by which he has granted to us his precious and exceedingly great promises; that through these you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world by lust.

so, even for this very purpose, uniting to these things all diligence, add to your faith, virtue; and to virtue, knowledge;

For if these things are yours and abound, they make you to be not idle nor unfruitful to the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

For he who lacks these things is blind, seeing only what is near, having forgotten the cleansing from his old sins.

Therefore, brothers, be more diligent to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never stumble.

Therefore I will be ready always to remind you of these things, though you know them, and are established in the present truth.

But I consider it the right thing to do, as long as I am in this "tent" [Note: This is an allusion to his still being alive], to stir up your memory [of these things],

Yes, I will make every effort that you may always be able to remember these things even after my departure.

For when he was so honored and glorified by God the Father and from the supreme glory there were borne to him such words as these: "This is my Son, my Beloved! He is my Chosen!"??18 we heard these words borne from heaven when we were with him on that sacred mountain.

And we ourselves heard these words come from Heaven, when we were with Him on the holy mountain.

For these words did not ever come through the impulse of men: but the prophets had them from God, being moved by the Holy Spirit.

But there were false prophets, too, among the people, just as among you also there will be false teachers. These will secretly bring in destructive sects, denying even the Master who bought them, and bringing swift ruin upon themselves.

And many will follow their debauched lifestyles. Because of these false teachers, the way of truth will be slandered.

and, with delusive words, they will, through covetousness, make gain of you: the condemnation, long ago denounced against these, delays not, and their destruction does not slumber.

then [in light of the fact that all this is true, be sure that] the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial, and how to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment,

against whom even angels far superior to these beings in strength and power bring no abusive charge before the Lord.

But these, as unreasoning creatures, born natural animals to be taken and destroyed, speaking evil in matters about which they are ignorant, will in their destroying surely be destroyed,

suffering wrong as the wage of wrong which they have done. These are men who count it pleasure to carouse in open daylight; they are spots and blemishes reveling in their deceit, even while they are feasting with you.

Their very eyes are full of adultery--being eyes which never cease from sin. These men set traps to catch unstedfast souls, their own hearts being well trained in greed. They are fore-doomed to God's curse!

These are wells without water, and mists driven by a storm; for whom the blackness of darkness has been reserved.

Although these false teachers promise such people freedom, they themselves are enslaved to immorality. For whatever a person succumbs to, to that he is enslaved.

for, if having escaped from the pollutions of the world, in the acknowledging of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and by these again being entangled, they have been overcome, become to them hath the last things worse than the first,

This, already, beloved, is the second letter I am writing unto you; and, in these letters, I am stirring up - by way of calling to remembrance - your uncorrupted mind,

Above all things you are to know, that in these last times, impostors will appear, who will abandon themselves to their own sensual passions, whose cry will be,

But, these people intentionally forget that the heavens, which existed long ago, and the earth, which was formed out of water and by water, [were created] by the word of God.

Through these waters the world of that time perished when it was flooded.

Therefore since all these things will be destroyed like this, what kind of people ought you to be in holy living and godliness,

Therefore, beloved, seeing that you look for these things, be diligent to be found in peace, without blemish and blameless in his sight.

as also in all of his letters, speaking in them of these things. In those, there are some things that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unsettled twist, as they also do to the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.

You therefore, beloved, knowing these things beforehand, beware, lest being carried away with the error of the wicked, you fall from your own steadfastness.