Chapter 16

Keep watch over your life. Do not let your lamps go out or your belts come loose; instead, be ready, for you do not know the hour when our Lord is coming.

Gather together frequently, seeking what benefits your souls; for the entire course of your faith will be of no use to you unless you are brought to completion at the final moment.

For in the last days false prophets and corrupters will multiply; the sheep will turn into wolves, and love will turn into hatred.

For as lawlessness increases, people will hate, persecute and betray one another. Then the deceiver of the world will appear as a son of God and will perform signs and wonders. The earth will be delivered into his hands, and he will do unlawful things such as have never happened since the beginning of the age.

Then humankind will enter the fire of testing, and many will stumble and perish; but those who endure in their faith will be saved by the accursed thing itself.

Then the signs of the truth will appear: first, the sign of an unfolding in heaven; then the sign of the trumpet call; and third, the resurrection of the dead.

But not the resurrection of all, for as it has been said: ‘The Lord will come, and all the holy ones with him.’

Then the world will see the Lord coming on the clouds of heaven.