Study Desk

Live a life of love. Love others just as Christ loved us. He gave himself for us—a sweet-smelling offering and sacrifice to God.

But there must be no sexual sin among you. There must not be any kind of evil or selfishly wanting more and more, because such things are not right for God's holy people.

Also, there must be no evil talk among you. Don't say things that are foolish or filthy. These are not for you. But you should be giving thanks to God.

I mean that you should use every opportunity you have for doing good, because these are evil times.

Always give thanks to God the Father for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Be willing to serve each other out of respect for Christ.

Husbands, love your wives the same as Christ loved the church and gave his life for it.

because no one ever hates his own body, but feeds and takes care of it. And that is what Christ does for the church

Remember that the Lord will give everyone a reward for doing good. Everyone, slave or free, will get a reward for the good things they do.

Pray in the Spirit at all times. Pray with all kinds of prayers, and ask for everything you need. To do this you must always be ready. Never give up. Always pray for all of God's people.

Also pray for me—that when I speak, God will give me words so that I can tell the secret truth about the Good News without fear.

I have the work of speaking for that Good News, and that is what I am doing now, here in prison. Pray that when I tell people the Good News, I will speak without fear as I should.

And I always pray for all of you with joy.

I thank God for the help you gave me while I told people the Good News. You helped from the first day you believed until now.

This is my prayer for you: that your love will grow more and more; that you will have knowledge and understanding with your love;

that you will see the difference between what is important and what is not and choose what is important; that you will be pure and blameless for the coming of Christ;

All the Roman guards and all the others here know that I am in prison for serving Christ.

But those others tell about Christ because of their selfish ambition. Their reason for doing it is wrong. They only do it because they think it will make trouble for me in prison.

To me, the only important thing about living is Christ. And even death would be for my benefit.

If I continue living here on earth, I will be able to work for the Lord. But what would I choose—to live or to die? I don't know.