But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.

For after this manner in the old time did the holy women which trusted in God tire themselves, and were obedient to their husbands,

Let him eschew evil, and do good; let him seek peace, and ensue it.

And who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that which is good?

but in your hearts consecrate Christ as Lord, being always ready to make your defence to any one who asks from you a reason for the hope which you cherish.

having a good conscience, that as to that in which they speak against you as evildoers, they may be ashamed who calumniate your good conversation in Christ.

By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;

Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.

which also after a true likeness doth now save you, even baptism, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the interrogation of a good conscience toward God, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ;

which is our righthand of God, and is gone into heaven: angels, power, and might subdued unto him.

Forasmuch as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he which suffereth in the flesh ceaseth from sin,

For you have given time enough in the past to the doing of the things which the Gentiles delight in-- pursuing, as you did, a course of habitual licence, debauchery, hard drinking, noisy revelry, drunkenness and unholy image-worship.

in which they think it strange -- your not running with them to the same excess of dissoluteness, speaking evil,

which shall give accounts to him that is ready to judge quick and dead.

But the end of all things is at hand: be ye therefore sober, and watch unto prayer.

Whatever be the gifts which each has received, you must use them for one another's benefit, as good stewards of God's many-sided kindness.

If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God; if any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:

But be glad in the degree in which you share in the sufferings of Christ; so that when his glory shall be revealed, you too may be glad with triumphant gladness.

I need hardly say that no one among you must suffer as a murderer, or a thief, or a criminal, or for interfering in matters which do not concern Christians.

but if anyone suffers [ill-treatment] as a Christian [because of his belief], he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify God [because he is considered worthy to suffer] in this name.

For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God. If it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them which believe not the gospel of God?

The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed:

Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly; not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind;

and chief Shepherd having appeared, you shall receive a crown of glory which will never fade away.

Watch: be vigilant:

Be vigilant, watch. Your adversary the devil as a roaring lion walks about seeking whom he may devour.

Whom resist, stedfast in faith, knowing that the selfsame sufferings are accomplished in your brotherhood which is in the world.

The God of all grace - which called you unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus - shall his own self, after ye have suffered a little affliction, make you perfect: shall settle, strengthen, and establish you.

By Silvanus, the faithful brother, as I suppose, I have written to you briefly; exhorting and testifying that this is the true grace of God in which ye stand.

Your sister-church in Babylon, chosen like you, and Mark my son wish to be remembered to you.

Greet ye one another with the kiss of love. Peace be with you all which are in Christ Jesus. Amen. {Here ends the First General Epistle of Peter}

Simon Peter, a bondservant and Apostle of Jesus Christ: To those to whom there has been allotted the same precious faith as that which is ours through the righteousness of our God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Grace and peace [that special sense of spiritual well-being] be multiplied to you in the [true, intimate] knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.

As his divine power has given to us all things which relate to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that has called us by glory and virtue,

through which he has given to us the greatest and precious promises, that through these ye may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

Wherefore I shall be ready always to put you in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and are established in the truth which is with you .

And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount.

And we have the prophetic word made surer, to which ye do well taking heed (as to a lamp shining in an obscure place) until the day dawn and the morning star arise in your hearts;

for no prophetic teaching ever came in the old days at the mere wish of man, but men, moved by the Holy Spirit, spoke direct from God.

There were false prophets among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you: which privily shall bring in damnable sects, even denying the Lord that hath bought them, and bring upon themselves swift damnation.

And many people will follow their unrestrained, indecent conduct, which will result in the true way [of God] being spoken against.

And did not have mercy on the world which then was, but only kept safe Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when he let loose the waters over the world of the evil-doers;

especially those who satisfy their lower nature by indulging in its evil passions which defile them, and who despise authority. Daring, headstrong men! They do not tremble when they abuse persons of majesty,

Whereas angels, which are greater in power and might, bring not railing accusation against them before the Lord.

But these [false teachers], like unreasoning animals, [mere] creatures of instinct, born to be captured and destroyed, reviling things they do not understand, will also perish in their own corruption [in their destroying they will be destroyed],

For the evil which overtakes them is the reward of their evil-doing: such men take their pleasure in the delights of the flesh even in the daytime; they are like the marks of a disease, like poisoned wounds among you, feasting together with you in joy;

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!

Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness;

These are fountains without water, and mists driven away by the storm, for which the blackness of darkness has been reserved.

They promise them liberty, whilst they themselves are slaves of corruption: for every one is enslaved by that which overcomes him.

For it would have been better for them not to have [personally] known the way of righteousness, than to have known it and then to have turned back from the holy commandment [verbally] handed on to 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.

This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance:

That ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour:

This first understand: that there shall come in the last days mockers, which will walk after their own lusts

For they willingly forget [the fact] that the heavens existed long ago by the word of God, and the earth was formed out of water and by water,

by which means the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:

But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.

But there is one thing, dear friends, which you must not forget. With the Lord one day resembles a thousand years and a thousand years resemble one day.

The Lord is not slow in fulfilling His promise, in the sense in which some men speak of slowness. But He bears patiently with you, His desire being that no one should perish but that all should come to repentance.

But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.

looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat?

and for new heavens and a new earth according to His promise we do wait, in which righteousness doth dwell;

And consider the patience of our Lord [His delay in judging and avenging wrongs] as salvation [that is, allowing time for more to be saved]; just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given to him [by God],

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

Then you, beloved, foreknowing watch, lest, having been led away by the delusion of the ungodly, you may fall from your own stedfastness:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life;

(For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;)

That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.

This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.

If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness [of sin], we lie and do not practice the truth;

If we say we have no sin [refusing to admit that we are sinners], we delude ourselves and the truth is not in us. [His word does not live in our hearts.]

My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye should sin not: if, though, any man sin, yet we have an Advocate with the father, even Jesus Christ, which is righteous.

whoever says he lives in Christ [that is, whoever says he has accepted Him as God and Savior] ought [as a moral obligation] to walk and conduct himself just as He walked and conducted Himself.

Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning.

Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth.

Have no love for the world or for the things which are in the world. If any man has love for the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

because this is all that is in the world; the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not of the Father, but is of the world.

Children, it is the last hour [the end of this age]; and just as you heard that the antichrist is coming [the one who will oppose Christ and attempt to replace Him], even now many antichrists (false teachers) have appeared, which confirms our belief that it is the last hour.

I have not sent you this letter because you have no knowledge of what is true, but because you have knowledge, and because that which is false has nothing in common with that which is true.

Let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father.

And this is the promise which he promised us, even the life eternal.

But the anointing which ye have received of him abideth in you, and ye need not that any man teach you: but as the same anointing teacheth you of all things, and is truth, and is no lie, and even as it hath taught you, ye shall abide in him.

For this is the message which ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another:

and not be as Cain, which was of the devil and slew his brother. And wherefore slew he him? For his own deeds were evil, and his brother's righteous.

and whatsoever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments, and practise the things which are pleasing in his sight.

And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us.

Hereby ye know the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses Jesus Christ come in flesh is of God;

and every spirit which does not confess Jesus Christ come in flesh is not of God: and this is that power of the antichrist, of which ye have heard that it comes, and now it is already in the world.

We are of God: he who has the knowledge of God gives ear to us; he who is not of God does not give ear to us. By this we may see which is the true spirit, and which is the spirit of error.

No one has seen God at any time. But if we love one another [with unselfish concern], God abides in us, and His love [the love that is His essence abides in us and] is completed and perfected in us.

And his Spirit which he has given us is the witness that we are in him and he is in us.

And we have seen and do testify that the father hath sent his son, which is the saviour of the world.

And we know and have believed the love which God hath in us. God is love; and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him.

And the command which we have from Him is that he who loves God must love his brother man also.

All that believe that Jesus is Christ, are born of God. And all that loveth him which begat, loveth him also which was begotten of him.

For all that has been begotten of God gets the victory over the world; and this is the victory which has gotten the victory over the world, our faith.

Who is it that overcometh the world: but he which believeth that Jesus is the son of God?

This is he that came by water and blood, Jesus, the Christ; not by water only, but by water and by blood; and the Spirit is that which testifies, for the Spirit is the truth.