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2 Peter 3:10

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Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 6, 1883

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 9, No. 46.

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2 Peter 3:10.

By Editor

A BROTHER beyond the mountains asks concerning this text, "Does it state that the earth as well as the works is to be burned up? Why is also omitted in the Revised Version? May it not be made plain from other scriptures that the earth will not be totally destroyed?"
We think that "also" is correctly omitted in the Revised Version. The Scriptures are very plain upon the point that the earth will not be totally destroyed. On verse 11 Clarke says:—
"All these things shall be dissolved. They will be separated, all decomposed; but none of them destroyed. And as they are the original matter out of which God formed the terraqueous globe, consequently they may enter again into the composition of a new system."
And Barnes, on verse 10, says:—
"So far as the action of fire is concerned, the form of the earth may pass away, and its aspect be changed; but, unless the direct power which created it interpose to annihilate it, the matter which now composes it will still be in existence. . . . The word rendered burned up, like the word just before used and rendered fervent heat—a word of the same origin, but here intensive—means that they will undergo such a change as fire will produce; not, necessarily, that the matter composing them will be annihilated."
You will be interested and no doubt instructed by reading a sermon by Wesley on this subject.
A few texts of Scripture will place the matter beyond all doubt.
The Saviour said, Matt. 5:5, "The meek shall inherit the earth." Ps. 37 says the same thing and adds, "Their inheritance shall be forever." Man would never have lost the earth if he had not sinned. By sin the earth is defiled and corrupted; but Paul says of our inheritance that it has been purchased and is waiting for redemption. Eph. 1:14. This can refer only to the earth.
We may conclude from the words of Peter that the new earth will bear the same relation to the "earth which now is," that this bears to the earth which was before the flood. There can be no doubt then, when the "fountains of the great deep were all broken up," and the "windows of heaven were opened," that the face of nature was so changed that everything looked new and strange to Noah. And so will it be when the fire has passed upon the earth, melting the elements and turning the earth "into a lake of fire;" when it comes forth beautified and free from every sign of the curse, well may it be called "a new earth." The most important point is that we heed the admonition of the apostle in verses 11–14 of this chapter.