I am well pleased. Listen to him. And Peter saying, we heard that voice.

We have the prophetic word more fully confirmed. Peter is saying to those who are listening to what he is saying, those who are reading what he has written, you see more clearly now because of the confirmed word from the apostles than even we understood when we were with Jesus at that time.

We didn't understand what was happening, which is why Peter was just talking off the top of his head because he was terrified.

He had no idea what else to say. We read in Luke chapter 24 that all the way up to Jesus's ascension into heaven, the disciples had no idea what to make of these things.

But it was when Jesus explained to them the scriptures that their eyes were open to understand everything that had been prophesied from the prophets in the

Old Testament all the way up until the present. The things that Jesus said that they didn't understand even when Jesus was saying them.

Suddenly, their eyes had been opened by Christ to be able to know what had been prophesied about him in the holy scriptures.

And so Peter is saying to his readers, you are able to understand this even now better than we understood it at the time that Jesus was telling us about these things.

And you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

This is talking about the second coming. But this this explanation of rising in your hearts is to suggest that the coming of Christ is not just something that will be an objective event.

It's not just something that we behold with our senses and observe, oh, Christ has returned.

It's also there's going to be a full transformation that begins way down deep in the core.

Anytime that we have this reference to the heart, love the Lord, your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, it's it's way down deep in the very inner recesses, as far down into the center as you can possibly dig from there all the way out.

Because remember what Jesus said about sin, it is from the heart comes evil thoughts, evil suspicions, a slander, malicious words, lies, murder, sexual immorality.

It starts in the heart. That's where a person is corrupted. And so when a person is transformed in Christ, that also begins in the heart.

It doesn't start from the outside in. It begins from the inside out. And so the return of Christ is going to be that perfect revelation in such a way that we have not yet experienced until he returns.

We are being sanctified now. We are fully sanctified on the day of the Lord. Sanctification ends the day that Christ returns and we will see him as he is because we will be made to be like him, as it says in First John three, two.

So, again, this is not just something that we observe on the outside as an objective event. It's also something that that transforms the heart of all of the saints from way down deep in the center all the way out.

Our lowly bodies are made to be like his glorious body in every way, shape and form from the soul to the material.

Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

This wasn't made up by any person who conceptualized these things, especially considering that the entire Bible was written over a span of fifteen hundred years.

And yet all speaks in the very same voice, which can only be done by the power of the Holy Spirit, for no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man.

But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. A week and a half ago, when

I was critiquing Nabil Qureshi's visit to Bethel Church and he talked about how there were tons of people who came up to him,

I think he said something like thirteen hundred people that were prophesying over him. And he said some prophecies, you know, they were good, they were meaningful, they were encouraging.

We have to be careful about prophecy because prophecy can be dangerous. There are people that will say prophecies who mean well, but it probably wasn't actually coming from God.

What does the Bible say about a prophet who prophesies, but then it's confirmed that that prophecy didn't come from the

Lord. They prophesy something. It didn't happen. Therefore, it could not possibly have come from God. What does the scripture say about that?

It says that a person who prophesies like that shall be put to death. That's the way it was in theocratic Israel.

Deuteronomy chapter 18. The prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak shall die.

That same sentence applies even for people now who will claim to speak a word from God, but it did not actually come from God.

It's blasphemy. It is taking the Lord's name in vain and it is punishable by death to say that God told me to tell you this, but then it didn't really come from God.

It is a lie and it did not come from the Lord. It came from where? If it doesn't come from God, who does it come from?

It comes from the devil. And though it is not up to us to carry out that sentence, we don't live in a theocracy anymore.

This is not theonomy we're talking about here. So it is not our job to carry out the sentence of putting a person to death who prophesies something from God that didn't actually come from God.

But in the end, if that person does not repent of their sin and come to the Lord, they will stand before him in judgment and they will be judged for their lies.

And the Bible assures us that their sentence is death for that level of blasphemy to claim something came from God that they knew in their mind did not come from God, but was actually a word from the devil.

So it is not for us to speak prophecies that did not come from God. It is it is a very serious offense against the

Lord. And so Peter is saying here, no true prophecy, no true prophecy was ever produced by the will of man.

Men spoke from God. As they were carried along by the Holy Spirit, the revealed will of God has been given to us in his scriptures.

God will not reveal any new truth apart from what we see in the

Bible. May all things be tested according to the word of God written down by people who were eyewitnesses of his majesty, who were there when the voice was proclaimed of Christ.

This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him, our great

God. I pray that we would have hearts and minds that are all the more diligent to listen to our Savior Christ as he commissioned his disciples to go and make disciples.

He also said, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded. And so may we be held accountable to the commands of Christ.

May we stand in fear and awe and reverence of God, not playing around with your name or using it to our own fancy, but we worship you for the glorious God that you are and test all things according to the scriptures, that which was written down by your prophets and your apostles to your glory.

We seek and desire nothing beyond what has been given to us by God himself in your word, the

Bible. So keep us accountable to these things and help us to be trustworthy stewards who handle the word of God rightly.

In the name of Christ we pray, Amen. You can find a complete list of videos, books, devotionals, and other resources online at www .tt