Commentaries and Other Bible Study Helps - Prayer Tents - Prayer Tents

2:17 The false teachers are waterless springs (they promise refreshment and bring none) and mists driven by the wind (they sow confusion wherever they go), devoid of any inherent value. The gloom of utter darkness has been reserved (Gk. tēreō, "keep, guard, hold, preserve") for them, as for the evil angels ("kept," v. 4) and the unrighteous ("keep," v. 9).

2:18 The false teachers entice by sensual passions . . . those who are barely escaping from the clutches of sin. They prey on newly professed Christians, teaching that they can do whatever they wish sexually and no harm will come of it.

2:19 The false teachers operate under the guise of freedom, but in actuality they entice others to become as they are, slaves of corruption, once again overcome by evil.

2:20-22 It would have been better for these false teachers never to have escaped the world in the first place, than to follow in the path of the knowledge of . . . Christ only to abandon that path and return to a life of sin and darkness. One reason it is better not to have known about the holy commandment is that those who turn away after falsely confessing the Christian faith will not be inclined to consider Christ again. Another reason is that their knowledge and experience of the Christian life makes them more accountable before God (cf. Luke 12:47-48). Some understand these verses to teach that true believers can lose their salvation. It is more likely that Peter refers to those who appeared to be Christians but then showed by their apostasy and their behavior that they never truly belonged to Christ (see notes on John 6:66; 15:2; Gal. 2:3-4; 1 John 2:19). God promises that those who truly know him will never fall away because he will keep them by his grace (cf. John 10:27-29; Rom. 8:28-39; Phil. 1:6). Those who do turn back show that their true character is like that of a dog (cf. Prov. 26:11) or a sow. They appeared to have been saved, but by returning to the vomit and mire of the world, they demonstrated that they were never truly regenerated.