First Letter of Peter 2

¹ Be sure, then, you are never spiteful, or deceitful, or hypocritical, or envious and critical of each other.

² You are new born, and, like babies, you should be hungry for nothing but milk – the spiritual honesty which will help you to grow up to salvation –

³ now that you have tasted the goodness of the Lord.[*a]

⁴ He is the living stone, rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him; set yourselves close to him

⁵ so that you too, the holy priesthood that offers the spiritual sacrifices which Jesus Christ has made acceptable to God, may be living stones making a spiritual house.

⁶ As scripture says: See how I lay in Zion a precious cornerstone that I have chosen and the man who rests his trust on it will not be disappointed.[*b]

⁷ That means that for you who are believers, it is precious; but for unbelievers, the stone rejected by the builders has proved to be the keystone,[*c]

⁸ a stone to stumble over, a rock to bring men down.[*d] They stumble over it because they do not believe in the word; it was the fate in store for them.

⁹ But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a consecrated nation, a people set apart[*e] to sing the praises of God who called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light.

¹⁰ Once you were not a people[*f] at all and now you are the People of God; once you were outside the mercy and now you have been given mercy.

¹¹ I urge you, my dear people, while you are visitors and pilgrims[*g] to keep yourselves free from the selfish passions that attack the soul.

¹² Always behave honourably among pagans so that they can see your good works for themselves and, when the day of reckoning comes, give thanks to God for the things which now make them denounce you as criminals.

¹³ For the sake of the Lord, accept the authority of every social institution: the emperor, as the supreme authority,

¹⁴ and the governors as commissioned by him to punish criminals and praise good citizenship.

¹⁵ God wants you to be good citizens, so as to silence what fools are saying in their ignorance.

¹⁶ You are slaves of no one except God, so behave like free men, and never use your freedom as an excuse for wickedness.

¹⁷ Have respect for everyone and love for our community; fear God and honour the emperor.

¹⁸ Slaves must be respectful and obedient to their masters, not only when they are kind and gentle but also when they are unfair.

¹⁹ You see, there is some merit in putting up with the pains of unearned punishment if it is done for the sake of God

²⁰ but there is nothing meritorious in taking a beating patiently if you have done something wrong to deserve it. The merit, in the sight of God, is in bearing it patiently when you are punished after doing your duty.

²¹ This, in fact, is what you were called to do, because Christ suffered for you and left an example for you to follow the way he took.

²² He had not done anything wrong, and there had been no perjury in his mouth.[*h]

²³ He was insulted and did not retaliate with insults; when he was tortured he made no threats but he put his trust in the righteous judge.

²⁴ He was bearing our faults in his own body on the cross, so that we might die to our faults and live for holiness; through his wounds you have been healed. You had gone astray like sheep but now you have come back to the shepherd and guardian[*i] of your souls.