What Is Paul's Letter To The People Of Ephesians?

The letter to the Philippians has been the subject of historical criticism in relation to its contemporary authors and philosophers. In Studies in Paul’s Letter to the Philippians , Hans Dieter Betz scrutinizes five segments from the letter to the Philippians to examine scholastic interpretations and to suggest a new interpretation regarding its literary genre as preparation for death(praemeditatio mortis).

We must understand Ephesus if we want to understand the Book of Ephesians. Ephesus was a large prosperous city in Asia Minor. One of the seven wonders of the world was in Ephesus. It was a large temple dedicated to a goddess named Diana (Artemis). The temple and streets were lined with immoral goddess prostitutes. It was a very wicked city and immorality flourished and flooded over into society and families. Paul was clever in using the concepts of holiness, service, and temple to reveal the power of the Gospel in how it creates a new people born of God dedicated to His holy purposes.

The book of Ephesians is one of Paul’s many New Testament letters, or epistles, to the Christian church still in its infancy. At the time of its writing, Paul is in Rome, imprisoned for championing the purposes of Christ and growing the church. We see numerous occurrences where Paul, being a man of little concern for the status quo, is either imprisoned or fleeing capture by Jewish or Roman officials for usurping the latter (Acts 19: 23-41). The date of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians is dated 60-61A.D., depending on differing research. While this is certainly one of his epistles known as the “prison letters”, Ephesians was penned prior to Paul’s first roman

Christians are to be people of joy! Their lives should be characterized by contentment, confidence, and hope. The book of Philippians is written to show us how to live a life of joy. Today we are going to be looking at Philippians 2:5-11. (read).

While Paul was in Ephesus, around the year 54 AD, he wrote two letter to the church to Corinth. He wrote these letter to direct and to bring some correction to the church in Corinth. I am going to look at the first letter he wrote, 1 Corinthians. The people of Corinth had been polytheists, meaning they worshiped more than one god, and they we having a hard time wrapping their minds around the idea of Christianity. There area host of issues that Paul addresses in this letter such as: sexual immorality, women, the abuse of the Lords Supper, division in the church and the abuse of spiritual gifts. It is important to point out the way that Paul addresses these issues not from a condemning standpoint, but from the mindset of fatherly correction.

The Apostle John settled the first Christian community in Ephesus. Paul pastored everywhere including synagogues. It was ranking number three city of Christians after Jerusalem and Antioch. One of the possible reasons for Paul writing the letter is to let the Ephesians know how he was doing in jail. Large crowds were probably in over 20,000, the Temple of Artemis was home to many occult, magic, politics and pagan events. It has also been said about the book of Ephesians, the letter may have been circular and had a wider area than one audience. Paul moved around and had a following when he was not

The Epistle of Paul to the Ephesians is one of great intriguing distinction. The letter possesses unique properties in comparison its fellow Prison Epistles namely, Philemon, Philippians and Colossians. The author of this work seeks to further expound upon these unique properties and its implications for how one should interpret the Epistle, specifically Ephesians 1:3-14.

The literary genre of the book of Ephesians takes on the form of a letter similar to others in the Bible. This letter took on a different form because it did not include a personal greeting like other letters, but something that does not away from the true meaning of the letter (Abbott, p. 1). The whole book of Ephesians is broken into parts with Paul going from spirituality to practical biblical moral standards. In the first part, (1:1–2:22) Paul describes the blessings of the new life of Christ and reminds the Gentile believers how much God has done for their salvation. In chapter 3, Paul extends his blessings with a prayer to God for strengthen love, and the submission to God the Father. In the chapter 4, Paul describes the Christian morals and how believers should live together in this new life. While in Chapters 5 & 6 Paul describes how Christians should treat each other and how to utilize the armor of God in this new society.

There is an ongoing debate whether or not the letter to the Colossians was written by the Apostle Paul. This letter purports to be from Paul to the Colossians. It has been suggested by 1:1, that the authorship could be that of Timothy, written while Paul was in jail and that he gave it Paul’s name out of respect, prominence and importance. The letter is Pauline, but stated in Timothy’s own way…Conceivably. Paul did not find the church in Colasae. Possibly, it was Epaphras, as it is recorded, “who is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf,” (1:7). Paul had never been there, as it is recorded in this letter that you have “never seen my face.” The authorship is not important, the authority is. The fact that the letter to the Colossians is in the New Testament makes it authoritative.

throughout his letter Paul did not fall offended, instead he focused on the comfort received from God and that of the Corinthians as well. Personally, I assume this must have taken a toll on Paul. Again, he fell afflicted with sickness. Paul was disgust with anxiety about the church of Thessalonica which he was forced to abandon due to threats of looming persecution, and attacks fluctuating from previous illnesses. Now approximately 56 A.D. Paul begins to write another (Epistle) letter to the Gentiles at Corinth, Galatia, Rome and Thessalonica and a few others . He also was writing to Philemon, Timothy, Titus, and the Saints at Rome. His utterly and unbearable illness reappeared, at Paul’s, Third Missionary Journey 53- 57 A.D. Paul felt he had received the sentence of death. Being arrested, imprisoned- accused of violating the sanctity of the temple by bringing in Gentiles was only a few

The New Testament was a huge part of my life as a young man as I grew up in the church and my father was a deacon. I have always been drawn to helping others and protecting those who cannot protect themselves, which is why at a young age I joined the United States Marine Corps and served four years before joining the Memphis Police Department for the last twenty years. One passage that has always been a part of my life is from Ephesians 4: 22-28. Furthermore, the literary form used in the Book of Ephesians is the letters although, not directly from Paul they are from under his influence by the school of Pauline, which created the book and disseminated the structure of the church (Harris, 1995). I digress, the passage of Ephesians stated that

My character started forming back in the 90s when I, a 25-year-old medical college graduate, became an "accidental" church planter. Together with my friends, we were playing Christian "street music" and preaching the Good News in downtown Kremenchuk, the Ukrainian city that I grew up in. Soon, people started coming to Christ, which forced us to launch a community group that later became a church. That was the first time I began evaluating my relationship with other people as a leader and surveying my character formation. Hence, I discovered continual inconsistencies between my own character and the biblical description of a Christian leader.

The author of this particular book of the Bible is unknown, making the book of Hebrews.

This chapter gives a change in the emphasis of this great book of the Bible. The first three chapters of Ephesians are highly doctrinal about the person and character of Christ and God’s plan for His Son. Chapter four starts the emphasis on the practical aspect of the theology. We as Christians are to model the person and character of Christ. We are to “walk worthy of the vocation wherewith we are called.”

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.