Chapter five continues Paul’s admonition from chapter four. In Ephesians 4:32 he told us to forgive like God; in Ephesians 5:1-5 we are told to imitate God in every way, specifically in our love for one another. Connecting back to Ephesians 2:1-3 and Ephesians 4:19-20 (and reminiscent of Galatians 5:16-23), the believer’s life should not […]
Chapter four begins the second half of the letter with a major change in Paul’s grammar and intent. The entire letter contains 41 imperative verbs (which is already a high percentage ); however, only one of them occurs in the first half (“remember” in Ephesians 2:11). Thus, of the 197 verbs in chapters 4-6, more
Chapter nine best begins with Jeremiah 9:3 and introduces a new indictment by God against the Israelites. Not only were they lying under oath (Jeremiah 7:9), a violation of the ninth commandment 1, they were constantly lying to each other in the normal course of life. Jeremiah 9:3-9 expresses God’s displeasure at their lying tongues.
