So we are still on the last half of 2nd peter chapter 2. For a bit of context, Peter has been describing true prophecy as opposed to false prophecy or false teaching. In the end of chapter 1, he writes that the origin of the good news is from God, the origin of all prophecy is the word of God. True Prophecies don’t come from the prophet’s interpretation of the times, or the prophet’s own will or desire. True prophecies come from God, and there are verses in Hebrews that say that now God doesn’t speak through prophets but through his son Jesus. So if we want to understand the word of God we need to understand Christ and how his atonement fulfills prophetic messages and promises in the old testament. Those prophecies that clearly don’t point directly to Christ are either messages of things that have happened which foreshadow Christ, or things that will happen at some point later in the end times. Now in Chapter 2, Peter says just as there were false prophets in the old times, there will be false teachers today. You will be able to see them because they change around the true doctrine, and secretly introduce heresies. Their message will not be orthodox or Biblical. The origin of their message will not be God, but will be their own selfish desires and they will greedily exploit you with stories that are made up. They see you as merchandise or a commodity, and don’t really care for your heart. God didn’t spare these types of people throughout history. God punished Angels that were disobedient. God flooded the world but saved Noah. God leveled Sodom and Gomorrah, but spared Lot and his family. God has shown that he can and will punish wrongdoing and he can and will rescue his righteous elect. We have the righteousness not of just Noah or Lot, but we have been imputed with the righteousness of his Son Jesus. Now False teachers will continue in their lies, and will blaspheme against God and Angels in matters they don’t understand. They will live with boldness and arrogance, proudly dishonoring the All Powerful God. Last post I gave a silly example about someone like me with no boxing experience spitting in the face of Floyd Mayweather and challenging him to a fight. Now that might be a silly example, but in reality it understates the level of mismatch and outclass. Mayweather and I are both human beings, But I stand little to no chance in defeating him in any way. But at least he and I are both human living in bodies that will expire. Maybe I could win if he was very sick or temporarily paralyzed, (even then, probably not, right?) If Mayweather had infinite power and ability to create the universe, immortality, all knowledge… you know, like if he were God, then challenging him would seem even stupider. And that’s just what false teachers and prophets are doing. False prophets are like brute animals, destined to fall into their trap of delusional pride, just like Satan’s original sin, and Adam and Eve’s sin, when they were promised they could be like God. Peter is reminding the readers that False teaching will not go unpunished. So let’s continue:

13 They will be paid back with harm for the harm they have done. Their idea of pleasure is to carouse in broad daylight. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their pleasures while they feast with you.[e] 14 With eyes full of adultery, they never stop sinning; they seduce the unstable; they are experts in greed—an accursed brood!

False teachers will be paid back with harm. Why? Because they are doing harm. That’s Justice. False teachers do harm. Bad doctrine leads to bad behavior. In Peter’s time there was a lot of bad doctrine. If you espoused Gnostic doctrine, you will think your flesh and all of the physical creation is corrupt, and is beyond all ability to salvage. Some Gnostics lived a very stoic life denying themselves all pleasure so they could enter the spiritual realm. This is a form of salvation by works. If you think you can do something to be good enough or righteous enough or favorable enough for God’s acceptance, you are bringing yourself to a place of divinity- Making yourself like God. Which is a form of idolatry (kind of the same exact sin as Satan or Adam/Eve) . Now, if you thought that you could potentially be good enough to be like God, you may live a terrified life, because messing up would be catastrophic. Living as if you had to earn your salvation is a life of fear, just skirting by until you make a mistake, lose your temper, slip up somewhere (or anywhere!). And if you are honest, you inevitably acknowledge you aren’t perfect. You most likely would appear nice or good, but inside you’d be miserable because you fail to achieve perfection. The other way around this is to deny that you’ve done anything wrong. Other Gnostics would argue, why bother trying if everything is corrupt anyway, so what you do in your flesh doesn’t matter at all. But this is not salvation by grace, this is Eyes wide shut. That other side of Gnostic doctrine is denial of a sin problem to begin with. If you think you don’t have a sin problem, you will continue doing things that gratify your flesh or your selfish desire, you don’t see it as sin, and so you don’t imagine you need salvation. As time goes on, this behavior will cause you to drift further and further away from God’s salvation, God’s instruction will seem strict, His Judgment will seem unfair, and His Righteousness will not seem desirable. You will prefer the sin you are enslaved to instead of the freedom that the only the Son, Jesus, could give. In Peter’s time, these false teachers were not only teaching bad doctrine, but they were living bad doctrine. Peter describes them as people who carouse in broad daylight.

Their eyes are full of adultery, they seduce people, and prey on those who are weakest, seducing the unstable. Peter had used imagery of trapping an animal in false doctrine, and these teachers are trap setters, even while they are in a trap of their own. They are greedy for their own personal gain, and followers mean more personal gain. So I like to do this little exercise when I teach the kid’s Bible study; it serves as a refresher for the 10 commandments. We play this game where we read about someone sinning in a Bible story and figure out which commandments are being broken. So let’s do this with false teachers. From Peter’s description these false teachers have other gods besides God himself (1), they make idols of themselves (2), they are doing what they do in the name of God, which is using the Lord’s name in vain (3), If we assume they are teaching people on a day off, they are turning a holy day of rest into a day of business (4), they are covetous of popularity and other peoples favor and being experts of greed they are covetous of money (10), Peter says they fabricate stories or make things up, which is false witness (9), and their eyes are full of adultery, so whether they are physically honoring marriage or not, they are committing adultery in their mind (7). They consider their followers their own property, so they are kind of stealing a portion of God’s creation, and calling it theirs (8). What’s left? Let’s assume they aren’t murdering people or dishonoring their parents, but 8 out of 10 commandments being broken is pretty bad, especially by someone who claims to be a teacher or supposed to be leading others.
Now the false teachers in Peter’s time were called an accursed brood. Their behavior and conduct was terrible if they are doing even half the things that Peter is describing here. Are there false teachers today? Certainly. There are people who preach in front of a cross, but never explain sin, who never explain why Jesus died, and how our sins were forgiven. How we were dead in transgression and sin, and God brought us back to life. People use the pulpit as a revenue stream, and it’s disgusting. There are some churches that have sermons that never include the good news, and rarely even discuss scripture. If anything from the Bible is used, it is a short quip or quote, and certainly not discussed in its context.
To people like us who study the Bible, some of these false teachers stories seem laughable, because we know the truth. In 2011 we would drive past a billboard that says the world is ending in 2012, and kind of roll our eyes, or giggle. How can we dismiss those billboards as boloney? They look silly enough, but what if they are true? Well, what does the Bible say? Ecclesiastes 9:12 says Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so people are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them.” Sure the Author of Ecclesiastes is saying we don’t know when we will will have an hour of misfortune or maybe death, but is that the same as not knowing the end times?

We know that Jesus said this about the end times in both Matthew 24:36 and Mark 13:32: “Heaven and Earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away. But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.”
Some might argue that Jesus wasn’t talking about the end times when he said “that day” in Matthew 24. Sure, Jesus could have been (likely was) talking about the destruction of the temple for much of Matthew 24, but it sounds like a change of gears when Jesus says Heaven and Earth will pass away. Even setting aside Matthew 24 and Ecclesiastes, other places in scripture confirm that the end would come like a thief in the night, nobody is expecting or making an appointment with the thief.

So, just by this explanation, you can see through reading scripture we understand how things work, and we can learn how to interpret scripture in a way that doesn’t violate other parts of scripture, and there are things that only the Father knows, not even the Angels or Son know when some things happen. The end will be as unpredictable as a thief. Which brings us to that silly billboard. Who put those up? Harold Camping and Family Radio among others saying random dates around 2011 and 2012 are the end. And while we’ve built our theological house on sound doctrine, there are many who read these billboards, and maybe open their Bible for the first time only to be misdirected by a false teacher. Peter says there is Harm that is done from false teaching, and modern false teachers are no exception. What harm is there? If you falsely believe the world will end in the next year, that will cause a change in behavior. You might not focus attention on your career or your family. You likely will not save for a future that you don’t believe will happen. People change the plans of their lives, they spend money and time supporting “ministries” that aren’t teaching sound doctrine, ministries that aren’t preaching the Good News, Ministries that aren’t bringing their congregations to a true understanding of salvation through Jesus Christ. Even if the ministry mentions Jesus or salvation by Grace, adding numerology or specific dates the world needs to end is introducing something into scripture that just isn’t there. And those people who have listened to the doomsday prophets and have earnestly searched scripture for signs or messages may miss the most important message of scripture, and may come to doubt truth of the rest of the Bible when the world doesn’t end, and all the additions to doctrine and misquoted verses don’t turn out to be true. I’ve mentioned Harold Camping, and his final day did arrive. The last day for him turned out to be December 15, 2013. He fell and died; for him the world did end. His soul entered into the eternal, and his body left the temporal. Interestingly, in March 2012, he stated that his attempt to predict a date was “sinful”, and that his critics had been right in emphasizing the words of Matthew 24:36: “of that day and hour knoweth no man”. In his final days, he added that he was now searching the Bible “even more fervently…not to find dates, but to be more faithful in [his] understanding.”. I think it was merciful of God to allow this man to publicly repent of his attempt to predict a date that even Jesus Himself denied knowing. And I would like to believe that he was honest in his repentance and was genuine. It might not be much of a solace to people who sold their possessions to donate to the fraudulent ministry. But it does take a lot of humility to admit publicly you were not just wrong about something, but were sinning. (even if that thing was clearly proven wrong). Maybe my thoughts are going back and forth a bit, but I would like to believe he legitimately had made an error, thought he was warning people about something he thought would happen, and later repented for it, acknowledging that Jesus died for his sin. Maybe things ended well for him, and we obviously didn’t know what as happening in his heart. But we know this; if Harold Camping hadn’t repented and instead kept money he had accepted from his followers, enriching himself in the process of lying about God’s message, the end for him would not be pretty. We will see in a few verses what happens to false teachers who boast and never repent. But let’s keep reading

15 They have left the straight way and wandered off to follow the way of Balaam son of Bezer,[f] who loved the wages of wickedness. 16 But he was rebuked for his wrongdoing by a donkey—an animal without speech—who spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.

This prophet, Balaam, was a man who was hired by the King of Moab to put a curse on the Israelites. There were fees for divination, and Balaam was approached by the elders. That night, Balaam actually spoke to God and God told him that he should not go with the men, and should not curse the Israelites, because the Israelites were God’s people and to be blessed. The Moabites returned to their king, and the king sent more distinguished elders with more money. Balaam said even if the king gave him all the silver and gold in the palace, he would not be able to oppose God. God gave Balaam permission to go with them, but to do Only what God tells him to do. The Next Morning, the prophet saddled up his donkey to meet with the Officials. But God was displeased with something Balaam was about to do. From the surface, Balaam seemed like a pretty good guy. God had told Balaam not to curse the Israelites, and he didn’t. God told him not to go, and he didn’t. Then God gave him permission to go with the men, but only do what God tells him to. Balaam went with the men and it seemed like he was obeying God, but there was something wrong with Balaam’s path, something wrong with Balaam’s attitude. An Angel scared the donkey 3 times, and three times Balaam beat his donkey. That’s the reference. Now what is the way of Balaam? When we read about him in the book of Numbers, we see a man who was a prophet for hire. Not an admirable profession, but he did something remarkable, because he conversed with God, and presented the king of Moab with the words of God. By all definitions of prophet, He was a true prophet in that he said exactly what God told him to. So what’s the back story, and how did he become an example of false teacher? If we read the book of numbers, chapter 22. He was called by the king of Moab to curse Israel. He normally accepted payments to allegedly make God do things that humans couldn’t or wouldn’t be able to do, pronouncing curses in God’s name. Balaam had a reputation of being able to successfully curse people before their downfalls, and when he blessed them, they did well. He had a decent track record and it was noted by the King. But a crazy thing happened because God actually got involved in Balaam’s transaction with the King of Moab. God constrained him, and didn’t allow him to pronounce curses, only blessings to Israel. Interestingly enough when we first read about Balaam he said, “even if you gave me all the gold and silver in the royal treasury I can’t curse Israel.” That sounds noble. When you read this in a charitable way it sounds like he is a prophet that can’t be bought, and is a man of integrity. But that line also tells us Balaam’s motivation. He wanted money, he wanted to collect. And normally he would up the price as the job got harder or more conflicted, he would curse enemies or bless those who paid him, and it worked fine. The problem this time was God wouldn’t let him say anything but the truth. A true prophet tells the truth, and Balaam was forced for this one moment in his career to be a true prophet. There was no amount of money that could be paid to him, because God made the job impossible, Balaam was prevented from cursing Israel.

As an example. If money motivated me more than anything else, and I wanted it, and you said, “I have a billion dollars; all you have to do is complete a 50 foot long jump. One jump. Unassisted with no trampolines or springs.” I would be excited at first, but then I would look up long jumping and realize, the world record is somewhere around 29 feet. Maybe I could get another inch; maybe if I trained enough I could win a world record. (again probably not, but it’s achievable). But to jump 1.7x the distance the best athlete in the world has ever jumped? Impossible. I would be full of despair because I know it can’t be done, and I want that money SOOO BAD. Back to Balaam, he used to be able to curse people and he could bless people, but now God says you can only speak truth. You can only say what I tell you to say. It’s like the movie Liar, Liar, where the main character has to live 24 hours without lying. Balaam was corralled into doing something that he regularly got paid for, but doing it God’s way. This is true both figuratively and literally. He gets on his donkey, and realizes the donkey won’t let him travel to do his work the way he wants to. He has to do it God’s way. He beats the donkey when it doesn’t move, then he does it again, and the donkey pushes him against a wall banging up his ankle. Finally miraculously the donkey talks to him and asks him why all of a sudden he is being beaten. Donkey says, “in the past, all our lives I have done what you said but not now.” God allows Balaam to see an angel with a sword, and the angel tells him I would have killed you. Angel says, “The donkey saw me and turned away from me these three times. If it had not turned away, I would certainly have killed you by now, but I would have spared it.” The angel cares for the innocent animal more than the prophet for hire, Balaam. He would have spared the donkey, but certainly Balaam would have ridden right into the sword. And the angel says that Balaam’s path was a “reckless” one. Peter says that the donkey “restrained the prophets madness”. We find out that Balaam is unable to curse Israel, but according to the book of Revelation and later in the book of Numbers we read that he teaches the king how to put a stumbling block in front of Israel. He can’t ask God to curse them, but he learns that if Israel assimilated with Moab culture and their idols, and if the Israelites would start to fornicate or engage in sexual immorality with the Moabite women, eat unclean foods, they would derail their own standing with God. Balaam could not ask God to curse Israel, he could not curse Israel in the name of God, but with Balaam’s ecumenical theology and Moabian additions to Israel’s law and culture, Israel could curse themselves and stumble and disown God just fine on their own. And that’s what happened. So Balaam is an interesting character because he was a true prophet. He was forced to speak the words of God, but his instruction and his teaching and his counsel and advice were all wicked. His motivation was greed.
It’s also interesting and humbling to see that God uses prophets to speak his words, yet there’s nothing remarkable or special about the man. God also used a donkey to speak His word to Balaam, and God used a reckless, wicked, false teacher (someone who Peter compares to an unreasoning animal) Balaam to speak truth to the King of Moab.

17 These people are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them.

These false teachers are springs without water and mists driven by a storm. When you teach the true word of God, you provide people water of life. Humanity is thirsty and needs water. Jesus died once and for all for our sins, whosoever believes will not die but have eternal life. If you drink from a well of Jacob you will be thirsty again, but if you drink of the teaching of Jesus you will never thirst again. When you go to a spring or well you need a drink, but an empty spring without water will leave you thirsty. When you come to a church you need water, you need Jesus, you need sustenance, a good pastor or church will give you that teaching, but a false teacher will give you nothing but some mist that comes before a storm. You can’t drink mist, so not only are you left thirsty, and not satisfied, but danger, conflict, turmoil- a storm is to follow. God reserves the blackest darkness for them, they will be eternally banished from His presence, not just for sinning, but for teaching others that it’s ok. Jesus warned against sinning, but even more that if you cause a child who believes and has faith to stumble or if you teach that sin is ok, it would be better to have a millstone tied around their neck and thrown into the sea. Blackest darkness is reserved for them; These false teachers are bad news.

18 For they mouth empty, boastful words and, by appealing to the lustful desires of the flesh, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error. 19 They promise them freedom, while they themselves are slaves of depravity—for “people are slaves to whatever has mastered them.”

Peter tells us these false teachers speak empty boastful words.

False teacher: “I am a prophet of God! I am speaking Gods words!”

Truth: ‘Great, so was that donkey. The only difference is the donkey was speaking the unadulterated truth but you are fabricating stories, lying, and the donkey was humble about it, but you are boasting and proud. So in reality, you are a few steps below that animal.”

The false teachers appeal to our natural lustful desires. It’s just like what Paul tells Timothy. There is a time where people don’t want to put up with sound doctrine. They want to be told what their itching ears want to hear. People want assurance that their sins are ok, that they can follow their heart. That their sin is not so bad. The truth is, our sins are not OK, our hearts are deceptive. Our flesh is lustful and the desires of our body and our natural self war against what God’s instructions tell us. Our sin is so bad that God had to send his only begotten Son to become our sin and take our place and die for us. It’s a harder pill to swallow, but False teachers don’t bother with the truth. Instead they entice people who are escaping from bad situations or escaping from those who live in error. False teachers find people who are vulnerable and tell them exactly what they want to hear. They promise freedom, but are enslaved and trapped by their sin. It is worth remembering that we are slaves to something. Whether we are slaves to sin or we are slaves to righteousness. Clearly one is better than the other.

20 If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and are overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning.

Verse 20 is a bit interesting because it looks kind of like you can know Jesus and still be overcome by the world? Does this say we can lose our salvation? If they are able to escape the corruption of the world by knowing our lord and savior Jesus, but are later entangled in the world they are worse off. First Peter isnt saying they escaped corruption of the world by knowing Jesus as their Lord and Savior. He is saying they escaped corruption by knowing our Lord and Savior. So these people he refers to presumably aren’t themselves professing a saving faith in Jesus, they are acquainted with the Jesus that we call our Lord and Savior. That distinction is important. I have read some commentaries that talk about this verse and explain there is a great benefit for people to know and study and emulate Jesus. Asking “what would Jesus do?” will get you out of a lot of potential problems in this world. Living a life with a morally Christian framework will prevent you from Judging others, hating one another, stealing, being jealous. All those things are good and are grace from God, but those works, those things dont save us. So you can escape from a lot of the corruption of the world, and still not be saved. You can also later, after escaping that corruption, again seduced into slavery of sin and back there entangled in corruption. And yes you end up worse off than before. Why worse off?

21 It would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than to have known it and then to turn their backs on the sacred command that was passed on to them. 22 Of them the proverbs are true: “A dog returns to its vomit,”[g] and, “A sow that is washed returns to her wallowing in the mud.”

So whether you spend your whole life in sin and corruption, or you temporarily escape from corruption but fall back into it, in both cases you aren’t saved from your sin, in neither case you end up in heaven. True. But in the second case, you’ve escaped from certain sins and vices, certain corruption, certain sin patterns, but it was only temporary, and you end up back in the thing you were enslaved to before. Sometimes, you end up deeper in the sin than when you started. In the first case, you remained ignorant your whole life, bad but better. In the second case God mercifully gave you a taste of the goodness of Righteousness, God gave you a sense of the peace and order He offers, he shows you some of the Temporary fruits of righteousness and justice and fairness and common charity, and still you reject it even more knowingly and less ignorantly than before.
Peter says the first is better, the second is like the proverb of a dog returning to its vomit, a particularly gross, gut wrenching image. A sow that when washed swallows back in its mud. I think these verses allude to something kind of interesting. This idea is reinforced by other parts of scriptures and it’s very theoretical thoughts about Hell and not something Christians will need to experience. Judgment Day will look better for some unrepentant people than others. As Evangelists we always stress the important divide Heaven or Hell. This is the big one that obviously matters the most. But if Heaven is not where you end up, Judgement isn’t the same for everyone. Jesus said it is better for Sodom and Gomorrah on that day of judgment than people in cities of Israel who saw his miracles and even after the evidence, they still rejected him. If Sodom and Gomorrah had seen Jesus miracles, Jesus says they would have repented, and those places still would be here. In life we don’t get do-overs, we don’t know how we would respond if we were in another situation. If people were stoning me like they martyred Stefan, would I pray for them and commit my spirit to God? I hope so, but I don’t know. If I lived in Sodom, would I have hung out with Lot and been frustrated by the sin of the city? I hope so, but I don’t know. But God Does! Jesus’s judgment day teaching confirms, God knows these “what if’s”. He takes those things into account when people arrive at judgment day. Punishment is eternal in duration, but apparently not the same for all sinners. It is Fair. It’s Just. It’s a Judgement that is deserved. The only thing about God’s judgment day that is unfair is those he shows mercy to some people. God’s judgment is incredibly unfair to His Elect when he sees us as righteous, but punishes his perfect Son. Gods judgment is unfair when we are counted as sons and daughters, even though in our very flesh and blood we were rebellious enemies. Heaven is unfair, because it’s Mercy, and that should give leave us feeling gratitude and thanksgiving.