A believer I know is the only Christian in the family. Despite a common Christian heritage, genuine faith is mocked. The mockers were infected with false teaching, and now they are spiritually dead. It is heartbreaking.
It is with sorrowing love of people like this that Peter condemns false teachers in the strongest possible language: unreasoning animals, creatures of instinct, born only to be caught and destroyed, and like animals they too will perish....These people are blots and blemishes, springs without water and mists driven by a storm. Blackest darkness is reserved for them. Those who once seemed to believe and teach truth but turned to error, Peter likens to unclean animals: "A dog returns to its vomit,” and, “A sow that is washed returns to her wallowing in the mud.”
Peter does not tell Christians to send false teachers into the blackest darkness of death. Their judgment is in better hands: "the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials and to hold the unrighteous for punishment on the day of judgment." Above all we sheep of God's flock are told to stay away from the wolves. May they feel the sting of the Good Shepherd's rod and staff, if possible unto repentance.
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