Faith, knowledge, and imitation of God's kindness
The author is addressing Diognetus directly, urging him to desire the faith just described and to learn what it means to imitate God's kindness.
If you too come to desire this faith, you will first receive knowledge of the Father.
For God loved human beings. For them he made the world. To them he subjected everything on earth. To them he gave reason and mind. To them alone he permitted looking upward toward him. He formed them from his own image. To them he sent his Son, the only-begotten. To them he promised the kingdom in heaven, and he will give it to those who love him.
And once you know him, with what joy do you think you will be filled? How will you love the one who loved you first in this way?
And when you love him, you will be an imitator of his kindness. Do not be surprised that a human being can become an imitator of God. He can, when God wills it.
For happiness does not consist in lording it over one's neighbors, or in wanting to have more than the weaker, or in being rich and using force against those below oneself. No one can imitate God in these things. They are outside his majesty.
But whoever takes up the burden of his neighbor, whoever wants to benefit the one who is worse off in the very thing in which he himself is stronger, whoever supplies to those in need the things he has received from God and so becomes a god to those who receive them, this person is an imitator of God.
Then, while you are still on earth, you will see that God lives as a citizen in the heavens. Then you will begin to speak the mysteries of God. Then you will love and admire those who are punished for refusing to deny God. Then you will recognize the deceit of the world and its error, when you know the true living in heaven, when you despise what only seems to be death here, when you fear the real death, which is kept for those who will be condemned to the eternal fire, which will punish those handed over to it to the end.
Then you will admire and bless those who endure the temporary fire for the sake of righteousness, when you recognize that fire.
Greek
Ταύτην καὶ σὺ τὴν πίστιν ἐὰν ποθήσῃς, καὶ λάβῃς πρῶτον μὲν ἐπίγνωσιν πατρός...
ὁ γὰρ θεὸς τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ἠγάπησε, δἰ οὓς ἐποίησε τὸν κόσμον, οἷς ὑπέταξε πάντα τὰ ἐν τῇ γῇ, οἷς λόγον ἔδωκεν, οἷς νοῦν, οἷς μόνοις ἄνω πρὸς αὐτὸν ὁρᾶν ἐπέτρεψεν, οὓς ἐκ τῆς ἰδίας εἰκόνος ἔπλασε, πρὸς οὓς ἀπέστειλε τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ τὸν μονογενῆ, οἷς τὴν ἐν οὐρανῷ βασιλείαν ἐπηγγείλατο, καὶ δώσει τοῖς ἀγαπήσασιν αὐτόν.
ἐπιγνοὺς δὲ τίνος οἴει πληρωθήσεσθαι χαρᾶς; ἢ πῶς ἀγαπήσεις τὸ οὕτως προαγαπήσαντά σε;
ἀγαπήσας δὲ μιμη τὴς ἔσῃ αὐτοῦ τῆς χρηστότητος. καὶ μὴ θαυμάσῃ εἰ δύναται μιμητὴς ἄνθρωπος γενέσθαι θεοῦ δύναται θέλοντος αὐτοῦ.
οὐ γὰρ τὸ καταδυν̔??ʼ στεύειν τῶν πλησίον οὐδὲ τὸ πλέον ἔχειν βούλεσθ̔??ʼ τῶν ἀσθενεστέρων οὐδὲ τὸ πλουτεῖν καὶ βιάζεσθἁ??ʼ τοὺς ὑποδεεστέρους εὐδαιμονεῖν ἐστιν, οὐδὲ ἐν τούτοις δύναταί τις μιμήσασθαι θεόν, ἀλλὰ ταῦτα ἐκτὸς τῆς ἐκείνου μεγαλειότητος.
ἀλλ’ ὅστις τὸ τοῦ πλησίον ἀναδέχεται βάρος, ὃς ἐν ᾧ κρείσσων ἐστὶν ἕτερον τὸν ἐλαττούμενον εὐεργετεῖν ἐθέλει, ὃς ἃ παρὰ τοῦ θεοῦ λαβὼν ἔχει, ταῦτα τοῖς ἐπιδεομένοις χορηγῶν θεὸς γίνεται τῶν λαμβανόντων, οὗτος μιμητής ἐστι θεοῦ.
τότε θεάσῃ τυγχάνων ἐπὶ γῆς, ὅτι θεὸς ἐν οὐρανοῖς πολιτεύεται, τότε μυστήρια θεοῦ λαλεῖν ἄρξῃ, τότε τοὺς κολαζομένους ἐπὶ τῷ μὴ θέλειν ἀρνήσασθαι θεὸν καὶ ἀγαπήσεις καὶ θαυμάσεις: τότε τῆς ἀπάτης τοῦ κόσμου καὶ τῆς πλάνης καταγνώσῃ, ὅταν τὸ ἀληθῶς ἐν οὐρανῷ ζῆν ἐπιγνῷς, ὅταν τοῦ δοκοῦντος ἐνθάδε θανάτου καταφρονήσῃς, ὅταν τὸν ὄντως θάνατον φοβηθῇς, ὃς φυλάσσεται τοῖς κατακριθησομένοις εἰς τὸ πῦρ τὸ αἰώνιον, ὃ τοὺς παραδοθέντας αὐτῷ μέχρι τέλους κολάσει.
τότε τοὺς ὑπομένοντας ὑπὲρ δικαιοσύνης θαυμάσεις τὸ πῦρ τὸ πρόσκαιρον καὶ μακαρίσεις, ὅταν ἐκεῖνο τὸ πῦρ ἐπιγνῷς.