2Peter 3:8, 9 (LITV, eSword ed.)
8 But let not this one thing be hidden from you, beloved, that one day with the Lord is "as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." (Psalm. 90:4) 9 The Lord of the promise is not slow, as some deem slowness, but is long-suffering toward us, not having purposed any to perish, but all to come to repentance.
In the context where this is found, Peter is encouraging those who scoff and are saying that the words of Jesus regarding his coming are not to happen. Peter heard Jesus’ words that day in the garden on the mount of Olives. He knew that Jesus said he was coming in his life time, that his generation of disciples would see Him coming in His kingdom.
Some use this passage to support a futurist view of the coming of Messiah/Christ. Trying to add thousands of years to the fulfillment of Jesus’ words. But this is not what is being said by Peter to his fellow disciples.
At Peter’s writing of this letter, it had been about thirty years since Jesus’ pronouncement in the garden. The disciples had been under persecutions from the Jews and Rome. They were taught that Jesus would return in his kingdom within their life times, and here thirty years later it still had not occurred.
Peter is writing them to encourage them to not give up hope, that God is not slow in keeping his promises. The time period between Jesus’ ascension and the day of Pentecost, was one of evangelizing Israel. Taking the gospel of the kingdom to all the tribes of Israel in all the nations of the Roman Empire in which they lived. It was a time period for them to repent and accept the Messiah King sent by God to them. For them to enter into the New Covenant in His blood.
Judgment was coming on all who refused the Messiah of God.
2Peter 3:7 But the heavens and the earth now, having been stored up by the same Word, are being kept for fire to a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.
The ungodly of Israel, who did not keep the law of the Mosaic covenant, who rejected the Messiah of God, and were complicit in the murder of the Son.
Peter is reminding them that the judgment of the Jews is at hand, it will happen soon. The phrase “the heavens and the earth now” is referencing that time period, “now” means this immediate heaven and earth. Heaven and earth in prophetic language refers to the kingdom of God among men, where the rule of heaven is carried out on the earth by a kingdom of men. Many eschatological references are about the passing of the old heaven and earth and the birth of a new heaven and earth. So too here in Peter’s letter, where that present heaven and earth are stored up for fire in the soon coming day of judgment and the destruction of the ungodly men of the Jews.
Some futurists want to make Peter’s quote of a thousand years to God as one being of a formulaic nature. One thousand years equals exactly one day to God, they say. They also say that a millennium is exactly one thousand years. They take a very wooden, mathematical stance on this and base a lot of their futurist theology on it. Some Rabbis also consider it this way, making the time of the world as seven thousand years, as exampled by the week of creation, with the Messiah coming in the six day, or millennium, and a seventh day,or millennium Sabbath.
Peter is quoting from the Old Testament.
Psalm 90:4 For a thousand years in Your eyes are as a day, yesterday, when it passes, and as a watch in the night.
I see this as a figurative one thousand years. Because it is compared to either a single 24 hour day, or yesterday or a single watch in the night which is only a few hours long.
There is nothing formulaic about this, Peter only quotes a part of this original statement which in context is talking about the short life span of a man in comparison to God's infinite life and great majesty as creator and judge over mankind.
For those who want Peter's statement to read as a formula 1,000 years = one day to God, they have the necessity to return to the original and also form the formula, 1,000 years = 6 hours of night watch to God. Logically it can't be both, unless you take both as figurative, saying that God's accounting of time is not the same as man's accounting of time.
As Peter said to his readers, God is not slow in keeping his promises. The day of the Lord came as Jesus told Peter and the other three disciples that day in the garden on the mount of Olives, within their life time. At the time Peter was writing it had been about 30 years from that garden discussion, they only had to wait about ten more years for the fulfillment of that promise.
The judgment of God and His Messiah came in their generation and ended in 70AD with the destruction of Jerusalem (earth) and the temple (heaven), bringing to an end the Old Mosaic covenant kingdom age and ushering in the New Covenant Messianic Kingdom age. The old heaven and earth seated in Jerusalem was destroyed in the judgment of the Jews, and the new heaven and earth ruled by the Messiah King replaced it. The New Jerusalem which is also the people of the Messianic kingdom, the bride of Christ where the new rule of heaven is found in the earth.
