1. Grace, mercy, and peace to Your from God our Heavenly Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen. Impatience: in a fast-paced, frantic culture, it’s a problem. Impatience: as we wait through Advent days while the world around us is already acting as though “It’s Christmas!” Problem! Impatience: with all God seems to let slide down here. What’s his problem? Our calling to be the advent people of God begins with patience and ends with peace. The message today is taken from 2 Peter 3:8-14, it’s entitled, “Advent Patience,” dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. We may be impatient with God’s patience. St Peter writes in 2 Peter 3:8–9a, "8 But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness.” Some in Peter’s day were becoming impatient with God’s patience. Especially as they faced scoffers and persecution, it seemed Christ was never coming back. Had they been wrong in believing?
3. Are we some of those accusing God of slowness? When we face pain and sadness and rejection, we may wonder where he is too—if not actually to end the world, at least to use his power (now!) to end our problems. What’s taking Christ so long?!!
4. The fact is God is not slow but wishes that no one would perish. 2 Peter 3:9 says, “9 The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.” God’s patience is for a gracious and glorious purpose. If Christ returned at our convenience—the first time we wanted him to come bail us out—think of the souls who would be lost! God loves them too! Christ died for them too! This was the reason John the Baptist came—to rescue souls by preparing them with repentance.
5. Still, the Day of the Lord will come, and creation as we know it will pass away. That’s why Peter writes in 2 Peter 3:10, “10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed.” All that we find value in and cling to will be—must be!—destroyed. The “earth and the works done on it” will pass away. Even the buildings and monuments we all know—the White House, the Great Wall of China, the Pyramids of Egypt, the Eifel Tower. The event will be stunning and spectacular.
6. What will we see? Wait for a little longer in this proclamation. Creation will pass away, but God’s Word will not pass away (Lk 21:33). Knowing this, what sort of people ought we to be (2 Peter 3:11–12)? People who scoff (vv 3–4) or doubt (v 9a)? No, we ought to be people who live in holiness and godliness. This is what we ought to be, often not what we are.
7. But, for us, Jesus left the splendor of paradise to live in this anything but holy and godly world. For us, the Son humbled himself as a Servant. For us, Jesus the Son went to the cross and grave. For us, Jesus God’s Son will return in glory and gather his Church. That’s a promise!
8. For his promise is a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. 2 Peter 3:13 says, “13 But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.” Unlike our “creations”—temporal, artificial, egotistical (those things we build)—his promise is for something far greater: “new heavens and a new earth.” Not just more of the same. God is doing a whole new kind of thing. This is the place “in which righteousness dwells”—where all is holy and godly, where we suffer no more sadness or scoffing or pain, even from our own sin.
9. During Advent: We look back to remember how surely God keeps promises, leading to the manger. We look forward to this promise yet to be kept, knowing God is faithful. “What unbelievers call the end of the world means, in fact, that we—finally!—will receive ‘new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells’ (2 Peter 3:13), that creation—finally! —will be good again and the world a paradise, as it was meant from the beginning. Oh, if we were only there!” (Giertz, 739)
10. Therefore, we shall be at peace (2 Peter 3:14). Good news: We will be “found in him.” Which makes us “spotless and blemish-free.” “And at peace.” We are reconciled with God by Jesus’ atoning death on the cross for us. That is, we have peace from Christ and through Christ and in Christ. So, we are messengers of peace. As God is patient, desiring repentance, so Advent, awaiting Christ’s return, is time to prepare others.
11. Expiration Dates. Medicines have them. Cereals have them. Batteries have them. Coupons have them. Gift certificates have them. Warranties have them. Even sour cream has an expiration date as you’ll find out quickly in the Taggatz household! So does the world. And so does every person living in this world. But the date isn’t printed or posted for Christians—or for unbelievers—to see. Peter writes to the Church: “But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a roar, and the heavenly bodies will be burned up and dissolved, and the earth and the works that are done on it will be exposed” (2 Pet 3:10). The Advent reality is that the world’s days are numbered. Its expiration is part of the salvation story. The return of Christ is both promised and certain. That expiration date of this world has already been set. When it comes, when Jesus comes, the waiting will be over and the redeemed will rejoice in the “new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:13b).
12. Patience, God’s patience—that no one may perish. Though this old creation will pass away, we will be a people waiting in holiness and godliness, because we have a promise: peace in Christ. Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.
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