The whole "thousand years as one day" interpretation spin you are putting on this passage is incorrect. God was saying through Peter that it didn't matter if He prophesied an event a thousand years in advance or a single day in advance - BOTH would be fulfilled at their respective times.
Spot on. This notion that God can say "Tomorrow I will do X" then wait 1000 years "to Do X" (Because To God 1000 years is Tomorrow) and Still be true to His word, is perposterous.
Genesis 7:1-4. There, God told Noah:
Enter the ark, you and all your household; for you alone I have seen to be righteous before Me in this time [generation]. You shall take with you of ever clean animal by sevens, a male and his female; and of the animals that are not clean two, a male and his female; also of the birds of the sky, by sevens, male and female, to keep offspring alive on the face of all the earth. For after seven more days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights; and I will blot our from the face of the land every living thing that I have made.
There are several things in this passage that should be noted. First, this is a prophecy of judgment. Secondly, God declared
when the judgment, i.e., the rain, would start. Thirdly, He stated
how long the rain would last. Fourthly, God spoke this to Noah,
a man trapped in time. God was very specific as to
when the rain would begin and to
how long it would last. God told Noah that after
seven days it would rain for
forty days and nights. Now, our first question regarding this passage is
not how we should interpret what God said, but
how would Noah interpret what God said. Would he understand that God was outside time? That is to say, the references that God made concerning when the judgment would come were to be measured
by how time relates to God? Applying the futurist’s interpretation of
2 Peter 3:8-9to this passage, was God telling Noah that after
7,000 years it would begin to rain and once it started raining, it would continue for
40,000 years? Or should the plain, everyday definitions of the terms be understood? We find our answer in verse’s 10 and 12:
And it came about after the seven days, that the water of the flood came upon the earth¼ And the rain fell upon the earth for forty days and forty nights.
Here, just a few short verses later, we have the fulfillment of that prophecy. This shows us that
God meant exactly what He said to Noah. Seven days
equaled seven days. Forty days and nights
equaled forty days and nights.
In
Exodus 9:1-5. There, it is written:
Then the Lord said to Moses, "Go to Pharaoh and speak to him,Thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, "Let My people go, that they may serve Me. For if you refuse to let them go, and continue to hold them, behold the hand of the Lord will come with a very severe pestilence on your livestock which are in the field, on the horses, on the donkeys, on the camels, on the herds, and on the flocks. But the Lord will make a distinction between the livestock of Israel and the livestock of Egypt, so that nothing will die of all that belongs to the sons of Israel." " And the Lord set a definite time saying, "Tomorrow the Lord will do this thing in the land."
In this passage, God is more specific about when this plague would befall the Egyptians. The text stated that "
The Lord set a definite time." It seems to indicate that God put an expiration date, if you please, on His mercy. When was that expiration date? The text states "Tomorrow." Here, again, is a prophecy concerning judgment. It contains a specific time statement: "Tomorrow." It was a prophecy given to a specific person in history. However, even though there are similar elements in this passage to the one before it, there is something different. Pharaoh. Pharaoh is different because he was a man
outside the covenant of God. A Gentile. Now our question is, "How would Pharaoh, a non-covenant Gentile, understand the term tomorrow? " Would he understand that it would be fulfilled the following day, or if we apply the futurists interpretation of
2 Peter 3, was Moses
actually telling him that God would destroy all the livestock of the Egyptians around a
thousand years from when this prophecy was given? Verse 6 gives us our answer. It reads:
So the Lord did this thing on the morrow, and all the livestock of Egypt died; but the livestock of the sons of Israel, not one died.
Once again we see that not only was the "how" part of the prophecy fulfilled (the death of the Egyptian livestock),
but the "when" part of it was fulfilled as well (they all died the following day). God declared that He would kill all the livestock of the Egyptians on the following day, and He did just that.
Next lets look at
Exodus 11:4-5. There it is written:
And Moses said, "Thus says the Lord, About midnight I am going out into the midst of Egypt, and all the first-born in the land of Egypt shall die, from the first-born of the Pharaoh who sits on his throne, even to the first-born of the slave girl who is behind the millstones; all the first-born of the cattle as well."
In these verses we have the same elements as the previous examples. 1) This was a prophecy of judgment. 2) It was given to a man trapped in time. 3) It had a specific time statement concerning its fulfillment. In this passage God is even
more specific as to when this prophecy would be fulfilled. He said that He would kill all the firstborn of Egypt "
about midnight." But lets use
2 Peter 3 again and see if this is the right way to interpret prophetic time. Now if Moses gave this prophecy around 6:00 a.m., was he stating that God would kill the firstborn of Egypt about 750 years later?
Well, lets see. In chapter 12 and verse 29, it is written:
Now it came to about at midnight that the Lord struck all the first-born in the land of Egypt
Once again, God gave a specific time statement when judgment would fall, and He fulfilled it when He said He would.
Lastly, Lets look at some passages relating to the same prophetic event: the Babylonian captivity.
Jeremiah 25:11. And this whole land shall be a desolation and a horror, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.
Jeremiah 29:10. For thus says the Lord, "When seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place."
2 Chronicles 36:20-21. And those who escaped from the sword he carried away to Babylon, and they were servants to him and to his sons until the rule of the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed its sabbaths. All the days of its desolation it kept sabbath until seventy years were complete.
Once again we have the same elements in these passages as we had in the preceding ones. 1) This was a prophecy of judgment. 2) It was given to men trapped in time. 3) It had a specific time statement concerning its fulfillment. God spoke through Jeremiah to the nation of Israel that they would be in bondage for seventy years. Now if the futurists interpretation of
2 Peter 3:8-9 is applied to these passages, then the nation of Israel would be in bondage approximately 25,550,000 years! But is this an accurate interpretation? Daniel didn't think so. For in
Daniel 9:1-2, it is written:
In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasureus, of Median descent, who was made king over the kingdom of the Chaldeans in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, observed in the books the number of the years which was revealed as the word of the Lord to Jeremiah the prophet for the completion of the desolations of Jerusalem, namely, seventy years.
The King James Version states that Daniel "
understood the number of years." What interpretive hermeneutic did Daniel use to understand the number of years? the futurists interpretation of
2 Peter 3:8-9, or the plain meaning of the phrase "seventy years?"
Obviously, the plain, everyday meaning of the phrase. This alone should answer any question and settle any debate as to how to properly interpret the time statements of Biblical prophecy. However, as if this alone wasn't enough, God gave us another proof: history. In
2 Chronicles 36:20-21, God said that the nation of Israel would be in bondage "until the reign of the kingdom of Persian." History teaches us that Persia came into power in 536 BC at the over throw of the Babylonian Empire. History also teaches us that Israel was in bondage to Babylon from 606 BC until their over throw by Persia in 536 BC. That equates to
exactly seventy years.
To recap, we have gone from "seventy years," to "forty days and nights," to "seven days," to "tomorrow," to "midnight,"
and in each case, God fulfilled His word exactly WHEN He said He would.
