1. My dear friends, this is the second letter I have written to encourage you to do some honest thinking. I don't want you to forget
2. what God's prophets said would happen. You must never forget what the holy prophets taught in the past. And you must remember what the apostles told you our Lord and Saviour has commanded us to do.
3. But first you must realize that in the last days some people won't think about anything except their own selfish desires. They will make fun of you
4. and say, “Didn't your Lord promise to come back? Yet the first leaders have already died, and the world hasn't changed a bit.”
5. They will say this because they want to forget that long ago the heavens and the earth were made at God's command. The earth came out of water and was made from water.
6. Later it was destroyed by the waters of a mighty flood.