Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ:

grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.

His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and excellence.

By these he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may escape from the corruption that is in the world because of lust, and become partakers of the divine nature.

Therefore, brethren, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall;

so there will be an entrance richly provided for you into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to stir you up by way of reminder,

since I know that the putting aside of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me.

And I will see to it that after my departure you will be able at any time to call these things to mind.

For he received honor and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him by the Majestic Glory, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased."

And we have the prophetic word made more sure, and you will do well to pay attention to this as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.

for no prophecy was ever made by the act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves.

And many will follow their licentiousness, and because of them the way of truth will be reviled.

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, to be reserved for judgment;

and if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly thereafter;

and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men

(for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds),

But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and killed, reviling in matters of which they are ignorant, will be destroyed in the same destruction with them,

but he was rebuked for his own transgression by a donkeya beast without speechwho spoke with a man's voice and restrained the prophet's madness.

These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm; for them the blackest darkness has been reserved.

For speaking out arrogant words of vanity, they entice by fleshly desires, by sensuality, those who barely escape from the ones who live in error.

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.

This is now the second letter that I have written to you, beloved, and in both of them I have aroused your sincere mind by way of reminder;

that you should remember the words spoken beforehand by the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord and Savior spoken through your apostles.

They deliberately ignore this fact, that by the word of God heavens existed long ago, and the earth was formed out of water and by means of water,

But by the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with fire, and the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up.

Since all these things are to be destroyed in this way, what sort of people ought you to be in holy lives and godliness,

looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed by fire, and the elements will melt with intense heat!

Therefore, beloved, since you look for these things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, spotless and blameless.

You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of lawless men and fall from your own steadfastness.

But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.