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2 Peter 3:17<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position.<\/span><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n Truth to Learn<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Based on what Peter has just taught us, we must be wary of false teachers who would cause us to stumble.<\/p>\n Behind the Words<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cYou already know<\/span>\u201d is translated from progin\u014dsk\u014d<\/span><\/em>, which is made up of pro<\/span><\/em>, meaning \u201cbefore, in time or place\u201d and gin\u014dsk\u014d<\/span><\/em>, which means \u201cto know absolutely or completely.\u201d The word is expressed here as a present participle. Hence, a literal translation would be \u201cknowing \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n The word translated \u201cbe on your guard<\/span>\u201d is the Greek word phulass\u014d<\/span><\/em>, which means \u201cprotect yourself, be on guard, or be aware of.\u201d It is expressed here in the imperative mood, indicating a command. Therefore, we see that the opening phrase of this verse could be translated as, \u201cTherefore beloved ones, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSecure position<\/span>\u201d is from st\u0113rigmos<\/span>, which is derived from st\u0113ridz\u014d<\/span>, meaning \u201cto set firmly in place.\u201d So we see, st\u0113rigmos<\/span> refers to \u201ca position of stability.\u201d<\/p>\n Meaning Explained<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Therefore<\/span>, that is, because there will be scoffers and false prophets who deny the truth of the Word and who deny that Christ is returning again and who don\u2019t believe that there was a flood or that there will be a fiery judgment\u2026 knowing<\/span> beforehand<\/span> that Christ will return and there will be a judgment of this world and its inhabitants, be on your guard!<\/p>\n Peter is commanding us to be on our guard and to protect ourselves from the teachings of the scoffers and false teachers. Otherwise, he says, we may be led astray by their erroneous teaching. Remember we learned earlier that they will use a symphony of words to entice us into their false teaching.<\/p>\n How can we protect ourselves from false teaching? I learned years ago that people who are trained to detect counterfeit money do not spend their time studying various forgeries and counterfeits. Instead, they study the real thing over and over again in excruciating detail so that they can spot a fake, being different from the real thing. In the same way, we need to constantly be studying the Word of God over and over so that we will be able to spot false teaching. It is not sufficient to simply hear a sermon once a week and spend a few minutes reading our Bibles. We need to be studying the Word constantly!<\/p>\n Peter then tells us that if we do get led astray, we may fall from our \u201csecure position<\/span>.\u201d Peter is not saying that we will fall from salvation. As we\u2019ve shown before, we cannot lose our salvation. What we can lose, however, is our firm footing, our position of spiritual stability, and we can stumble and fall into sin if we get led astray by false teaching.<\/p>\n Application<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n We now know that Christ is coming again (it could even be today). And, we know He is coming as the Judge who will perform a trial by fire. We also now know that there are many false teachers who would draw us away from our firm footing. Therefore, beware and lift your eyes, for your redemption draws near!<\/p>\n In God\u2019s service, for His glory,<\/strong><\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2009 Will Krause. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –<\/p>\n <\/span>If this message or this link was forwarded to you by a friend and you wish to receive future verses directly to your inbox, you can call the church phone \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 2 Peter 3:17 Therefore, dear friends, since you already know this, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your secure position. Truth to Learn Based on what Peter has just taught us, we must be wary of false teachers who would […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[395,396,397],"class_list":["post-1046","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-be-on-guard","tag-fall","tag-secure-position"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd5geA-gS","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1046","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1046"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1046\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"signature\"](\"\/signature.gif\")
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