Prayer for Maturity Based on Christ’s Preeminence

9 Because of this also we, from the day we heard about it,* did not cease praying for you, and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual insight, 10 so that you may live in a manner worthy of the Lord, ⌊to please him in all respects⌋b, bearing fruit in every good deed and increasing in the knowledge of God, 11 enabled with all power, according to his glorious might, for all steadfastness and patience with joy, 12 giving thanks to the Father who has qualified you for a share of the inheritance of the saints in light, 13 who has rescued us from the domain of darkness and transferred us* to the kingdom of the Son ⌊he loves⌋c, 14 in whom we have the redemption, the forgiveness of sins, 15 who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all* creation, 16 because all things in the heavens and on the earth were created by him, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers, all things were created through him and for him, 17 and he himself is before all things, and in him all things are held together, 18 and he himself is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he himself may become first in everything, 19 because he was well pleased for all the fullness to dwell in him, 20 and through him to reconcile all things to himself, by* making peace through the blood of his cross, through him, whether things on earth or things in heaven.

21 And ⌊although you were formerly alienated⌋d* and enemies in attitude, because of your evil deeds, 22 but now you have been reconcilede by ⌊his physical body⌋f through death, to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you remain in the faith, established and steadfast and not shifted away from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.