Book of Common Prayer

¹¹ If all these things will perish, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy living and godliness, ¹² looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, in which the heavens shall perish with fire and the elements shall be consumed with heat? ¹³ Nevertheless, we look for a new heaven and a new earth according to his promise, wherein righteousness dwells.

¹⁴ Therefore, dearly beloveds, seeing that you look for such things, be diligent to be found by him in peace, without spot and undefiled. ¹⁵ And count the longsuffering of the Lord to be salvation, even as our dearly beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you – ¹⁶ yea, in almost every epistle speaking of such things, among which are many things hard to understand, which those who are unlearned and unstable pervert, as they do other scriptures, to their own destruction.

¹⁷ You therefore, beloveds, seeing you know it beforehand, beware lest you also be plucked away with the error of the wicked and fall from your own steadfastness; ¹⁸ but grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

To whom be glory both
now and forever.
Amen.

²⁸ For I say to you, among the children of women there is no greater prophet than John. Nevertheless, one who is less in the kingdom of God, is greater than he.

²⁹ And all the people who heard, and the publicans, justified God, and were baptized with the baptism of John. ³⁰ But the Pharisees and scribes rejected the counsel of God against themselves, and were not baptized by him.

³¹ And the Lord said, To what shall I liken the people of this generation, and what are they like? ³² They are like children sitting in the marketplace and calling one to another, and saying, We have piped to you, and you have not danced; we have mourned to you, and you have not wept. ³³ For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say he has the devil. ³⁴ The Son of man has come, and eats and drinks, and you say, Here is a man who is a glutton and a drinker of wine, a friend of publicans and sinners. ³⁵ Yet wisdom is justified by her children.