The careful exegete always asks, How did this sound to the original hearers? What was the setting in which they heard it? What was the likely response in the room as the text was being read? Asking these kinds of questions and imagining that kind of world opens up all kinds of possibilities for teaching, preaching, and applying. Nowhere is this truer than in the opening section of Ephesians. For years, I have read Ephesians and the other Pauline Epistles as if they were examples of modern American