2 Peter 2:18-22

¹⁸ For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error.

¹⁹ While they promise them liberty, they themselves are slaves of corruption; for by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage.

²⁰ For if, after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the latter end is worse for them than the beginning.

²¹ For it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered to them.

²² But it has happened to them according to the true proverb: “A dog returns to his own vomit,” and, “a sow, having washed, to her wallowing in the mire.”

great swelling words of emptiness (v.18) = Exaggeration, unreality, boastfulness, and emptiness. Conveys the same idea as waterless wells and driven mists—great pretensions but no results.

allure (v.18) = entice, lit. “to bait a hook or set a trap with bait”

lewdness (v.18) = outrageous conduct shocking to public decency, violent spite and indulgence in lawless insolence

the latter end is worse for them than the beginning (v.20) — At the beginning, they lived in sin but then were exposed to righteousness in Christ. After they reject that truth, there is nothing else that could possibly save them so they are infinitely worse off.

proverb (v.21) — The first is found in Proverbs 26:11, while the second appears to come from an extra-biblical source, the ancient History of Ahikar. Peter may be thinking of Matthew 7:6. — Guthrie, page 1256.

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There are those who believe the kingdom saints could lose their salvation, we are not of that number. We do, however, agree that they did not enjoy the assurance of their salvation. …

First and foremost, the kingdom saints, to whom Peter was writing, are said to be saved. You will recall the woman who washed our Savior’s feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. The Lord said to her, “They sins are forgiven,” then added, “They faith hath saved thee; go in peace” (Luke 7:36-50). … What did her faith save her from? Obviously, she was saved from her sins and the judgment to come. If she could lose her salvation, as some claim, then what would have this woman been delivered from—it surely could not be her sins, simply because she’s once again in jeopardy of the hell-fire judgment.

The Lord said to Nicodemus under this same program, “That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). Those who believe in him here are said to have eternal life. We know from the record that Nicodemus responded to the Master’s words and received eternal life. But in what sense did he have eternal life if he could have lost it? It was not eternal if there was ever the possibility of losing it.

Surely this passage should settle the matter that the sheep in Israel, who believed Christ was their Messiah, were eternally secure. “And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand” (John 10:28). If these saints, any one of them, lost their salvation, then would it not have to be said that they were plucked from the Savior’s hand? God forbid!

But what then does Peter mean when he says, those who have a knowledge of Christ, if they again become entangled in the pollutions of the world, it would have been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness? Clearly the apostle is addressing the false teachers and those led astray by their cunning ways. They escaped the pollutions of the world, not by conversion, but through an outward knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Religiously speaking, there were numerous benefits to being closely aligned with the kingdom message. But to be thus re-entangled in evil, after having once escaped it through the professed knowledge of the Lord and Savior, was infinitely worse than if they had not known the way of truth at all.

Judas is a prime example. He was one of the twelve who played the part of a believer so effectively that the other disciples had absolutely no idea he was a worker of iniquity. … He saw how his close association with the things of the Lord could benefit him personally …

But the Lord unmasked this unsavory character for who he was—a devil (John 6:70-71). To which the Lord added, “Woe unto that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It had been good for that man if he had not been born” (Matthew 26:24). This is also the sense of Peter’s words concerning those who wear the cloak of deception for personal gain. …

Peter uses two animals to illustrate his point — a dog and a pig — both of which were despised by the Hebrews. … A man who professes Christ may outwardly appear to have experienced a change in his life, yet his heart is far from God. He is like the pig that has been washed, but given the opportunity, returns to the mud. You see, it’s the pig’s nature to do so. So it is with the unbeliever, inwardly he will always return to his sinful ways. — Sadler, pages 216-219

I think I agree with Sadler. The false teachers were deceiving those Jews who were part of the assembly but who hadn’t yet placed their faith in Christ. As part of the assembly, exposed to the truth, they were in a position to eventually make the right choice. But the teachers were luring them back into sin and away from the truth, which put them in a far worse position.