Having therefore these promises, beloved friends, let us purify ourselves from all defilement of body and of spirit, and secure perfect holiness through the fear of God.
I mean that the Covenant which God had already formally made is not abrogated by the Law which was given four hundred and thirty years later–so as to annul the promise.
He who sows in the field of his lower nature, will from that nature reap destruction; but he who sows to serve the Spirit will from the Spirit reap the Life of the Ages.
Among them all of us also formerly passed our lives, governed by the inclinations of our lower natures, indulging the cravings of those natures and of our own thoughts, and were in our original state deserving of anger like all others.
Now that, through your obedience to the truth, you have purified your souls for cherishing sincere brotherly love, you must love another heartily and fervently.
Dear friends, I entreat you as pilgrims and foreigners not to indulge the cravings of your lower natures: for all such cravings wage war upon the soul.
For it is with this end in view that the Good News was proclaimed even to some who were dead, that they may be judged, as all mankind will be judged, in the body, but may be living a godly life in the spirit.