Skip to main content

A Prisoner With Access: Thoughts on Ephesians 3:1-13 [12]

If you are new to this blog, please start with 1 (Intro) and then continue in order.

Even though Paul is suffering in prison (v13 and 1), he does not want the Ephesian Gentile believers to lose heart (v13). Rather than focus on this suffering, Paul focuses on the grace given to him to be able to preach the gospel to the Gentiles and share the "unsearchable riches of Christ". Paul felt especially grateful for this because he considered himself "the very least of all the saints" since he was a persecutor of the church. Wow! I wonder if that would be my focus if I were in prison for sharing the gospel, just being thankful that God allowed me to share it!

Once again, we have this idea of access to God. Ephesians 2:18 talks about having access to the Father in one Spirit through Christ, now for both Jews and Gentiles. In chapter 3 verse 12, we again see that it is through our faith in Christ Jesus our Lord, but also have the added idea of  having boldness with confidence in our access to God through Christ. So once again, Hebrews 4 comes  to mind:  14 Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ephesians 1:15-23 [7]

If you are new to this blog, please start with 1 (Intro) and then continue in order. Before each day's work, pray and ask God to open your eyes to his truth through his Holy Spirit. Ask for his leading and guidance. Also, as you read, stop to praise God for things, thank God for things, confess sin, or ask for help to be like the example you see in the scriptures. Just generally talk to God about what you are reading about! DAY 1 AND 2 Pray Read chapters 1 and 2 and look for key words that are repeated. Pick 2 and then mark them distinctly on your manuscript in chapters 1 and 2. Praise God for something about him in the passage. DAY 3 Mark grace and peace distinctly in chapters 1 and 2 if you didn't already. I circled grace in orange and put blue waves under peace (as in peace like a river😀 ), but you can mark them however you'd like. If grace and peace are what you marked, feel free to look for other repeated words to mark. DAY 4 Paul prays for the Ephes...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ephesians in Review - Unity and Honesty [25]

If you are new to this blog, I encourage you to start with  Intro [1]  and then continue in order. This is in answer to Ephesians in Review at the end of   Ephesians 6:10-24 THE LAST ONE!!! [23] . This study of Ephesians has been so rich for me.  It was one of my favorite books of the Bible before I started, but I love it even more and understand it even better now. It has also amazed me how many opportunities God has given me to share from my time studying it. It seems like Ephesians relates to EVERYTHING! 1) When I started studying Ephesians this time, I was struck by the theme of unity. I found that it was all over the place, even when the word itself was not used (for more on unity, see my post,  Unity Through and Through - Thoughts on Ephesians 4:1-16 [16] ). I was happy to receive confirmation of that when I read one of my pastor's sermons, and he said that unity was the main theme of Ephesians: "to unite all things in [Christ], things in heaven an...
Post a Comment
Read more

Does the Translation Matter? [3]

If you are new to this blog, please start with 1 (Intro) and then continue in order. The first thing to do is to read through the whole book of Ephesians to get the big picture. But before you do that, you need to pick a translation. I will be using and referring to the ESV. You can use whatever translation you'd like, however, for this kind of detailed study, a word to word translation would be preferred over a thought to thought translation. The introduction to your translation may talk about this.
Post a Comment
Read more