²⁵ I turned my mind to know and to search out and to seek wisdom and the sum of things and to know that wickedness is folly and that foolishness is madness.^(A)

³ First of all you must understand this, that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and indulging their own lusts^{(A) 4} and saying, “Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since our ancestors died,^[a] all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation!”^{(B) 5} They deliberately ignore this fact, that by the word of God heavens existed long ago and an earth was formed out of water and by means of water,^{(C) 6} through which the world of that time was deluged with water and perished.^{(D) 7} But by the same word the present heavens and earth have been reserved for fire, being kept until the day of judgment and destruction of the godless.^(E)

⁸ But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.^{(F) 9} The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you,^[b] not wanting any to perish but all to come to repentance.^(G)

³ And in their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation, pronounced against them long ago, has not been idle, and their destruction is not asleep.^(A)

⁴ For if God did not spare the angels when they sinned but cast them into hell and committed them to chains^[a] of deepest darkness to be kept until the judgment;^{(B) 5} and if he did not spare the ancient world, even though he saved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood on the world of the ungodly;^{(C) 6} and if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to destruction^[b] and made them an example of what is coming to the ungodly;^{[c] 7} and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man greatly distressed by the debauchery of the lawless^{(D) 8} (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by their lawless deeds that he saw and heard), ⁹ then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trial and to keep the unrighteous until the day of judgment, when they will be punished^(E)

Jeremiah Complains to God

Take Life as It Comes

9 All this I laid to heart, examining it all, how the righteous and the wise and their deeds are in the hand of God; whether it is love or hate one does not know. Everything that confronts them ² is vanity,^[a] since the same fate comes to all, to the righteous and the wicked, to the good and the evil,^[b] to the clean and the unclean, to those who sacrifice and those who do not sacrifice. As are the good, so are the sinners; those who swear are like those who shun an oath.^{(A) 3} This is an evil in all that happens under the sun, that the same fate comes to everyone. Moreover, the hearts of humans are full of evil; madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead.^(B)

²⁷ See, this is what I found, says the Teacher, adding one thing to another to find the sum,^(A)

Judgment and the Future Belong to God

¹⁶ Moreover, I saw under the sun that, in the place of justice, wickedness was there, and in the place of righteousness, wickedness was there as well. ¹⁷ I said to myself, “God will judge the righteous and the wicked, for he has appointed a time for every matter and for every work.”^(A)

²⁰ So I turned and gave my heart up to despair concerning all the toil of my labors under the sun,^(A)