2 Peter 3:18

But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord. — Or, But grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord — i.e., it may mean “the grace of our Lord” as well as “the knowledge of our Lord.” But the Greek is not decisive on this point; and the rendering in our version avoids the awkwardness of coupling a subjective and objective genitive together by “and.” For “the grace of our Lord” must mean the grace of which He is the giver; while “the knowledge of our Lord” must mean the knowledge of which He is the object. Romans 15:4 and 1 Peter 1:2 are not instances of such coupling.

The Apostle ends, as he began, by exhorting them to that sound knowledge which he sets forth as the sure basis of all Christian activity, whether the knowledge be full and mature, as in 2 Peter 1:2; 2 Peter 1:8; 2 Peter 2:20 or to be acquired and increased, as in 2 Peter 1:5 and here.

DOXOLOGY. — The Epistle comes to a most abrupt conclusion, without any personal remarks or greetings. This is so unlike the First Epistle, so unusual in Apostolic letters generally, that an imitator, and so accomplished an imitator as the writer of this Epistle must have been, would scarcely have omitted so usual and natural an addition. The addition would have been doubly natural here, for the personator (if the writer of the Epistle be such) is personating St. Peter near the end of his life, writing to congregations whom he is not likely either to see or address again. Surely the circumstances would have seemed to him to demand some words of personal greeting and tender farewell; and Acts 20:18; 2 Timothy 4:6, would have supplied him with models. But nothing of the kind is inserted. Assume that St. Peter himself is the writer, and then we can understand how he came to disappoint such natural expectations. His heart is too full of the fatal dangers which threaten the whole Christian community to think of himself and his personal friends. As to his death, which cannot be far off, he knows that it will come swiftly at the last, and his chief fear is lest it should come upon him before he has left on record these words of warning and exhortation (2 Peter 1:13). Therefore, at the opening he hurries to his subject at once, and presses on, without pause or break, until it is exhausted; and now that he has unburdened his heart he cares to say no more, but ends at once with a tribute of praise to the Master that bought him.

To him be glory. — Better, to Him be the glory — all that His creatures have to render. Whatever may be our view of 2 Peter 3:15, there can be no doubt that in this doxology homage is paid to Jesus Christ as true God. It is, perhaps, the earliest example of that “hymn to Christ as God” which Pliny tells Trajan the Christians were accustomed to sing before daybreak.

And for ever. — Literally, and to the day of eternity. The phrase is used by the LXX. in Sir. 18:10, but is found nowhere else in the New Testament. It means that day which marks the end of time and the beginning of eternity, the day which not only begins but is eternity. The expression is quite in harmony with the general drift of the chapter. “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but” “the day of God” “shall not pass away.”

Amen. — Comp. Jude 1:25. Here the word is of rather doubtful authority. Being usual in doxologies, it would be very likely to be added by a copyist.