Dearly loved ones, as I was very eagerly planning to write to you about the salvation we share in common, I felt it necessary [instead] to write urging you to contend earnestly for the faith [i.e., the teaching of Christ] which was once and for all delivered [by the apostles, See verse 17] to the saints [i.e., God's holy people].

For certain persons have crept in unnoticed--men spoken of in ancient writings as pre-destined to this condemnation--ungodly men, who pervert the grace of our God into an excuse for immorality, and disown Jesus Christ, our only Sovereign and Lord.

My mind is therefore to put you in remembrance, forasmuch as ye once know this, how that the Lord - after that he had delivered the people out of Egypt - destroyed them which afterward believed not:

while the angels who abandoned their own domain, instead of preserving their proper rank, are reserved by him within the nether gloom, in chains eternal, for the doom of the great Day ??7 just as Sodom and Gomorra and the adjacent cities, which similarly glutted themselves with vice and sensual perversity, are exhibited as a warning of the everlasting fire they are sentenced to suffer.

Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

Yet these men, as a result of their dreams, defile the flesh, reject authority, and insult the glorious ones.

Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil as he disputed about the body of Moses, dared not bring against him a railing accusation, but said, The Lord rebuke you.

But these speak evil of those things which they know not: but what they know naturally, as brute beasts, in those things they corrupt themselves.

11How terrible it will be for them! For they lived like Cain did , rushed headlong into Balaam's error to make a profit, and destroyed themselves, as happened in Korah's rebellion.

These are they - who, in your love-feasts, are hidden rocks, as they fare sumptuously together, fearlessly, themselves, shepherding, - clouds without water, by winds swept along, trees autumnal, fruitless, twice dead, uprooted,

And Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied also as to these, saying, Behold, the Lord has come amidst his holy myriads,

and to convict all the ungodly of all the ungodly deeds which in their ungodliness they have committed, and of all the hard words which they, ungodly sinners as they are, have spoken against Him."

But as for you, my dearly-loved friends, remember the words that before now were spoken by the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ--

how they used to say to you-- 'As time draws to an end, there will be scoffers, who will be led by their godless passions.'

Remain in God's love as you look for the mercy of our Lord Jesus the Messiah, which brings eternal life.

And have mercy on some, who are doubting;

others you must try to save, as brands plucked from the flames; and on others look with pity mingled with fear, while you hate every trace of their sin.

to the only God our Saviour--through Jesus Christ our Lord, be ascribed glory, majesty, might, and authority, as it was before all time, is now, and shall be to all the Ages! Amen.