Purpose of the Letter

1 This now, beloved, a second letter to you I write, in both of which I stir up your pure mind in remembrance.
2 That you may be mindful of the words spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour.

The Coming of Scoffers

3 Knowing this first: that there will come in the last of the days scoffers, walking according to their own lusts.

The Coming Day of the Lord: The Return of Christ

4 And saying, “Where is the promise of his coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things thus continue from the beginning of the creation.”
5 For this they willingly ignore, that the heavens of old were, and the earth from water and through water having stood by the word of God.
6 By which things the then world, being flooded with water, perished.
7 But the present heavens and the earth are being kept by the same word, reserved for fire to a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men.

God’s Timing and Judgment

8 But this one thing, beloved, do not let it escape you: that one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
9 The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness; but is patient toward you, not desiring that any perish, but that all come to repentance.
10 But the day of the Lord will come as a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a rushing noise, the elements being dissolved with burning heat, and the earth and the works in it shall be burned up.

How to Live in View of All This

11 Since then all these things are to be dissolved, what sort of persons ought you to be in holy behaviour and godliness,
12 Looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, by which the heavens being on fire will be dissolved, and the elements being burned will melt?
13 But according to His promise we look for new heavens and a new earth, in which righteousness dwells.
14 Therefore, beloved, since you await these things, be diligent to be found by Him in peace, spotless and blameless.

Paul’s Writings and Warning

15 And consider the long-suffering of our Lord as salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul according to the wisdom given to him wrote to you.
16 As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as also they do the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.

Final Exhortation

17 You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take heed lest, being carried away with the error of the lawless, you fall from your own steadfastness.
18 But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and until the day of eternity. Amen.