Ephesians 3

¹ So I, Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus for the sake of you pagans…

² You have probably heard how I have been entrusted by God with the grace he meant for you,

³ and that it was by a revelation that I was given the knowledge of the mystery, as I have just described it very shortly.

⁴ If you read my word you will have some idea of the depths that I see in the mystery of Christ.

⁵ This that has now been revealed through the Spirit to his holy apostles and prophets was unknown to any men in past generations;

⁶ it means that pagans now share the same inheritance, that they are parts of the same body, and that the same promise has been made to them, in Jesus Christ, through the gospel.

⁷ I have been made the servant of that gospel by a gift of grace from God who gave it to me by his own power.

⁸ I, who am less than the least of all the saints have been entrusted with this special grace, not only of proclaiming to the pagans the infinite treasure of Christ

⁹ but also of explaining how the mystery is to be dispensed. Through all the ages, this has been kept hidden in God, the creator of everything. Why?

¹⁰ So that the Sovereignties and Powers should learn only now, through the Church, how comprehensive God’s wisdom really is,

¹¹ exactly according to the plan which he had had from all eternity in Christ Jesus our Lord.

¹² This is why we are bold enough to approach God in complete confidence, through our faith in him;

¹³ so, I beg you, never lose confidence just because of the trials that I go through on your account: they are your glory.

¹⁴ This, then, is what I pray, kneeling before the Father,

¹⁵ from whom every family,[*a] whether spiritual or natural, takes its name:

¹⁶ Out of his infinite glory, may he give you the power through his Spirit for your hidden self to grow strong,

¹⁷ so that Christ may live in your hearts through faith, and then, planted in love and built on love,

¹⁸ you will with all the saints have strength to grasp the breadth and the length, the height and the depth;

¹⁹ until, knowing the love of Christ, which is beyond all knowledge, you are filled with the utter fullness of God.

²⁰ Glory be to him whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine;

²¹ glory be to him from generation to generation in the Church and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever. Amen.