¹² Now also we beseech you, brethren, get to know those who labor among you [recognize them for what they are, acknowledge and appreciate and respect them all]—your leaders who are over you in the Lord and those who warn and kindly reprove and exhort you.

¹³ And hold them in very high and most affectionate esteem in [intelligent and sympathetic] appreciation of their work. Be at peace among yourselves.

¹⁴ And we earnestly beseech you, brethren, admonish (warn and seriously advise) those who are out of line [the loafers, the disorderly, and the unruly]; encourage the timid and fainthearted, help and give your support to the weak souls, [and] be very patient with everybody [always keeping your temper].^(A)

¹⁵ See that none of you repays another with evil for evil, but always aim to show kindness and seek to do good to one another and to everybody.

¹⁶ Be happy [in your faith] and rejoice and be glad-hearted continually (always);

¹⁷ Be unceasing in prayer [praying perseveringly];

¹⁸ Thank [God] in everything [no matter what the circumstances may be, be thankful and give thanks], for this is the will of God for you [who are] in Christ Jesus [the Revealer and Mediator of that will].

¹⁹ Do not quench (suppress or subdue) the [Holy] Spirit;

²⁰ Do not spurn the gifts and utterances of the prophets [do not depreciate prophetic revelations nor despise inspired instruction or exhortation or warning].

²¹ But test and prove all things [until you can recognize] what is good; [to that] hold fast.

²² Abstain from evil [shrink from it and keep aloof from it] in whatever form or whatever kind it may be.

²³ And may the God of peace Himself sanctify you through and through [separate you from profane things, make you pure and wholly consecrated to God]; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved sound and complete [and found] blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah).

²⁴ Faithful is He Who is calling you [to Himself] and utterly trustworthy, and He will also do it [fulfill His call by hallowing and keeping you].

²⁵ Brethren, pray for us.

²⁶ Greet all the brethren with a sacred kiss.

²⁷ I solemnly charge you [in the name of] the Lord to have this letter read before all the brethren.

²⁸ The grace (the unmerited favor and blessings) of our Lord Jesus Christ (the Messiah) be with you all. Amen, (so be it).

24 After Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had taken into exile Jeconiah [also called Coniah and Jehoiachin] son of Jehoiakim king of Judah and the princes of Judah, with the craftsmen and smiths from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon, the Lord showed me [in a vision] two baskets of figs set before the temple of the Lord.

² One basket had very good figs, like the figs that are first ripe; but the other basket had very bad figs, so bad that they could not be eaten.

³ Then the Lord said to me, What do you see, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs—the good figs very good, and the bad very bad, so bad that they cannot be eaten.

⁴ Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

⁵ Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Like these good figs, so will I regard the captives of Judah whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans for their good.

⁶ For I will set My eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land; and I will build them up and not pull them down, and I will plant them and not pluck them up.

⁷ And I will give them a heart to know (recognize, understand, and be acquainted with) Me, that I am the Lord; and they will be My people, and I will be their God, for they will return to Me with their whole heart.

⁸ And as for the bad figs, which are so bad that they cannot be eaten, surely thus says the Lord, So will I give up Zedekiah king of Judah and his princes and the residue of Jerusalem who remains in this land and those who dwell in the land of Egypt.

⁹ I will even give them up to be a dismay and a horror and to be tossed to and fro among all the kingdoms of the earth for evil, to be a reproach, a byword or proverb, a taunt, and a curse in all places where I will drive them.

¹⁰ And I will send the sword, famine, and pestilence among them until they are consumed from off the land that I gave to them and to their fathers.