Archive for the ‘2 Peter 3:9’ Category

Polhill:

God, by turning a virtual or ordinative will, does will the turning and salvation even of the very pagans. According to that will, God would (as I have laid down) be seen in every creature, sought and felt in every place, witnessed in every shower and fruitful season, feared in the sea-bounding sand, humbled under in every abasing providence, and turned to in every judgment. Thus the very Philistines saw by the light of nature; “Give glory to God,” say they, “peradventure he will lighten his hand from off you,” (1 Sam. vi. 5). Also, the Ninevites’ counsel was, to cry mightily to God, and turn from their evil ways; who can tell,” say they, “if God will turn and repent,” (Jonah iii.8 , 9). In a word; the meaning of all God’s works is ” that men should fear before him,” Eccl. iii. 14). The goodness and patience of God leads them to repentance, (Rom. ii. 4). Hence the apostle tells us, ” The Lord is long-suffering to us ward, not willing that any should but that all should come to repentance,” (2 Peter iii. 9). Mirus hic erga humanum genus amor, saith Calvin on the place, quod omnes vult esse salvos, et ultro pereuntes in salutem colligere pnratur est. God, in indulging his patience and long-suffering to men, doth virtually will their repentance and salvation. I know some interpret this place otherwise: God is long-suffering to us, that is, the agapetoi, in the former verse, not willing that any, viz. of us,) should perish, but that all,(vis., of us,) should come to repentance. But I conceive that there is no necessity at all that the text should be so straitened, nor yet congruity for longsuffering towards the beloved, that they, who have already repented, should come to repentance. Neither does this answer the scope of the place, which asserts, that God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, upon this ground, because of his long-suffering: and his long-suffering extends to all, and in that extent its true end and scope is to lead them to repentance and salvation. Wherefore, the meaning is, God is long-suffering to us, not to us beloved only, but to us men, not willing our perdition but repentance. The true duct and tendency of his long-suffering is to lead men to repentance and salvation; and, therefore, in willing that long-suffering, he doth virtually and ordinatively will their repentance and salvation.

Edward Polhill, “The Divine Will Considered in its Eternal Decrees,” in The Works of Edward Polhill (Morgan, PA.: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1998), 210-211. [Some spelling modernized, and underlining mine.]

16
Jul

Thomas Duke on 2 Peter 3:9

   Posted by: CalvinandCalvinism

Introductory note:

There is a popular claim regarding 2 Peter 3:9 which often surfaces here and there on the internet. Gordon Clark echoed this assertion:

Peter is telling us that Christ’s return awaits the repentance of certain people. Now, if Christ’s return awaited the repentance of every individual without exception, Christ would never return.

Gordon H. Clark. I & II Peter (New Jersey: Presbyterian & Reformed, 1980), 2:71.

The argument thus asserts that if the will of God in view respects all mankind, then accordingly, Jesus will never return. Thus a neat little reductio is set up: Ergo, the will under consideration cannot respect all mankind, but the elect exclusively.

Against this, Duke’s following comments well apply:

3:9(b): “Not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”

If His longsuffering is the reason for the delay, His will or desire in regard to all men is the motivation behind the reason. There are, it seems, two related but separable aspects to God’s “willing,” one negative and one positive: He is “not willing that any should perish”; He is willing, however, “that all should come to repentance.” The word “willing” translates a present participial form of the Greek verb boulomai, which bears a close resemblance in meaning and usage to another Greek verb, thelo. Generally speaking, present participles denote action taking place at the same time as the action of the main verb, in this case “longsuffering.” Since this verb (makrothumia) appears in its present, active, indicative form, the implication is that God’s “willing” continues for as long as His “longsuffering” continues. Therefore, Peter may be conveying that when God’s longsuffering has been exhausted, so too will His willing in this matter likewise end.

…Nevertheless, this much is clear: Peter’s primary intent in verse 9 is to refute the scoffers’ argument that the delay in Christ’s Parousia renders it either highly suspect or simply untrue. This he accomplishes by offering both the reason for His delay (His longsuffering) and the motivation underlying the reason (His “willing”). Verse 9 contributes this insight to Peter’s four-pronged attack: God’s love for all men, rather than His incompetence, indifference, or inability (as the scoffers would have it) explains the delay in His return. Peter’s reply thus grounds the delay in the loving, gracious, and merciful character of God. At the same time, it appears that Peter ties the length of the delay to the Lord’s longsuffering, not to His willing, so that the delay in his Second Coming depends upon the duration of His longsuffering, not upon the coming to repentance of every person. Other verses in the epistle decisively reinforce the exclusion of a “universal conversion” interpretation. For example, verse 7 of chapter 3 speaks of the heavens and the earth being reserved “for fire until the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (emphasis supplied). Notwithstanding God’s patience in waiting for and wanting everyone to come to repentance, not all will repent and be saved in the end…

Thomas H. Duke, “An Exegetical Analysis of 2 Peter 3:9,” Faith & Mission 16 (1999) : 8 and 10.

[For those interested, email me for a pdf copy of the complete article.]

10
Jul

Robert Letham on 2 Peter 3:9 in Response to John Owen on the Same

   Posted by: CalvinandCalvinism

[Hulse’s prefacing remarks:]

One of the readers of Reformation Today has pointed out that John Owen, a foremost and respected theologian, restricted the meaning of 2 Peter 3:9 to ‘the elect’. The text reads as follows, ‘The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness: but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.’

In seeking to refute Arminianism Owen became intolerant of the Arminian interpretations and said, ‘I shall not need add anything concerning the contradictions and inexplicable difficulties wherewith the opposite interpretation is accompanied.’ He also said, ‘That to believe that God has the same will and mind towards all and everyone in the world is to come not far short of extreme madness and folly’ (Owen’s works vol. 10, p. 348ff.).

We do not believe that God has the same will and mind towards all in the world in as much as he has by sovereign election determined to save a people for himself. We are dealing now with the question of his revealed will, in which he will have all to be saved. This Owen himself, and all the Puritan divines, maintained. The question before us is whether 2 Peter 3:9 should be included as one of the passages which either directly state or infer that God’s revealed will is for all to be saved. Under pressure Owen sought to restrict it, but was it necessary to do so?

Since this issue arose from the article by Bob Letham, ‘Theology well formed or deformed?’, we have asked him to give us an exposition of 2 Peter 3:9. He has responded as follows:

[Letham’s answer:]

The particularity of redemption is not endangered by adopting a more inclusive reference than Owen would allow. Indeed, Calvin himself understood Peter’s language in precisely that way. However, we would all agree that our ideas should not rest on human authority or tradition, but on biblical exegesis.

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3
Jun

William Burkitt (1650-1703) on 2 Peter 3:9

   Posted by: CalvinandCalvinism

Burkitt::

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 his long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

Our apostle here answers the cavil and objection of the fore-mentioned scoffers, namely. That if Christ intends to come to judgment, why does he so long defer his coming? To this our apostle replies, 1. By assuring Them that this delay ought not to be judged according to our sense and apprehension of things, tor God does not measure time as we do; but a thousand years, which seem so long to us, are but a day, yea, but a moment, to him who is eternal, and inhabits eternity. To the eternity of God no finite duration bears any proportion, to eternity all time is equally short; God does not measure time by our pole, nor cast up years by our arithmetic. 2. He assures them farther, that God’s delay of judgment did not proceed from slackness, but from divine patience and goodness. He delays his coming, on purpose to give men time to repent, and by repentance to prevent their own eternal ruin. Learn hence, 1. That God’s delay of judgment is no ground for sinners to conclude that he will not come to judgment, for our Savior has no where fixed and determined the time of it. We can neither be sure when our Lord will come, nor certain when he will not come. Learn, 2. That the true reason why God defers judgment, is to give sinners opportunity for repentance; if this be not complied with, he reserves those who are incorrigibly bad to a more remarkable ruin, condemning them that will not be saved, but obstinately destroy themselves.

William Burkitt, Expository Notes With Practical Observations on the New Testament (Philadelphia: Published by Thomas Wardle, 1835), 2:749-750. [Some spelling modernized; underlining mine.]

Binning:

1) Nay, but saith the convinced soul, I know not if he will he merciful to me, for  what am I? There is nothing in me to be regarded. I have nothing to conciliate favour, and all that may procure hatred. But, saith the Lord, I am ‘gracious,’ and dispense mercy freely, without respect to condition or qualification. Say not, if I had such a measure of humiliation as such a one,–if I loved him so much,–if I bad so much godly sorrow and repentance,–then, I think he would be merciful to me. Say not so, for behold he is gracious. He hath mercy on whom he will have mercy; and there is no other cause, no motive to procure it; it comes from within his own breast. It is not thy repentance will make him love thee, nor thy hardness of heart will make him hate thee or obstruct the vent of his grace towards thee. No! if it be grace, it is no more of works,-not works in that way that thou imagines. It is not of repentance, not of faith in that sense thou conceives; but it is freely, without the hire, without the price of repentance or faith, because all those are but the free gifts of grace. Thou would have these graces to procure his favor, and to make them the ground of thy believing in his promises but grace is without money. It immediately contracts with discovered misery, so that if thou do discover in thyself misery and sin, though thou find nothing else, yet do not cast away confidence, but so much the more address thyself to mercy and grace, which do not seek repentance in thee, but bring repentance and faith with them unto thee. Yet there is something in the awakened conscience. I have gone on long in sin; I have been a presumptuous sinner; can he endure me longer? Well hear what the Lord saith, I am ‘long-suffering’ and patient. And if he had not been so, we had been damned ere now. Patience hath a long term, and we cannot outrun it, outweary it.–Why do we not wonder that he presently and instantly executed his wrath on angels, and gave them not: one hour’s space for repentance, but cast them down headlong into destruction, as in a moment; and yet his majesty hath so long delayed the execution of our sentence, and calls us unto repentance and forgiveness, that we may escape the condemnation of angels? His patience is not slackness and negligence, as men count it, 2 Pet. iii. 9. He sits not in heaven as an idol, and idle spectator of what men are doing; but he observes all wrongs, and is sensible of them also. And if we were mindful and sensible of them also, he would forget them. He is long-suffering. This is extended and stretched-out patience beyond all expectation, beyond all deserving, yea contrary to it.. Therefore, as long as he forbears, if thou apprehend thy misery and sin, and continuance in it; do not conclude that it is desperate. ‘Why should a living man complain?‘ As long as patience lengthens thy life, if thou desire to come to him, believe he will accept thee. Hugh Binning, “The Common Principles of the Christian Religion,” in The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning (Ligonier, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1992), 51 [Some spelling modernized, underlining mine.]

2) Now, as the spider sucks poison out of the sweetest flower, so the most part of souls suck nothing but delusion and presumption and hardening out of the gospel. Many souls reason for more liberty to sin, from mercy. But behold, how the Lord backs it with a dreadful word, ‘who will. by no means clear the guilty.’ As many as do not condemn themselves before the tribunal of justice, there is no rescinding of the condemnatory sentence, but it stands above their heads, , he that believes not is condemned already.’ Justice hath condemned all by a sentence. He that doth not, in the sense of this, flee unto Jesus Christ from sin and wrath, is already condemned. His sentence is standing. There needs no new one. Since he flees not to mercy for absolution, the. sentence of condemnation stands unrepealed. You guilty souls who clear yourselves, God will not clear you. And, alas! how many of you do clear yourselves! Do you not extenuate and mince your sins? How hard is it to extort any confession of guilt out of you, but in the general! If we condescend to particulars, many of you will plead innocency almost in every thing, though you have, like children, learned to speak these words that ye are sinners. I beseech you consider it; it is no light matter, for’ God will by no means clear the guilty;’ by no means, by no entreaties, no flatteries. ‘What! Will he not pardon sin? Yes indeed: his name tells you he will pardon all kind of sins, and absolve all manner of guilty persons: but yet such as do condemn themselves, such as are guilty in their own conscience, and their mouths stopped before God,–you who do not enter into the serious examination of your ways, and do not arraign yourselves before God’s tribunal daily, till you find yourselves loathsome and desperate, and no refuge for you,–you who do flatter yourselves always in the hope of heaven, and put the fear of hell always from you,–I say, God will by no means, no prayers, no entreaties, clear or pardon you, because you come not to Jesus Christ, in whom is preached forgiveness and remission of sins. You who take liberty to sin, because God is gracious, and delay repentance till the end, because God is Long-suffering,-know God God will not clear you; he is holy and just. as he is merciful. If his mercy make thee not fear and tremble before him, and do not separate thee from thy sins,–if remission of sins be not the strongest persuasion to thy soul of the removing of sin,–certainly thou dost in vain presume upon his mercy.  Hugh Binning, “The Common Principles of the Christian Religion,” in The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning (Ligonier, PA: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1992), 52-53. [Some spelling modernized, underlining mine.]

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