I noticed that when my 9-month-old granddaughter wants to hide from me, she doesn’t actually hide. Instead, she covers her eyes with her hands. She hasn’t learned that closing her eyes doesn’t make anything disappear. The truth is still there, though we may want to “see things differently.”
Many in our world make a similar mistake; they take the view that what is unseen to them can’t be true and should thus ‘disappear’ from serious thought. Peter wants to assure his readers – and us today, that what he is writing is the truth, and that Jesus is who He says he is and will do what He says He will do. And even though we weren’t witnesses to these events, he was and wants us to know that it is the truth – not clever myths made up. Peter had absolute certainty about Jesus’ power; he saw what he saw.
But God intends that we share the same certainty about the truth of these things, not by being there, but by walking in faith and following the examples of those that went before us. The events, though unseen by us, are no less real or powerful to change our lives. Like my granddaughter, we can cover our eyes – listening to false ideas and ignoring God’s Word, but it doesn’t change the fact that God’s Word is still real and relevant to us today.