In this book I imagine myself sitting down to talk with you, my brothers and sisters in the faith, who with me love the appearing of our Lord Jesus, as Paul says to Timothy. I do not know you of course. But I know one thing about you: you are no longer young. I should like it if we could do some more talking together. We won't make our talks too long or too deep. You are not so much interested in that kind of talk anymore. You would rather talk about things that need to be said, what is essential, the things that really matter.