1 Peter 2:11

Plain English Version

My friends, you belong to God. You don’t belong to this world. Right now you are like strangers here in this world. So I’m telling you this really strongly. Sometimes you will really want to do something bad, like the people that belong to this world do, but you have to be strong and leave it. You will think, “I really want to do that bad thing,” but then you will think, “My spirit is telling me that it is the wrong thing to do.” So you’ve got to leave it.

Cross References

Genesis 21:34

Abraham and all his people lived for a long time in the country that belonged to the Philistia mob.

Genesis 23:4

Abraham said to them, “This is your land, and I am just camping here. I need to bury my wife’s body. Can I buy some of your land to use for a grave?”

Genesis 47:9

And Jacob said to Pharaoh, “I am 130 years old. All my life, I’ve lived on country that belongs to other people. I never had my own land, just like my grand-fathers never had their own land. You know, my grand-fathers lived for a long time, and they died when they were very old. But my life has been short, and I had a lot of trouble in my life.”

Acts 15:20

We have to write them a letter, to tell them not to worry about getting that young man operation. But we’ll tell them to follow just these rules, – If somebody reckons that a statue is a god, and if they give food to that statue to show respect to it, don’t eat any of that food. – And don’t sleep with somebody that you are not married to, as if they are your wife or husband. – And if somebody holds an animal’s neck really tight to kill it, don’t eat its meat. – And don’t eat the blood of animals.

Acts 15:29

If somebody reckons that a statue is a god, and if they give food to that statue to show respect to it, don’t eat any of that food. – And don’t eat the blood of animals. – And if somebody holds an animal’s neck really tight to kill it, don’t eat its meat. – And don’t sleep with somebody that you are not married to, as if they are your wife or husband. Make sure you don’t do those things, and you will be all right. That’s our message to you now. Goodbye.”

Romans 12:1

My Christian friends, God is so very good to us. So I really want you to use your bodies to live for him. A long time ago, God told his people to give him animals to show him respect. They did it like this. They used to kill the animals and burn them up. But now it is different. Now you have to use your bodies to live for him and do good things, it’s like you are giving your own bodies to God while you are still alive. If you do that, you will make God happy. That is the proper thing to do to show that you follow God.

Romans 7:23

but there is a big fight going on inside us. That bad part of us makes its own law. It makes us think the wrong way. It makes us its prisoners so that we can’t do the things we really want to do.

Romans 8:13

If you keep on doing those bad things, you will die. But if God’s spirit is in you, he can help you block that bad part of you, like you kill it, and then you will not do those bad things, and you will live with God for ever.

Galatians 5:24

You see, sometimes doing bad things makes people feel good. But people that belong to Jesus Christ stop doing those bad things. That bad part inside them might make them feel like doing those bad things, but they don’t take any notice of it any more. It is like they nailed it to a cross and killed it.

Ephesians 2:19

So now, you mob that are not Jews, you are not strangers any more. You don’t belong to a different nation any more, but you belong to God’s family, and you are in God’s mob now.

Ephesians 4:1

So now, even though I’m in jail because I follow Jesus, I’m asking you strongly to live the right way. You see, God picked you to be his own people, so you have to live his way.

2 Timothy 2:22

Lots of young people just follow their own feelings, and then they do bad things. But you have to keep away from anything like that. Keep away from anything that will push you into doing something bad. Instead of that, you have to try to do good things, and always trust God, and love people, and don’t fight anyone. Some people live like that. They pray to God, and they only want to do good things. Well, make those people your good friends, and you live like that too.

James 4:1

Why do you always fight and argue with each other? I’ll tell you why. It is because you only think about things that you want for yourself, to make yourself happy, and you don’t care about anyone else. So you fight everyone else to get the things you want.

1 Peter 1:1

I am Peter, and this letter is from me. I am one of Jesus Christ’s special workers. I’m sending this letter to you people that God picked to be in his family. I’m sending it to you Christians in a lot of different places, called Pontus, and Galatia, and Capadoshia, and Asia, and Bithinia. You had to leave your homes, and now you live in those places.

1 Peter 1:17

You know that God is our father, and you pray to him. He looks at everything we do, and he treats us in a fair way. So you have to properly respect God now. You don’t belong to this world, you are only living here for a little while, but later you will live with God.

1 Peter 4:12

My friends, you are following Jesus, and from that you are getting trouble. Don’t be surprised about it. God lets you get that trouble to show that you really trust Jesus.

1 Peter 4:2

It shows that you want to do the things that God wants. So whenever you want to do something bad, you have to turn away from it and live God’s way.

2 Peter 3:1

My friends, this is now my 2nd letter that I’m writing to you. Both of these letters are to help you remember things. I want you to think properly about these things.