Transcript & Slides: Animal Religion (2 Peter 2:9-22)

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Animal Religion (2 Peter 2:9-22)
By David Feddes

Today we're going to continue studying the book of Second Peter, which has an overall theme: to know and to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. If you're like a lot of people, you don't read Second Peter very often—or some of the other letters toward the back of the New Testament. I hope that's not true of you, but these are not always the most familiar books to some people.

Parallels between 2 Peter 2 and Jude

Second Peter and Jude are books that have a lot in common. The book of Jude is a short one, just one chapter, but Second Peter 2 is very, very similar to Jude. I want to take just a moment to show you the similarity between those two chapters. Both of them deal with false teaching.

There will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them. (2 Peter 2:1)
For certain men … have secretly slipped in among you. They … deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord. (Jude 1:4)

Their condemnation from long ago is not idle (2 Peter 2:3)
... whose condemnation was written about long ago. (Jude 1:4)

God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment. (2 Peter 2:4)
And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment. (Jude 1:6)

He turned Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes … making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly. (2 Peter 2:6)
Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 1:7)

They indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority… they blaspheme the glorious ones. (2 Peter 2:10)
These people   … defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones. (Jude 1:8)

Even angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. (2 Peter 2:11)
But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.” (Jude 1:9)

But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct… blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction. (2 Peter 2:12)
They blaspheme all that they do not understand; and what things they do understand by instinct, like unreasoning animals—these are the very things that destroy them. (Jude 1:10)

They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing. (2 Peter 2:15)
They have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error. (Jude 1:11)

They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, while they feast with you. (2 Peter 2:13)
These men are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm. (Jude 1:12)

These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. (2 Peter 2:17)
They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind… for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever. (Jude 1:12-13)

Remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles. (2 Peter 3:2)
But you must remember, beloved, the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude 1:17)

…knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. (2 Peter 3:3)
They said to you, “In the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires.” (Jude 1:18)

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 3:18)
But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. (Jude 1:20)

What's going on? Both are talking about false teachers, but there's more than that going on. It's almost certain that one had the other's letter before him when he was writing. Peter probably had a copy of Jude's letter and adapted it to address a similar situation. Jude's letter is quite a bit shorter, and Peter says more in his first chapter and then in his third chapter that isn't in Jude. But that middle chapter of Second Peter borrows a lot from Jude, putting it sometimes in slightly different words. It's clear that there's a strong parallel between them.

Whatever one's theory of how the letters were put together—and there are some who think that Jude was borrowing from Peter—the majority of scholars who analyze this think that Peter had Jude's letter as he was writing his own. Whatever the case, both authors fought for the faith against those who were false teachers. They exposed those false teachers, and then they both said, “Now here's what you need to do: you need to know the Lord better; you need to keep growing in him.” That's the best way to be immune to the tricks of those who are false teachers.

Today we want to focus especially on the last half of Second Peter chapter 2, and we're going to think about animal religion—people who think and act like animals. Sometimes Peter even uses animal pictures to give us a sense of who these teachers and their followers are.

In our last message, we heard the first half of Second Peter 2, and it talked about those false teachers. It says they're going to sneak in among you, they're going to bring in destructive heresies, they're even going to deny the Master who bought them. They're going to follow immoral urges, they're greedy, they're going to speak false words to exploit you and make money off of you, and they're going to get condemned and destroyed. Peter uses three examples: the fallen angels, the flood that swept the world, and the fire that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. These examples show that God knows how to punish his enemies and rescue his friends.

⁹ The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment ¹⁰ and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, ¹¹ whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. ¹² But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction, ¹³ suffering wrong as the wage for their wrongdoing. (2 Peter 2:9-13)

 

When you look at this portrait, the first thing you find out about these practitioners of animal religion is that they are very careless toward mighty spirits. There are glorious beings—the glorious ones, the angels of God—and even the fallen ones are still fallen from that glorious state and are beings of tremendous power, intellect, and subtlety. Somebody is out of touch with reality when they talk lightly about the angelic world and treat the demonic realm as though it is a joke, with funny little pictures of the devil; the devil is nothing to worry about. The fallen angels, people who are oblivious to that whole realm of mighty spirits, follow their own irrational animal instincts because if they do not feel it, touch it, and see it, it is not real. They follow the urges they have, and then they are bleating and barking and blaspheming about things they are clueless about.

Jude says about this: the mighty archangel Michael, one of the greatest beings God has made, when he was contending with a fallen angel, did not use his own authority; he said, “The Lord rebuke you.” When you are dealing with beings of that kind of power and magnificence—even if they are fallen—you do not resort to your own strength, and you do not act as though you can joke about it and make light of it. Animal religion does not fear demonic powers; they say that is medieval. They make jokes as though it is something to be taken lightly, and, as the old saying goes, “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.” The angels do not speak of the fallen angels lightly; they know what a force they are to contend with, even though the angels of God are beings of greater magnificence and power because they can still draw on the power of God.

The short of it, as Peter says, is that they are like animals strutting toward the slaughter. They are acting like animals, following their own instincts like creatures born to be killed and eaten; they are dead meat in short. He is reflecting the kind of thing Psalm 49 says: “Man in his riches, without understanding, is like the beasts that perish.” (Psalm 49) We are like animals if we think everything there is consists of our urges, our comfort, and our wealth, and especially if we start teaching that as the sum and substance of religion.

Peter has talked about their lack of respect for authority: they do not respect human authorities and they do not have regard for the divine powers and the angelic realm. He returns to the fact that they are sexually immoral; they count it pleasure to revel in the daytime, their blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions while they feast with you. They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin, and they entice unsteady souls. These are people who party all the time. The Bible normally says those who get drunk do so at night and those who behave immorally do it at night; these people are so shameless that any time is party time. This picture of drunkenness, of using substances to change your moods, of chasing anybody you are interested in—Peter says they are drunk on booze and lies. Literally, it says their eyes are full of adultery: when they look at someone, everything they see looks to them like a prospective bed partner; they cannot look at people any other way. Peter draws this almost as a caricature, but he is saying this is what these teachers are like: they have an ever-growing appetite for sin.

These urges drive them and they appeal to people when they enlist these urges for others. I do not need to go into any more detail; I have already spoken of it before: since the sexual revolution, especially in our own culture from the 1960s onward, even many religious teachers have been teaching people to act like animals. We are animals; we are created with bodies. There is an animal element to every human being. God gave us bodies; we have that in common with animals. We have appetites and urges, but we are also given a spirit and a mind meant to harness those appetites and live according to God’s Word, not simply according to what my appetite told me in the last five minutes. The will, the mind, and the spirit are meant to channel and control the good bodies God gave us. Urges are god-given, but they can easily be distorted or let run out of control and become immoral urges. Someone without the Spirit of God, someone who is not living by the life of God within them, can easily degenerate into something very similar to animals.

They have hearts trained in greed, accursed children forsaking the right way; they have gone astray and followed the way of Balaam the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing but was rebuked for his transgression. A speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness. Hearts trained in greed—the original Greek word is gymnasto, the word we have for gymnasium—these people are superstars of greed; they hit the gym every day to get greedier. They are working out, pumping iron, until they can really flex in greed. Peter is almost going over the top in describing this, but perhaps he needed to.

If you look at one of the most popular forms of religion and so-called Christianity today, it is the health-and-wealth gospel. They work out in greed and they promise workouts in greed; they promise you will get wealthy, prosperous, and successful if you work out like they do. Peter then speaks of the prophet Balaam, the one in the Old Testament who reappears as an example in the New of what not to be—one of those religious leaders who is in it for ease and cash. Balaam had an offer from a king; the king offered him money to come and curse the Israelites. He sent nobles with gifts; Balaam liked the gifts, but he got a message from God that he was not supposed to accept them or go. Balak, the king, sent more important nobles with cushier gifts and made an even bigger offer; this time Balaam got a message that seemed to say, okay, go ahead. When God told him to go, He was essentially saying, “If you want the money, go chase it,” but Balaam was happy and headed down the road. God was angry at Balaam and sent an angel, who stood with a drawn sword. Balaam, being the dunce that he was, did not see the angel, but his donkey did. If you call these teachers animals, don’t insult the animals; a donkey sees better than the religious prophet. The donkey saw the angel with the drawn sword and swerved off the road to avoid the angel. Balaam beat the donkey. The donkey tried again to avoid the angel by rubbing his leg against the wall, which really hurt, and Balaam beat the donkey again. Then he forced the donkey to go between a very narrow set of walls; the donkey, with the angel standing there, lay down because she could do nothing else. Balaam got furious, and the Lord opened the donkey’s mouth and said, “Why are you beating me?” Balaam said, “Because you have made me look like a fool; I am so angry that if I had a sword I would kill you.”

When your donkey talks to you, don’t talk back, okay? And when you say, “I wish I had a sword,” there is a sword in the vicinity—and it’s aimed at you. Very often there are things that come into our lives and we get mad because they kept us from a path we intended to take. But are you sure that those detours didn’t save you from something a lot worse?

At any rate, Balaam is very angry at his donkey, and then God gives that donkey the ability and the power to speak again. When the donkey does, Balaam is angry at first, but then he realizes—God finally shows him that angel waiting to kill him. Then he’s allowed to go on, and he blesses Israel. But later on, he’s not allowed to curse the Israelites, so he gives Balak a little help—a helpful tip as he leaves. He says, “You know what, I can’t bring a curse on them, but if you can get your women to go mingle with theirs, and get them to sleep with your women and worship your gods, then God’s going to bring judgment on them. That’s what you’ve got to do.” And sure enough, it works. Except then, when there’s a war between Israel and them, Balaam is killed. So that’s the story of Balaam.

The short of it is, don’t be like Balaam. And don’t follow morons who are like Balaam, who have to be restrained from their madness by a donkey talking. Another thing to keep in mind is that sometimes a donkey does know better than the one who is supposed to know. Some Christians who know the Word of God, who know the way of righteousness, can be intimidated by people with titles or important positions. If they have a “Reverend” or a “Ph.D.” associated with them, or if they’re a professor of this or a pastor of that, it seems obvious to you as an ordinary person that they’re way off track. You might say, “But who am I?”

Well, occasionally the Lord will open a mouth. If a donkey could correct a prophet, maybe you could correct somebody once in a while too. So another message that Peter is saying here is, don’t be intimidated by those who are supposed to be more important and supposed to know better, because sometimes it’s just clear that people are going against the clear teaching of the Scriptures, against the way of salvation in Christ, against the way of living for Christ, and they need to be restrained and corrected.

Then Peter says, “These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm; for them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved.” (2 Peter 2:17) Waterless springs—picture yourself traveling through a desert, and you’ve been told that at a certain spot there is an oasis, a place with a bubbling spring with cool, fresh water. Around that spring are palm trees with dates and other fruit growing on them. You’re walking through the desert, looking forward to getting to that oasis so you can get cool, fresh water and something good to eat. You get there, and it is waterless. The spring is dry, the plants around it are shriveled, there is no fruit, no water to drink. What a disappointment—and it might be fatal. If you’re out in the desert and were counting on a pit stop and there’s nothing there, that would be disastrous. Peter says that’s what these false teachers are like. You come to them, you think you’re going to get living water from them, you think you’re going to get some delicious nutrition from them—and you get a dry hole in the ground. That’s how well they’re going to help you out.

Another picture he uses is mists driven by a storm. You’re farming, and your crops are dry and shriveling. Finally, you see some clouds in the sky coming toward you, and you say, “Ah, rain at last!” Then the wind picks up and blows like crazy, carrying away all those clouds you were hoping would deliver rain, and the crop goes on shriveling and dying. That is what preachers without the gospel—preachers who don’t bring the way of righteousness to people—are like. Peter wants us to know exactly what’s going on, because later he’s going to say they promise certain things but don’t deliver. That’s what he’s saying here: they’re waterless springs, mists driven by a storm, for them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved.

“For speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption.” (2 Peter 2:18-19) Again, the waterless spring and the mist driven by a storm—they’re promising something, and you’re counting on it: freedom. Except they’re even worse slaves than their listeners, for “whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved.”

Those words tell us some serious things that are wrong with these teachers, but they also show us what the attraction is in the first place. You hear Peter talk about them and some of the things he says, and you wonder, why would anybody ever listen to anybody like that? They speak with bold authority. Verse 10 says they don’t respect authority, and they talk even against angels and demons without knowing what they’re talking about. But you know what? They’re bold and willful. They’re boastful, and somebody who can talk big and with great confidence can usually get a following, because people like a really brash, bold, self-confident person—at least some people do. They may boast of their qualifications, their degrees, their lofty positions, their achievements, and so forth, and this draws people toward them.

Another key to their effectiveness is that they know whom to target. They target shaky souls. They go after the newer believer, the one who’s not yet well established and well taught in the faith. They go after the young, who haven’t made up their minds about a lot of things. They go after those who may have struggled with mental illness or have an area of brokenness in their life that’s made things hard, leaving them disoriented. So you have these teachers targeting the shaky. Even in the animal realm, wolves and similar animals are always looking for the young, the weak, the straggler—the ones on the fringes. And it works. They target those who are going to be most vulnerable to them. They also target and appeal to sexual passions.

Look at the last fifty years in the life of the American church. The more liberal churches especially have simply erased from the Bible what is said about sex within marriage—and only within marriage—between a man and a woman. That is much more comfortable to either not speak of or to outright deny. They are training hearts in greed again, and people like money. They promise fulfillment, they promise freedom—and who doesn’t want to be fulfilled, who doesn’t want to be free, who doesn’t want to be told, “Hey, your urges are good; God wants you to be happy”? So they promise this fulfillment and freedom, but what are they? They are slaves of corruption.

We’ve lived with a lot of promises—some from false religious teachers, some from false secular teachers. “You’re going to be happy if you make money,” they say. And you find more and more people enslaved to their work. They’re making money, but how much of it are they enjoying? They become enslaved to their work. They become addicted to alcohol or drugs, which were supposed to make them feel better and make them happy, but now they’re hooked. There are those who thought sexual pleasure is the be-all and end-all, and now they don’t know anymore how to stick with one person and enjoy the benefits that faithfulness brings. They get hooked on pornography; they can’t leave it alone. Or they get hooked on the pleasure train: “I want to be free, I want to be fulfilled—one more program, one more show, one more thing.”

And with our big screens and little screens on our smartphones, we’re freer than ever to take part in anything whatsoever throughout the whole world. We’re free—and we can’t leave that thing alone for forty-five seconds. They even do surveys on how often people check their phones. These little instruments of freedom have everybody chained to them. They can be nice and convenient for some things, but before you know it, if you think that kind of thing is what sets you free, you find the chains are getting heavier and heavier.

The word for “entice” is deleazo, which simply means “baiting a hook.” They entice unsteady souls; they entice by sensual passions of the flesh. And when the fish is swimming toward the bait, it sees only that smiling, delicious worm—not the hook. But the hook is there, and that’s what Peter is telling us. They entice by sensual passions of the flesh, and they target the souls that haven’t heard of worms on hooks before, and they get them. But Peter’s telling us so that we won’t fall for that.

He says, “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves.” (2 Peter 2:19) There Peter is echoing what Jesus himself said: “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31-32) Those religious teachers who were listening to him said, “We have never been slaves to anybody; we are free.” Jesus said, “Anyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.” (John 8:33-34) That’s what Peter says here: they promise freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption because they’re slaves of sin.

The apostle Paul said something similar in Romans 6:16: “You are slaves to whatever you obey, whether to righteousness and God or to sin.” Peter says you’re a slave to whatever has overcome you. Jesus gives the only solution: “If you abide in my word, you’ll know the truth, and the truth will set you free. If the Son sets you free, you’ll be free indeed.” (John 8:31-36) Otherwise, not. You need Jesus to set you free. You need the truth to guide you and set you free. And if you don’t like the real Jesus and the real truth, the only other option is not freedom but slavery.

Any teacher who comes to you and says, “You know that Jesus you used to hear about—the one who lived a perfect life and hung on a cross and died? You know what? He was actually kind of a pal, and his blood and death didn’t accomplish anything for you in relation to God. But he did have some helpful and encouraging therapeutic tips for you. And you know that Sermon on the Mount? It’s all about how Jesus is everybody’s friend, and we have to get away from the harsh, strict ideas Christians teach—talk of hell—and go with the gentle Jesus of the Sermon on the Mount.”

That line only works if you never read the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount says, “If you look at someone lustfully, you’ve already committed adultery with her.” (Matthew 5:28) “If you hate somebody, you’ve already committed murder.” (Matthew 5:22) “Your righteousness is going to have to be better than the scribes and the Pharisees, not worse.” (Matthew 5:20) “You need to walk the narrow road that leads to life that only a few walk, because there’s a broad road to destruction, and many walk down it.” (Matthew 7:13-14) “If something causes you to sin, get rid of it; it’s better to lose something than to go to hell.” (Matthew 5:29-30) That’s the Sermon on the Mount.

So again, the only way false teachers can get at you is if we live in total ignorance of what the Bible actually says.

“For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.” (2 Peter 2:20) That final phrase, “the last state has become worse for them than the first,” is an echo of some words of Jesus. Jesus spoke of a person having demons kicked out and being set free from demonic power. He said that unclean spirit, if nothing moves back in, goes around for a while, not finding a home, and then comes back to the person it was originally handling and possessing. The unclean spirit finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. (Matthew 12:43-45)

That’s what Peter is talking about when he says that if they’ve been delivered and have made a break through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ but then turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them, then the last state is worse for them than the first. “It would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them.” (2 Peter 2:21) “What the true proverb says has happened to them: the dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.” (2 Peter 2:22)

When Peter says that people are worse off if they have come to know something of Christ and then turned away, what does he mean? What do they mean when they say you’re better off not knowing than knowing and then turning back?

If you turn from the way, if you reject the faith, if you deny Christ, then a couple of things happen. You get a harder heart. An ex-Christian is harder to save than a pagan. When you’ve had some taste of what Christian living is like, some sense of who Jesus is, and you say no, your heart is harder than it was—much harder. For some, there may never be any turning back. I don’t want to say that too strongly, because God in his mercy has done some amazing things in the lives of very hardened people. But overall, an individual who grew up in the church and then chucks it all—an individual who was all excited about following Jesus and then says on second thought, “Yeah, not for me”—that’s very, very hard. In some cases, it just won’t happen at all for them ever to be saved.

This is true also of nations and cultures. There are nations that have had extensive exposure to the Christian gospel, wonderful opportunities, tremendous transformations in national life, and blessings that came because of that—as marriages flourished, as social conditions improved, as economies improved. Not because of a health-and-wealth gospel, but because people were living responsibly and learning from the Christian way. But when nations grow proud and turn away from the Lord, they are worse than nations that had stayed pagan all along, that never believed. Their opportunity for revival is much less. To have turned away from Christ indicates a hardness and rebellion much stronger than if they simply hadn’t yet heard the good news. So they’re better off not knowing than knowing and rejecting.

Another reason is that the punishment is harsher. Hell is worst for those who knew the most. Jesus says it’s going to be better for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for those towns where he taught his wondrous truths and did his miracles, because even though Sodom and Gomorrah behaved worse, they had much less opportunity and much less divine revelation. All they had was Lot living there—you know, Lot, a guy, yeah, a righteous man, sort of, maybe a little bit—but these towns had Jesus Christ living right among them. We need to understand that if you’ve had a wonderful exposure to the gospel of Jesus Christ and have been part of a congregation where people loved Jesus and followed him—not perfectly, but genuinely—and then you say, “That’s not for me; I reject that; I want real freedom,” the Bible says hell is worst for those who knew the most.

This passage raises the question: can salvation be lost? It talks about people who escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. What’s going on? Whatever’s going on, we need to observe that Peter is clearly teaching that churchgoers and professing Christians can end up in hell. That’s undeniable. Whatever your doctrine—whether you think those who are saved could later lose their salvation, or whether you believe the truly saved can’t lose their salvation—one thing is certain: there can be people sitting in pews who end up in hell. There can be people who were baptized who are lost forever. There can be people who came to the Lord’s Supper and were lost. There can be people who were preachers and even missionaries who are lost. Jesus says so.

So whatever your doctrine of whether people can lose their salvation or not, it’s very clear that people who behave in religious ways and maybe clean up their act for a little while can certainly be lost. Knowing of Christ, admitting your sins, improving your behavior—those are not in and of themselves proof that you’ve been born again, that you have new life from Christ. Perseverance in the faith is the evidence that you have eternal life, not a temporary five-minute brand of life.

So can salvation be lost? I think the clear answer from the Scriptures is no. Those who are apostates—who turn away from the faith, who betray the faith—were never born again; they were never truly saved in the first place. Their nature never changed. Peter himself talks about being elect in his first letter. He talks about being shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that’s ready to be revealed in the last time. He talks in his second letter about God providing everything we need for life and godliness and about growth, and he says if you practice these qualities you will never fall; your calling and election will be sure.

So Peter definitely believes that eternal life is eternal, that God’s salvation truly does save. But he also recognizes that there are those who seem to be saved for a while, who are changed temporarily by what they learn of Christ and by their experience with Christian people, but the Bible speaks of them as people who never really were part of the faith. The apostle John in 1 John 2:19 says, “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us, for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.” That’s John’s explanation: they never really belonged, and their leaving proved it. If they leave the faith, that shows they never really belonged to the faith in the first place.

When Jesus deals with the false teachers and the evildoers on the last day, his words are going to be, “I never knew you.” (Matthew 7:23) He will not say, “It was nice to know you for a while; we had a pretty good relationship going, but things got fouled up.” He says, “I never knew you.” You never had a living, healthy relationship with me. So I think the teaching of Jesus and the rest of the Scriptures is that saved people don’t get lost. But the Scripture also teaches that saved people persevere. So if you’re looking back and saying, “You know, back when I was seven I walked to the front of the church, I walked the aisle,” or, “When I was such and such an age I got baptized,” that’s not the question. The question is, are you in Christ now, and is he in you?

This or that event is not the final evidence that you have eternal life. Eternal life is evident in you; eternal life is making a difference in you, and you’re persevering in it. “What the true proverb says has happened to them: the dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.” (2 Peter 2:22) In short, they are reverting to their nature. Their nature didn’t really change. That’s why I say those who are truly saved remain saved. But there are some who seem to have experienced something, yet it didn’t change their nature at all. The dog throws up and feels better inside—but it’s still a dog.

The proverb Peter is quoting is Proverbs 26:11: “As a dog returns to its vomit, a fool returns to his folly.” If you’re a fool and you do a couple of smart things because somebody advised you, but your basic nature never changed, you’re still going to be a fool. A dog may feel better after it vomits, but it’s still a dog—it still eats disgusting things, including its own vomit. That’s what Peter says: you might feel better, but you’re still going to be a dog unless something happens to change who you are. Or think of the pig: “The sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.” She got washed; she looks better—but she’s still a pig. Give her half a chance, and she’s right back in the mud again, because she’s a pig. The dog may feel better, the sow may look better temporarily, but they’re still what they always were. They revert to nature.

Animal religion is religion for those who have not been born again, who don’t have a new nature by the work of the Holy Spirit. They don’t have Christ living within them, and people who have been following animal religion need to be born again. Jesus said that to a very respected religious teacher: “You must be born again.” (John 3:7) Otherwise, you are a slave to sin; otherwise, you are doomed and damned.

Sometimes dealing with the dogs and the pigs can get pretty risky. One message is that if we find ourselves in that kind of condition, we must seek Christ for new birth. Another is that sometimes we’re going to be dealing with folks who are like dogs and pigs. Jesus said, “Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet and then turn and tear you to pieces.” (Matthew 7:6) Sometimes you find out, in dialogue with somebody, that they are very hardened and nasty in their wickedness. Jesus says, “Okay, don’t ever give up on anybody totally, but if you realize that’s what you’re dealing with, don’t keep throwing out more pearls, and don’t keep giving sacred things to those who are not ready to receive them.” Maybe at some point God will change their circumstances and make them more open to it. But there are people you must recognize, for now, are not going to be receptive to the things of God.

By the same token, we need to recognize what Peter’s telling us: we need to be born again; we need to follow teachers who’ve been born again and know the new birth and who preach the new birth. Otherwise, we’re just going to be following people who are slaves while they promise freedom. They’re going to be filthy while they’re promising cleanliness. They’re going to be eating their own barf while they’re trying to nourish you. It’s a crude way of speaking, but it’s not my idea.

Nowadays, the way you deal with false teachers is by saying, “I respectfully suggest to you, my brothers and sisters in Christ, that abomination would be a rather poor idea, and heresy might be something you’d be better off avoiding.” When you talk that way, you’re sending the message that it doesn’t matter that much. You’re suggesting there are no great and mighty demonic powers behind this, no enslaving powers ripping us up and killing us, and no God we’ve got to reckon with. I’m not saying not to be polite and respectful in your ordinary human interactions, but politeness by preachers is killing us. Politeness by Christians who don’t know how to recognize and denounce sin is killing us.

Read the prophets. Read the apostles. You will find some very strong language. That’s why this message is titled “Animal Religion.” The Bible speaks of it in these terms—like irrational creatures, creatures of instinct. “The dog returns to its own vomit; the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.” (2 Peter 2:22) Jude says something similar: “They understand by instinct like unreasoning animals; they follow their own ungodly desires.” (Jude 10, 16) And here’s the real line that clarifies everything: “They follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit.” (Jude 19) They’re not born again; they don’t have the Spirit, and that’s why instinct reigns.

Jesus, that great gentle teacher who never said anything rude to anybody—aside from calling them dogs and pigs and vipers and wolves—did warn very strongly. He said, “You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape being sentenced to hell?” (Matthew 23:33) Why do you call a false teacher a serpent? Because they slither and they’re sneaky, and you can never pin them down. That’s part of it. But they’re also poisonous; they’re deadly. And Jesus wants us to know what false teaching does.

As we began our message on First Peter 2, they’re woolly wolves. “Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves.” (Matthew 7:15) That’s the message of the Lord Jesus Christ.

The upshot is that you and I need to be born again ourselves. This is why we need to be growing constantly in grace, because the sign of truly being born again is persevering—growing in grace, bearing fruit, having life in us, eternal life. We need to know who’s out there—both the mighty powers, the unseen powers of the evil one, as well as his ambassadors, who appear as angels of light, as servants of righteousness, as people who are just one more good sheep trying to help you along.

Now, we can go off the deep end and denounce everybody who has one minor disagreement with us as a woolly wolf, a snake, a pig, or a dog. That happens all too often in church life, where we’re at each other’s throats and ready to shoot each other. That’s a terrible mistake. But don’t make the opposite one, where nothing is worth fighting for, where nothing is so serious that it doesn’t need to be denounced. We need to be warned. That’s why the Bible is full of such warnings.

So may God help us to grow in grace. May God help us to be people who can recognize woolly wolves and be spared from what they can do to us.

Prayer

Dear Father, we pray help us to walk with you faithfully, to grow in your grace, to grow in knowledge, to not be fooled. Lord, help us not to be blown about by every wind of doctrine or tricked by deceitfulness and cunning, but instead, Lord, to speak the truth in love and grow up into maturity. Lord, help some right now who might be vulnerable, who might feel shaky, whose faith is struggling—whether under hard circumstances or in the face of challenges from false teaching. We pray, Father, that you will bring deliverance, that you will nurture the life that is in them. Where those, Lord, have not been born again, we pray for new life and new birth. And where there is that new birth but still a struggle, we pray for growth and rescue and deliverance. And Lord, help us who are in this body of Christ to build one another up in love, to speak the truth in love, to be ready, Lord, to help each other as well as to be strong in defending against the wolves. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

  

Animal Religion (2 Peter 2:9-22)
By David Feddes
Slide Contents

Parallels between 2 Peter and Jude

There will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them. (2 Peter 2:1)
For certain men … have secretly slipped in among you. They … deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord. (Jude 1:4)

Their condemnation from long ago is not idle (2 Peter 2:3)
... whose condemnation was written about long ago. (Jude 1:4)

God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment. (2 Peter 2:4)
And the angels who did not stay within their own position of authority, but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment. (Jude 1:6)

He turned Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes … making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly. (2 Peter 2:6)
Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 1:7)

They indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority… they blaspheme the glorious ones. (2 Peter 2:10)
These people   … defile the flesh, reject authority, and blaspheme the glorious ones. (Jude 1:8)

Even angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. (2 Peter 2:11)
But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.” (Jude 1:9)

But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct… blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction. (2 Peter 2:12)
They blaspheme all that they do not understand; and what things they do understand by instinct, like unreasoning animals—these are the very things that destroy them. (Jude 1:10)

They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing. (2 Peter 2:15)
They have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error. (Jude 1:11)

They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, while they feast with you. (2 Peter 2:13)
These men are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm. (Jude 1:12)

These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. (2 Peter 2:17)
They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind… for whom blackest darkness has been reserved forever. (Jude 1:12-13)

Remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles. (2 Peter 3:2)
But you must remember, beloved, the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude 1:17)

…knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. (2 Peter 3:3)
They said to you, “In the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires.” (Jude 1:18)

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 3:18)
But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. (Jude 1:20)

2 Peter and Jude

• Peter probably had a copy of Jude’s letter and adapted it to address a similar situation.
• Both authors fought for the faith, exposed false teachers, and told believers to know and grow.

False teachers

• Sneak among God’s people
• Bring in destructive heresies
• Deny Jesus the Master
• Follow immoral urges
• Speak false words to exploit
• Get condemned and destroyed

Punish and rescue
⁹ The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment ¹⁰ and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, ¹¹ whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord. ¹² But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction, ¹³ suffering wrong as the wage for their wrongdoing.

Animal religion

• Careless toward mighty spirits
• Follow irrational animal instincts
• Make blasphemous noises about things they don’t understand
• Strut toward slaughter

Immoral urges
They count it pleasure to revel in the daytime. They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, while they feast with you. ¹⁴ They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls.

• Party time all the time
• Drunk on booze and lies
• Eyes see only adulteresses
• Ever-growing appetite for sin

Greedy like Balaam
They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! ¹⁵ Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, ¹⁶ but was rebuked for his own transgression; a speechless donkey spoke with human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.

Waterless Springs and Storm-Driven Mists
¹⁷ These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved.

Attracting a crowd
¹⁸ For, speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error.  ¹⁹ They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. 

• Speak with bold authority
• Target shaky souls
• Cater to sexual passions
• Train hearts in greedy gain
• Promise fulfillment & freedom but are slaves of corruption

Entice (δελεάζω) = Bait a hook
They entice unsteady souls… they entice by sensual passions of the flesh (v. 14, 18)

Free indeed
If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free… everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin… So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. (John 8:31-36)

Worse off than ever
²⁰ For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.

The unclean spirit finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first. (Matthew 12:45)

²¹ For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteous-ness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. ²² What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”

Better not knowing
If you turn from the Way, reject the faith, and deny Christ, you get:

• Harder heart: ex-“Christian” is harder to save than a pagan.
• Harsher punishment: hell is worst for those who knew most.

Can salvation be lost?

• Churchgoers and professing “Christians” can end up in hell.
• Knowing of Christ, admitting sins, and  improving behavior are NOT proof of rebirth. Perseverance is!
• Traitors were never reborn or saved; their nature never changed.

²² What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”

Animal religion
... like irrational animals, creatures of instinct … “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.” (2 Peter 2:12, 22)
… understand by instinct, like unreasoning animals … follow their own ungodly desires … follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit. (Jude 1:10-19)

Jesus warned that dogs and pigs are dangerous (Matthew 7:6). Jesus also pictured false teachers as poisonous snakes: "You serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell?" (Matthew 23:33). Jesus said that false teachers take after their father, the devil (John 8:44). False teachers are headed for hell like that old serpent, Satan the dragon (Revelation 12:9; 20:10).