Do you set a time limit for the Messiah?
Response to comment [from an agnostic]: "Like say it is the year 1300000 A.D. Christ hasn't returned yet, or whoever your messiah is if you are from another religion. Is that about time to give up the faith? Say if he's not year 3000 years from now, wouldn't that make you skeptical? What's your deadline for this man?"
God's plan is
right on schedule.
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"2 Pe 3:4 Where is the promise of
His coming? The early church
believed that Jesus was coming back
imminently (cf. 1 Cor. 15:51; 1
Thess. 1:10; 2:19; 4:15–18; 5:1, 2).
These scoffers employed an emotional
argument against imminency rather
than a biblical argument. Their
argument played on ridicule and
disappointment. the fathers. The OT
patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob (cf. Rom. 9:5; Heb. 1:1). all
things continue as they were. This
argument against the second coming
of Christ is based on the theory of
uniformitarianism, which says that
all natural phenomena have operated
uniformly since the beginning of the
earth. The false teachers were also
implying that God is absent from
earth affairs. In effect, they were
teaching that, “There will not be a
great cataclysmic judgmental event
at the end of history, because that
is not how the universe works. There
never has been such a judgment, so
why should we expect one in the
future. Instead, everything in the
universe is stable, closed, fixed,
and governed by never varying
patterns and principles of
evolution. Nothing catastrophic has
ever happened in the past, so
nothing catastrophic ever will
happen in the future. There will be
no divine invasion, no supernatural
judgment on mankind.”
3:5 they willfully forget. The false
teachers, in their quest to avoid
the doctrine of judgment,
deliberately ignore the two major
previous divine cataclysmic
events—creation and the flood. by
the word of God the heavens were of
old. Creation was God’s stepping
into the emptiness and bringing the
universe into existence, not by
uniformitarianism, but by an
instantaneous, explosive 6-day
creation. Everything has not gone
along in some consistent, unvarying
evolutionary process. In six, 24
hour days the whole universe was
created mature and complete (see
notes on Gen. 1; 2). earth standing
out of water and in the water. The
earth was formed between two realms
of watery mass. During the early
part of the creation week, God
collected the upper waters into a
canopy around the whole earth, and
the lower waters into underground
reservoirs, rivers, lakes, and seas.
See notes on Gen. 1:2–9.
3:6 by which. That is, by water.
God, by creating water above and
below, built into His creation the
tool of its destruction. the world
that then existed. A reference to
the pre-flood world order. This
world included the physical
arrangement with the canopy above,
the waters in the underground
reservoirs, rivers, lakes, and seas
below, and the heavens in the
middle. The pre-flood world,
sheltered from the sun’s destructive
ultraviolet rays, and with a gentle
climate without rain, storms, and
winds, was characterized by long
life of humans (Gen. 5) and the
ability of the earth (like a green
house) to produce extensively.
perished, being flooded with water.
The second great divine cataclysm
that defeats the idea of
uniformitarianism, was the universal
flood which drowned the whole earth
and altered that originally created
world order. According to Genesis
7:11ff., the flood occurred from two
directions: first, the bursting open
of the sources of water below as the
earth cracked open and gas, dust,
water, and air burst up; then came
the breakup of the canopy when hit
by all that upward flow, which sent
the water from above crashing down
on the earth. The deluge was so
cataclysmic that the inhabitants of
the earth were all destroyed, except
8 people and a representation of
every kind of animal (see notes on
Gen. 7:11–24). Clearly, by those two
great events, it is clear that the
world is not in a uniformitarian
process.
3:7 which are now. Humanity, since
the flood, lives in the second world
order. One of the obvious
differences between the two
world-orders is that people live 70
years in the present world not 900
years, which was a common age of
pre-Flood human beings. And Peter
was making the point that there is a
third form of the heavens and earth
yet to come following another
cataclysm. are now preserved by the
same word. The present world system
is reserved for future judgment,
which will come by the Word of God
just as creation and the flood came.
God will speak it into existence as
well, after the present order is
again destroyed. reserved for fire.
God put the rainbow in the sky to
signify that He would never destroy
the world again by water (Gen.
9:13). In the future, God will
destroy the heavens and the earth by
fire (cf. Is. 66:15; Dan. 7:9, 10;
Mic. 1:4; Mal. 4:1; Matt. 3:11, 12;
2 Thess. 1:7, 8). In the present
universe, the heavens are full of
stars, comets, and asteroids. The
core of the earth is also filled
with a flaming, boiling, liquid lake
of fire, the temperature of which is
some 12,400 degrees Fahrenheit. The
human race is separated from the
fiery core of the earth by only a
thin 10 mile crust. Far more than
that, the whole of creation is a
potential fire bomb due to its
atomic structure. As man from atoms
creates destructive bombs that burn
a pa
th of death, so God can
disintegrate the whole universe in
an explosion of atomic energy (see
notes on vv. 10–12). until the day
of judgment … of ungodly men. The
earth waits for the day of judgment
and destruction of ungodly men. The
godly will not be present on earth
when God speaks into existence the
judgment by fire (cf. 1 Thess. 1:10;
5:9)." MacArthur, J., Jr. (Ed.).
(1997). The MacArthur Study Bible
(electronic ed., p. 1958).
Nashville, TN: Word Pub.
"The next time someone asks you why am I here? What is the point? You can just point them to these two verses. Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created absolutely everything. Revelation 5:13 And then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea and all that was in them singing to him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praises and honor and glory and power forever and ever! And everything in-between those who verses you could put in one giant parenthesis. God made everything. A few other things happened and then everything worshiped him--that's the story in a nutshell." ~ Daryl Ferguson
In the beginning Gods ( אֱלֹהִים ) he created (Ge 1:1).
Creation Series by Daryl Ferguson
Response to comment [from a Christian]: "He is giving agnostics time to repent."
You'd think he'd say thank you.
Ac 17:27, 2 Thess. 2:1
