awaiting and keeping close in mind [literally, awaiting and speeding up] the presence of the day of Jehovah [Greek, of the God], through which the heavens being on fire will be dissolved and the elements being intensely hot will melt!

2 Peter 3:11-13; Kingdom Interlinear Translation.

60. (a) If we really believe what God’s Word says, how should we live? (b) To those who have been called to heavenly life, what exhortation does the apostle Peter give?

⁶⁰ True believers in the certain fulfillment of God’s word of prophecy ought to live in harmony with their expectations. They will not selfishly live for this present system of things, that is to say, for the “heavens” and “elements” and “earth” that are to be dissolved, destroyed, in the way that God’s Word describes. Why live for what is soon to perish? And perish with it? Dedicated, baptized Christians, in particular, have “obtained a faith, held in equal privilege with [the apostle Peter’s], by the righteousness of our God and the Savior Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 1:1, NW; Weymouth; American Standard) To such Christians as have the call to the heavenly kingdom, the apostle Peter goes on to say: “Do your utmost to make the calling and choosing of you sure for yourselves; for if you keep on doing these things you will by no means ever fail. In fact, thus there will be richly supplied to you the entrance into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” (2 Peter 1:10, 11) The apostle Peter says that they are “aliens and temporary residents,” and, hence, they are not part of the symbolic “heavens,” “elements,” and “earth” that are “thus to be dissolved.”​—1 Peter 2:11.

61. (a) In harmony with Peter’s exhortation, what sort of persons and practices do true Christians shun? (b) What is necessary in order to stay in the spiritual paradise?

⁶¹ Consequently, those who take heed to Peter’s exhortation have nothing to do with the “false teachers” who “quietly bring in destructive sects” and who “disown even the owner that bought them, bringing speedy destruction upon themselves.” Christians holding to true prophecy do not follow these false teachers. Such faithful Christians are not among the many who “will follow their acts of loose conduct” and on account of whom “the way of the truth will be spoken of abusively.” (2 Peter 2:1, 2) To avoid causing the way of the Bible truth to be spoken of abusively by ridiculers and other worldlings, Christians who heed the apostle Peter’s words pay constant attention to what sort of persons they ought to be “in holy acts of conduct and deeds of godly devotion.” By this course they will escape from “bringing speedy destruction upon themselves” along with “the heavens and the earth that are now” and that are “stored up for fire.” (2 Peter 3:7) By “holy acts of conduct and deeds of godly devotion,” Jehovah’s Christian witnesses today stay in their spiritual paradise.

62. (a) Is there anything that we can do to make the “day of Jehovah” come sooner? (b) How can we show that we ‘keep it close in mind’?

⁶² They do not let themselves be affected by any ridicule of those who postpone in their minds the thieflike coming of Jehovah’s day of judgment. They have long awaited it and, until it arrives, they will keep awaiting the “presence of the day of Jehovah.” Unlike the ridiculers, they are “keeping close in mind the presence of the day of Jehovah.” They never let it out of their minds. They keep it constantly in mind as an event that is close at hand. The longer they live on earth, the closer it gets. They cannot hurry it, hasten it or speed it up in a literal way, for they know that Jehovah has his own fixed date for its arrival. But they keep steadily on the watch in order that, no matter how soon and unexpectedly it may come, they will be fit to enter into it in a condition approved by Jehovah God. So their continuing on in “holy acts of conduct and deeds of godly devotion” is in agreement with their “keeping close in mind the presence of the day of Jehovah.” They know what the presence of that day means. What?

CLEARING THE WAY FOR “NEW HEAVENS AND A NEW EARTH”

63. When the “heavens” are dissolved, what will this mean for them?

⁶³ The “presence of the day of Jehovah” is the means “through which the heavens being on fire will be dissolved and the elements being intensely hot will melt!” (2 Peter 3:12) The governmental “heavens,” to which the worldly religious leaders have clung for support and protection, will be set on fire by Jehovah God. “For,” says Hebrews 12:29, “our God is also a consuming fire.” (Deuteronomy 4:24) This will signify the dissolving, the destroying, of those governmental “heavens.” How this will be brought about as by fire the apostle Peter does not explain. However, the “sayings previously spoken by the holy prophets” describe how this will be.​—2 Peter 3:2; 1:21.

64. Through what inspired prophet was an explanation given as to how those symbolic “heavens” will be destroyed as by fire?

⁶⁴ In the prophetic dream of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon during the days of the prophet Daniel, there was given a picture of those symbolic “heavens” as from the date of 607 B.C.E., when Nebuchadnezzar destroyed Jerusalem and its temple, down to the “presence of the day of Jehovah.”

67, 68. Until what period of history does that world-power image continue standing, and what happens to it then?

⁶⁷ According to the king’s prophetic dream, that world-power “image” continues standing, in its historical fulfillment, in the “conclusion of the system of things,” in which we today find ourselves. (Matthew 24:3; 28:20; 13:39, 49) That “conclusion of the system of things” is brought to a grand climax by the “presence of the day of Jehovah,” during which the symbolic “heavens,” “elements,” and “earth and the works in it” are destroyed as by fire. That is the “day of judgment and of destruction of the ungodly men.” (2 Peter 3:7-12)