Lord: 'Wait a minute, sit tight'

"What's life going to be like in the third heaven? It's not going to be an unusual, shocking, unfamiliar environment. To me that's one of the most wonderful things about it. Heaven will be a place of total familiarity. It's going to feel like home. It's going to be a welcoming environment; a natural place for you to be.

"Yes, it's going to have animals. You're going to have cities, rivers, farmers, jobs, agriculture, demanding activities. In fact, one of the things God does all through the Scriptures is when He created man, it was to participate with Him. Not just to dictate what goes on but to understand what He's doing and actively participate with Him in the carrying out of His creation," explains Richard Jordan.

"There will be demanding activities. You're not going to be bored, sitting on a cloud drinking mint juleps and watching the little chubby angels go by. You know, about 30 minutes of that and you'd be tired, bored stiff."

*****

II Peter 1: [12] Wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be established in the present truth.

[13] Yea, I think it meet, as long as I am in this tabernacle, to stir you up by putting you in remembrance;
[14] Knowing that shortly I must put off this my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath shewed me.
[15] Moreover I will endeavour that ye may be able after my decease to have these things always in remembrance.
[16] For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

"Pete says, 'I'm going to die just like the Lord told me I would back in John 21, but I want to be sure that after I'm gone you understand the things we've been preaching to you are not cunningly devised fables.'

"What were they preaching to them? Verse 10: [10] Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall:

[11] For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

"Peter's been preaching about that coming kingdom. In John 21 you see they were expecting that coming kingdom to arrive rather quickly; it was on the horizon for them. And yet by the time you get to II Peter, Peter's old and going to die and the kingdom hasn't come.

"He writes II Peter so the people he's writing to, that 'little flock' of Believers who followed his ministry, will understand that what he preached to them isn't false.

"He said, 'We went up on the mount of transfiguration and we were eyewitnesses; I'm telling you what I SAW when I saw Him transformed in His glory, and we've got a more sure word of prophecy. We've actually got God's Word on this, which is better than any eyewitness account.'

Verses 19-21: [19] We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts:

[20] Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
[21] For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

II Peter 1:3-4: [3] Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,

[4] 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 the creation.

" 'Nothing's changed, Peter. What you said was wrong.'

Verses 8-9: 8] But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

[9] The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

"That's an important statement. Men say, 'If you tell me you'll do something and you wait a little while, you must have been lying.' God's not that way, but He is longsuffering to usward.

"So, Peter says the delay in His coming is no big deal, because a thousand years for us is like a day to the Lord. Time doesn't change His mind.

"If you tell somebody you'll do something and six months from now you hadn't done it, you know you might not ever do it. But the Lord's not that way. If He ever told you He's going to do something, it doesn't make any difference how long it takes, He's going to do it.

"When God formed the nation Israel, He told Moses, 'Go down there and tell Pharoah, Let my people go.' So, Mo goes down there and tells him and the Lord says, 'He ain't going to let them go, so I'm going to give 10 plagues.'

"I don't know about you, but if I was wanting to get delivered right away, I wouldn't want, 'Well, let's stop and do 10 more things before we do that.' 

"It'd be, 'Lord, hey, us down here we'd appreciate you getting the show on the road.' The Lord says, 'Wait a minute, sit tight, first I'm going to whack old Pharoah around a little bit. Take the gods of Egypt and destroy them, demonstrating that I'm the God of gods. Before I do that, I got this to do, but don't worry, I'm going to do that.'

"That delay principle goes all through Israel's history and Pete's calling on it here. He says, 'The Lord's not slack; He'll do what He said He'll do, but right now He's being longsuffering.'

Verses 15-16: [15] And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you;

[16] As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.

"The longsuffering is explained to you by Paul in his ministry. I Timothy 1:16: [16] Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting.

"That means God interrupted the prophetic program. He didn't do away with it; He just put it on pause so He could do something He hadn't promised anybody He would do; something He kept secret to Himself but now is doing, which is the dispensation of grace.

"And when that happened, you know what that meant? Peter, instead of going into the kingdom, he's going to die."