Spurgeon's notes on 2 PETER

"Make your calling and election sure."
 

2 Peter 1

The second general epistle of Peter was written to warn the churches against the evil influence of certain teachers, erroneous in doctrine and impure in life. The style is earnest and tender, and is peculiarly marked by a solemn grandeur of imagery and diction.

2 Peter 1:2, 3

Grace comes to us through the understanding; we grow in the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord, and so obtain more grace: hence the importance of earnest thought, and diligent study of the Scriptures.

2 Peter 1:4

Precious faith lays hold on Precious promises, and so raises the soul beyond mere nature into the highest conceivable condition, making it like to God in holiness and virtue. The phrase, "partakers of the divine nature," is a very remarkable one; we cannot become divine, but we can be "partakers of his holiness."

2 Peter 1:6, 7

Link these hand in hand as virgins in the dance, or place them one upon another, that like the stones of an arch they may yield mutual support.

2 Peter 1:8-11

You shall enter grace and glory at flood tide, and not as those who are "saved so as by fire."

2 Peter 1:16-18

Of this transfiguration of our Lord and the attesting voice of the Father, Peter speaks in his epistle.

The apostles, by seeing the transfiguration, were confirmed in faith and enabled to bear witness concerning their Lord to all generations.

2 Peter 1:19

The witness of Scripture is even surer than the voice heard in the mount. How much then ought we to prize it! How well content may we be without visions and revelations.

2 Peter 1:21

We may not regard the Bible as the private word of Moses or Isaiah, but as the revelation of God to all time, most sure and infallible.

 

2 Peter 2

Holy men of old spoke as they were moved by the Spirit.

2 Peter 2:1-9

Former judgments are the sure proofs that present sin will also meet with punishment.

2 Peter 2:22

The apostles were most anxious that believers should persevere, and therefore they cautioned them as to the dire results of apostasy. These frequent warnings should make us watchful, and lead us to cry mightily to him who alone is able to keep us from falling. Only divine grace can preserve us from the seducing spirits which abound on all sides.

 

2 Peter 3:3, 4

They insinuate that there is no God, or that if there be he takes no interest in the affairs of men, or else surely he would have come to judge his enemies long before this.

2 Peter 3:5, 6

They willfully forget that there was one grand interposition of vengeance, and therefore it is not altogether true that the machinery of nature has from time immemorial moved on regardless of human sin. Once by water has the world been destroyed, and by another element it shall soon be overwhelmed.

2 Peter 3:7-9

He waits that men may wait on him. He gives the race space to repent; but, alas, it abuses his longsuffering!

2 Peter 3:14-16

Good doctrine can be twisted to bad purposes. This is not the fault of the doctrine, but of the foolish or wicked minds which pervert it. We must not neglect the study of those great truths which Paul treats of for it is the ignorant who wrest them, and therefore we should not be of the number. If we are well acquainted with the deep things of God we shall, by God's grace, be all the less likely to abuse them.