2 Peter 2:20
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning.
Truth to Learn
True salvation can’t be lost, but mere intellectual salvation can.
Behind the Words
The word translated “corruption” is the Greek word miasmata. According to Adam Clarke’s Commentary on the Bible, “The word was anciently used…to express those noxious particles of effluvia proceeding from persons infected with contagious and dangerous diseases.”
“Knowing” is translated from epignōsis, made up of epi, meaning “above or over” and ginōskō, meaning “to have intellectual knowledge.”
The word translated “entangled” is emplekō from which we get our English word implicate. This particular Greek word originally meant “to braid in or to interweave.” It later came to mean “to be involved in or to become entangled in.”
Meaning Explained
This is one of those verses that, on the surface, appears to imply that it is possible to lose one’s salvation, so let’s look closely at it. Remember that Peter is talking about those people “who are just escaping from those who live in error,” and these false teachers were “promising them freedom,” but instead what these false teachers did was: “by appealing to the lustful desires of sinful human nature, they entice people who are just escaping from those who live in error.”
He now says, “If they have escaped the corruption of the world …” What is this corruption that Peter is talking about? It is all the contagious, putrefied slop that is created by sin. Peter does not say that these people had escaped from sin but from the effects of sin in the world. And, he says that these have escaped “by knowing the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” It was through intellectual knowledge that these people were able to escape the pollution of the world; it was not by experiencing faith in the Savior. It was head knowledge, not heart knowledge. And through this great knowledge that they had acquired, they were able, in their own strength, to temporarily get away from the corruption and purification of the world system.
But, because they had knowledge instead of faith, they “are again entangled in it and overcome.” And Peter says that their state is now worse than it was before they had escaped. They have now been convinced that their sins are okay and that there is no need for repentance. Even their great intellectual knowledge is not able to save them now (and, in fact, it wasn’t able to save them in the first place). These people have not just returned to their former sins in a casual manner, they are now totally entangled in them.
The point is not that one can lose one’s salvation; rather, it is that salvation through human efforts is not salvation at all.
Application
No matter how much you know about the Bible and no matter how much you deny your own desires and sinfulness, you cannot be saved apart from submission to God Almighty, confessing (agreeing with God regarding) your sinfulness and accepting the blood of Christ to cleanse you from your sins.
In God’s service, for His glory,
Copyright © 2009 Will Krause. All rights reserved.
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