25, 26. (a) To what time factor does the apostle Peter draw attention in warning? (b) Who had earlier made mention of such a thing, and of what should it make us aware?

²⁵ “But,” the apostle Peter goes on to say in warning, “by the same word the heavens and the earth that are now are stored up for fire and are being reserved to the day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men.

“THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH THAT ARE NOW”

28. (a) So are “the heavens and the earth that are now” a new earthly sphere with a new atmosphere, different from those that existed before the Flood? (b) How do we know that, when God created man, he did not have in mind using for destructive purposes the waters that were suspended above the earth?

²⁸ So, when 2 Peter 3:7 speaks of “the heavens and the earth that are now,” it could not mean a new earthly sphere with a new atmospheric “expanse” around it. It is also to be noted that, in 2Pe 3 verses 5 and 6, the apostle Peter did not say that the “heavens from of old and an earth standing compactly” were stored up for water and were to be reserved for the day of judgment. God did not have such a thing in mind when he originally made the literal heavens and earth and settled man on earth. At that time God gave the perfect man and woman the opportunity to live in an earthly paradise forever without a day of judgment.​—Genesis 2:17-25.

29. (a) Are “the heavens and the earth that are now” the same kind of heavens and earth as are referred to in 2 Peter 3:5? (b) So why must the “fire” referred to in verse 7 also be figurative?

²⁹ Accordingly, “the heavens and the earth that are now” are stored up, not for waters of a global flood, but for fire and are reserved to the day of judgment and of “destruction of the ungodly men.” Evidently this means a heavens and an earth of a kind different from that of the original literal heaven and earth. This being so, then the “fire” here mentioned must be different from literal fire, hence a figurative “fire,” such as is often spoken of in the inspired Scriptures.

“STORED UP FOR FIRE”

34. What several facts make it unreasonable to view the fire referred to in 2 Peter 3:7 as being literal?

³⁴ Such a sworn statement against another global flood would be of little comfort to humanity if, instead, God purposed to engulf all the earth with a literal fire, to have a literal worldwide conflagration. Also, if the expression “the heavens and the earth that are now” included the stars of heaven that are visible to the human eye, what would such a literal fire do to the sun of our solar system and to all the other stars in our Milky Way and all the other galaxies that are already balls of fire of a temperature higher than fires generated here on earth? Reducing our earth to a charred cinder by a global conflagration would hardly harmonize with God’s declared purpose to convert this earth into a global paradise by his Messianic kingdom.

35. (a) What, then, is the meaning of “fire” in that scripture? (b) And what are “the heavens” that are “stored up for fire”?

³⁵ Evidently, then, the “fire” for which the “heavens and the earth that are now” are stored up is a symbolic fire that brings about a destruction of condemned things just as efficiently as a literal fire does to combustible things. This being the case, the expression “the heavens and the earth that are now” takes on a symbolic meaning. So “the heavens” symbolize the governmental systems, the governing authorities “that are now” and to which mankind is subject. In Romans 13:1 the Christian apostle Paul calls these “the superior authorities,” saying: “Let every soul be in subjection to the superior authorities, for there is no authority except by God; the existing authorities stand placed in their relative positions by God.”

36. (a) In harmony with that, what is the “earth” that is “stored up for fire”? (b) Give a Scriptural example of such use of the term “earth.”

³⁶ Accordingly, the “earth” that is under these heavens symbolizes the human society that is under and in subjection to the “superior authorities.” At one time, for more than a century after the deluge of Noah’s day, this human society spoke but one language. Genesis 11:1 calls attention to this, saying: “Now all the earth continued to be of one language and of one set of words.”

37, 38. (a) To what else that is high or lofty are the political governments likened in the Scriptures? (b) Illustrate this from Isaiah chapter 34 and Micah chapter 1.

³⁷ In full keeping with the reference to the “superior authorities” as “heavens” is the Biblical likening of such political governments to “mountains.” As an example, in Isaiah 34:2-5 the Sovereign Lord God says: “Jehovah has indignation against all the nations, and rage against all their army. He must devote them to destruction; he must give them to the slaughter. And their slain ones will be thrown out; and as for their carcasses, their stink will ascend; and the mountains must melt because of their blood. And all those of the army of the heavens must rot away. And the heavens must be rolled up, just like a book scroll; and their army will all shrivel away, just as the leafage shrivels off the vine and like a shriveled fig off the fig tree. “For in the heavens my sword will certainly be drenched. Look! Upon Edom it will descend, and upon the people devoted by me to destruction in justice.” With the destruction of the armies in the coming “war of the great day of God the Almighty” at Har–Magedon, the governments that they have supported will melt, dissolve, like mountains melting in the blood of slain armies.

³⁸ Another picture of the dissolving of the symbolic heaven-high mountains is given in Micah 1:3, 4 in these words: “For, look! Jehovah is going forth from his place, and he will certainly come down and tread upon earth’s high places. And the mountains must melt under him, and the low plains themselves will split apart, like wax because of the fire, like waters being poured down a steep place.” When, shortly, Jehovah God the Almighty, by means of his heavenly executional forces, comes in contact with the governmental mountains of this system of things, it will be like subjecting them to incandescent heat. Their solidity will melt!

39. So what does the future hold for the “heavens and the earth that are now” and for “ungodly men,” and why?

³⁹ So the “day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men” to which the “heavens and the earth that are now” are reserved will be, figuratively speaking, a fiery one for all the destruction that it will cause. It will be the day of the executing of divine judgments upon the entire visible system of things. Also, it will be a day for “destruction of the ungodly men,” inasmuch as they do not view and treat Jehovah God as the August One, the Universal Sovereign. They are irreverential toward Him, the Holy One.

NOT A TARDILY MOVING GOD

40, 41. Though the coming of Jehovah’s “day of judgment” may seem slow to the ridiculers, what fact about time ought to be taken into account?

⁴⁰ It is “by the same word,” that is to say, “the word of God,” that the “heavens and the earth that are now” are unchangeably “stored up for fire and are being reserved to the day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men.” This is something for the modern-day ridiculers, who treat the “presence” of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as not yet in effect, to think about. That “same word” of God, which authoritatively declared the purpose for which the “heavens and the earth that are now” have been permitted to exist so long, will without fail be carried out.