· Isaiah 40:1-11
· Psalm 85:1-2, 8-13 (13)
· 2 Peter 3:8-15a
· Mark 1:1-8
Peter makes an interesting point here: time does not mean the same thing to the Lord that it means to us.
On an individual level, if you've been asking the Lord to do something for you, you could take this to mean that the Lord will do it in his own time, but that's not actually what Peter said. What Peter says is "the Lord is not slow about his promise." Did the Lord promise to do whatever it is you're praying for? I bet not. The Lord made specific promises to specific people in the Bible, and none of them include "I'll give you whatever loot you ask for." You don't really see in the Bible someone saying "yo God, can you get me some loot?" and God promising to come through for them.
So we're not talking about God answering your prayers for material benefits. God did not promise to do that. Peter is talking about the things God specifically said he would do, and hasn't done yet; and about the only thing that's left on the list of "things God promised us" is the Last Day. And what Peter is suggesting about the Last Day is that God is holding off to give everyone a chance to repent.
If the Last Day is not to come until everyone has repented, then we're going to be waiting a very long time. In fact, right now we're going entirely in the wrong direction for that. We're getting more self-righteous by the day. We, ourselves, you and I. The rest of the world too, but I'm talking specifically about you and I and our culture. We are becoming more and more full of ourselves. When I was growing up, it was perfectly acceptable to point out whatever was done wrong. Whether a child did poorly in school, or an employee did a poor job, or the government underperformed, it was perfectly acceptable to say it and expect improvement. In fact, once upon a time, and not too long ago at that, people believed there was merit in doing one's job right, even if it doesn't validate your uniqueness or whatever you want to call it. In fact when I was growing up, your job wasn't about celebrating your unique beauty by doing whatever you want at the expense of correct performance.
Our culture of individualism tells us that whatever we do is great and beautiful because it reflects our own glorious personality, which is intrinsically beautiful and valuable to mankind. All this does is promote narcissism and incompetence. We can't accept criticism of our performance. We don't even accept the very concept of criticism as a valid social process. But if we can't even handle having our poor performance pointed out at work, how can we ever pretend to repent? If we work off the principle that whatever we do is an intrinsically valuable expression of our beautiful uniqueness, how can we genuinely believe that anything we've done is wrong?
The current trend in our culture is the very opposite of repentance. It's teaching us that we can do no wrong; yet the more we reject criticism, the less we are even capable of recognising "right" from "wrong", whether in our job performance, in our interpersonal interactions, or in our inner thoughts and the things that are known to ourselves only.
Ironically, while our cult of the individual is driving us further and further from God, it is also destroying our physical world, so that if we go on long enough, we will indeed end up dissolving the heavens and earth and everything in between. We're going to bring the Last Day upon ourselves – minus what God promised. If the Last Day comes as God chooses, the earth will be destroyed, but we will be saved. If we simply destroy the earth through our pig-headed inability to accept that we're doing something wrong, we will simply die, and presumably, we'll all go to Hell. Is there really such a thing as Hell? I believe Hell is within us. If the world ends before we repent, our souls will spend eternity being eaten by our guilt, anger, pride and sin. That ugly feeling you get when someone criticises you? That's what Hell will be like. Every foul, ugly, painful feeling we bring on ourselves by sin will be eating at us for ever. We will literally be gnashing our teeth in the outer darkness.
So Peter tells us, while we wait for the Last Day, strive to be at peace and without sin. What is sin? We keep making lists and lists of what's a sin; generally taken to be "whatever I do isn't a sin, and whatever you do is." A minister of the Anglican Church once told me that bowling is a sin. Bowling? You know what bowling is? You take a ball and throw it at a bunch of pins. How in the world is this something the Lord cares about? It's not. The Lord doesn't care about bowling or card-playing or anything else we call "sin", per se. What the Lord cares about is behaviour that is anti-social instead of pro-social. Most things are neither intrinsically anti-social nor intrinsically pro-social; you have to look at context. But there are a few things that I can't think of as having a pro-social function in any context. Gossip; consumerism; smoking; imperialism; war-mongering; inability to accept criticism. I'm sure there are more.
When you think about it, an easy way to avoid most sins is humility. If you are humble, you will not buy a big house and a fancy car, and all sorts of material goods you don't need. If you are humble, you will not think we have the right to send an army here or there to impose our worldview. If you are humble, you will not freak out when someone criticises you. Why will the meek inherit the earth? Because the proud can only do one thing: destroy it.
Following Jesus requires action. And he told us himself: the first action is to give up material possessions. Not to the point where we can't live, but whatever is unnecessary, a source of pride or a something that controls us because we can't give it up, and certainly whatever is anti-social. Live simply. Live so that you are denying yourself. Live so that you know you want more, but you choose not to reach for it, because it would not serve the Lord.
Praise be to God, the Withholder, the Expander, the Abaser, the Exalter.
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