Eventually, for his own purposes and in kindness to Hannah, God granted her years-long prayer for a son. We are told that she conceived a son “in due time,” a reminder that this child came along at just the time the Lord had ordained, and the child was given the name Samuel which means “the Lord hears,” or “heard by the Lord.” What an appropriate name for a child prayed for, for so long.

God’s nature as the One who both hears the prayers and acts on behalf of his people should be the great motivating factor in persevering prayer. Hannah’s years of praying without receiving an answer were no doubt used by the Lord to prepare her to receive an answer that would, in the end, be a far greater blessing than even she could have imagined. God hears you, Christian. He cares for you in such a way that not a single one of your sorrows will be wasted as you cast your cares upon him (1 Peter 5:7).

The books of Samuel belong to the category of Old Testament historical narrative. They are not epic poetry like the Odyssey. Nor do they bear any of the hallmarks of mythological writing. We will find no cyclops or sirens here. In these books we will read genealogies, records of military personnel, government records, and the accounts of battles won and lost. But the vast majority of the books of Samuel are given to the accounts of particular individuals as they traverse family drama, fear, jealousy, marriages, births, violence, friendship, betrayal, and loyalty. Most significantly we will trace the handiwork of God as he preserves the righteous line promised in Genesis 3:15.

The books of Samuel, therefore, tell the story of God’s dealings with his people. The primary figures are Samuel (prophet/judge), Saul (Israel’s first king), and David (forerunner of the royal Messiah). Certainly we will learn powerful lessons about integrity, loyalty, failure, and the madness of sin. But we will also learn about the enduring grace of God in preserving the line that will bring the Savior King into the world. And that brings us back to Hannah and what appeared for years to be her hopeless barrenness. As he does so often for his people, God turns despair into hope and hope into fulfillment.

Beginning in verse 14 he calls his readers to “be diligent to be found in him without spot or blemish, and at peace.” Just as we see throughout the New Testament, the full assurance of our salvation does not call for passivity but diligence. That Christ’s righteousness has been graciously imputed to us is not to produce apathy but diligence to live according to that grace.

Knowing that the Lord is indeed returning and that there will be a final judgment we ought not be “carried away by the error of lawless people and lose your own stability” (vs. 17). Instead, we are to “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (vs. 18). The depths and goodness and perfections of Christ are such that we will never exhaust the knowledge and grace of him. The deeper our knowledge of Christ and growth in his grace, the more our hunger for him will increase.

Peter assures his readers that God is not slow. He is not dragging his feet to fulfill the promise of the Son’s return. He appeals to Psalm 90 to make his case. That Psalm is all about God and his relationship with time: “For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night” (Psalm 90:4). God is eternal and therefore exits over and outside time. The Lord’s patience has a gracious purpose. Unwilling to lose a single one of his people, he delays the final judgment until the elect from every nation will be gathered in to “the new heavens and the new earth where righteousness dwells” (vs. 13).

When we forget, we lose sight of what is revealed to us in his Word, and we lose our orientation to truth, which has devastating consequences. Life and death hang in the balance and it is only through the clarity of the Scriptures that we can know how to be saved from the wrath of God.

In the first chapter of 2 Peter, the church is encouraged to remember the blessings of being united to Christ. He urges them to remember lest they forget and fall into error. Here in chapter 3, Peter returns to this theme.

The false teachers deny the return of Christ and his judgment so that they can revel in their sin and lead others into sin. We should not be so proud to think that we are impervious to false teaching. It is enticing. We can be drawn in when the false teachers’ message lines up with the false teachings we privately believe. When we preach to ourselves the false narrative of “I’m a failure,” we will readily believe someone who says, you aren’t a failure, you just need to try harder. When we believe that we’re actually pretty good and that God should take that into consideration when he hands out wealth and health and the good life, we’re susceptible to false teaching. When we say to ourselves, “This isn’t really sin. It’s not that big of deal,” we will find ourselves attracted to false teachers who don’t talk about sin and repentance. When we wander so far into sin that we call sin good, we are headed for heresy and there are plenty of false teachers who will lead us further into sin. When we find ourselves in the same sin again and again and our half repentance doesn’t produce righteousness and holiness, we are prone to look for a false teaching that will justify our sin instead of heeding the Biblical warning to flee from sin.

Peter identifies these false teachers and their teaching as “waterless springs and mists driven by a storm” (2 Peter 2:17). They promise life, but give death. We would do well to heed the warning Peter gives us. We must look out for false teachers. We must “look in” at the false narratives we regularly preach to ourselves. And we must look to our Savior who is the “spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:14).