You have been very kind to me, your servant. You have been very kind to save me. But I can’t run all the way to the mountains. What if I am too slow and something happens? I will be killed!
The Lord is our protector and glorious king. {\cf2\super [491]} \par God blesses us with kindness and glory.\par The Lord gives every good thing\par to people who follow and obey him.\par
\{I would punish that country\} even if Noah, Danel, and Job {\cf2\super [114]} lived there. Those men could save their own lives by their goodness, \{but they could not save the whole country\}.” The Lord my Master said these things.
And if God chose his people by grace, then it is not the things they have done that made them God’s people. If they could be made God’s people by the things they did, then God’s gift of grace would not really be a gift.
But, because of God’s grace (gift), that is what I am. And his grace that he gave me was not wasted. I worked harder than all the other apostles. (But I was not really the one working. It was God’s grace that was with me.)
I pray that the Lord will allow Onesiphorus to have mercy from the Lord on that Day. {\cf2\super [11]} You know how many ways Onesiphorus helped me in Ephesus.
Those were the spirits who refused to obey God long ago in the time of Noah. God was waiting patiently for them while Noah was building the big boat. Only a few people—eight in all—were saved in that boat. Those people were saved by water.
And God punished the \{evil\} people who lived long ago. God brought a flood to the world that was full of people who were against God. But God saved Noah and seven other people with Noah. Noah was a man who told people about living right.