1, verses 19 and following. 2 Peter 1, 19. The page in this Bible is 1,018. The church provided Bible here. Previously, we had read and studied verses 12 to 15. Peter wrote about reminders and the importance of reminders, how he's gonna tell us things again and again. And then verses 16 to 18, we studied about the transfiguration that Peter wrote. about the time that he went up onto a mountain and Jesus presented his glory in brilliant light. And what's amazing is that we turn to our passage now is that Peter is comparing the revelation of God through that transfiguration to the revelation of God in these pages that we're reading together. And it tells us about the value of the pages of our Bible. Fascinating to see the comparison, and we'll talk about that. So we'll start with verse 19, 2 Peter 1, 19, and this is God's word. It just went out, there we go. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man. But men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." This far we read in God's holy word. So Jesus is coming again. It's one of the themes that we've already uncovered in this chapter, that Jesus is coming again. And some people still doubt that. How do we Christians then respond to doubters, people who wonder whether our one thing that we're looking forward to, that our Lord Jesus will come again for us, is even true? How do we respond to that, to doubters? And so Peter's writing about that, and along with the other things that he's writing about. In verses 16 to 18, Peter's addressing this. Since he himself saw and heard Christ, that Peter was an eyewitness to the truth about Christ, we covered that last time, and that we should take Peter's word for it, because Peter is an official spokesperson, and Peter is saying that Jesus has come, Peter is saying that Jesus is coming again. And so Peter's message basically here, if you allow me to kind of say it a different way, Peter is saying to us, take my word for it, because I'm an official spokesman who's called an apostle of Jesus Christ, that Jesus is coming again. And all these things that the apostles are teaching are true. Okay, so that's Peter's message. And we do, we Christians take Peter's word for it. But what about people who are not convinced? What about the doubters out there? What about the people who question the entire Christian presentation, the entire body of material that we believe as Christians? How do we respond? How do we respond to them? What about people who oppose Peter and oppose the Christian faith? Well, Peter has an answer in today's passage. Here, Peter basically communicates to anyone in the world, especially perhaps doubters, he says, even if you won't take my word for it, there's an authoritative source to believe, the creator himself through his word. And so he's presenting to us the value of the scriptures, and that that is what we have as believers to present to doubters, to present to skeptics, to present to the world, this book, this incredibly valuable book. And so that's my main point today. If you're looking at your handout, it says, because God wrote the Bible, it's glorious and authoritative. There's three angles on this truth today. Number one, we pay attention to it. Number two, we must realize the authority of the Bible isn't based merely on Peter and other humans seeing and hearing and reporting that to us. There's much more. And then thirdly, we must believe that the author of the Bible is its authority. And of course, the author is God. So first, how much attention we should give to the Bible. So again, a quick review. Back in verses 12 to 15, Peter wrote about reminders. Then verses 16 to 18, he wrote about the transfiguration. That time when Peter saw Jesus go up on a mountain and to present his glory through brilliant light. And at that moment, what happened? God the Father spoke from heaven. So we covered that last time. speaking Father from heaven audibly in words that could be heard and understood. But now he builds on his case further and says here in verses 19 to 21, we should focus on the written word of God. We should focus on the written word of God. That's why he says, in verse 18, we ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with him on the mountain. And, verse 19, and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you do well to pay attention. So we have the prophetic word. This phrase means that we possess the word of the prophets. such as the prophet Isaiah, prophet Jeremiah. Peter here urges his audience to pay attention to the written word compared to the word of God that was received through a light, as a light shining in a dark place. Compared to the spoken word from God the Father, we now have the written word. Understand the comparison to a light here. A light shining in a dark place, he says, in verse 19. When you go outside at night with a flashlight, what do you do with your flashlight? You don't take the flashlight, turn it on, and point it into your own eyes and stare right in the bulb of the flashlight. That's not the use of a flashlight, so that can't be what he means here. You use the beam of light to shine on other things, and that enables your eyes to see where the light is shining on them. That's how he's using this illustration of a light shining in a dark place. Let me use another example here. You don't drive gas to get where you need to go in your car. You use gas to drive your car to where you need to go. So it's as silly as saying we use light to stare at the light. We use the light to look at all the other objects that are seen because of the light. They're in the darkness, but the light is shining, now we can see them. Those objects are no longer shrouded in darkness. Instead, those objects have become visible precisely because of the introduction of light to the formerly dark place. That's his illustration. So what he's saying is the light shines on everything. We interpret everything that happens in the world by the light of the Bible. This is extremely relevant and highly valuable for everyday living. The light of the Word of God lights up everything we see and everything we do. It's not just about the light of the Bible. Let's study the Bible and again and again just talk about our doctrine of Scripture, but Scripture shines on every other topic. So the prophetic word, he says, shines into a place that was dark. The place that was dark is the world in which we're living. Wow, do we feel that sometimes. And spiritually, it is dark. And the world is full of errors. The world is full of falsehoods and things that people believe. People are without the knowledge of Christ. People lose their previous knowledge and commitments. And upon us, in this place, the Word of God shines, thankfully. And Peter's encouraging our hearts. He shows us the understanding of what is right and wrong and how to be saved. And so many other topics beyond just salvation is taught by the Scriptures. It's lit up by the teaching of the Word of God. So the word of God keeps shining on us, shining on our lives, shining on our city, our country, the topics that we are addressing. And as we get to know Christ better through the scriptures, he himself walks with us in personal relationship. And so Peter's reminding us all this in order to encourage us. Again, he's writing a second letter to people who are discouraged, and separate from one another. People who are suffering, that's us. We're discouraged, separated from each other, and needing this encouragement. So he's writing to us as Christians today. We have the prophetic word. We have the prophetic word. We could read Jeremiah today. We could read Isaiah today, right? We could read the things of Moses in the original Pentateuch. And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed to which you would do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place. And he continues now, and we focus on the last part of verse 19, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. So the day is interpreted in relation to the phrase morning star. Until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. It's the phrase light bringer. The phrase morning star could be literally translated light bringer. It's symbolic, of course, symbolic of what? Morning Star, Lightbringer, is symbolic of Christ and his eventual return. Christ is the one who's given us the Bible. Christ is the one who's come into this world to be our Savior. Christ is the one who's coming again, right? It's Lightbringer is Christ. So both the word day and the word Morning Star or Lightbringer are poetic descriptions of the second coming of Christ. Remember, he's already talked about this. Over the last few weeks, we discovered in this paragraph, he's focusing our attention, future, on the second coming of Christ. As he wrote, for example, three verses earlier, in verse 16, when he wrote, we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. And we talked about how that's the second coming of, his future coming of Jesus Christ. And here in verse 19, he wrote that we must pay close attention to the prophetic word of scripture in reference to Christ's imminent second return. That's what encourages us. As dark as it gets, as difficult as it gets, and more things get messed up, we focus more and more on the imminent second return of Jesus Christ. And we pray for that to come, and to come quickly. And we can tarry, while he tarries, we can be encouraged and continue to follow him, whether it's a day, a decade, or another hundred years. We can focus on the Lord Jesus Christ as his people. But how about this phrase, in your hearts? Did you notice that in verse 19? Until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts? So the whole phrase in verse 19, together again, think carefully with me, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. How can the morning star rise in your hearts? because Christ is known to us now by faith in our hearts. We don't just have to wait until he comes, splits the heavens, and literally, physically, bodily comes down here. We have that encouragement now in our hearts by faith. Christ has already come to us, in a sense, you see, by faith in our hearts. We already believe in his return. We already are covered by his blood. spiritually. His death and His resurrection covers us by our faith and His second coming is our encouragement even now before He comes. Keep knowledge of Christ and his future return in our hearts even while we wait for his actual appearance and his actual return. So it's an already and not yet. Already we have faith and the gift of his grace and not yet do we see him in person. And both are being referenced here by Peter skillfully in verse 19. But the issue for Peter, the pastoral apostle Peter, the issue is our hearts. And He's getting us to focus on our hearts. Because you can look ahead to the second coming of Christ and wait for it, but then what do you do this week? What do you do this day? So right now, in our hearts, we need to focus on the Lord Jesus Christ and act as if we are people who are filled with hope. Act as if we're people who are filled with love and filled with faith. The issue then becomes how much attention we pay to Christ's reign, Christ's second coming, and to his word for us now. He doesn't just leave us alone. He says, well, you're on your own until I come back. Maybe mom and dad do that sometimes for kids at home, but that's not how our God treats us. He says, I am with you, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you. And so he has his word for us every moment until he returns. So people who are faithfully and eagerly looking for the return, for the second coming of Christ, are the same people who are gonna be eagerly paging through his scriptures and attending to what he has said to us to get us through this moment, to get us through our lives. We are the people who, in our hearts, have his day already dawning, but having the morning star, the light bringer, wanting so much for him to come. All right, so that was point one, how much attention we give to the Bible. It tells us about Christ's first and second coming, and we eagerly search the scriptures in order to build up our faith and hope. So secondly, moving on now, the authority of scripture is not based only on human eyewitnesses. We get this from verse 20. Knowing this, first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. So, first of all, as a phrase, is an important point that Peter introduced with the words, first of all, and as another translation also faithfully says into English, above all. First of all, above all. It's a very similar meaning, right? But I don't want you to get the sense of it being chronological. First, and then second, and then third, and then fourth. That's not what he's saying. He's saying, in comparison to the priority of, the importance of, it's above all. It's first of all in the sense of its first importance. So that's all I wanted to point out to you. If you grasp that, you're right tracking with Peter. Above all, first of all, the highest importance. So the readers are given credit for knowing, right? So verse 20 says, knowing this above all, and then knowing, indicates that the audience does understand. And what is it they understand? They understand the Bible did not start in the mind of a human being. This is so important, that Peter says, above all, or first of all, what is the item of first importance or highest importance? What is the point that's more important than the other points? What is above all? That the Bible is not from humans. The Bible is not from humans. Here's Peter writing a page of the Bible. He's writing a book of the Bible, and he's a human, and he's saying, don't trust this just because it came from me, Peter. He himself is not the basis of 1st and 2nd Peter. God wrote 1st and 2nd Peter. He says if you don't have that straight, if you don't have that clear, if you don't understand that, then get back to that, because above all, of the highest importance is to appreciate these words have come to us from our God. And what is it that is important? It is the word of God. It is what our Creator, our Redeemer is saying to us, and it's from His authority, not from its authors, and go all the way back. It's not just Moses, not just David, or Jeremiah, or Luke, or Paul. Not from the elders and pastors of your church. Do you gain your belief system? Not from the highest court of the church, which in our circle is called the General Assembly. You have three courts of the church, the local with the elders and pastors, the regional across the Midwest is what we call the Presbytery, the pastors and elders in the whole area of the country, and then the highest level is an annually, we get together once a year for a week, and it's called a General Assembly meeting, and you don't get your belief system from them. We get some of the information and information about our missionaries and hospitalization and taking care of the business of the church, but we don't get our core belief system from the highest courts of the church. That court gets its beliefs from Scripture. The Bible is our authority. The Word of God gets authority from God, period. That's it. No prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation, Peter writes here. This is what he means. In other words, no prophecy of scripture gets its authority from a mere human being, even if it's an apostle named Peter. or Paul, or John. Never. No prophecy of Scripture. None of them ever. Not the words of Moses, not the words of Ezekiel. Never. At no instance in the formation of the pages of Scripture, start to finish, did the will of man ever win the day. It's not just what Peter intended to write. The Bible does not come from Peter. It comes from God, what God intended to write to us through Peter, through his work as writing and his authorship of this book. And when we believe this fact, from verse 20, it will show itself in the way we live. It will show itself in the way we decide things. We will orient ourselves our whole lives based on what God's word says then. Is the word of God right about the starting point of life? Who made your lungs that are now threatened by coronavirus, right? Who made our lungs? Who made your heart and blood vessels? Who made all of the things about us, our abilities? In Psalm 139, David celebrates and sings to God this truth. Psalm 139, 13. For you formed my inward parts. You knitted me together in my mother's womb. The starting point of life is when God started creating a life, and that's you. He started when we were inside of our mother's womb to knit us together in only the way that the Creator can. In other words, human life begins at the point that we medically call conception. And I set out all of that to illustrate his point here. Do you see how broad-reaching the concept is if we take this book as from God? then it applies light everywhere. And for the highly debated issue of the start of life and the laws that we are creating around the start of life, it's really very simple when you come to the Bible and you take it as the word of God. We count this book as precious because it orients us for how to make decisions, how to think about life. Let God be true and every man a liar. This is our starting point. This is our orientation point. This is where we find truth and sustain truth. Where would we be without the Bible? It is said that when the famous missionary Dr. David Livingston started his trek across Africa, he had 73 books in three packs weighing 180 pounds. He must have really pared down. I would have brought a whole lot more than that. After Dr. Livingston, the missionary, and his traveling group had gone 300 miles across Africa, 300 miles, Livingston was approached by his group and he was obliged to set down some of the books to be left right there alongside the road because of the fatigue of his team carrying his baggage. They would set down some books and keep moving, 73 books down to, I don't know, 50 books. They got farther along and they were worn out. They began to be concerned about their ability to make it to the destination, have still a full team. Their lives were becoming at stake. 50 books had to become 30 or something. I don't know the progression. But as they continued on their journey, the library grew less and less until he had one book left. And having heard this whole message, you know exactly which book he had left on his journey. His belief about the Bible showed itself in that decision. He was left with one book, and the book was the Bible. Why? Because he believed what Peter's writing here in verse 20. He believed that the Bible was the book of top importance. We call this the high view of Scripture. If you give me only one book, it's always going to be this book for a right-thinking Christian. The authority of Scripture is not based on only human eyewitnesses. You don't believe that just because I said it to you today. You don't believe it just because Peter wrote it down. You believe it because God has written it on your mind and heart to believe the things that his word says, including this. So that was point two. We're moving on to number three. The original author is himself the authority, as verse 21 says. Four, no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. So the content of the scriptures, originates not in Peter, but in God. Not in Peter alone, I should say, but in God. So Peter did, in fact, write this, and it was his thoughts, is what he had to say to the church, but it's also God originating, and it's God's thoughts, what God had to say to the church. So men who were prophets and men who were apostles spoke and wrote from God. The writers of the Bible were men, human beings, yes, but the writer of the Bible is simultaneously God, God himself. And that's what Peter is stressing here in verse 21. That Isaiah wrote the book of Isaiah, so did God. Matthew wrote the book of Matthew, so did God. Peter wrote the book of second Peter, so did God. And here Peter's using one single Greek term to capture the concept here. That Greek term is translated to English in verse 21 very accurately as these two words. One Greek word, two English words. Carried along. Carried along. The authors of scripture were carried along by the Holy Spirit. You see it there in your English? It's the Greek word from which we get the word ferry, like a car ferry. It transports people. One of my favorite things is to go on the car ferry in Lake Michigan. You take it from the Wisconsin side, go to the Michigan side, you drive your car, well actually they drive it on for you, and your car goes along with you so you can travel on the other side of the lake, a car ferry. It's carrying cars along across the water, the cars on the ferry boat. So Peter's here teaching us this word carried along by the Holy Spirit is the words of the Bible were ferried along, carried along by the Holy Spirit. And so the end result is the Bible has exactly the words that God, the Holy Spirit, wanted it to have. You don't get to a completely different destination when you put your car in the car ferry. You get where the car ferry's taking your car. You don't get to a completely different destination when the Holy Spirit is ferrying your words along. Peter's buoyed up and carried along by the Holy Spirit to get the exact words that we're studying today. This is totally God, it's 100% God. God is speaking here in these words and Peter's urging us to remember that because it's gonna make all the difference in our decisions. Remember that Peter was coming to the end of his own life. He revealed that to us in just a few verses earlier. As he's writing the letter of 2 Peter, he's coming to the end of his own personal life on earth. And consequently, he's writing, in addition to a letter, he's writing a kind of testament, leaving in a sense of glory. There's a sense of his telling us what's important. And he's writing down words from God the Holy Spirit to say that God the Spirit has unhindered authority in the written word of God. Because the Apostle Peter has written, as one carried along by the Holy Spirit, we must submit ourselves to these very words as actually words from our Creator and Redeemer. So in the closing days of Peter's life, Peter had the high and inestimable privilege of being used by God to write down the words of God in this book of the Bible which we call 2 Peter. And I don't know what you've done in your life. I don't know what you'll have the privilege to do in your life. I've had the privilege to preach God's word, and I'm fulfilled. But to be able to write down a book, two books, 1st and 2nd Peter, that will be included into the list of only 66 books that are called eternal, that's pretty cool. That's a nice accomplishment. Peter's given this, that's why I call it, high and inestimable privilege of being able to author one of the books of the Bible. And all he's saying is, forget about me. It wasn't Peter. It was God who carried me along. And all that you get here is from God. Forget about the messenger. And what he's saying in saying that is not just forget about the messenger, but don't forget about the author. Don't forget about the origination of these words. There's authority in these words. and it doesn't come from the fact that I'm Peter. There's power in these words, and it can't be that power comes from Peter. Peter is thinking correctly, and our God is helping us in these words. I'll try to illustrate. Many years ago, in a Moscow theater, Alexander Rostovets was converted while, listen, he was converted while playing the role of Jesus. in a bad play entitled Christ in a Tuxedo. I can't recommend it, but it's a beautiful illustration. Mr. Rostovtsev was supposed to read two verses from the Bible, two verses from the Sermon on the Mount. In Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, it's what we call Matthew 5, 6, and 7, and then Rostovtsev was supposed to cry out, give me my tuxedo and top hat. Read the two verses and then say, give me my tuxedo and top hat. That was his line in the play. But as he read the words, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted. Mr. Rastavez began to tremble at the power and the authority of the eternal words of God. And instead of saying his next line, instead of following the script of the play he was acting in, Mr. Rastavez kept on reading from the Bible. He read the next verse in Matthew 5, ignoring the coughs and the calls and the foot stamping of his fellow actors. Finally, remembering another Bible verse that Mr. Rasavez himself had learned in his childhood in his own church, he simply stopped reading that part and cried out these words from Luke 23, 42. These are the words stated by the criminal on the cross next to the cross of Jesus. And before the stagehands could quickly lower the curtain, Before they could call on Mr. Rostavas to come across and get off the stage and stop the play, the Lord Jesus Christ, before the curtain reached the floor, by the power of his word and by his own Holy Spirit, had taken the one who played Jesus in the play and he turned him into his own, one who truly trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ by the power of his word. He had converted him into a child of God on the spot by the power of his own word. Mr. Rostovas had suddenly gathered for, who had suddenly had gathered for the express purpose and those who had come before him were assembled in the audience in order to watch, paying money for, tickets for one purpose, to hear that man mock Christ in a bad play. And instead what those who paid money for saw was Christ, the majestic word himself, showing himself Lord over every man as the audience watched. The authority of the living Bible is the living God himself. That's Peter's point in verse 21. So what have we seen? We've seen because God wrote the Bible, it's glorious and authoritative. We've seen how much attention we must give to the Bible, urged on by Peter and by the Holy Spirit. Secondly, we saw how the authority of scripture is not based on only human eyewitnesses. And thirdly, how the original author is God himself. He is the authority. So I have two takeaway points for you. One, trust your Bible, and two, appreciate your Bible. Two takeaway points. One, trust your Bible, and two, appreciate your Bible. Trust your Bible, I've been hammering away at the whole message. It's basically, it's trustworthy. Base all of your decisions on the Bible. Have it shine light on all the problems. You read the newspaper, you wanna know light, read the Bible. You read your work situation, your family situation, whatever your difficulty is, let the light shine on that and trust it. It's trustworthy because it's from God. Trust your Bible. It's pretty simple. I wanna move on to the second one, my last application point. Appreciate your Bible. I think that's a thrust of what Peter's writing in these verses. Appreciate your Bible. Attain that very high view of this book. See the glory of the scriptures. Sense the power of these pages. Know that this book is truly from God. and appreciate it as such. Act in that way. Let it reorient your schedule. How do you start your day? How do you go through your week? Where do you turn at times of difficulty and pain? The Bible is clear and plain. It's elegant and informative. As Peter's writing to people who are separated, suffering, under difficulty, Peter's pointing them back to appreciating their scriptures. I'll try to illustrate this as we close. A man in Kansas City was severely injured in an explosion. The victim's face was badly disfigured, and he lost his eyesight, as well as both of his hands. The man was a brand new Christian, and one of his greatest disappointments was without eyesight, without hands, and his face being terribly disfigured, he could no longer take up his Bible and read it. Would that be your greatest disappointment? I heard about a lady in England who read Braille with her lips. Hoping to do the same, he sent for some pages of the Bible in Braille, and he tried reading the dots, the raised dots of Braille with his lips. Much to his dismay, in his particular condition, he discovered that the nerve endings in his lips had been so destroyed in the explosion, he could not sense the dots at all. He kept trying, kept trying, not knowing what else to do. One day, as he brought those braille pages to his lips, his tongue happened to touch a few of the raised characters. He could feel them with his tongue. Like a flash of thought, he said, I can read the Bible using my tongue. At the time that that happened and at the time the story was written, that blind man had already read through the entire Bible four times. I need to say it again. He read through the entire Bible four times with his tongue, using Braille dots. All I can say is, appreciate your Bible. Let's pray. Father, how we thank you.