ephesians on Life

Life is short, and we do not have much time to gladden the hearts of those who are traveling the dark journey with us. Oh, be swift to love, make haste to be kind.

We long to see our lives whole, to know that they matter. We wonder whether our many activities might ever come together in a way of life that is good for ourselves and others. Lacking a vision of a l...

I want to provide fresh documentation that the only way that any one of us can live at our best is in a life of radical faith in God.

O God, you are the sure foundation and the certain cornerstone. Building on you brings life, yet we often turn away and try to find hope by building on other foundations. Self-esteem, money, career, f...

To the Trinity be praise! God is music, God is life that nurtures every creature in its kind. Our God is the song of the angel throng and the splendor of secret ways hid from all humankind, But God o...

God, source of all light, by your Word you give light to the soul. Pour out upon us the spirit of wisdom and understanding that, being taught by you in Holy Scripture, our hearts and minds may be open...

Faith is a how and, more specifically, a way of living in light of an event.

Go after a life of love as if your life depended on it—because it does.

What is the meaning of life? Why is it that we exist? Or to put it in the immortal words of Douglas Adams, “what is the meaning of life?” If you ask Google, which I did, various answers come up. Wiki...

Should anyone knock at my heart and say, “Who Lives here? I should reply, “Not Martin Luther, but the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Preaching Commentary What is the meaning of life? Why is it that we exist? Or to put it in the immortal words of Douglas Adams, “what is the meaning of life?” If you ask Google, which I did, vario...

Almighty God, by our baptism into the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ, you turn us from the old life of sin: Grant that we, being reborn to new life in him, may live in righteousness a...

The Christian's new life is a life of love, forgiveness, and kindness, modeled after the example of Christ.

The best use of life is love. The best expression of love is time. The best time to love is now.

Context— Looking Ahead The next 2 weeks (Week 5 – 4:17-5:2; and Week 6 – 5:3-21) move into more of the practical application of what we’ve seen thus far in Ephesians. The week after that (Week 7 – ...

The gospel is therefore not just the ABCs of the Christian life, but the A to Z of the Christian life. Our problems arise largely because we don’t continually return to the gospel to work it in and li...

Pastor: God not only provides us with armor to stand against the devil’s schemes, but once fitted for battle, He tells us to pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and request...

God just doesn’t throw a life preserver to a drowning person. He goes to the bottom of the sea, and pulls a corpse from the bottom of the sea, takes him up on the bank, breathes into him the breath of...

After the Civil War, in an incident recounted by Charles Flood in Lee: The Last Years, Robert E. Lee visited a woman who took him to the remains of a grand old tree in front of her home. There she cri...

A holy life will make the deepest impression. Lighthouses blow no horns, they just shine.

I want to suggest a pretty radical idea about what family is for. Family is about the forming of persons. Being a person is a gift, like life itself—we are born as human beings made in the image of Go...

Our faith is not a matter of our hearing what Christ said long ago and “trying to carry it out. The real Son of God is at your side. He is beginning to turn you into the same kind of thing as Himself....

The Christian’s life in all its aspects—intellectual and ethical, devotional and relational, upsurging in worship and outgoing in witness—is supernatural; only the Spirit can initiate and sustain it.

Context Standard Letter Format Recall the Greco-Roman letter form that Paul uses in Ephesians: Salutation and Greeting Thanksgiving Body Exhortations/Encouragements Closing/Farewell...

One of the real problems in modern life is that people who are good at being civil lack strong convictions and people who have strong convictions lack civility.

According to Dallas Willard, grace is “God doing in us and for us what we could not do ourselves.” We are meant to be forgiven by grace; we are also meant to live by grace. We often believe that only...

What you do in the present—by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neig...

[Speaking about art] As you climb the stairs of quality, you’ll meet individual works that you’ll need for the rest of your life, works that will thrill you, energize you, lift your soul, soothe you, ...

Whisper to me again How you formed me in my mother’s womb, Fashioned me over generations, Over eons of unfolding of the earth Until it could bear life  On its flaky crust, the dust From which you f...

Loving God, you are the author of all life. You created the heavens through the words of your mouth. You also are constantly creating new life. However, we don’t accept the new life you give us. We ch...