As the Creator of all, the Lord God is the master of “time” so that he alone determines what happens when. Peter had already used the term to describe Christ’s return on the Last Day (1 Peter 1:5). That Day, of course, is also the day for the final judgment. Peter knew that that day could come at any moment: “like a thief” (2 Peter 3:10). Though we are inclined to cast that Day into the future and so separate it from the events happening today, Peter connects that Day (with its judgment) directly to the suffering his readers experience, and he does so because he expects that return any moment and so sees today’s events as the beginning of tomorrow’s Judgment.
17 For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?