To whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto you, did they minister these things, which now have been announced unto you through them that preached the gospel unto you by the Holy Spirit sent forth from heaven; which things angel desire to look into.

If you call "Father" the one who judges everyone impartially according to what they have done, you must live in reverent fear as long as you are strangers in a strange land.

and, A stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence; for they stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.

and this they were destin'd to. but you are the chosen race, you are kings and priests, the holy nation, the peculiar people, that you might display his glory, who called you out

Who once not a people, and now the people of God: they not commiserated, and now commiserated.

Dearly beloved, I beg you as aliens and exiles to keep on abstaining from the evil desires of your lower nature, because they are always at war with the soul.

having your behavior seemly among the Gentiles; that, wherein they speak against you as evil-doers, they may by your good works, which they behold, glorify God in the day of visitation.

Servants, take orders from your masters with all respect; not only if they are good and gentle, but even if they are bad-humoured.

In like manner, ye wives, be in subjection to your won husbands; that, even if any obey not the word, they may without the word be gained by the behavior of their wives;

when they see how pure and reverent you are.

but they must be of an internal nature, the character concealed in the heart, in the imperishable quality of a quiet and gentle spirit, which is of great value in the sight of God.

For in this way in the olden time the holy women also, who put their trust in God, used to adorn themselves. They were ever in submission to their own husbands;

They were submissive to their husbands, as Sarah, for example, obeyed Abraham and called him master. You have become true daughters of hers, if you practice doing right and cease from every fear.

You married men, in the same way, must live with your wives in an intelligent consideration of them; you must show them deference, too, as the weaker sex, as they share with you the gracious gift of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

For, He that would love life, And see good days, Let him refrain his tongue from evil, And his lips that they speak no guile:

But even if you should suffer for righteousness, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear or be disturbed,

having a good conscience; that, wherein ye are spoken against, they may be put to shame who revile your good manner of life in Christ.

after they were disobedient long ago when God patiently waited in the days of Noah as an ark was being constructed. In the ark a few, that is eight souls, were delivered through water.

wherein they think strange that ye run not with them into the same excess of riot, speaking evil of of :

But they must render account to Him who stands ready to judge the living and the dead.

For unto this end was the gospel preached even to the dead, that they might be judged indeed according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

Based on the gift each one has received, use it to serve others, as good managers of the varied grace of God.

Therefore, those who [are allowed to] suffer in harmony with God's [permissive] will, should commit their souls to a trustworthy Creator, [who will take everything into account], while they go on [trying] to do what is right.

Do not act as dictators over the people you are assigned to care for, but [rather] serve as examples of how they ought to live.

They at Babylon, elected jointly with you, and Mark, my son, salute you.

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

For the man in whom they are lacking is blind and cannot see distant objects, in that he has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his old sins.

For they were no fictitious stories that we followed when we informed you of the power of our Lord Jesus Christ and of his coming, but we had been eye-witnesses of his majesty.

For not, by will of man, was prophecy brought in, at any time, but, as, by Holy Spirit, they were borne along, spake, men, from God.

But there were false prophets among the people, as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly put forward wrong teachings for your destruction, even turning away from the Lord who gave himself for them; whose destruction will come quickly, and they themselves will be the cause of it.

Many people will follow their immoral ways, and they will cause the true way to be maligned.

And in covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose sentence now from of old lingereth not, and their destruction slumbereth not.

For if God spared not angels when they sinned, but cast them down to hell, and committed them to pits of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment;

and saved the upright Lot who was so distressed by the immoral conduct of unprincipled men??8 for as long as that upright man lived among them, day after day his upright soul was tormented by what he saw and heard of their lawless actions??9 then the Lord knows how to rescue God-fearing people from trial and to punish wrongdoers while they are being kept for the Day of Judgment,

but chiefly them that walk after the flesh in the lust of defilement, and despise dominion. Daring, self-willed, they tremble not to rail at dignities:

while [those] angels, who are greater in strength and power than they, refuse to speak against such authorities, in condemnation, before the Lord.

But these, as creatures without reason, born mere animals to be taken and destroyed, railing in matters whereof they are ignorant, shall in their destroying surely be destroyed,

suffering wrong as the hire of wrong-doing; men that count it pleasure to revel in the day-time, spots and blemishes, revelling in their deceivings while they feast with you;

They have eyes full of harlots, eyes that cannot stop sinning. They entice unsteady souls. Their heart is trained in greed. They are an accursed generation.

forsaking the right way, they went astray, having followed the way of Balaam the'son of Beor, who loved the hire of wrong-doing;

Such men are dried-up springs, clouds driven by the storm, and they are doomed to densest darkness.

For, uttering great swelling words of vanity, they entice in the lusts of the flesh, by lasciviousness, those who are just escaping from them that live in error;

promising them liberty, while they themselves are bondservants of corruption; for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he also brought into bondage.

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein and overcome, the last state is become worse with them than the first.

For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them.

They are an example of that true saying, The dog has gone back to the food it had put out, and the pig which had been washed to its rolling in the dirty earth.

and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for, from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.

For this they willfully forget, that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water and amidst water, by the word of God;

[while] waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be destroyed [by] being burned up and the celestial bodies will melt [as they] are consumed by heat!

as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; wherein are some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant and unstedfast wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.

For this reason, my loved ones, having knowledge of these things before they take place, take care that you are not turned away by the error of the uncontrolled, so falling from your true faith.

I am writing to you fathers, because you have known Him [i.e., Christ], [who has existed] from the beginning [See John 1:1]. I am writing to you young men, because you have overcome the [power of the] evil one [i.e., through faith they had gained victory over Satan, See 5:4].

For the things in the world--the cravings of the earthly nature, the cravings of the eyes, the show and pride of life--they all come, not from the Father, but from the world.

They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us: but they went out , that they might be made manifest that they all are not of us.

Look at how much love the Father has shown to us [Christians], that we should be called His children! But, that is what we [really] are! The reason the people of the world do not know who we are is because they do not know who God [really] is.

All that are born of God do no sin, for his seed abideth in them, and they cannot sin, because they be born of God.

if they condemn us for anything, for God is greater than our consciences, and he knows all.

Beloved, if our heart does not convict us [of guilt], we have confidence [complete assurance and boldness] before God;

The one who habitually keeps His commandments [obeying His word and following His precepts, abides and] remains in Him, and He in him. By this we know and have the proof that He [really] abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us [as a gift].

Beloved, believe not every spirit, but prove the spirits, whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world.

They are of the world: therefore speak they as of the world, and the world heareth them.

Because, three, are they who are bearing witness -

The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in truth; and not I only, but also all they that know the truth;

For many deceivers are gone forth into the world, even they that confess not that Jesus Christ cometh in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist.

Dearly beloved, you are acting faithfully in doing what you can for the brothers, especially as they are strangers.

They have borne testimony to your love before the church. You will do well to speed them on their way worthily of God;

because that for his name's sake they went forth, and took nothing of the gentiles.

So if I come, I will keep in mind the things he does, talking against us with evil words: and as if this was not enough, he does not take the brothers into his house, and those who are ready to take them in, he keeps from doing so, putting them out of the church if they do.

For there are certain craftily crept in, of which it was written aforetime unto such judgement. They are ungodly, and turn the grace of our Lord God unto wantonness; And deny God the only Lord, and our Lord Jesus Christ.

And angels, who did not remain within [the bounds of] their proper authority, but left their own realm, God has kept in perpetual bondage, under [thick] darkness, awaiting judgment on the Great Day [when they will be punished].

So also Sodom and Gomorrah and the near-by cities which in like manner glutted themselves in sensuality and unnatural vice, are exhibited as a warning of the eternal fire, in the punishment they undergo.

Yet in just the same way these dreamers also defile the flesh, while they set at naught dominion and scoff at dignities.

But these speak evil of those things which they know not. In those things which they know naturally - as beasts which are without reason - they corrupt themselves.

Woe be unto them, for they have followed the way of Cain, and are utterly given to the error of Balaam for lucre's sake, and are cast away in the treason of Korah.

These are spots which of your kindness feast together, without fear, feeding themselves. Clouds they are without water, carried about of winds: and trees without fruit at gathering time, twice dead, and plucked up by the roots.

They are raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame. They are wandering stars, to whom is reserved the mist of darkness forever.

to give judgment against all men, and to rebuke all that are ungodly among them, of all their ungodly deeds, which they have ungodly committed, and of all their cruel speakings, which ungodly sinners have spoken against him."

These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts, whose mouths speak proud things. They have men in great reverence because of advantage.

But, beloved, remember the words which were formerly spoken by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; for they told you,

how that they told you that there should be beguilers in the last time, which should walk after their own ungodly lusts.

These are they who make separations, sensual, having not the Spirit.

And you should show pity toward some people because they have doubts [regarding spiritual matters];

Happy is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of the prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein. For the time is at hand.

Behold, he cometh with clouds, and all eyes shall see him: and they also which pierced him. And all kindreds of the earth shall wail. Even so, amen.

and his feet like unto brass, as though they burnt in a furnace: and his voice as the sound of many waters.

So write the things which you have seen [in the vision], and the things which are [now happening], and the things which will take place after these things.

I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience, and how thou canst not forbear them which are evil: and examinedst them which say they are apostles, and are not: and hast found them liars.

Yet you have this [to your credit], that you hate the works and corrupt teachings of the Nicolaitans [that mislead and delude the people], which I also hate.

I know thy tribulation, and thy poverty (but thou art rich), and the blasphemy of them that say they are Jews, and they art not, but are a synagogue of Satan.

But I have a few things against thee: that thou hast, there, they that maintain the doctrine of Balaam, which taught in Balak to put occasion of sin before the children of Israel, that they should eat of meat dedicated unto idols, and to commit fornication.

But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols.

Behold, I will cast her into a bed, and them that commit fornication with her into great adversity, except they turn from their deeds.

Unto you I say, and unto others of them of Thyatira, as many as have not this learning, and which have not known the deepness of Satan, as they say; I will put upon you none other burden,

And he will tend them with a rod of iron (they will be shattered like ceramic vessels), as I also have received from my Father.

So, remember how you have received and heard the message [i.e., they had eagerly accepted the Gospel]; [now] obey it and repent. For if you do not become [spiritually] alert, I will come as a thief [i.e. unexpectedly] and you will not know the [exact] time that I will come upon you [in judgment. See 2:16, 25].

Thou hast a few names in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy.

Behold, I make them of the congregation of Satan - which call themselves Jews and are not, but do lie -Behold, I will make them that they shall come and worship before thy feet: and shall know that I love thee.

And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold.

Out from the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder, while in front of it seven flaming lamps were burning; they were the seven spirits of God.

And the four beasts had, each one of them, six wings about him, and they were full of eyes within. And they had no rest day neither night saying, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty, which was, and is, and is to come."