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September 01 Since All These Things Will Be Dissolved: Authentic Christian Education Must Be Aimed at Eternity

2 Peter 3:1-18

Fall Convocation 2026

Let me say, first of all, that it would be worth gathering here for this occasion, if only to hear this congregation sing hymns, and get to declare the faith once for all delivered to the saints together in song. And I want to say to the student body, you’re looking mighty good. And I want you to know how much I appreciate the fact that you are joining in the formality of this moment, the meaning and the weight of this moment. It’s something to begin an academic year. That’s true for any academic institution, but those that are not Christian or theistic in orientation, I mean, quite frankly, it’s nothing more than just getting another one started. That’s it. For us, it’s something very different. It is a matter of succession of faithfulness. For us, it’s a formality that goes back in terms of this opening convocation, goes back all the way to the medieval university.

There in the heart of the Middle Ages, when the emergence of the idea of the university came, and it came as a servant to the church, it came explicitly, not only in a theistic context, it came explicitly in a Christian context. The very name university is a testimony to the universal, to the fact that there is one sovereign creator God of the universe, all truth is in him, revealed by him, held by him. And thus the task of education, the task of teaching and learning is an essentially theological task. It’s a biblical task. It’s a spiritual task. It’s a churchly task.

Even those scholars in the medieval universities, they had to do something to say, this is important. We got to start this. They started with worship. They would meet in something, usually a cathedral. They would gather together. The scholars would come in. How would they dress? Well, they would dress in their scholarly dress. And then the students would come in also dressed for the occasion. It was a service of worship. The formality of it was hardly foreign to the medieval world. It does seem a little foreign to our world. I mean, there were young children out there and they watched all these grown people wearing costumes walking into a church. That’s what it looks like. Why are we doing this? It is because this is a conscious continuation of a heritage of Christian teaching and learning. This is a self-conscious, lived out reenactment and reminder of what is at stake.

One of the central truths held by the medieval university in the Christian age was that the stewardship of knowledge and the stewardship of teaching came down to the fact that these things are so precious that to get them wrong is wrongly to testify not only about creation, but the creator. To get these things wrong is to lead to moral error, as well as to some kind of mathematical error. The scholars gathered together in these convocations, committed themselves to Christ, to the church, to the gospel. Now that’s not what you’re going to see in most prestigious universities these days. Even in the remainders of these medieval universities, most of the university culture has been directed in a very secular way for a very long time. There are some of the colleges and units that continue some, at least, historical reenactment of it all.

It’s very interesting that when James Petigru Boyce, who was the founding faculty member of this institution, and by the way, had been pastor of the First Baptist Church of Columbia, South Carolina from which we have a new trustee. You talk about continuity. There it is. And when he came and was making the argument for the existence of this institution in an address called “Three Changes in Theological Education,” one of the most important things he said was, “Number one, this is going to be a confessional school. It is going to be one accountable to the church.” And because this was on the other side, by 1859, it was already clear to those who were establishing this school that theological liberalism was on the rise. And as a matter of fact, Basil Manly Jr., the son of the founding chairman of the board here, Basil Manly Sr., had gone to an institution in the north and encountered theological liberalism. And thus his father, one of the most significant figures in the south, not to mention the Southern Baptist Convention, said to him, “Leave there and go to Princeton.” Princeton was at that point, Presbyterian Orthodoxy. The point was this, better to study with Presbyterians who are Orthodox than with Baptists who are not.

But that’s not a long-term answer. The long-term answer means we need a Baptist Princeton, and that’s exactly why this institution was established. It’s exactly why this moment is so important. It’s also why on this day in September of 2026, we see the confluence of several things. And that confluence includes the fact we have new members of the board of trustees here. We have our officers of the board who have been here. We have new students, and returning students, and we have faculty. We’re all gathered in one place. When you look at this, you recognize the stewardship of what is represented in this room is simply massive. If this faculty misteaches, it will show up in the churches. If this faculty misleads, it will show up in souls.

If this student body is merely casual and learning, it will fade away. All these things are before us. If the board of trustees fails in its task, the institution wanders off into the larger world of genetic higher education, which is increasingly in my view, worthless. It’s a reminder as we are together in this convocation that we all have jobs to do. One of my jobs is to direct us to Scripture, and I want to do that looking at the final chapter of 2 Peter. I turn to 2 Peter 3. Here now the Word of God.

Peter writes, “This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder, that you should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, ‘Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.’ For they deliberately overlook this fact, that the heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and through water by the word of God, and that by means of these the world that then existed was deluged with water and perished. But by the same word the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly. 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. 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. 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. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace. And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”

It’s an astounding passage. I have to tell you, I’m at least awesomely astounded by the fact that this is from Peter. A part of me just has to stand back in awe and wonder in how a Galilean fisherman ends up writing like this. It is the sovereignty of God. Simon, back in Galilee, I don’t think talked this way. I don’t think this is fishermen on Galilee talk. This is apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ talk. This is the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, as Peter writes on apostolic authority. This is his second letter. And as he makes very clear, he has urgencies. Several people asked me on what text I would preach this morning, and there’s been almost uniformly a strange look on the face when I said 2 Peter 3.

I think I know why. I think I know why. I think it is because in an occasion like this, you are really focused on beginning a new year with assurance of the joy of Christ, and the comfort of faith, and the encouragement of the saints, and all that. And this is here, but wow, I chose a text in which the entire cosmos is dissolved. And it is because how many times we read Scripture? Sometimes you read Scripture, and something just lands on you, and you’ve seen it, you’ve seen it. You may have preached on this passage as I have. You may have taught all this, but then you just see something. Sometimes interestingly, it’s more visible in a different translation. So if you learn the text in one translation, and all of a sudden, you’re looking at another translation, and you see there’s a nuance here, I think I missed, there’s a rhythm, there’s a structure I think I missed.

I’ve got to look more closely at this.

That’s why my mind and heart were drawn to this particular passage, and I’m going to focus on one part of it with greater intensity. This astounding passage is about the coming day of the Lord. And in that context, Peter is just so intent on presenting the truth to Christ people, in order that they will be sober minded, joyful and faithful in anticipation of the day of the Lord, that great and awesome day, awesome as in awe. And you’ll notice it starts with a very sober warning, as Peter begins to write. And the apostles do this. It’s amazing how the apostles will move from correction and admonition to encouragement. The apostles, by the Holy Spirit in terms of the apostolic writings, can go from something that is joyful as the very foundation of our salvation and the next thing, of necessity, they’re warning against error or trouble, even troublemakers in the church.

Peter’s often very just clear. He uses words by the way. One of the things you see in this passage is that Peter, he gets on a word, and he uses it over and over again. He warns of scoffers who will come. And I love the sentence in this text, in which we are told what scoffers do. What do scoffers do? They scoff. Good. Thank you. Yeah. That’s what they do. That’s how they become a scoffer. It’s not like you go up to someone and say, “You’re a scoffer. Start scoffing.” No, you hear them. You detect them and you detect this scoffing spirit, and then you know, well, what we have on our hands is a scoffer. This is also a reminder to us that this early in the history of the Christian church, there were those who were bringing disrepute upon the gospel. They were seeking to undermine the gospel.

It’s just very helpful for us to understand that from the beginning, the gospel has had not only friends, but enemies.

Peter calls them out. He even indicts them specifically because they are sowing doubt about the certainty of Christ’s coming. So it’s a particular kind of scoffing. It’s a scoffing addressed at the promise coming day of the Lord. Now let’s just remind ourselves what’s included in that promise. What’s included in that promise? The day of judgment coming, yes. What’s included in that promise? The throne of grace. Yes. What’s included in that promise? The end of an age, yes. What’s included in that promise? The beginning of a new age, yes. What’s included in that promise? A new heaven and a new earth. What’s included in that promise, in the gospel? Heaven.

It’s clear not only in this passage, but in others in the New Testament, that there were some who believed that the return of the Lord was absolutely imminent. It would happen right then. And there were those who then when it didn’t happen as quickly began to say, “Look, God’s lost the timetable. Maybe he’s changed his plan.” And this scoffing was obviously creating a real problem in the church. Peter responds, “These men who are scoffing, they’re driven by their own sinful desires.” That’s very helpful for us to know. I can tell you that one of the patterns you will see in life is that the people who will scoff at, say, a clear doctrinal claim are often the same people who will in their lives scoff at moral rules.

I will give credit where credit is due. I was with a group of theologians and others. One was a Roman Catholic, a conservative Roman Catholic, and he simply said, “Theological liberalism is rationalized sexual misbehavior.” All right? Not going to find that in the dictionary, but there’s a sense in which if God hasn’t said this, then you can do this. It’s this rationalized sexual misbehavior. But Peter says, “God is not slow. His timing is not off. He hasn’t lost the script. He hasn’t lost the clock.” And as we will be told again, he’s not bound by time. His timing, however, his interventions, his sovereign acts are perfect and perfectly timed. He has not lost the script. His timing is not off. He is not slow. Judgment is surely coming, as you see in verse seven. God is not slow, but even as God is not slow, this time reminds us that this is God’s grace in order that there may be sinners who will repent.

This is a time and this time is not just God being slow. That’s not what it is at all. It is God’s patience in order that the gospel may be preached, and sinners may hear the gospel, and seize upon Christ, and be saved. Don’t misread the times.

Peter’s also very clear that this time for preaching the gospel will not last forever, for the Lord will come like a thief. Metaphors are interesting, aren’t they? The Lord will come as a thief. 1 Thessalonians 5:2, Paul speaks of the Lord, but he speaks specifically of a thief in the night. The thief comes with unexpected timing. The thief comes, and it’s on the thieves timing, the thief’s timing. I want to look particularly at verses 10 through 13, and I just want to look at that dramatic language again. I’m going to read those verses 10 through 13. I’m going to see if you hear what has so struck me. “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. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of people ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be set on fire and dissolved, and the heavenly bodies will melt as they burn! But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells.”

All right, let me just confess something to you. And this is a confession, in which all the men in this room are commonly guilty, and this may explain something to the women in this room. All right? So let me just make this confession. We never grow up. I mean, there’s a sense in which we must, but there’s another sense in which we never do. In every man, no matter the age, there is a little boy waiting to blow up the world. Daniel Dennett, who was one of the most infamous of the new atheists as they were known in the 1990s, a scientist, research scientist, he wrote a book one time in which he spoke of his dream as a boy. His dream as a boy came down to a universal acid.

He said, “I just as a boy was listening to the teacher teach, and here’s what I thought. Maybe one day someone will develop an acid which is so acidic, it will burn through everything.” He detailed his malevolent adolescent vision. The acid would be formed and it would consume the test tube. It would then consume the tester. It would consume the laboratory. It would consume the school. It would consume the town, the city, the state. It would consume the planet. It would consume the entire cosmos, just a few drops of this universal acid and all would be dissolved.

Now, I’m thankful, by the way, that there is no such universal acid, and I’m counting on the fact that the day of the Lord will come before some malevolent scientist comes up with a universal acid, but I do understand that vision. You’re listening to a teacher, and the mind’s at work. Well, if an acid could do this, and a stronger acid could do that, and an even stronger acid could do this, then what about an acid that could just acid everything. I was just reading through 1–2 Peter. When I was so struck coming to 2 Peter 3 by one word used three times. It’s the word “dissolved.”

Now, without going into a lot of detail or doing a Greek word study or anything, it basically means dissolved. I mean, like a universal acid, like it was there, now it’s not. In the Old Testament, there are similar passages about things, including the created order just melting away. There are even in this passage references to destruction by fire. You see the heavenly bodies will be burned up. Here’s what struck me, brothers and sisters. You know what dissolved means? Dissolved, gone. It’s all going to burn. It’s all going to disappear. Now I know, let me just go ahead for the New Testament scholars and those in biblical theology, and all of you, that means everybody in the room, you’re already concerned about some of the exegetical questions in this text. I’m just going to say, I’m not dealing with the continuity discontinuity question, because I think the New Testament biblical theology is very clear.

There’s both continuity and discontinuity. This world is going to disappear, but out of it, by God’s glorious sovereignty, will be a new heaven and a new earth over which Christ will reign forever. But as for this stuff, I mean, you, me, all the stuff, the pews, the campus, the bricks, the stones, dissolved. I mean, seriously dissolved? The cosmic, massive destruction in this passage staggers the imagination. I mean, we read it calmly. I didn’t see any terrified faces, but this is a terrifying passage. Everything we know, everything we count on, not just breaking down, not just weaker than it was, not just winding down like a clock, but in this judgment on the day of the Lord, melting away and dissolving. Dissolved, dissolved, dissolved. Now, let me tell you why I was so drawn to this passage. It is because I think unless you are a Christian institution believing in this truth, unless you are operating out of the deep reservoirs of biblical historic Christianity, unless this kind of passage is on your mind, then by definition, you’re actually assuming and teaching the opposite.

I mean, if you go to a modern business school, they’re about business, and they don’t say, “By the way, all this is going to melt away.” Instead, it’s go build something great. Be the next. You got to watch who you say these days, because things get morally complicated, but be the next Bill Gates, or someone like that. Just go do something, build something real. What do you say? In other words, if this life is all there is, then the very idea there’s an end to this is just terrifying, so you just get busy, and you build bigger barns, you build bigger empires. But at the end of the day, at the end of the day, and this is one of the major themes in literature, and it shows up even these days, and what people are watching on television, or I realize that’s an anachronism, screening video, whatever.

Eventually, no matter how much you’ve got, you die. And then the big question is, who’s got it now? And of course, what we know is eventually no one’s going to got it. It’s all going to burn. All right, so if that’s true, if that’s true, let’s just think about it for a moment. Are we okay with that? I mean, honestly, let’s just face each other. Number one, we know this is God’s word. We know this is apostolic testimony. We know it’s true, but I’ve had to interrogate my own heart on this, honestly. It’s renewed interrogation. How much of this stuff do we think is going to last?

It’s one day all going to burn. And by the way, that’s not only all the things we treasure, it’s everything beyond. It’s the mountains and the hills and the oceans and the lakes. It’s the moon and the stars and the heavens above. I mean, I’ve had to interrogate my heart. Do I really, really live, as if I know all of this one day will be dissolved? I mean, I can tell you that will mess up your planning. Should we build this building? Well, maybe. Should we invest in this? Should we do this? We work very hard to maintain this campus, which right at a hundred years old, it’s a lot of work, but to God’s glory, it’s an incredible thing.

I feel this campus as a home. So even just speaking right here, I don’t walk these sidewalks. I don’t walk these halls thinking, “We need to plan for dissolving.” There is very clearly here in this passage, and this is actually the point, this is one of the major points Peter is making. There is in the entire Scripture, and particularly in the New Testament, this distinction between the already and the not yet. And so the already is where we are living in terms of the purposes and plan of God. The already is why we are here this morning. The already is because Jesus Christ has come. He has accomplished atonement for our sins. He was raised on the third day, and is the Lord of the church, and he’s given his church a commission. We are here because in the already, there is much for us to do, and there are things for us to build.

There are books for us to read, books for us to write, but there are papers to write, tests to take, teachers to teach, lectures to be given. All of this is to the glory of God, not in spite of the fact that everything’s going to dissolve, but because of the fact that everything’s going to dissolve.

All that to say, if I were speaking as a secular president to a secular school, I think all I would know to say, and I mean this honestly, this interrogates my heart. I think all I would know to say is, “Good luck.” Grab as much as you can, hold onto it for as long as you can, because that’s all there is. But instead, we are forced by this passage and by the structure of the gospel, by a gospel imperative, we are assigned an even greater meaning in this life than a secular meaning could ever understand. And it’s a heavier meaning, which is at the same time, the reminder that this is an age, and this too shall pass. But here’s the thing, this is not a secular institution. We are not here in the name of some state, or some donor, or something else.

We’re here in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, for the church of the Lord Jesus Christ. We’re standing on the faith once we’re all delivered to the saints. And this is actually good news for us. I want to say this is phenomenally unspeakably good news for us. It’s good news that the word “dissolve” is used three times here. It is good news that we are told all this is going to melt and burn. It’s good news because we’re looking for a new heaven and a new earth, and that reframes everything because it gives meaning to this life, to this term, to this semester, to this academic year. It gives meaning to this life in terms of marrying, and raising children, and welcoming grandchildren. It gives us grace, and mercy, and confidence in sharing the gospel, and sending missionaries, and preaching the Word, and all of this, and being infectious in society, sending out the graduates of the college into so many different areas of calling it a life.

It gives meaning to all of that, not because it will last forever, but because it won’t.

We’re the only people who can be told that all things are going to be dissolved, but it’s good news. We’re the only people who actually believe that, as important as all this is, and we see it as even more important than the secular mind can comprehend, it’s important only as a foretaste of what is to come. And God’s timing here is that God is patient in order that we may turn out graduates, who may go out into the churches, and go out into the world, and go out into the vocations, and will get married, and have children, and raise those children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, and will saturate the nations with the gospel. The Lord is patient in order that that will happen until in his perfect timing for he is not slow, and he is not asleep. When that day shall come, when that trumpet shall sound, everything is going to pass away.

Not by the way, in one act of spilling a universal acid, but in one massive act of divine judgment, when all things will be seen visible and invisible. And a new heaven, and a new earth is coming. Verse 13,

“But according to his promise we are waiting for new heavens.” In fact, a “new heavens and a new earth in which” what? “Righteousness dwells.” Aren’t you looking forward to that? A new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness lives.

Peter’s exhortation, “Therefore beloved, since you are waiting for these, be diligent to be found by him without spot or blemish, and at peace.” That’s a good word for us in this opening convocation. It’s a good word for Christ church in any moment. “And count the patience of our Lord as salvation.” He cites Paul. Some of the scoffers clearly are distorting Paul, and Peter names it very interesting. He treats Paul’s writings as Scripture. There’s so much in this, this apostolic weight. And by the way, the unity between Peter and Paul, again, there’s so much that’s glorious here.

“You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability.” How much do we need to hear that? Okay. We need to hear that. We need to hear that word clearly. “Knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.”

Brothers and sisters, faculty, students, trustees, all of those gathered and all those who will hear my voice, this is why this institution exists. This is why we’re gathered here on this day. This is why we are the people armed with this truth who are going to be undertaking this task before us with a renewed seriousness, simply because we know what is at stake. And what’s at stake? Brothers and sisters, judgment is coming, and all will be dissolved, and it’s going to be glorious, and all will be made well. Until that day, so long as we live, may the Lord find us faithful. And God’s people said, Amen.

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