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Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.¹

The glory of God is beyond compare. From the beginning, he made himself known as Creator.² He is all powerful, without beginning nor end; complete and whole. Everything he created was good.³ Then he created man and woman as a reflection of himself.⁴ And God saw everything that he made, and behold, it was very good.⁵ Their relationship with God was perfect until the woman was deceived and fell to temptation.⁶ When sin was birth they were cursed and had to be driven out from God’s presence.⁷

God showed the way back to him was through perfection for he was holy. He wrote his moral laws for clarity.⁸ His first condition was that his chosen people should have no other gods before him. Second, he would not even allow an image that was carved by man to be compared to him, showing himself as a jealous God.⁹ Recall the 10 plagues; God vented his disgust against the nation’s other gods.¹⁰ Having exhibited his power, God invited Moses to appear before him at Mount Sinai. And you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death.¹¹ God showed himself Holy and inapproachable save if called by him.

How then can we attain salvation? for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.¹² Yes, Jesus gave himself for our sins to deliver us.¹³ He chose us in him and predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ.¹⁴ This is the good news: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him . . . .”¹⁵

What now? Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new as come. We implore you on behalf of Christ be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.¹⁶ There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.¹⁷ In Christ we are blessed with every spiritual blessing.¹⁸ In Christ, we have every reason to rejoice! And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.¹⁹

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ—assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.²⁰ No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. . . And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. . . But new wine is for fresh wineskins.²¹

The new life begins with grace and is guaranteed to end in peace. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, . . .²²