Colossians 1

1. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

2. To the saints and faithful brethren in Christ, who are at Colossae: Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

3. We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you,

4. since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which ye have for all the saints,

5. for the hope which is laid up for you in Heaven, of which ye heard before in the word of the truth of the Gospel,

6. which has come unto you, as it has in all the world, and bringeth forth fruit, as it doth also in you since the day ye heard of it and knew the grace of God in truth.

7. Ye also learned of it from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is for you a faithful minister of Christ,

8. who also declared unto us your love in the Spirit.

9. For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding;

10. that ye might walk worthy of the Lord, in all pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;

11. strengthened with all might according to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness;

12. giving thanks unto the Father, who hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.

13. He hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the Kingdom of His dear Son,

14. in whom we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins.

15. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature.

16. For by Him were all things created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities or powers: all things were created by Him and for Him.

17. And He is before all things, and by Him all things consist.

18. And He is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He might have the preeminence.

19. For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell,

20. and having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself — by Him, I say, whether they be things on earth or things in heaven.

21. And you, who were once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, even now hath He reconciled

22. in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and unblamable and unreprovable in His sight,

23. if ye continue grounded and settled in the faith, and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel, which ye have heard and which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, am made a minister.

24. I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh, for His body’s sake, which is the church,

25. of which I am made a minister according to the dispensation of God, which is given to me for you, to fulfill the Word of God—

26. even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to His saints.

27. To them God would make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

28. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus,

29. for which I also labor, striving according to His working, which worketh in me mightily.