Ephesians Chapter 1

Salutation

1^:1 Paul, apostle of Christ^Messiah Jesus by God’s will, to the saints [in Ephesus]^ms and faithful in Christ Jesus. ² Grace and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.                                                                                         Eph 1:1-2                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              

The Blessings of Redemption

³ Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He’s blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in high places. ⁴ Before he founded the world, he chose us in Christ to be holy and blameless in his presence in love. ⁵ It pleased him to destine us ahead of time to be his children through Jesus Christ. ⁶ So we praise the glorious grace he freely extended to us in the Beloved. ⁷ He redeemed us by his blood, and that forgiveness demonstrates the rich grace ⁸ he lavished on us by providing us wisdom and insight. ⁹ He let us know his previously unrevealed will that, in his good pleasure, he intended for Christ ¹⁰ to oversee when the time came. He chose to sum up everything in Christ in heaven and on earth. ¹¹ In him we’ve become an inheritance for the One who accomplishes everything according to his own counsel and purpose. ¹² As a result of what he’s done, we praise his glory—we who have already placed our hope in Christ. ¹³ You’ve heard the truth as well—the good news about salvation—and put your trust in him; and he has sealed you with the Holy Spirit he promised. ¹⁴ The Spirit is God’s pledge to give us our full inheritance when he redeems his people—to the praise of his glory.                                                                 

Eph 1:3-14

Prayer for the Ephesians

¹⁵ I’ve heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for the saints. ¹⁶ So I keep including you in my prayers and being grateful for you. ¹⁷ I pray that the God of our glorious Lord Jesus Christ will give you wisdom and revelation by knowing him. ¹⁸ That means enlightening you to recognize what the hope of his calling is, to realize how rich his inheritance among the saints is, ¹⁹ and to understand what the unlimited greatness of his power is toward us who believe. ²⁰ God brought about that hope, inheritance, and power by raising Christ from the dead and seating him on his own right hand in high places. ²¹ Now he’s far above all rule, authority, power, dominion, and everybody else in this age and the next. ^22-23 God put him in charge of everything as head of his body the church, the embodiment of the One that fills everything.

Eph 1:15-23