I do not cease to give thanks for you when I remember you in my prayers.

For this reason I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you Gentiles –

This was according to the eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord,

to equip the saints for the work of ministry, that is, to build up the body of Christ,

Grace be with all of those who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love.

So then you are no longer foreigners and noncitizens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of God’s household,

because you have been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.

He, the very one who descended, is also the one who ascended above all the heavens, in order to fill all things.

For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says: “Awake, O sleeper! Rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you!”

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace

toward the administration of the fullness of the times, to head up all things in Christ – the things in heaven and the things on earth.

Now this secret was not disclosed to people in former generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit,

and to enlighten everyone about God’s secret plan – a secret that has been hidden for ages in God who has created all things.

to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

So we are no longer to be children, tossed back and forth by waves and carried about by every wind of teaching by the trickery of people who craftily carry out their deceitful schemes.

so that he may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless.

With every prayer and petition, pray at all times in the Spirit, and to this end be alert, with all perseverance and requests for all the saints.

among whom all of us also formerly lived out our lives in the cravings of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath even as the rest…

that you were at that time without the Messiah, alienated from the citizenship of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

when he nullified in his flesh the law of commandments in decrees. He did this to create in himself one new man out of two, thus making peace,