<p>2:14- see on 2 Pet. 3:16.</p><p><em>Having eyes full of adultery, they cannot cease from sin, enticing unstable souls-</em> The false teachers, both here and elsewhere in the New Testament, were sexual predators. The breaking of bread at Corinth was turned into a drunken feast where the equivalent of temple prostitutes were used. The Christian church was being operated just how most other religious cults of the time were- with sexual abandon and alcohol abuse used as part of their rituals. As suggested on 1 Peter, it seems that the converts Peter is writing to are those he made in the thousands in his early preaching to the orthodox Jews at Jerusalem. They had fallen a long way; from strict orthodox Jews full of faith in and love for Jesus, who had shared their goods amongst each other and then been persecuted, and for the sake of their faith had gone into exile in what is now Turkey... and there, the pressures of the refugee life had taken over. Bit by bit they had slipped into this state of immorality. We marvel at how a man can at one point in his life be so committed and spiritual; and only a few years later, end in the spiritual gutter. But we are surrounded by examples of it, and therefore the situation we are reading of here is not impossible to imagine. It is a sober warning that faith must be maintained. No apparent height of spiritual strength will be retained unless we in an ongoing sense exercise our hearts in the ways of the Spirit.</p><p><em>Having a heart exercised in covetousness, children of cursing</em>- Their tragic decline was because of the bad exercise of their hearts. They were covetous, just as the orthodox Jews of Lk. 16:14 were. They came to Christ with great zeal, but that basic problem with coveting remained. It became the regular mental experience of their minds, and it eventually led them to this tragic collapse of faith, similar to what Paul laments in Hebrews concerning the Jerusalem Hebrew Christians who instead of going into exile, had reverted to Judaism. They were sons of cursing / condemnation; at that moment, they would be condemned if the Lord returned or they died. And they could change that.</p>