Letter To The Book Of Ephesians

Ephesians 3:14-21 “For this reason I kneel before the Father, from whom his whole family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with the power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your heart through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge- that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in

Paul's letters to the church, also known as epistles, are considered some of the most important documents in the New Testament. Paul's writings continue to shape and forge church even today. His letters were written in some of the darkest, most intense moments of Paul's life, but they also celebrate the grace, love, and life changing power of Jesus. Paul's journey in faith is shown in raw, unapologetic honesty, and inspires Christians to maintain a forward momentum, and to run the race Paul speaks so passionately about in Hebrews 12:1. Paul is able to write with both confidence and humility as he writes about the Christian journey.

Therefore, Paul, employing the Lords wisdom, ensured the church to be viable and Godly in a city mentioned of similar importance as Rome, Corinth, Antioch, and Alexandria. In his ministry, Paul makes multiple journeys to Ephesus to ensure that the Word was growing in such a keystone city to much of eastern Asia. On his first missionary journey, he diverted to Macedonia at the Lord’s prompting, prohibiting him from travelling to the region. However, Paul leaves behind Aquilla and Pricilla (Acts 18:18-21), on his second journey, as more of an advance party to begin establishing the church. This was a necessary move, as a full effort by Paul to minister in Ephesus would have not gone successfully. The Ephesian economy aligned itself with pagan religion, as well as Judaism, and relied heavily upon trades, such as idol making, which related to the worship of pagan gods. For example, the temple of Artemis sustained an industry of silversmiths and idol makers. During Paul’s second third journey, due to his effective ministry in Ephesus, caused such a disruption in pagan commerce, merchants incited a mob to eliminate him from the city. The church remained despite his hasty departure. Paul centered his basis of ministry in this keystone city during his third missionary journey. As a result, this allowed him to

Throughout human history, our ancestors lived out the Christian faith in their generation. As a result, the faith passed down into their children’s generations, continuously reaching today’s generation. Then, our society changed from a primitive society to a modern society. With the invention of technology, it creates a new direction towards spreading the Gospel. While our ancestors spoke and wrote Gospel in church, my generation use technology to share the Gospel on social media and Bible apps. With the different styles of preaching the Gospel, how can we unite our generations to pursuit God’s purpose?

A literary analysis is the practice of looking closely at small parts to see how they affect the whole. Literary analysis focuses on how word techniques are used by the author to create meaning. One of the reasons that Paul penned his letters in Ephesians was to bolster areas that were weak in the church. In addition to that, Paul wanted to clarify central beliefs that may not have been well-defined. Probing Paul’s letter with such a supposition, reveals several frailties among the Ephesian that Paul needed to encourage and reinforce. One of these weaknesses are amalgamated with the word riches, which is present throughout the letter in Ephesians. In this portion of the essay I will break a portion of the text down into parts, in order to examine the different elements of this piece of literature, by analyzing a portion of the text.

When black slaves were brought from Africa over to the New World, they were ripped away from their cultures, customs, and religion. Most slaves would later become Christians due to colonialist ideology, but the problem with this was that christianized slaves posed a threat to slave systems. Christianity taught blacks to see themselves as equals to their white counterparts in the eyes of God, therefore in the church, blacks began to question the Christian hierarchy imposed by protestant preachers which stated that slaves were bound to obey their masters. White Christians justified their rights to enslave blacks with biblical verses such as those found in Ephesians:

The Epistle of Paul to the Romans is a letter of introduction to Christianity for the Jews and the Gentiles of Rome. The letter to the Romans is fairly different than a number of other letters that had been written by Paul because this letter is not in response to situations or concerning events that’s going on in Rome, rather, it is a little more relaxed and informative. Paul gives to the Romans introductory and foundational information that appears to be somewhat of a precursor for when he arrives and what his ministry will be when he gets to Rome. There are a variety of topics that Paul touched on ranging from God’s righteousness, salvation, spiritual growth, and sovereignty of God, which Paul addresses and makes it relatable to the gentiles.

The City of Ephesus was a city of wealth, and was impacted by Christians greatly for centuries. “Ephesus was founded by Ionian Greeks at a location where

The genre of Ephesians 2:1-10 is an Epistle. The Epistles were letters teaching specific churches or groups of people; often inspired by God. They are split into two categories: Pauline Epistles, written by Paul and traditionally Paul was the first word of the book in Greek, and General Epistles, often referred to as the Catholic epistles and were written to the universal Church. The Pauline Epistles consist of: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. The General Epistles consist of: Hebrews, James, 1 and 2 Peter, 1, 2 and 3 John, and Jude. The interpretive principles of this genre are that it is meant to be read as a whole and in one sitting in order to get the main idea of the passage, one must view the paragraphs as the main unit of thought in the passage, one must know the structure to understand the letter, and one must do background reading to fully comprehend the main concept and the history and culture of the setting.

The theme of his letter to the Ephesians is that believers have been unified in salvation by grace and are called to live like Christ. Ephesians 2:1-8 focused mainly

Is thought that the recipient of the letter were people from a province in central Asia Minor and Paul preached them during his first mission. The authors of the letter to the Galatians was Paul and Jesus Spirit. One of the main purpose of the letter or theme was to address the relationship from the Gentile Christians towards Judaism. The main points of the letter are to be truthful to God and commit to Him, in order to gain the Kingdom of heaven. In verse Gal 1:7 Paul clarifies that there is no other Gospel than the one that Jesus proclaimed. Paul explains that there is people that try to confuse Christians and pervert the gospel of Christ but he is warning us not to fall into that. It repeats over and over to not follow the law of the world but the teachings of Jesus Christ. We all are the church. The ones who believe on God are the church. To be the church in this letter means to believe in Jesus Christ and only worship God because He gave us freedom from sin and He is the only one that can lead us to the Kingdom of God. It also means to live by the fruit of the Spirit which is in love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Gal 5:22-23). It means to die to the sin, to reject the sin of, fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing (Gal 5:19-21), and anything that looks like

Ephesians 6:10-16: Paul becomes aware of all the evil that stalks the church of Ephesus and he tries to make everybody aware by explaining them their own significance and identity in Christ.

1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, also known as the Pastoral Epistles, attempt to describe proper hierarchy in the early church. They reject the idea of having women being significantly involved in the community. Libertarian theology interprets Christianity through the viewpoint of the poor. Leftist theology is a more liberal political party. It advocates equality and rejects the idea of social hierarchy. These three ideas were considered heterodidascalia, or “the other teachings,” in the early church (Menendez, 185). The Pastoral Epistles attempted to limit the number and type of people who could have power and authority, and they did this by “[addressing] specific church leaders and [targeting] specific groups” (Menendez, 186). By narrowing the gap between the secular and religious groups, it is possible to “deepen the national dialogues” (Menendez, 187). Based on the conservative, Pastoral interpretations of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, there is no room for equality amongst the people and it seems to me like they are taking certain rights away from these different groups of people. If the Pastorals were more sensitive to the three issues stated above, it could allow a better understanding between the state and church.

In the beginning of the book of Ephesians, Paul specifically states that he is the author of the letter to Ephesians, though the authenticity of Paul’s authorship has been questioned. Signing the name of an influential person of the period was common practice from “the third century BC to the first century AD.” Though it would not be the first time that Paul’s name was forged, Ephesians is not a controversial letter, so if the author did not want to include his own name, he could have written the letter anonymously; also, given moral influence of the text, the author would not have lied for no cause. Ephesians is a bit different from the other letters of Paul in that it does not follow the normal structure he has previously used: “salutation, thanksgiving, prayer, body, ethical exhortations, greetings.” Paul also makes many personal references throughout the book of Ephesians including sharing that he is in prison.

In my passage Ephesian 1:15-23, this is Pauls prayer to Jesus of giving thanks, God has given us so much, and when God gives us a lot our perception can be changed based on how much we get from God, but we are blind because we can never be satisfied so we ask for more. We can build a wall of ungratefulness and never see the “light of God”.