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Thank you for joining me today in the cafe. Welcome to another KJV Cafe episode. I’m Pastor Clark Covington and we’re going to dive right into a wonderful topic. Today, we are talking about standing tall for the Lord Jesus Christ in these last days. I’m going to reach some scripture to you from 2 Peter 3:1-10. 2 Peter 3 1-10. “This second epistle, beloved I now write unto you in both, which I stir up your pure mines by way of remembrance, the ye may be mindful of the words, which were spoken before by the holy prophets. And of the Commandment of us, the apostles of the Lord and Saviour, Knowing this first that there shall come in the last days, scoffers walking after their own lusts, and saying, where is the promise of is coming for since the father’s fell asleep? All things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation, for this, they willingly are ignorant of that by the word of God the heavens were of old and the Earth standing out of the water and in the water whereby the world that then was being overflowed with water flourished. But the heavens and the Earth, which are now by the same word are kept in store reserved unto fire against the day of judgement and perdition of ungodly men. But He loved 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, the Lord is not slack concerning His promise as some men count slackness. But as long suffering to us word not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in the, which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise. And the elements shall melt with fervent heat and the Earth. Also, and the works that are therein shall be burned up“. Wow. What? A beautiful piece of scripture. What an honest piece of scripture. In here, Peter is urging is begging, is exhorting. The church to be stirred up in their pure minds. For this last day time that, you know, Peter was writing this then in Bible times, thousands of years ago, saying you need to be stirred up, how much more so as we are on the precipice of the rapture on the, on the very edge of the second coming of the very, very end of the end of the end of the last days. Before the church has taken home, how much more? So should we be stirred up with pure minds? Amen. What a wonderful beautiful scripture. And today, we’re just going to spend a few minutes talking about that. We’re going to go ahead and focus on that. Meditate on that. Tell me if you don’t feel a little bit more stirred up after this message, if you don’t feel a bit more fired up for the Lord, Firstly, here are pure minds, need to be stirred up. We need pure minds, we need to be fired up for the Lord. The end times are upon us. But let me ask you, and be honest here today, Where is your heart and your mind? Is it on the things of the Lord? Is it on God’s word? Is it on serving the Lord as Peter instructs us to do? Or is it on the things of this world? You know, think about this. We put so much and I say we because I’m included in this, we put so much emphasis on things that happen in this world. You know, we worry about our kids if we have kids or grandkids and we have grandkids, we worry about our spouses and our family. We stress out about work and we stress out about getting somewhere on time and making an appointment and We have health concerns and financial concerns and we’ve got concerns about concerns and we get all wound up in this world. And then what does that do to our position as Christians to our role as a Christian servant as one that is here to serve Christ to live for Christ? What does that do for our mind? Well we get all jumbled up in the wrong stuff and Peter is saying here look be loved. You know, beloved is like saying look I I love you, you’re my friend and you’re my Christian brother or sister. Look, I’m writing to you, to stir you up your pure mind. To remember what Christ did for you and why is Peter writing this? Why is he getting at this? Oh, it’s very simple because the time is at hand, when some are doubting, aren’t they? Some or doubting In the last days are scoffers, right? Uh, we see here. Uh, in verse 3, so right in the beginning of this scripture here in 2 Peter 3. 2 Peter, 3:3, knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days. Scoffers walking after their own lusts, and what does it mean to scoff at something? That’s the idea that they are doubting that they are arrogant, they’re prideful. They’re saying I’m looking around and I don’t see any problems. Hey, if you’ve been, uh, to Orlando Florida, I haven’t been some time, but they have some nasty songs out there. There’s a, there’s some rain over there and it comes out of nowhere, it can be sunny and you can look around and say, hey yeah, right, it’s gonna rain today. I don’t think so. In 30 minutes later, you could be hiding under a coffee table. You know, you could be locking yourself in a bathroom because you never heard rain like that the scene wind like that, you know, there’s scoffers right now, saying, look around, uh there’s nothing going on verse 4. Uh, where is the promise of His coming, right? What’s the promise? That’s Jesus, Christ’s return for since the father’s fell asleep. All things continue as they were from the beginning of creation, and we have scoffers today. Let me tell you something, the fact that someone would, if you said to them, I’m ready for the Lord to come. I believe the Lord’s going to come really soon. Maybe tomorrow and they laughed at you. The fact that they laughed at you is fulfilling this prophecy in the Bible. This it’s fulfilling this scripture. It is. It is validation that we are in the last days last days because it is nothing to laugh about. Amen. We’re in the last days because it’s nothing to laugh about Uh and here we see why this is so fascinating verse 5 of 2 Peter 3. Here’s why for this, they willingly are ignorant of this idea of willful ignorance. What does it mean? It means don’t ask. Don’t tell. It means if I close my eyes means, if I put my hands over my ears, I don’t have to see and I don’t have to hear, right? And willful ignorance is the idea of I just don’t want to know. I’d rather just imagine nothing about this particular subject and that is the position of many scoffers. They’re, they’re not Bible Scholars, many scholars, they’re not Bible Scholars because if they’re Bible scholars, they’ll realize the truth, inherency of scripture, they’ll realize the unbelievable prophecy that’s laid throughout all of scripture, they’re realize the unbelievable connection that Jesus Christ. In all of scripture, they’ll realize that, however, many authors authored, the Bible all did. So, in a way that God worked it through the Holy Spirit, that all of the scripture is unified so many ways and all goes along to paint a picture of our loving Saviour, Jesus Christ, and they’ll go through all of this, and they’ll read about the crucifixion. The mock trial that led to the crucifixion, the read about the resurrection. The read about how He’s spent Jesus Christ has been seen by over 500. Amen. The read about all of this. They can even go to extra biblical accounts that’s accounts that aren’t even in the Bible. They can read there from justifist and many others about how Christ really lived and they can go ahead and maybe look up and see some information about how all of these artifacts, you know, King Hezekiah, they found the well and so forth and the water, the water tunnels, or they can read about the Cyrus cylinder that points to the Babylonian captivity of the Israelites. And, you know, they can go through all that and say, hey, wait a minute, God’s real. They’re not Bible Scholars, they’re not doing any of that. What are they doing? They’re just scoffing. They’re just saying, I don’t want to know. They are wilfully. Ignorant and oh, what a scary thing. It is to be wilfully ignorant. You know, when it’s your life, you know, do you go to the doctor? And the doctor says, I’ve got a grave diagnosis for you and you say, I don’t want to hear a doctor and you walk out, I mean it’s your life don’t you want to know? It’s your health. And what Peter is saying here is hey this is your life. This is your health. You need to know this and these people are being wilfully ignorant. So you need to step up your game and get stirred up. Amen. You need to get stirred up and what is Peter like in this to a way that God has given an example for us in His word. Um, verse 6. Whereby the world that was then being overflowed with water perished. Well, what does that mean that refers to Noah’s flood. Genesis 7 11 and the 600th year of Noah’s life and the second month, the 17th day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of Heaven were opened And so we see here in verse 7 of 2 Peter 3. But the heavens and the Earth which are now by the same word are kept in store reserved in the fire against the day of judgement that perdition of ungodly men. So, what we’re seeing here is what was referenced in the scripture as a matter of fact, in 2 Peter 3:5, even uh it says for this willingly, our ignorant of and then it goes on to say that by the word of God, the heavens were of old and the Earth standing out of the water. And in the water, what does that mean? That means there was water in the heavens above, there was water below and all the water came up and so it’s the same thing as Genesis 7 11 when it says all the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of heaven were opened it’s the same idea. And so, what Peter is saying here ,is there was a time that people in the day of Noah were buying and selling and getting married and giving themselves to marriage and thinking that crazy guy building that boat. That guy’s a nut and there were scoffing at Noah. And what happened? Noah had that door open. It could have come in. Amen. Many people probably worked on no one ship yet. No one came in. And God flooded that place, and God himself. Shut that door, amen. And only no end. His family were saved. Amen. And it’s the same thing that happened, then that is happening now, in these last days. So what is the prescription? What do we need to do? We need to understand God’s marching orders. We need to understand why God wants us stirred up and we see why God wants us stirred up here in. Um, let’s see here 2 Peter 3:9 and very familiar verse. I’ve been quoting this verse a lot lately because I never want to preach anyone into the corner to then to think that they couldn’t be saved. 2 Peter 3: 9. The Lord is not slack. Is promises some men count slackness but is long-suffering to us word, long-suffering He’s willing, He’s waiting, He’s patient, He’s suffering through seeing all the sin that’s in the abomination. Waiting for you to be saved. Not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance the Lord wants everybody to get saved. Amen! The Lord doesn’t want anyone to die. I believe that not all will be saved. The Lord is all knowing, He knows past president and future. He knows who will be saved, but He wants to give everyone the opportunity. A God help me to say this, but when we die, we all are going to face. The Lord, right? Every knee will bow and those are saved. They will be at the beam of seat. Amen. They will get rewards for what they did, for the Lord, out of the pure heart. And those that are lost. They’ll be at the White Throne judgement and they will face the Lord, and Lord is going to give them an account. He’s going to give them a chance uh to maybe say why they didn’t believe in Him and so that would not work if He was not willing for them to be saved. So verse 9 shows that he wants all to be saved but some will reject and some will scoff. And so, what does the Christian do? What is, what are our marching orders? We know that the Lord wants people saved. The Lord wants everyone saved. So, our marching orders are to stand up for Christ to stand tall for Christ. In these end times to be stirred up and to stand up so we can lead others to Christ. That’s what God wants us to do. That’s why we’re here to glorify Him and to lead others to Christ to show them the prophecy that I’ve talked about, to show them the cross that I’ve talked about to show them that Jesus Christ loves them and died for them and paid their sin debt. And all they have to do is accept that free gift. If they understood that their works, wouldn’t get them into heaven. That their church membership. Wouldn’t get him into heaven, that their bank account won’t get him into heaven, then nothing else will get them in, but the blood of Jesus, if they understood, that just had to accept that free gift, that just had to realize their sinful state, and come to God and say, I’ll make you Lord And Saviour in my life, how many would do it? But what are we doing in these end times? We were just trying to get by just trying to get through another day. Look, we need to be on fire for God. I wish I had more time to dive into this, but I challenge you this week, this month this year. As long as Lord Terry’s, get on fire for God, get the things of the world, put them on the side, stand up for Christ stand tall. Tell people about Jesus don’t be ashamed. And in the end, it’ll all be worth it because we are almost done here. So, let’s make it about Jesus in these last days, he died for you. The least you can do is live for Him. Thank you so much for listening today. I look forward to talking with you again soon. Take care. And God bless. Amen.