<p>3:12 <i>Looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat</i>- The earth being dissolved&nbsp;connects with Is. 24:19: &quot;The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is clean dissolved&quot;. The earth may specifically refer to the land- that promised to Abraham, which is the centre of Bible prophecy. The previous verse alludes to the flood, as 2 Pet. 3 does: &quot;The windows from on high are open (cp. Gen. 7:11) and the foundations of the earth do shake&quot; (Is. 24:18). Is. 24, especially in the Septuagint, appears to have been very much in our Lord's mind during His Olivet prophecy. 2 Pet. 3 being based on the Olivet prophecy, it is to be expected that it will have connections with the same source passages. &quot;The earth&quot; in Is. 24 meaning 'the land' (of Israel) indicates that 2 Pet. 3 is also primarily concerning the troubles that came upon the land in AD70 and which shall come there in the last days.</p><p>Frequently the Greek word translated &quot;look for&quot; here is used in the context of the second coming, often translated &quot;waiting&quot; (Jude 21; 1 Cor. 1:7; Rom. 8:19; Phil. 3:20; Heb. 9:28; Tit. 2:13; 1 Thess. 1:10). Our 'waiting' for the Lord is not therefore a passive thing- it is shown by our &quot;holy way of life&quot;, something which needs our constant active attention. All too often the impression is given that our 'waiting' is a grim, passive clinging on to a set of doctrines received at baptism. This is certainly part of it- but the quicker we take a dynamic approach to considering &quot;what manner of persons&quot; we ought to be, the sooner the Lord's coming will be hastened. That our spiritual effort, especially in prayer, preaching and pastoral work mentioned earlier, should hasten the coming of that great day should never cease to be a source of wonder and inspiration to us. But do we really want to see the day of Christ? Distractions of family life, the challenge of careers, personal ambition, a desire for a few more years to work on our character- these and many other factors lead us away from an all consuming desire to see the day of the Lord. And if we lack that, then there will be little true motivation for developing a spiritual character and doing the preaching and pastoral work, which we know between them will hasten the day. As if to provide motivation in all this, verse 12 repeats verbatim the language of :10 and 11 concerning the totality of destruction which awaits the present world order: &quot;The day of God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved (= :11)... and the elements shall melt with fervent heat (= :10)&quot;. This repetition underlines the fact that every element of the present system will be destroyed- the only common link between this life and the future world order is the spirituality which we now develop. We came into this world with nothing, a naked baby; and all we can leave it with is God's record of our spiritual character. Thus it will be by our real spiritual character that we recognize and relate to each other in the Kingdom, rather than by our present physical characteristics. For this reason even the rejected will be able to recognize (in this sense) giants of faith such as Abraham entering into the Kingdom.</p><p>The coming of the Lord is spoken of as being delayed (Mt.&nbsp; 25:5); and yet it is our spirituality which hastens the day of Christ's coming (2 Pet. 3:12). Putting these facts together shows that the day of Christ will not come when planned because the ecclesia are not as spiritual as they were 'expected' to be- or at least, that's how God wants us to see it.</p>