As A Dying Man - [2 Peter 1:12-15]

You know, the human mind is an amazing creation. We have been given the capacity to imagine worlds beyond reality. We learn, we invent, and we retain vast amounts of information, snapshots of life, sports statistics, song lyrics, vital things, birthdates, mathematical formulas, all manner of information.

In fact, I would say, you know, I like to say, I have a peculiar capacity for remembering things that have no significance whatsoever, absolutely insignificant trivia. In fact, I'm confident that many of you have that same ability.

If I were to ask almost any question, because I know that you're very intelligent and that you have massive quantities of information there, I think I could probably get some kind of answer for almost anything this morning.

But I was really struck a few years ago when we went to the Shepherds Conference and Al Moeller explained, basically without taking a breath, what happens when some noise is made and how our mind processes the information and we actually, you know, it goes in your ear and you process it and you actually translate it into something usable.

And he just went boom, boom, boom, so fast that I could hardly even understand what he was saying. And it was amazing, boom, boom, boom. The facts were laid out clearly, swiftly, and it was hard to keep up with them.

And it really was, as I thought about it, a testimony to the God-given ability to memorize facts and to replicate them, to just throw them out there. Our minds are really amazing. But they are notable for one other thing, our capacity, our ability to forget.

We forget things that we don't want to forget, right? I guess otherwise we wouldn't forget them, I don't know, you know. I mean if you forget something and you don't care if you forget it or not, do you forget it?

I don't know, it's kind of an imponderable. But how often do we just forget things and we really don't want to? Now think about it for a second, what do you not forget? What are the things that just kind of stick in your mind?

And I think typically the things, the facts that stick in our mind the best are the things that we've repeated over and over and over again. For me it was, I mean I just, in the fourth and fifth grade, maybe the third or second grade, the kids probably do it in kindergarten now, but the multiplication tables, I just went over them and over them and over them.

In fact I love to get, there were these little folders they used to make and they had the multiplication tables on them and I loved to look at that. And then I had a little, I was a weird kid, I had this little slide rule that had the multiplication tables on it and I loved that slide rule.

I just loved everything about multiplication tables. And you could ask me to this day and I absolutely, I know everything backwards and forwards when it comes to multiplication tables. Why? Because I practiced.

Repetition works. Training works. We used to have a saying on the sheriff's department, you do what you'll perform as you train. You can't just expect to go out there on a given day and just be super caught because it's not going to happen.

Michael Phelps won eight gold medals. He didn't just fall into the pool and grab eight gold medals. He trained relentlessly day after day after day and so when he hit the pool in the Olympics, he knew exactly what he was doing.

He knew exactly how hard he could push himself because he'd done it. He had confidence that he could do it. I'd invite you to open your Bibles to 2 Peter chapter 1 verses 12 to 15 and we're going to study this morning a topic that many people don't like.

The Need for Repetition in Spiritual Growth

Repetition. 2 Peter 1 verses 12 to 15. Peter writes, therefore, and of course one of the letters of therefore refers back to what's before it and we'll get to that. Therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things.

Even though you already know them and have been established in the truth which is present with you, I consider it right as long as I am in this earthly dwelling to stir you up by way of reminder, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me.

Verse 15, and I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure you will be able to call these things to mind. Now this morning, I want you to see three commands drawn from our text so that you will both be reminded of the truth and be challenged to remind others.

There is a theme that you are going to hear this morning and it's the importance of being reminded. I'm going to remind you to be reminded. There are three urgent imperatives so that your spiritual reflexes, as it were, will be finally honed and you will respond rightly when confronted with false teaching.

I told Lou I might do this. I've got to say, I'll do something a little bit different but let me just say, you know there was one time in my career as a police officer where my life quite possibly could have been at stake.

Was talking to a gentleman, I was at his door looking for a sister to give her a subpoena and I noticed a bulge underneath his, he had this sweatband on which I thought was curious for such a skinny guy.

And I started looking at that bulge and I go, you know, what is that? And so I asked him, I said, what is that? And he started, and I recognized now that it's a gun. And he started reaching for it and you know what, before he could reach for it and I was reaching for it, I had my gun out and I said, don't move.

And I'm like, wow. Now how did that happen? How did that happen? Because my reflexes, I'd trained enough that my reflexes were such, when I recognized the danger, my gun was out before I almost knew, I mean everything just rushed together.

I was yelling at him, I was reaching for the gun, I was pulling my own gun. All that came together because I had trained, I was ready for the moment. Spiritual life is not different. We need to be trained, we need to be ready.

Peter wrote this letter to warn about false teachers. And you say, well false teachers will never get me, that'll never happen. Peter wrote this letter because he knew it would happen. He knew that false teachers would come along and that people would follow them.

And you know what, you have to be ready. When that guy starts with his false teaching, your reflexes have to be such that you're out with the truth before he throws his lies at you and confuses you. You have to be trained, you have to be ready.

Our first imperative, our first command this morning, you need to be reminded of what you already know. You need to be reminded of what you already know. Let me say it again, you need to be reminded of what you already know.

Look at verse 12, therefore, I will always be ready to remind you of these things. Again, therefore obviously refers to the previous context. Peter's giving us his reasoning for going in a new direction by giving us his motivation.

He says, my motivation is what I just told you. He just told them that they needed to evaluate their lives, what we talked about last week, to make sure that their calling and election were more sure by looking for their growth in various spiritual qualities.

He's also reminded his readers of all the blessings that are theirs by virtue of being in Christ. That's how he started the letter and how God has given us everything pertaining to life and godliness.

And it is by the work of God shown by our growth in these areas that we are granted entrance, as he says there in 1 Peter, or 2 Peter, entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

It is because of the necessity of remembering our blessings in Christ and examining our lives that Peter says he's going to remind you of these things, the things that he's just been talking about. Now over the past few weeks, I've been exchanging internet messages with a man who says he's a Christian, but he thinks that Christians are not to be subjected to earthly governments.

Without getting into all the details, I asked him where he goes to church. And he goes, well, you know, I don't really go to one church because I don't know if there's anybody who can really handle me.

And I thought, phew, you got that right. But he says, you know what, he goes, he says, I don't really need a place where they do expository preaching. I've had more expository preaching than just about anybody I know.

I've heard enough. And that just doesn't comport with what Scripture says. Salvation is a single moment in time, a one-time event with ongoing consequences. But sanctification, that is, being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, being transformed from image to image, is an ongoing process.

John 17, 17 says, sanctify them in truth, thy word is truth. This man says, I don't need to sit under the expositional teaching of the word because I get all that I need. I read various preachers. I do different things.

I don't need to sit under the word. I remember when I was in seminary, we had these preaching labs. Rick Holland was one of the professors in there. And one of the guys got up and gave his sermon and sat down.

And Rick just sat there and he said, you know what? He said, don't hold back. He goes, you think because we're seminary profs and we're seminary students that we don't need to hear the word? He goes, slap us with it.

Hit us with it. We need the word as much as anyone. And I thought this week, I go, that is exactly right. There is no one who can sit there and say, I don't need to hear this. I already know it all. I'm done.

I have arrived. I am the pinnacle of theological fitness. It just doesn't happen. You, me, and every Christian needs to be soaked, submerged in these truths to be reminded. And Peter promises to always be ready to do so.

One commentator says, the implication is that they already knew these things, but they must be reminded to keep them central in their thinking. Just as I was saying earlier with a police officer, you have to be thinking officer safety.

As a Christian, you have to keep the truth firmly in mind. You have to be focused on these things. Why? Because what you do immediately in an emergent situation is what you are prepared to do. We forget all the time, all the time.

And consider what the Bible says about forgetfulness and how forgetful we are. Consider Israel, delivered from slavery in Egypt, brought through the Red Sea with the Pharaoh's army, hot in their pursuit, hot in pursuit, and then destroyed.

And what were they doing within a very short period of time? Making a golden calf, worshiping idols. The Old Testament is filled with reminders of God's delivery of Israel, of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Why? Why, over and over again, remember the covenant I made with your fathers. Remember the deliverance from... Why? Because people forget. They need to be reminded. And we not only forget, but sometimes we think we get it and we don't.

We hear it, but it doesn't really sink through. I think maybe the single hardest class I ever took was calculus. I guess I just was not smart, but I had a hard time grasping the concept. So what I would do is I would take...

I bought extra books and I would sit there and I would read what different authors would say about the same thing because I needed to get different perspectives so I could put it all together. Sometimes we can hear something over and over and over again, and then one day we just go, I get it.

It finally makes sense to me. I understand why God had to choose me before the foundations of the world. Or I understand why this or that. Now think about Peter, the author of this book. He was with Jesus for the entirety of his ministry.

We have the Gospels, and I hope this doesn't shock you, but I don't think we have every sermon that Jesus ever preached. And I'm pretty sure, this also may be shocking, I'm pretty sure that Jesus repeated some of his sermons.

So Peter, sitting there, hearing the Lord frequently, I don't know if it was every day, but over and over and over again preach sometimes the same message. Did he get it? Did he understand everything?

He lived, he ate, he walked, he talked with God in the flesh every single day. But clearly, he didn't fully get it, not until after the resurrection. If Peter, who had access to God in the flesh, didn't fully understand things, if it took a while for it to sink through his skull, I think we might need to hear the same things over and over and over again.

And let me tell you, you might say, well, you know, being reminded, hearing the same thing, that's boring. It's not boring, it's essential. Again, in verse 12, even though you already know them. Much like my online friend, I think there are Christians who view sermons as a been there, done that, know that kind of experience.

My question for you is, do you have the Bible wired? Do you really know all the doctrine, all the truths of Scripture? Is there no one who can teach you anything? I keep using all these seminary illustrations this morning, but you know, one of the most humbling experiences in seminary, I think, was one day the dean of seminary, it was our last year in seminary, told each of the more than 80 students in this class to take out a blank sheet of paper.

And he told us to write out the names of the books of the Bible in order and to spell them all correctly. We had five minutes to do so. And I think out of the 80, I think there might have been four or five of us who were able to do it.

It's pretty small for men who are training for the pastorate. If I was to ask everybody this morning to take out a sheet of paper and give you five minutes to write out all the names of the Bible in order and spell them correctly, could you do it?

You might be doing okay until you got up to Habakkuk. How many K's in Habakkuk? Don't answer that. But again, consider Peter's purpose to protect, in writing this letter, to protect the church from the oncoming onslaught, the attacks of false teachers.

Yes, they knew these things, but they needed to be reminded. Listen to what Lucas and Green say. Those who teach the Bible have a great responsibility here because there will always be a temptation to hold people's attention with something new.

We have to be humble enough to recognize that we are not creators of the Christian message. The task, the vital task, is to keep reminding people of it, the message, over and over and over again. Peter says they already know these things.

They have gathered all the facts. They intellectually have apprehended them. But what will happen when that knowledge is attacked? Will they, like Eve does when she's confronted by Satan, will they fold?

Will they, like Israel, abandon the true God for idols? Or when they are confronted by a false teacher, will they remember all the time and effort that Peter went to in order to stress what is true? Again, as I said, experts say that in times of stress, we react.

We don't think. We react. You might have the knowledge, but are you prepared? Listen to Jude 4. For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only master and Lord Jesus Christ.

Listen, false teachers may not have fake stenciled on their forehead. They may not walk in wearing some flashing garb that says, I'm a fake. There was a movie years ago where Steve Martin wore this multicolored, bright jacket.

And as soon as you walked in the room, everybody should have thought, false teacher. They don't come in like that. Listen again to that word. For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, under the radar.

They're in stealth mode. And what are they going to do? They're going to, as Satan did in the garden or with the Lord himself, they're going to distort scripture. They're going to bend it just a little bit, twist it just enough to take you off in a new and improved, allegedly, direction.

Paul also wrote about being ready to fight spiritual warfare like this. In 2 Corinthians 10, he says, we are destroying speculations, false teaching, and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God.

And we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ. Look at how he says that. This is a battle. He uses battlefield language. We're to demolish speculative theories about God. New things are not to be embraced, but they are to be torn apart.

They are to be destroyed. MacArthur says, there is no such thing as brand new spiritual truth, only a clearer understanding of the timeless truths. You already know the truth, and you need to be ready to defend it.

Knowledge without a willingness to employ that knowledge, I would argue, is a form of pride. You've just puffed up your head. You're not ready to do anything with it. Being reminded will make you stronger.

Look at verse 12 again. Even though you already know them and have been established in the truth which is present with you, the verb you have been established pictures knowledge as having been confirmed and strengthened by subsequent experience, imparting an inner character of stability, of immovability.

It's a perfect tense, meaning a one-time event with ongoing results. You have been established. You've been planted. You are firmly planted. That sounds like Psalm 1, doesn't it? Peter understood this word well, this word having been established just before he would thrice deny Christ.

Jesus said this in Luke 22, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.

And that word strengthen is the word establish. And he's saying, listen, after you, Peter, have hit the bottom, you will be in a position to strengthen, to establish your brethren. Later in the book, Peter says, in 2 Peter, later in the book, Peter says that false teachers are after the unstable, which is the exact opposite of this verb.

Listen to 2 Peter 2, verse 14. Talking about the false teachers, he says that they have eyes full of adultery that never cease from sin, enticing unstable souls, those who have not been firmly established, having a heart trained in greed, accursed children.

You want to be stable. You want to be firmly established. Talking about the difficulties, understanding some of the things of Paul, Peter writes in 2 Peter 3, verse 16, which the untaught and unstable distorts.

Talking about those false teachers as they do the rest of the scriptures. Unstability, unstable people, quite the opposite of being firmly established. We need to be firmly established in these truths.

That phrase, the truth in there. Having been firmly established in the truth, the truth suggests a relatively, this is Hebert, says the truth suggests a relatively fixed body of doctrine that the Christian church accepted and proclaimed.

We would call it orthodoxy, the truth. There is one truth. There is one fixed truth. Jude called it the once for all delivered faith. Listen, each one of you this morning, if you know Christ, you have that same truth, that same set of facts.

Are you established in it? My challenge to you or my encouragement to you this morning is that you need to be reminded of what you already know. Secondly, you need to be stirred about what you already know.

It is right to be stirred up. Look at verse 13. I consider it right, he says, or righteous, as long as I am in this earthly dwelling, to stir you up by way of reminder. Now tradition tells us that Peter was crucified upside down.

Clement, a co-worker of Peter and Paul, indicates that Peter suffered a great deal during the persecution of Christians directed by the Caesar Nero. We know that this letter was written toward the end of Peter's life.

And that's why I titled this message, As a Dying Man. He could see the end. He's getting old. He's probably about 70 years old. He knows that the end is coming. And he thought it right, proper, correct, that as long as he had breath, that he was going to stir his readers by reminding them of the truth.

Now, do you get stirred up by the proclamation of the truth? This verb means to cause, to wake up, awaken. So my message to you is wake up, be stirred in your souls. The word of the living God is being proclaimed to you for his glory and for your protection.

The truths that you have learned, that you have been taught are not exercises in intellectual gymnastics. They're not so that you can pass some kind of test and get 70 on it. They are truths that stir the hearts of the children of God.

Can you hear the gospel one more time? Are you tired of it? Would you rather hear something new and refreshing? We had this incident on this flight from North Carolina or from New York to Carolina last week.

And I want you to just imagine that you're on that plane sitting in the emergency row before the plane takes off. And the stewardess gets up as they always do, and they read these cards. And sometimes the stewardess is just kind of, have you ever seen this?

You're on an airplane, and they hold up the little bell buckle, and they're like, shh, and they throw it to the side, and they don't even care, okay? But if you're sitting there and those engines stopped working, you probably have just a minute where you're like, what did she say to do, right?

Now get this, false teachers and false teaching will come your way. And you absolutely have to be alert, you have to be prepared, on your guard, fully prepared to defend your mind, your family, maybe even your church.

Fix these truths firmly in your mind now and be stirred by them, be moved by them, be fixated on them, memorize them, teach them to your children, affix them to your doorposts. Okay, I'm going a little too far, put them on your forehead.

That's what the Old Testament believers were told to do, right? Emphasizing the importance of knowing the truth. It may be the old, old story, but it is ever fresh and amazing to those who have been saved by grace.

It is good to be stirred up, it is urgent to be stirred up. Look at verse 14, knowing that the laying aside of my earthly dwelling is imminent as also our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. Again, Peter knew that he was no longer a young man, he couldn't jump and play basketball anymore, it was over for him.

We think back in the life of Peter, right after as Jesus is getting ready to leave, and he's having a discussion with Peter, and he says to Peter that he is too old to attend his sheep, and then the Lord says truly, truly to Peter.

He says, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished, but when you grow old, as he was now, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you and bring you where you do not wish to go.

That time was coming and Peter knew that. He would soon lay aside his earthly dwelling, his tent, his body, he was going to die. He doesn't say, you know what, I'm worried, I'm concerned about myself.

In fact, he had quite the opposite, he wanted to establish to strengthen his brethren before he went. He knew where he was going, he knew he was going to be with the Lord forever. And he set about to establish them.

And so my question would be, does doctrine matter? Does it matter? Peter thought it mattered. Peter thought it was important to teach it and to remind them of what they already knew about it. Why? To stir them up, to get them excited about it, even as his own death approached.

Shouldn't he have been thinking about retirements? What about maybe a cruise? We were talking last night at dinner, somebody said, it's cheaper to go on a permanent cruise than it is to be in a retirement home.

It got me thinking. I love Piper's book, Don't Waste Your Life, and he opens up by saying, here's the American dream. The American dream is to retire to Boca Raton at the age of 50, and to play golf and collect shells and stuff like that.

And he goes, imagine this, he goes, judgment day, the Christian goes up and says, Lord, look at my shells, my shells. Peter wasn't going to go out like that. He wanted to make sure the church was ready, that it was ready for this attack that was going to come.

And he was going to give them the truth right until the end. He wasn't worried about his handicap. He wasn't worried about anything else. He was concerned about the welfare of those that he would leave behind.

He was like the general, knowing that he wouldn't fight in the battle, but wanted to walk the ramparts of the fortress one more time to make sure everything was ready. Firstly, first imperative, we saw you need to be reminded of what you already know.

Secondly, you need to be stirred up about what you already know. And thirdly, you always need to be reminded about what you already know. Peter was diligent. He was very diligent, and diligent instruction is needed.

Look at verse 15, and I will also be diligent. Peter was diligent at that moment, and I have no doubt he was diligent until it was no longer possible to be diligent until he was passing out. He also wrote this letter, which would stand as a permanent reminder to his readers and to you of those things he believed were needful.

But diligent study is needed. Again, look at verse 15, and I will also be diligent that at any time after my departure, you will be able to call these things to mind. Now, just as a side note, I find the word for departure interesting, because it is the word that we would say exodus.

He was leaving, stage rights. And where does it have its roots, that word? Well, from the escape of Egypt to the promised land of Israel. Peter knew his future life was a promotion. He knew where he was going, and in his teaching and writing, he was preparing his readers to fend for themselves.

MacArthur said this, he desired to leave a final will and testament to remind saints of the greatness of salvation, the blessedness of assurance, and to make certain that false doctrine did not rob them of their rich spiritual heritage.

That was Peter's desire for his readers, and it's his desire for you. He may well have had in mind when he said this that I'm going to be diligent. His collaboration with Mark about the gospel of Mark.

Peter was the main source for the gospel of Mark. However, note what he says here, that his readers would be able to call these things to mind. Beloved, you cannot remember what you do not study. I don't know if you took calculus, but give me some of those differential equations, some of those, some of the different things that you learned 20, 30 years ago.

That you spent all night cramming for and then purged from your mind. It's what we do on a daily basis that forms our habits, our thinking, our ability to defend ourselves. I mean, some things you can never forget.

I don't know why, but I remember the preamble of the Constitution of the United States even though I learned it in the eighth grade. Why? I guess I really like my teacher. I don't know. But it's the things that we focus on that we remember.

And Peter made every effort to provide you with the tools you need to be protected from false teaching. You need the truth, and he wrote it under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. So firstly, you need to be reminded about what you already know.

You need to be stirred about what you already know. Thirdly, you always need to be reminded about what you already know. I'm reminded of what Paul wrote in 2 Timothy. Again, giving Timothy instruction on how to establish and run a church.

He says, remind them of these things and solemnly charge them in the presence of God not to wrangle about words, which is useless and leads to the ruin of its hearers. Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth.

Listen, remind them. It says to the pastor, be diligent to study, but remind them of these things. Give them the truth over and over again. And I think about, in terms of practical application, what can we do with this?

This idea of reminding. May I just say this morning, with the heart of a pastor and someone who doesn't think, listen, we need more numbers, we need more depth. Some folks can't come to Sunday school, I understand that.

But some folks just won't come into Sunday school. Some folks think Sunday is a time for sleeping in. What can I possibly learn in Sunday school anyway? And again, I would just go back to this. If seminary professors, if future pastors, if current pastors think I need to hear the word, I need to be under the word.

I need to be taught those things over and over and over again because I forget them. When I need them, they flee from me. If they didn't, I would never sin. If my mind was so fixed on the truths of Christ that those were always in front of me, would I sin more or less?

I think less. Tonight at 6 o 'clock, the word's gonna be taught. We won't have as many people here. Beloved, again, I'm not after the numbers. I want to remind you, I want you to be reminded of the things that we need in our lives.

The things to fight off false teaching. The things to protect ourselves from sin. We have books out of the book table. We're not out to make a profit, we don't make a profit. But there are timeless truths therein and insights, not new insights, not fresh insights, but insights that you can only get in depth when you read books.

That you can ponder, that you can think about. They're all a matter of, I just sent out an email, Bob Bureau sent me a note the other day saying the vault for the Shepherds Conference tapes. All those things are available online.

You can literally spend your life immersed in the truth of God, listening to sermons all the time. Now, if you're here this morning and you say, these things don't interest me. There might be a reason for that, maybe you don't know Christ.

And I wanted to take just a couple minutes to talk to you. The Bible tells us that all, each and every single person has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. You say, well, I'm certainly not perfect, and no one is, and that's right.

But our lack of perfection, one sin, one thing, I heard it called doing something wrong this week, I did something wrong. It's not something wrong, it's sin. Sin is falling short of the glory of God, failing to keep his perfect law.

And one sin is enough to merit eternal hell. Listen to what Jesus said. He said, if your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than having two hands go into hell, into the unquenchable fire.

That means it never gets put out. It's never satisfied. People say, well, God is love, and that is true. But God is not only love. In fact, somebody made me a very nice bumper sticker that says God is wrath.

But he is justice, he is righteousness, and he is wrath. Listen to Romans 2 .5, but because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath. And revelation of the righteous judgment of God.

God is going to judge every single person, everyone. And he is going to show forth his wrath on that day. And the sad truth is we come into this world estranged from God, separated from him. We come into this world with a sinful nature.

We sin because of our nature and because of our own choice. And on our own, we could never deserve heaven. Why? Because Jesus says the standard is perfection. Be perfect, even as your father in heaven is perfect.

You say, but wait a minute, you just said we can't be perfect. That is exactly right. That is exactly right. And if you don't get anything else this morning, I want you to understand that. You cannot be perfect, and yet you must be perfect.

And then, in my opinion, the greatest two words in all the Bible, but God. We are hopeless. We have no opportunity to get to heaven. But God is rich in mercy. He pours out mercy upon those who do not deserve it.

That's the definition of mercy. He sent his son, the Lord Jesus, fully God, to take on an additional nature, to become man as well as God. Jesus lived a normal life, normal in the sense that he got tired.

He got hungry. He did everything that we humans deal with, but he never sinned. That is, he always did what God commanded and never fell short of the perfection God demands. He ultimately was wrongly accused and condemned to a death he did not deserve.