Paul An Apostle of Christ Jesus By the will of God, To the faithful and devoted followers of Christ Jesus Who are in Ephesus. May favor be yours and peace, From God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Blessed be the God And Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who blessed us once for all with every spiritual blessing In heaven and in Christ, Just as he once for all chose us in him Before the creation of the world, To be devoted to himself and blameless in his sight. For, in his love, he had once for all determined That we should become his sons through Jesus Christ, In fulfilment of the kindly purpose of his will, For the majestic character of the favor 1:5. Which he kindly bestowed on us in his dear It is in him and through his death we have deliverance, That is, the putting away of our offences. This is in harmony with the wealth of the divine favor Which God heaped on us, With every kind of wisdom and prudence, When he once for all made known to us The secret truth concerning his will. And it is also in harmony with the kindly purpose, Which God formed once for all in him, To bring everything together again in the Christ, When the times are ripe for it,— Everything in heaven and everything on earth: In the Christ, I say, in whom we became God's possession, To which we had already been appointed, In the intention of him who does everything Just as the deliberate purpose of his will determines, EPH. 1:12. EVERYTHING IN HIM. 209 So that we, who have already hoped in the Christ, Should win praise for the perfection of his character. It is in him you also heard the message of the truth, salvation. The Good News of your In him you also believed and were marked as his By receiving the Holy Spirit as promised. And this is a foretaste and pledge of our inheritance, Telling of the deliverance of God's own possession, And of praise for the perfection of his char acter. For this reason, and because I have heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is among you, and of your faithfulness to all his devoted followers, I do not cease to give thanks for you and I keep mentioning you in my prayers. I keep asking the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father whose character is perfect majesty, to give you his Spirit as a source of wisdom and revelation in the real and true knowledge of himself. I keep asking that your spiritual vision may be made so clear that you may appreciate the hope which his divine call opens to us, the wealth and majestic character of 1:18. his inheritance among his devoted followers, and the surpassing greatness of his power which he is able to exercise for us who believe in him. It is the same mighty power as that which he exercised on the Christ when he raised him from the dead, and caused him to sit at his right hand in heaven, far above angelic beings of every rank, and everything else which has a name, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come. And God put everything in Christ's power, and gave him as head over everything to the Church, which is his body, the fulness of him who fills everything with everything it has. You Take, for instance, your own case again. were dead because of your offences and sins. you once lived in them after the fashion of this world, and under the influence of the ruler of the powers of the air, the spirit who is now working in the disobedient. And it was among these all of us also once lived, indulging the cravings of our carnal nature, carrying out the desires prompted by it and by our own thoughts. And by our very nature we were fit subjects of divine judgment like everybody else. But because of the great love he had for us, God was full of pity for us, and so while we were still dead because of our offences, he gave life to us in giving life to the Christ. It is by favor you have been saved.-And, in union with |